Cuyamaca Rancho State Park (Green Vally Campground)

[AUTiger]

After a very cold hang in Grand Canyon (Mather) a few weeks ago, I convinced my wife to join me for an overnight to Cuyamaca here in San Diego County. It's about 45min-1hr from San Diego so we decided to head up there Sunday morning. After we drove through the park up to Lake Cuyamaca and noticed the trend of "park here and pay $7 for the day", we decided to try to check in and get our "park pass" but basically got told that we couldn't even enter the campground until 2pm. (We took the opportunity to drive back down the interstate to Alpine Brewing Co. and have lunch. )

The Green Valley Campground is much what you expect out of a high desert campground. Lots of dusty flat-ish ground and not a lot of trees. $30/night (plus an $8 reservation fee?) seems a bit dear for hangers but the campsites are huge... some of them big enough for 3 large tents. I would consider coming back to this particular campground for tent camping with a large group. I don't think I would come back to this campground with the intention of hanging. I would consider Paso Picacho Campground further up the road, as it seems to have a few more trees but, I think I would only do that if I had a group of 4 or more to split the $38 fee. The park itself has tons of hiking trails and a nice-sized lake, for the paddlers amongst us. I will be coming back for a day trip at the very least.

In our site, G038, there were two trees perfectly spaced apart and another that was just way too close. I was stubborn enough to hang the hammock anyway. My wife, refusing a pad in addition to her sleeping bag, ended up sleeping in the truck because she got cold. (Always have a back up plan. ) I used the opportunity by jumping in her hammock as it was perfectly strung up, minus a broken ridge line, and had a halfway decent night's sleep. I didn't bother with a tarp because there wasn't any rain in the forecast but I wish I would have put one up just to keep the moon out of my face and maybe cut down on the high winds (20+mph) that started around 3-4 a.m. Does anyone have any experience hanging here? Are there particular sites that people have used that are better? I learned about this place from a search on here but I didn't notice any trip reports.

This is only the second time I have ever done a hammock-only camp and I still have a lot to learn. I don't really have a place to trial and error my rig because I only have one tree in my backyard. I am considering putting up a post across the yard from the lone tree to at least have a place to get my setup just right. I spent the first 2 hours just trying to the get my hammock strung between the two very close trees and it was comfortable-ish but... yeah. Just need more experience. While it wasn't cold last night at 55-58, I did use a thin foam pad which made it much more comfortable than my recent "adventure" to Mather Campground in Grand Canyon, where the temps dipped down to below 40 instead of the forecast temps of mid 50s. Long story but it was a miserable [in]experience.

I look forward to any constructive criticism and I can't wait to plan another attempt.

2014-10-13 17.05.31.jpg

[DanglingModifier]

There is another tree visible behind your wife's hammock. Could you have strung your hammock to that from the center tree both hammocks share, instead of stringing yours to the right to the tree that was too close? It's hard to make out distances in the photo. Don't rule out side by side hanging making a V shape with your hammocks when the trees allow it.

Bringing a single strut to hang from when car camping opens up so many more possibilities in site choices. Pretty much any spot that can hang one hammock can hang two hammocks if you have a viable strut for one end of one of the hammocks. When designing the post/strut for home, consider making something portable you can throw in the car when you go out camping. You won't need to keep it up on your lawn all the time, and you will be really familiar with it when you take it camping from your experience at home.

[joker421]

Sorry, I don't have any sage advice - I'm as new to this as you are, but...

WAR EAGLE!

[AUTiger]

WAR **** EAGLE, brother!

Keep fightin' the good fight down there in MS.

[AUTiger]

There is another tree visible behind your wife's hammock. Could you have strung your hammock to that from the center tree both hammocks share, instead of stringing yours to the right to the tree that was too close? It's hard to make out distances in the photo. Don't rule out side by side hanging making a V shape with your hammocks when the trees allow it.

Bringing a single strut to hang from when car camping opens up so many more possibilities in site choices. Pretty much any spot that can hang one hammock can hang two hammocks if you have a viable strut for one end of one of the hammocks. When designing the post/strut for home, consider making something portable you can throw in the car when you go out camping. You won't need to keep it up on your lawn all the time, and you will be really familiar with it when you take it camping from your experience at home.

The tree behind my wife's hammock was badly overgrown and it was in a bad position. I did attempt it but it wasn't ideal. Would have had my butt on the ground or sleeping at an angle (if that makes sense). I couldn't get the straps high enough on the left tree. There were other trees not shown but they were over 20' away. Not sure what would have come of that.

As for the strut: I am toying with a few ideas. Any suggestions for material would be helpful. I'll post something in DIY when/if I get it done.

[DanglingModifier]

If you search the forum for hammock stands you'll find endless ideas for hanging without trees. You'll get familiar with terms like turtlelady, turtledog, tensegrity, handy hammock, pipe stands, and various ideas for individual struts. Metal pipe and wood (2x4s work) are used often for a strut. The trick is having sturdy guy lines from the top of the strut to deep stakes (think 2' deep rebar for instance) to compensate for the tremendous shearing force that pulls laterally (inward) on the top of the strut from the weight of the hammock's occupant. Check out http://theultimatehang.com/hammock-hang-calculator/ to see some of the forces that are applied horizontally when you hang your hammock at different angles.

Here's a guy who posted a single strut project two days ago in the DIY section:

https://www.hammockforums.net/forum/...-Hammock-Stand

There's a lot more like that if you get familiar with the search interface.