The old days: We set up camp in the most hospitable and logical place (wherever we pleased). Lex introduced you to bran (yum! and the jokes would never end!). Don fell asleep flat on his back and awoke in exactly the same position (the trick of a clear conscience). Boy Scouts made time to shoot rabbits with their .22 calibur rifles. Boys were warned not to step on the cactus because it was dangerous - not endangered. It was a place for scouts and family reunions. If you met someone you didn’t know, it was because you didn’t know your geneology well enough. And they knew you, because you looked just like your dad or uncle or grandpa when he was your age.
Nowadays: There are 65 camping slots. Each camp site has a 12 L x 12 W x 18 H (raised) bed of indigenous mulched material for a standard 4-person tent. Don’t you dare place your tent anywhere else. There is also an elevated (18″) fire ring. If you use indigenous wood, you will be fined and ejected from the facility. Parking is limited to two average American cars per unit. Got a horse trailer? - Sorry Charlie, there’s no room for that here. And finally, if you aren’t lucky enough to have reserved one of the 65 sites, I’m afraid you’ll have to backtrack to a town (Elba or Almo) and get a room - lucky for you that someone just built a $2M facility for just such an emergency, oh, and more likely than not, the owners of that facility are the same ones that reserved all of the camping sites that weekend (they’ll “leave the light on for you.”). Yeah, more than half of them were still empty the next morning. As for scouts and families, they are gone. Probably got tired of being snapped at by grumpy environmentalists who tell them to stay on the trails (no signs indicate such) or not to climb on that rock (Treasure Rock in our case - no signs indicated such) - I know my kids had a belly full of it.
Advice to my peers? Steer clear of City of The Rocks. It will abuse your fond memories and is unfit for future ones - UNLESS - the cowboy in you doesn’t mind BREAKIN THE LAW.
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