Private Rustic Prairie
This is a list of answers/clarifications I've written in response to various campers' questions. This list is always developing and being added to, hopefully all your questions have answers here.
If you have any other questions or wish there was something else on this page, let me know and I'll be happy to answer/add them. Happy camping!
Some GPSs have a tough time finding the campsite, here's a link that shows where the campsite is. Take a look at it when you're on your way to make sure your GPS is taking you to the right location. Basically all you do is drive east on Covington Rd until it ends, then keep going. You'll see the fire pit and wood rack on your right when you get to the camping area. If you're in a big group you can park the cars a bit further down by the hunting blind to give you more room for tents in the camping area.
The main takeaway here is don't drive down Mazia road. Many GPS's try to go that way but that road doesn't connect to the camp site.
Here is a video of the enterance to the campsite starting at the Covington & Abbey road intersection.
This is a composting outhouse with a urine separator. Urine is pretty vile stuff and is the cause for most of the traditional outhouse stink, that's why the outhouse has a weird looking toilet, it lets us get rid of the urine as fast as possible. When you're using the outhouse make sure the liquids go in the funnel and the solids go down the hole, that's all there is to it. If you go #2 put a scoop of sawdust (from the blue barrel) down the hole to cover up your deed. The sawdust keeps the odor down, do your best to keep the sawdust out of the urine funnel.
Gentlemen, thou shall sit, it's not possible to use the outhouse standing; if you insist on standing use the shrubs outside.
Ladies, sanitary items cannot go in the outhouse, they wont break down, only toilet paper can go in the hole.
The wood rack has two standard 15Amp 120Volt wall outlets in the side for you to charge phones / run mini-fridges / crock pots / whatever with. It has a decent amount of capacity so feel free to leave it on all night if you're using it. Just be sure to flip the switch off when you leave so it's charged for the next guest. If you didn't select the electricity add on when you booked, feel free to use it. The only reason that add on is there is to advertise the feature; everyone's free to use the electricity.
My recommendation is bring an extension cord and power strip. That way you can run the cord to your tent and have a power strip inside the tent for phone chargers, air mattresses, electric blankets, etc.
When you leave, let me know if the wood is getting low, it helps me immensely to make sure the wood stays stocked.
Since the cell service on the prairie is pretty limited, I've built a virtual library. The library has a variety of Books, Movies, and Games available. I've added a wide range of genres so there's something for most everybody.
The outhouse has instructions hanging on the wall for how to connect to the library, but in the event that paper gets lost, here they are again:
- Turn on the solar panel outlets, the library runs on solar power. The library takes a few minutes to start up.
- You may need to turn airplane mode on for the phone to conenct properly. Skip this step now to see if it works, but come back to this one if you have trouble.
- Connect to the Prairie Virtual Library wifi network. The wifi doesn't have internet connection, so your phone might throw an error, click whichever button that keeps your phone connected.
- Once connected, open your web browser (safari, chrome, firefox, etc) and navigate to http://192.168.5.1 to load the library. Notice how it's http and not https, make sure you use the version without the s.
- You should have a long page of items you can browse, enjoy!
Some of the games are setup for computers, so they need mouse and/or keyboards so they wont work on your phone. Most of the games videos and books should work on any device.
It gets moved around when the area is mowed and by other guests. If it's in a weird spot feel free to move it somewhere else.
Feel free to use it or put it off to the side. When you leave, make sure it's on the fire pit so it's not laying in the dirt/mud getting gross or rusting.
If you don't currently have a Hipcamp account, click this button below and you'll get a free $10 towards your first trip!
This campsite is a hobby of mine, not a cash grab attempt. When I chat with people about the logistics of the campsite they usually suggest raising the rent fee. Sure, I could raise the fee, but that's not the point of this site. My goal is to make the prairie self sustaining. In spirit, a non-profit, but I'm not going to officially label it a non-profit due to the legal ramifications involved that I haven't quite figured out yet.
At the risk of sounding like a hippie, the goal of the prarie is to maximize happiness. Charging as much as possible doesn't further that cause.
As you can see from the below Sankey diagram, once everything is considered, this campsite still manages to cost me nearly $250 every year. I'm still brainstorming ways to minimize that out of pocket cost (Perhaps an LLC?) but this is the best I've figured out so far.
