My best friend and I went camping on his family’s farm property in Southwest Pennsylvania near Indiana, PA. For privacy reasons I cannot give out the exact location of his family farm. I hope you will understand. Again, for privacy reasons I will only refer to my friend by his first name.
The Farm
Nestled in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains of southwest Pennsylvania sits Andrew’s family farm. This sprawling 50+ acre property was once a strip mine for coal, now mostly covered and overgrown with trees creating a perfect habitat for many local wildlife. This also creates the perfect testing grounds for our camping and survival equipment in a semi controlled environment.
This property was passed down to Andrew and his brothers after their mother’s passing making this a 3rd generation farm of sorts. After talking with Andrew’s one brother, what is called a farm was more like a homestead than a farm.
Camping on the farm
Following the trail up the short mountain side, we drove to a clearing to park one of the vehicles. Morning all the gear into one vehicle, mine, we continued to drive through some ATV trails on the property looking for the perfect spot. Fortunately for my Subaru, it didn’t take long to locate our camping spot.
Once our spot was found, we began the task of setting up camp. First was setting up the hammocks followed by gathering rocks to make the fire pit. Now the beauty of this being his property is when we were done, we didn’t have to dismantle the fire pit.
This trip was my second time setting up and sleeping in my Warbonnet Blackbird XLC hammock. I’ll save my thoughts on it for another time when I have the chance to use it more. However, there is a slight learning curve going from my 8ft hammock to this one at 11ft. I also got to try out some new gear as well.
As stated previously, this property is perfect for testing your gear in a semi controlled environment. It’s far enough away from civilization that you can forget you’re not in the middle of nowhere yet close enough that if anything does go wrong, you can call for help and get help relatively quickly.
The next time I’m down to visit, I definitely want to explore the property more and help him build his Bushcraft bunker on the site we were camping on. From the little bit I saw of the property, it promises to be gorgeous, boasting hills, a creek, a swamp, and of course woods. While hunting is permitted on the property with permission from Andrew and his brothers, few have gotten permission to do so.
Final Thoughts
I’m glad to call Andrew my friend and even at this point, best friend. He’s lucky to have access to such a beautiful property and more so have inherited it. I definitely look forward to many more camping trips on the property. And if I’m lucky, maybe some hunting trips with the blessing of him and his brothers.
The following video was taken as a last minute thought as I was leaving the clearing coming down the hill. I wish I’d have thought about it and got video of the entire time driving off road. This was my first experience with my Subaru Outback off road. The Subaru lived up to its reputation for its off pavement ability.
Links
- PA Wild Camping Regulations
- PA DEP
- PA DEP Facebook page
- PA Wilds public land rules
- PA Game Commission
- PA Hunting & Trapping Digest with regulations
Remember, If I can do it, You can do it too!!!
The Wandering Leatherneck 