How to Eat Clean in the Bush

For the long weekend, I went camping with an awesome group of people down the south coast at a place called Bendalong.  When Eb, my gorgeous friend and fellow wellness chick (check out her kick-ass blog - http://everyhealthyday.com/), suggested the idea, I immediately jumped on-board despite the fact that I own absolutely zero camping gear here in Sydney.  This minor snag was quickly pushed out of my head to make room for images of roasting s'mores and sleeping under the stars.  I couldn't wait to get out of Sydney for the weekend and spend three days chilling out in the wilderness.  

Even before beginning to think about how and from where I was going to source a sleeping bag, mattress pad, tent, etc. (you know, the camping essentials), I was making a running list in my head of which foods and snack items I'd need to get me through the weekend without my home fridge and pantry.  Whenever I go on a trip away from home, no matter how long or short, civilized or provincial, I always go prepared with healthy food.  As I had never been camping before in Australia, much less to this particular location, I wasn't sure just how far into the bush we were going to go.  Were we hiking to our campsite or car-camping in a caravan park? Were there refrigeration capabilities or were we bringing eskies? Were there cooking facilities or were we eating from packets?  I had no idea.  I didn't have much time to prepare, so I decided to just organize healthy breakfast foods and snacks and hope for the best for the rest of our meals!  Luckily Eb is a seasoned camper so I knew I wouldn't be the only one steering clear of the hot dogs and going in search of nutritious nibbles. 

What did we eat? 

On the drive down, I sipped on a green smoothie as I presumed I wouldn't be getting in too many greens on this little jaunt.  

Breakfast:

Breakfast aftermath and Carina on the guitar

Both mornings, I woke up and had my obligatory hot water with lemon to get me going. For breakfast Sunday morning after our run, we had Qi'a pudding made with almond milk and topped with banana, passionfruit, and blueberries. The other morning, I had avocado and nut butter + banana on rice cakes.  

How very rustic...living up to our campsite's name!

Packing List: 

• Lemons 
• Qi'a cereal (chia, buckwheat and hemp)
• Almond milk
• Fruit 
• Avocados
• Nut butters
• Rice cakes 

Snacks: 

snack attack

Packing List:

• Bliss Balls (thanks Eb!)
• Homemade trail mix (sunflower seeds, goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut flakes)
• Superfood energy bars - this brand is my fave! 
• Dry roasted edamame
• Chickpea chips (thanks Carina!)

For lunches and dinners, we made do with what we had depending on what we were doing at the time. Gluten free veggie wraps, salads and BBQ'ed chicken and lamb were some standouts.   

building our s'mores by torchlight 

In my book, it's not a camping trip without s'mores so we made sure to pick up the necessary supplies before heading into the woods.  I have yet to encounter Graham Crackers in Australia so a bit of improv was needed when gathering the ingredients in the grocery store.  It also became apparent (I'd never looked before..) that Australians are not as big of marshmallow fans as us Yanks because the only ones I could find were measly little white and pink ones.  Who wants pink anyway? Yuck.  Regardless of lack of Honey Maid and Kraft in this country, the s'mores experience was still a brilliant success!  We even made it 'healthy' by using 70% cacao dark chocolate ;). 

So, other than eating...

What did we do?

We swam, surfed, sunbathed, read books, watched dolphins, walked on the beach, saw kangaroos (and an adorable little joey!), sat around the campfire, played the guitar, star gazed, laughed, appreciated the outdoors, and basked in the glory of a social-media free weekend!

Here are some of my favorite snaps: 

Terrific Trio: Eb, me and Carina 

Dolphin, not a shark!

Little joey pouchin' around

Our epic campfire...well done, boys

All and all, an awesome weekend away from The Big Smoke - great crew, beautiful weather, yummy food, simple living, and wholesome nature-loving fun.  It was nice to get back to Sydney feeling healthy and rejuvenated instead of tired, grumpy, and in desperate need of a detox.  I think we have the chia seeds to thank for that! ;) Can't wait for the next one!

What do you do to get away from city life? What are your go-to camping snacks? 

Going somewhere farther from home? Check out this post on how to stay healthy when traveling overseas.  

x Steph