First time solo camping after 40: what actually helped
By Wren · July 26, 2026
Who was Artemis? The short version, for anyone who wants it.
Artemis was the goddess of the hunt, the wilderness, and the moon. She moved through wild places alone and answered to nobody. She also, notably, had a band of women around her when she wanted them. She understood the difference between solitude and isolation, and she chose both deliberately.
She did not, as far as the myths record, spend three weeks talking herself into it first.
Some of us need the three weeks.
The conversation with myself started well before I booked anything. Is it safe? What if something goes wrong? What do I actually do when I get there? What will I bring? What if I can’t manage the tent? What if I hate it and I’m stuck?
What if I love it and I’m still stuck?
The anxiety was loud. It usually is. But underneath it was something quieter and more persistent: I wanted to know if I could. Not if it was possible in theory. If I, specifically, could do it. Pack the car, drive somewhere alone, sleep somewhere alone, wake up somewhere alone, and be fine.
There was only one way to find out.
The Logistics Are Real
Solo camping is more work than camping with other people. That’s just a fact worth knowing before you go, nothing more.
Everything is on you. The setup, the pack down, the decision-making, the carrying. If you forget something there is nobody to borrow it from. If the tent is difficult there is nobody to hold the other end.
Which is why, if you’re doing this for the first time: consider sleeping in your car. A well set up car with a decent sleeping mat, a pillow, and the back seats folded flat is genuinely comfortable and removes one of the largest logistical variables from your first trip. An easy-up tent solo is manageable but it is a project. Save that for when you know you’re coming back.
Pack light enough that you can carry everything yourself. Set up in daylight. Know where the amenities are before dark. Sensible, not dramatic.
Choosing the Right Site
This is where a lot of the safety question actually gets answered. Not all campsites are equal and for a solo woman, the site itself matters more than almost any other variable.
I chose somewhere with staff who checked in on me regularly. That detail changed everything. I wanted to be alone, genuinely, but I wanted to know that someone nearby knew I was there. The staff check-ins gave me exactly that balance, solitude without invisibility.
Look for managed sites with staff on site, good reviews from other solo women, and mobile coverage. Solo woman camping groups exist specifically for this kind of research and they are worth finding before you book anything. The stories, the site recommendations, the collective knowledge of women who have done exactly this, it’s the Artemis band in practical form. You’re just doing your reconnaissance first, not asking anyone’s permission.
What You Actually Do There
I sat and watched the trees.
That’s most of it, honestly. I walked. I watched the light change. I made food for one without negotiating with anyone about what we were having. I went to bed when I wanted and woke up when I woke up.
My nervous system, which spends most of its time managing the ambient noise of other people’s needs, got two days off.
The days settled quickly. The nights were another thing entirely.
I’m a city person. I went to the bush to decompress from city living and then lay in the dark with my ears fully alert, waiting for something familiar to arrive. The silence was too complete. Every small sound landed too loud. Nothing was wrong. It just wasn’t the sound I knew how to sleep inside.
And then, faintly, through the dark: the distant hum of traffic on a highway somewhere. Barely there. Enough.
My nervous system recognised it immediately. Something in me that had been braced since sundown finally let go. I was asleep within minutes.
I have absolutely no notes about this.
What It Gave Me
Proof. That’s the main thing.
Not proof that I’m brave or capable in any grand sense. Just proof that I, with my anxiety and my logistics questions and my loud internal voice, could do this specific thing. The first time is always the most expensive in terms of mental energy. Now that it’s behind me the next trip starts from a different place entirely.
I did two nights deliberately. One day of arriving and settling, one day of actually being there, one pack-up day. Dipping a toe rather than diving in. Right call for a first time.
Time needs to allow for it. Solo camping requires a particular kind of spaciousness in the calendar and the mind, and that doesn’t always line up. But when it does, I’ll go again.
The wilderness waited for Artemis. It’ll wait for you too.