Ransom Riggs
Camping vs. Glamping
by Ransom Riggs - June 16, 2008 - 10:27 AM

Glamor camping, or “glamping,” as it’s been dubbed, is on the rise in the U.S., even as the number of visits to national parks is declining. Last year there were 20 million fewer park visits than there were a decade ago, and the number of campers who “rough it” in gigantic RVs is quickly catching up to the number of those who do it in tents on the ground. What does all this mean? Even as our “eco-awareness” balloons, our willingness to experience nature in a primitive way is waning (even if the space-age, lightweight, sweat-wicking materials we make our tents and sleeping bags and whatever else out of are far from primitive.) Exhibit A, though, has to be glamping. So what is glamping? If you have around $10,000 per person per week (and up) to spend on a luxe camping trip, you can find out for yourself. Otherwise, here’s what you’re missing.

The Clayoquot Wilderness Resort, Vancouver Island

clay.jpgFar from the beaten path and an hour’s small-plane flight from the mainland, Clayoquot isn’t the kind of campground where you’ll find yourself in a pup tent wedged between obnoxious families drinking beer; instead, expect luxury “tents” furnished with antiques, Persian rugs and king-sized beds with heated blankets. You can ask your personal gourmet chef to serve up the s’mores and a hot dog if you want — though most opt for the rack of lamb or butter-braised salmon. If it’s hiking you’re after, a team of guides will drive you to the best part of the trail and drop you off in a spot where you’ll never have to pass the same tree twice or climb too steep a hill. Horse stables and private boats are also available on a whim — and then there’s the massage tent. The cost for all this next-to-nature luxury? About $50,000 for a weeklong family trip.

Paws Up Resort, Montana

Multi-room luxury tents are the norm here, but if you can’t handle the 30-second walk to the bathroom in the middle of the night — that’s an outhouse featuring heated slate floors, granite countertops and showers big enough for two — then you can upgrade to a “cabin”: 1,440 square feet on four acres, complete with hot tub. Either way, you’ll be in good company; among the clientele winging into Paws Up on private jets are the Rolling Stones, who once took over the place for a week. If you’re content with just the luxury tent, you’ll pay $600/night, plus $110 per day per person for food. (If you decide to book it, tell ‘em who sent you!)

Abercrombie and Kent

2_antarctica.jpgForget Fitch — Abercrombie and Kent has been whisking the ultra-rich away on high-end camping trips for decades. Their classic trip is an African safari “in the style of Hemingway and Roosevelt,” if you can believe that Hemingway enjoyed a five-course banquet on the African plain for dinner every evening; if you ask us, it’s a safari in the style of Bill Gates and Sting, both of whom have toured the African bush with A&K. If big game isn’t your cup of tea, however, travelers can participate in a food-offering ceremony with Buddhist monks in Bangkok, explore the citadel of Machu Picchu in the company of its resident archaeologist, or sail around Antarctica on the floating equivalent of the Four Seasons, on which each passenger has their own butler — for about $20,000/week. All of which makes me think that $400 tent I balked at shelling out for was a big fat bargain.

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Comments (13)

  1. Surely, camping I can handle; and glamour I can tolerate. But glamping?!? That I cannot accept. Its portmanteau looks like something someone with the IQ of Paris Hilton made up; perhaps it was her? The fact that rich people want to get in touch with nature, but do absolutely everything in their power to be as physically out of contact with its rawness as possible, makes them become even more out of touch with nature. And I’m not trying to be cute here with the word “touch.” I’m outright offended. The whole reason we have showers is to wash off layer upon gross layer of dirt, sweat, fish juices, bug spray, melted marshmallow, acid rain, and squished bugs we attached to in our sleeping bags. We are supposed to get dirty. We’re humans, meaning we come from Kingdom Animalia, Phylum Chordata, and Class Mammalia. Nature created us.

    posted by L on 6-16-2008 at 11:25 am

  2. Is anyone else annoyed at the way people keep forming new words by just smashing together two old words?

    posted by Alyssa on 6-16-2008 at 11:28 am

  3. This makes me wanna go hug a wet-bark tree and make love to all the animals.

    posted by J on 6-16-2008 at 11:40 am

  4. I’d like to go on one of those hunts where they have some caged multi-billionare turned loose and all you have to do is peg him.

    posted by Bassman on 6-16-2008 at 12:09 pm

  5. I hear rabid bears have an affinity for persian rugs and antiques, true story, read it in a book entitled “What to watch out for when you are incredibly rich and think you are camping when actually you are just in a 5 star resort that happens to be near nature”

    posted by Debra on 6-16-2008 at 12:45 pm

  6. Oh, dear. Just when I thought that camping in a cabin versus a tent was overkill. This is nuts.

    And the whole squishing two words together to make a “new” word also drives me crazy.

    posted by Holly on 6-16-2008 at 2:52 pm

  7. And to think I thought glamping was having a campsite with electricity so I can blow up my air mattress.

    posted by Lindsey on 6-16-2008 at 5:30 pm

  8. I’m not going to lie: Motel 6 is what I consider camping, but I have been known to give in and “rough it” in an RV.

    However, “glamping” is absolutely ridiculous. How can that even considered camping?

    posted by Melodye on 6-16-2008 at 5:52 pm

  9. i think i just threw up a little in my mouth. this glamping is wrong on so many levels.

    posted by Katherine on 6-16-2008 at 6:16 pm

  10. I agree with Katherine. This is so far removed from what camping is – and means.

    posted by Dawn on 6-17-2008 at 3:15 am

  11. WEll, I suppose some of these resorts, campgrounds, exotic game parks, probably use the money to keep the place up, right? Course, we’ll never see those places…How come you never hear about THESE people being eaten by bears or kidnapped by natives?

    posted by Leslie on 6-20-2008 at 5:22 pm

  12. Bravo, L! Glamping is not camping, and humans are supposed to get dirty and sweaty and wet – it makes the AC and toilets seem even more luxurious than this “glamping” nonsense. :)

    posted by Frank on 6-22-2008 at 2:29 pm

  13. I think I still prefer the unglamorous ways of camping, where you can spend the night on hard ground and have your food stolen by bears :)

    posted by ShoppingNotes on 6-23-2008 at 12:16 am

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