Top 5 Camping Games When You Forgot To Bring Games
You’ve got the tent set up, the fire is going, everyone has eaten, and then someone asks the dreaded question:
“So… what are we going to do now?”
You check the gear. No cards. No board games. No frisbee. No ball. Nothing.
Don’t worry. You don’t actually need any camping games packed in your gear bag. Some of the best games require nothing more than a few people, a little imagination, and the great outdoors.
Here are five of the best camping games to play when you forgot to bring games.
1. Mafia
If you've got a decent-sized group, Mafia is one of the best camping games you can play without bringing anything with you.
All you need are people and someone willing to be the narrator.
Everyone is secretly assigned a role. The basic version has Mafia members, innocent townspeople, and a narrator, with additional roles such as a Detective or Doctor if you want to make things more complicated.
The game alternates between night and day.
At night, everyone closes their eyes while the narrator secretly directs the Mafia. During the day, everyone discusses what happened and tries to figure out who the Mafia are. The group then votes to eliminate a suspect.
The Mafia have to lie and blend in with the group, while the townspeople try to figure out who's telling the truth.
No cards, dice or equipment required.
Mafia is especially fun around a campfire after dark. Just don't be surprised when your quietest friend suddenly becomes an expert liar.
2. Contact
Contact is a great word game when you want something that gets people thinking.
One person secretly chooses a word and tells everyone the first letter.
For example, the secret word starts with C.
The other players take turns giving clues for words they think of that also start with C.
Someone might say:
“It's something you drink.”
If another player thinks they know the word, they say “Contact!” The two players count down and say their answers at the same time.
If they give the same answer, the person holding the secret word has to reveal the next letter.
Now the secret word might be C-A..., and the guessing continues.
The goal is to use clever clues that other players can understand, while making them difficult enough that the person with the secret word can't figure out the answer immediately.
It's simple, requires no equipment, and can become surprisingly competitive.
3. Broken Telephone
Broken Telephone is perfect for a camping trip because it requires absolutely nothing — except a group of people who can keep a straight face.
Everyone sits in a circle. One person quietly whispers a sentence into the ear of the person beside them. That person whispers what they heard to the next person, and so on until the message makes its way around the entire group.
The final person says the message out loud.
The goal is to see how much the original sentence has changed.
And trust us, it will change.
Start with something relatively simple:
“The moose joined the camping tour carrying a blue canoe.”
By the time it gets around the circle, it might come out as:
“The mouse stole someone's blue shampoo.”
The longer and more ridiculous the original sentence, the better.
For a camping version, use words like moose, canoe, marshmallow, tent, raccoon, campsite and sleeping bag. The more unusual the words, the more entertaining the final result.
4. Two Truths And A Lie
This classic requires absolutely nothing except a group of people willing to embarrass themselves a little.
Each person takes a turn telling the group three statements about themselves. Two are true and one is completely made up. Everyone else has to guess which statement is the lie.
Camping makes this even better because people tend to have some pretty interesting stories.
Example:
I once slept in a snowbank.
I have been bitten by a raccoon.
I once got lost in Algonquin Park.
Only one of those can be a lie. Probably.
5. I'm Going On A Picnic
This is a memory game that starts easy and gets progressively harder.
The first person says:
“I'm going on a picnic and I'm bringing apples.”
The next person repeats the first item and adds their own:
“I'm going on a picnic and I'm bringing apples and sandwiches.”
The third person has to remember both:
“I'm going on a picnic and I'm bringing apples, sandwiches and marshmallows.”
Keep going around the group, with every person adding another item to the list.
By the time you get to ten or fifteen items, somebody is going to forget something.
And that's where the fun begins.
You can make it camping-themed instead:
“I'm going camping and I'm bringing…”
Now you're remembering sleeping bags, tents, fishing rods, marshmallows, bug spray, canoes, flashlights and whatever else your imagination can come up with.
For an extra challenge, make the items follow a particular rule without telling everyone what the rule is. Whoever guesses the theme, wins.
The Best Camping Games Don't Need Equipment
One of the great things about camping is that you don't actually need much to have a good time.
You can spend an evening playing Mafia, trying to outsmart everyone at Contact, testing your memory with I'm Going on a Picnic, or laughing at increasingly ridiculous Broken Telephone stories.
In fact, forgetting the board games might be the best thing that happened.
Sometimes the best camping entertainment is simply putting the phones away and seeing what the group comes up with.
And if all else fails?
There is always the classic camping game:
“Who can find the biggest stick?”
Winner gets absolutely nothing.
Except the biggest stick.