Girl Camper Makes Camping Cool for All

Janine Pettit didn’t discover girl camping. But she sure made it popular. Known across social media as “Girl Camper,” Pettit was a stay-at-home mom who raised three kids before turning her husband’s green light to join a camping group more than a decade ago into her own adventure. Now, she’s a well-known camping and RV festival enthusiast.

RoadtripMojo first met Pettit at the Florida RV Super Show back in 2018. She was showing off the latest Liberty Outdoors Mini Max teardrop trailer. We were smitten with the trailer. Her story, however, captured our imagination.

Sure, there were others before her, groups like Getaway Gals, Florida Floozies, and Mitten Kitten Sisters. The first one she’d ever heard of – Sisters on the Fly – at the time had fewer than 100 members, all tooling around in vintage trailers and sporting tutus and martinis. When husband, Rick, saw Janine continually surfing their site a few years later, he suggested she join.

Fast forward a few years, and Pettit’s now tooling around in her own trailer – a vintage 1959 Field and Stream trailer. When she pulled up in 2014 at a women’s outdoors adventure fair hosted by Country Living Magazine, a rep for website GoRVing.com said she’d be a perfect ambassador for the industry.

Would she blog for them? Absolutely. One hitch: they wanted her to tout “Glamping.” Glamorous camping? She balked.

“I couldn’t do that. I didn’t want this to be about women in tutus,” she recalls. “When I’m camping with my New Jersey girlfriends here, we’re kayalking and hiking and exploring.”

Camping Experiences that Resonate

Her experiences no doubt resonate with women campers everywhere, including those who travel the highway to hit their favorite art or music festivals. After all, the roadtrip and camp experience for many is as much fun as the destination. And when you’re pulling a short-box trailer or a teardrop unit, the nimble agility makes getting to, from, and around your favorite festival or campsite all the easier.

Pettit has turned her adventures into a business. Her popular weekly podcast explores girl campers “going places and doing things.” When tear-drop trailers came into vogue, Pettit paired up with Liberty Outdoors to hitch one of their Mini Max trailers to her Ford F150 for a 10,000-mile jaunt. She’ll be raffling off the trailer this month.

Along the way, Pettit has created a stop along the road for women campers. She’s not particular. Whether it’s a millennial driving her parent’s old Subaru with a kayak and a pup tent, or an 80-year-old widow driving her Class A, camping’s camping. To Pettit, it’s all about the women camper “tribes” taking shape around the country.

Pettit knows camping and music. Growing up, her father played guitar and picked banjo signing songs around the campfire with the family of nine. “I just had this crazy happy childhood,” she says.

Creating a Converted Camper

Rick, on the other hand, camped once as a kid at Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire. Today, he’s is a converted – if occasional – camper. He sometimes will fly out to meet Janine after she explores the open road (“I could’ve been a long-distance trucker in another life,” she enthuses). Like the time he showed up to Estes Park at the edge of Rocky Mountain National Park for eight days of boondocking.

“The poor guy didn’t know what he got himself into,” says Pettit, a handy lass as comfortable in the woodshop as she is renovating vintage trailers, decorating interiors, or tending to the campsite.

Her hands-on approach has earned Pettit a loyal following. When their daughter was flying home from that Colorado trip, a passenger who’s one of 21,000 who follow Pettit’s Instagram recognized the girl.

“Are you the daughter of Girl Camper,” she asked. “I’ve followed her for years.”

That’s what Pettit likes to hear. She wants to talk to – or hear from – every woman who camps or might entertain the notion. She calls it the “girl camping movement.”

‘Camping is not uncomfortable’

Next up: Her annual “Wonderful Women in Waxahachie” rally near the Texas locale her parents call home. Campers arrive in rigs or set up canopies decked out with cots, quilts, blankets, even battery-powered chandeliers.

“Camping is not uncomfortable,” she says. “I have 800 thread count sheets in my trailer. They’re better than the sheets I have at home.”

For some, comfort may be the bait. But the hook is the adventure. You don’t need to own a camper to get caught in the fun. Try before you buy. Rent a rig. Find a friend who camps – and tag along for a weekend. Or fine a nearby girl camping gathering. They’re out there. 

“Get yourself over to Cruise America or El Monte, book yourself a spot in a KOA campground, find a group, and just sign up,” she says. Skittish about safety on the road or traveling alone? Surf the RV Safety and Education Foundation website.

Learn from the pros

And if you’re in the Mid Atlantic region, join her in March at the Foxfire KOA in Huntington, West Virginia. Pettit will partner with Setzer’s RV to host a Camper College to show what’s involved in owning, operating and towing a travel trailer. They even have cabins on site for those not ready to pitch a tent or rent a rig.

It doesn’t take much to become a girl camper. Just a notion.

“All people need,” she says, “is the willing spirit to say, ‘I want in on this.’”