Time to pack for LGBTQ+ summer camp!

Growing up, I loved summer camps, no matter what kind. I would beg my mom to send me to Camp Orkila, where all the cool kids went, on Orcas Island in Washington. I went to single-day cooking camps at the local community market. In the first grade, I began attending Camp Coyote, a place where I made best friends — and so many s’mores — year after year, eventually becoming a counselor myself. Then, of course, there were the Mormon summer camps. You might think a closeted young lesbian would have hated them, but I looked forward to going every time — yes, even the year that I had to participate in Trek, a multiday reenactment of the pioneer trail, which included pulling a heavy wagon through the woods while wearing a dress and bonnet. The most important thing was I got to be outside — and yeah, maybe I flirted with the girls a little.

But as a queer adult, going to summer camp gets a lot harder. It’s already challenging enough to find affirming community spaces, let alone outdoor retreats that fit around my full-time job. But if you also want to indulge your childlike whimsy, you’re not alone. Adult LGBTQ+ summer camps were made for people like us.

‘Camp’ Camp Opening CircleElise Campbell

Some, like ‘Camp’ Camp, which hosts LGBTQ+ adults at an all-inclusive weeklong summer camp in central Maine, have been around for nearly 30 years. Others like Dyke Camp, now entering its second year, and Sappy Trips, which is hosting its inaugural getaway this summer, are just getting started. And then there are smaller, unofficial getaways organized by friend groups, like Camp Carabiner, the name bestowed upon a weekend getaway coordinated by Cailyn Fiori and Alice Naland, who wanted to deepen their connections with friends around the bonfire.

Why summer camp? Kayla Pekkala, ‘Camp’ Camp’s director of social media and communications, says she sought it out as an adult because it felt like “one of the only places I could really go be a kid.”

“I wanted to get back to that as an adult. And you know, go have some fun,” she says. “Who doesn’t want to go make arts and crafts by the lake?”

Every summer, ‘Camp’ Camp, one of the longest-lasting LGBTQ+ adult summer camps in the country, hosts more than 200 campers, ranging from 21 to 84 years old, hailing from all over the country. Some even come from abroad. “It was my first time being in a truly intergenerational community,” Pekkala says. A week at ‘Camp’ Camp can include everything from archery and swimming to horseback riding, pottery, and Broadway dance. Which yes, means there’s a “no talent, talent” show at the end of the week. It’s clear that this has become a sacred place to many. Not only has ‘Camp’ Camp persisted for decades, but 75 percent of its campers return year after year. “The phrase we always use is that if you come to camp, you’ll have the best time ever,” Pekkala says.

Color Wars at ‘Camp’ CampBree Anne Buckley

Dyke Camp, founded by Nic Pieta in 2025, came about because they believed “queer people should be able to have fun in the woods together.” The goal? To create an opportunity for the queer community, specifically dykes, to get outdoors and perhaps even “be naked, topless in a pond or sauna or pool,” Pieta says. What originally started as a 75-person weekend getaway to Camp Singers in upstate New York has more than doubled in size in 2026. Now, they’re taking over Camp Ramblewood in Maryland and offering campers instruction in everything from yoga and swimming to shibari, or Japanese rope bondage. “It gives you a time to just breathe and take a second to be like, wow, there’s actually more than my 9-to-5 out there, and there’s community to be made in these kinds of events,” Pieta says. “In our feedback form, so many people said that Dyke Camp was the best weekend of their lives,” adds Auggie Enzer, a fellow NYC-based organizer helping to plan this year’s getaway.

This year, born-and-raised New Yorker Liz Gonzalez is also officially hosting her first-ever edition of Sappy Trips, a queer weekend getaway upstate. Gonzalez, who describes herself as the designated “planner in my friend groups,” had been wanting to put something like Sappy together for years. After coming out at 22, attending culinary school, receiving her MBA, and perhaps just as importantly, going through a lesbian breakup, she knew she wanted to be “very intentional about seeking out queer community and making queer friends.” With Sappy Trips, the queer travel brand she launched at the end of April, she hopes to help people “really just take time out of the city and foster community with like-minded people.” The initial feedback form got over 200 responses. “Leading something like this just kind of makes sense and honestly brings me the most joy,” Gonzalez says of Sappy.

Campers at Dyke CampKade Joy

For Fiori and Naland, organizing Camp Carabiner was almost a no-brainer. The former roommates have experience hosting events ranging from Dykes and Dolls, a NYC- based community organization, to Naland’s annual Homocoming party, an event that reimagines a classic high school dance but with a queer twist. But while Camp Carabiner may not be an official camp per se, the goals and structure of the weekend are the same. “It almost felt like taking people home in a way,” Naland says of the trip, which took nearly 30 people to the Catskills. Together, they combined Naland’s project management background with Fiori’s planning skills and previous experience as a camp counselor. “I went to be a counselor at this one camp upstate the year that I was coming out, and that was such a perfect time and space for me to be like, ‘Oh, I can be my whole self here,’” Fiori says. They found a campsite, organized caravans, planned meals for the weekend, and put together an itinerary to guide them. This included everything from a field day to a movie night, and by some stroke of gay luck, woodchopping. “That was the gayest shit we did all weekend. It was literally like a butch-off,” Naland says.

“We’re kind of getting back to our roots (not to be) dramatic when [we’re] camping. Like you’re trying to fill your basic needs, you’re trying to make sure that you’re fed, that you’re warm, that you’re not getting eaten alive by mosquitoes.”

This article is part of OUT’s July-Aug 2026 print issue, on newsstands July 7. Support queer media and subscribe — or download the issue now through Apple News+, Zinio, Nook, or PressReader.

Hunter Doohan on the cover Out's July/August 2026 print issue