Discovery: Britany Robinson from The Dyrt

There are some things you need to know about Britany Robinson, Managing Editor at The Dyrt.

First, she’s a travel and culture writer whose work has appeared in The Washington Post, Curbed, BBC.com, Lonely Planet, and other respected publications. Also, she loves the outdoors and camping, and could technically be classified as a nomad.

She entered a road race to Mongolia with strangers. She has very candid observations on the service industry. She has an affectionate, complicated relationship with her van, Shirley. She has an ambitious dog named Jackson. Those are just the basics.

What is The Dyrt?

Most camping resources are terribly outdated. The Dyrtis revolutionizing that space as an online resource for all things camping. This breaks down into three big things: we’re an app for finding and reviewing campgrounds (we just completed a big redesign, available for both iOS and Android), a digital magazine of stories and advice around camping and the outdoors, and a communityof people who love to camp.

If you like to be surrounded by nature and sleep outside, The Dyrt is a home base for making that happen … for making it more enjoyable and more accessible to everyone.

What drew you to work there?

Four years ago I left New York City and drove around the country looking for a new place to call home. I’ve always felt drawn to the outdoors, and I wanted to live in a place with more access to that. I actually packed a tent and some basic camping supplies and I didn’t use them once. Whenever I thought to camp, I wasn’t really sure how to go about looking for a campground. I wound up staying in a bunch of Motel 6's.

After I moved to Portland, I met so many people who camp and climb and hike, and do all of these things that I’ve always wanted to do. Slowly, I learned how to access these outdoor activities. I really fell in love with camping when I moved to the West Coast, and this vast region of the country was just tempting me to sleep in its dirt.

I was a freelance writer, and after years of working from home I craved a more collaborative atmosphere. A friend sent me this job listing from The Dyrt and it seemed almost too good to be true. I’d get to write about this newfound interest! It would have to be a really awesome job for me to give up the freedom of freelancing, and this was it.

You’re kind of a “roving reporter” in a literal sense right?

I used to be, more so when I started. The Dyrt is growing so quickly right now, and it’s been all-hands-on-deck in a very exciting way. It’s been harder to hit the road, but I do plan on camping a lot this summer. Luckily, we have a huge community of campers who allow me to live vicariously through their camping experiences every day.

Last year, I bought a 1986 GMC Vandura, which has been converted into a camper van with a bed and a sink. I’ve taken several camping trips to the coast, and in June I’m heading to the Grand Tetons for a VanLife meetup.

Tell us more about this crazy van.

Ahhh the van. Yes, I live in my van part-time (#vanlife). Her name is Shirley and she is surly and unpredictable, but I love her regardless of many breakdowns. I rent my house out part-time, and when visitors are there, I move into Shirley with my dog Jackson. It’s an interesting challenge to live in a van in a city, but it has turned into a very cozy second home that I’m actually excited to be in whenever the time comes.

It’s also an awesome way to camp. I can roll up to a national forest or a campground late at night, and there’s no set up. I’m already home. And I’m camping. I love it.

Do you come up with all the story ideas or do you get pitched?

At this point, 99% of our story topics are developed in-house. We work with a bunch of outdoor brands, and our digital account managers develop stories through our partnerships with them.

The rest of the story ideas are mostly me, and I have some wonderful freelancers who work on them. We will be opening up The Dyrt Magazine to pitches from freelancers shortly, and I’m very excited for that. As much as I love developing story ideas myself, it’s going to give us a lot more depth and reach to share the experiences and expertise of outside writers.

If you write about camping and the outdoors, stay tuned! I’ll be sharing a call for pitches soon.

How does that content support The Dyrt’s overall mission?

Our content is a big part of how we make the outdoors more accessible. By sharing camping advice, stories, and camping destination guides, we’re offering the inspiration and information that people need to camp more.

Whether you’ve never camped in your life, or you’ve hiked the whole Pacific Coast Trail, we hope you’ll find something that will ignite your curiosity and convince you to plan that next trip.

What’s a way you see technology changing the way we interact with the outdoors?

Oof. Good question. On the one hand, I hope, and I see, that technology can actually help us get away from using so much technology while we’re enjoying the outdoors. I’d like to see people use The Dyrt to read about camping and find their campgrounds before they leave home, then put the phone away to enjoy their time outside.

Also, there are some really fun and beneficial ways to use technology while we’re enjoying the outdoors, like by taking photos and sharing them in a campground reviews, or on social media, so that future campers can find and enjoy a similar experience.

Sure, technology can be distracting. I hate how often I look at my phone to check Instagram or Facebook. But I’ve also seen beautiful connections and shared experiences through social media. People have found community through The Dyrt. It’s given them a platform to express how much they love camping, and chat about it with fellow campers, which is really cool to see.

When it comes to technology and the outdoors, balance is key. But technology can’t be responsible for balance — that’s on us. Use it when it’s helpful, then put the screens away and let your senses remember what it’s like to experience the real thing.

Do you think about the balance between capturing experiences to share with a digital community vs. having experiences without the need for documentation?

Absolutely! As a writer, I have a sort of compulsion to capture everything, which I have to remind myself isn’t always necessary.

What I really love about The Dyrt’s approach to social media is that our community of campers gives us so much authenticity. The photos we share on The Dyrt’s Instagram aren’t perfectly edited photos, taken from drones and professional cameras. They’re from real campers capturing their real experiences. Those photos really provide a service to other campers who are looking for places to camp. They’re able to see what it will really look like when they get there.

Travel, like food, definitely lends itself to a sense of “heightened self” when presented on social media.

Often times yes, but I love to see the unfiltered expressions of outdoor experiences through social media. I recently interviewed Brianna Madia for a story on The Dyrt Magazine. She’s a big Instagram influencer who lives in a van in Utah with her husband and her two dogs. She’s built a brand on authenticity. She shares some really heartfelt glimpses into her life, both the good and the bad.

I think social media users are, more and more, leaning towards authenticity over “pretty.” But there’s no denying that pretty gets a lot of likes, too. Also, it’s nice to have experiences that we don’t share. Some moments you should just hold close.

Is there an outdoor trend you wish would go away?

We’ve definitely used the term “bucket list” on The Dyrt Magazine, so hopefully this doesn’t sound hypocritical … but the bucket list mentality concerns me when I see it appropriated by the outdoor and travel industries.

This obsession with checking things or places off a list, to say you’ve been there or done that, is potentially damaging to both those places and our own experiences there. I’d like to see people focus instead on having deeper experiences, rather than more of them. What’s the point in being the youngest person to visit every country if you barely left the airport at half of them? I’m so tired of seeing that celebrated! Or spent a day in some places and didn’t speak to a single local?

I think camping is a great way to slow down and relax into our experience of places. When you fall asleep, surrounded by the smells of a forest you’ve never been in before, with the stars above you, and all those captivating (and occasionally slightly scary) night noises … those things make you want to take your time and soak it all up.

Where’s the craziest place you’ve camped?

The deserts of Mongolia and Kazakhstan. And that was before I knew much about camping. I did a 30-day road trip from London to Ulaanbaatar Mongolia, and my tent was one of those flimsy pop-up tents. No joke. About two weeks into that trip trip the poles were broken in several places and it was more like sleeping under a tarp than a tent. I bought my first real tent somewhere in Kazakhstan.

Where’s the craziest place you want to camp?

Everywhere! I’ve never camped on the beach. I’d love to wake up to the sound of waves on a camping trip, soon.

I’d also really like to get into mountaineering. I’ve climbed some non-technical peaks (Mount St. Helen’s), and I got a taste of technical climbing on Bolivia’s Huayna Potosi, so I’d love to take a course and have the skills to climb Mount Hood or Mount Shasta someday. I think it’ll be pretty cool to camp in the snow on the side of the mountain on the way up.