slept on the ground and comfortable!

[miisterwright]

I'm always sure that the next trip is the one where I won't be able to find a spot to hang and will have to go to the ground, but it hasn't happened yet and it's been a few years. I still like having a pad just in case. Backpacking has been no problem. In fact, I think it's been more difficult to find a good tent spot. Traveling has posed the most trouble. Car-camping sites generally suck for hammocking because you have to work with what you've got. But then, of course if you're car-camping you can bring your own supports and more "just in case" stuff.

Maybe next trip I'll go to the ground...

[babelfish5]

-Due to very cold weather and a poorly performing insulated air pad I decided to go to ground a few weekends ago and was surprised at how comforable I was. -

And the moderators let you post? Someones slacking off on the site.

Sorry to hear your converted to the dark side. Come back to the light darth......ther eis still time!!!

[TinaLouise]

Next month I'm headed to Bentonville NC for a Civil War Re-inactment. What I'm hearing from others (I going with my scout troop) is that we'll be camped in a wide open field, with NO trees!! I've tried to explain to my troop that I'll be looking for trees, I mean they've got to around somewhere, right???!!! And that I really don't mind hanging way over there, away from my group!!! I just can NOT see me going to ground willingly!!! The rest of my troop thinks I'll come to my senses and pack a tent and camp with them........
TinaLouise

[CajunHiker]

BLASPHEMY!!!!!!!

Wouldn't TRAITOR be a more appropriate term?

[Rat]

That's the beauty of the hammock/tarp as a shelter system; it's widely adaptable. When you carry a hammock/tarp system you really have:
1) a hammock/tarp shelter
2) Tarp tent shelter
3) bug bivy
4) ...
One of the main reasons I use a hammock/tarp is the adaptability, I can sleep on an incline with trees or a granite dome, with the same system, and be comfortable in both places.

[attrezzo]

The groundlings are trying to rouse us.

Well, MAN, look here! I have slept on the ground and been comfortable too, about 10% of the time I've camped. Backcountry mother nature has a funny way of making the "ground" in general a really uncomfortable place to sleep!

The rest of the time
-I've been attacked by crabs in the early morning (they burrowed UNDER the tent and when you'd move they'd knee jerk pinch you)
-Nearly eaten alive by fire ants (found small holes in the tent and went after crumbs and then me....)
-Did the root/rock/twig dance. That one's fun.
-Rolled downhill all night... people have nightmares like this that make them go crazy.
-Assaulted/annoyed by various forest animals, raccoons and mice mostly, sometimes coyotes would get close but never tried to get in. The other two I've had try to get into my tent MULTIPLE times. Once I was car camping with my wife and we left the food in the car with the window cracked (hot day). Who knows what happened during the day, but I accidentally forgot to close it at night and I woke up to raccoons jumping onto the car from a tree and trying to squeeze through the window. Scratching my car and nearly breaking the window.

And you know how much of that has happened, let alone possible, with a hanging bear bag and a hammock?...

Nothing but the varmits. I've heard stories of raccoons chewing through the rope on the branch and bringing the bear bag down, hasn't happened to me yet though. Everything else is either fixable or nearly impossible with the same amount of care you'd need with a ground setup.

In fact a reverse statement is true with hammocks. I get UNcomfortable sleep only about 5% of the time packing a hammock and the majority of that is because I have to go to ground (River rocks are my current bane).

[oldgringo]

I was a camper long before I became a hanger.

I love my hammocks, and want nothing more than to sleep every night for the rest of my life in a hammock.

But, I'm a pragmitist, and realize that oftentimes I can want in one hand, and...

I'm not going to obsess on hammocks. The tents/pads/cots remain part of my kit, and if that's what it takes to camp somewhere where there are no trees, well, I'll break 'em out, unapologetically.

My $.02

[optimator]

I was a camper long before I became a hanger.

I love my hammocks, and want nothing more than to sleep every night for the rest of my life in a hammock.

But, I'm a pragmitist, and realize that oftentimes I can want in one hand, and...

I'm not going to obsess on hammocks. The tents/pads/cots remain part of my kit, and if that's what it takes to camp somewhere where there are no trees, well, I'll break 'em out, unapologetically.

My $.02

I gotta agree with oldgringo (Dave is his name ) on this one. As much as my new found obsession with hammocks has possessed me, if I have to sleep in a tent because it's the only way I'll get into the woods, so be it.