A blast from the past – Outdoor gaming!

Outdoor gaming? But computers — and their owners — “hate” the outdoors. With all that moisture, dust, and glare, it sounds like a terrible idea. So why do it?

Yet I did! Not once, not twice — but more than twenty times. And honestly, I don’t think it’ll ever happen again.

Outdoor?

Yes — outdoor gaming. Well, not fully outdoors. More like… in a tent. Or an army tent. Or a mobile home (we’ll get to that). Even a horse trailer, once. Or a portacabin.

And not alone, either — but with hundreds, sometimes even thousands of others, all camping out in the middle of nowhere. With toilets, showers, food stands, a blazing fast network, internet access, and much, much more.

Oh, and not just for a day — but for six, sometimes even eleven days straight.

Basically, it was a full-blown festival. Just with less music ( or is it! ), and way more LAN cables.

And we called it “We Are Networking” — WAN for short. And later another festival named: Campzone!

So why this article?

Well, it’s summer. 25 degrees Celsius and rising. And that kind of weather brings back a lot of fond memories — of all the campsites I’ve been to over the years.

This post is a trip down memory lane.

How it all started

Back to early spring, 1999. I was still a poor student — with, to be fair, a bit of a computer addiction :P. I spent a lot of time on IRC back then. One of my regular hangouts was a channel called #NLCoders.

At some point, the conversation turned to the second edition of WAN — We Are Networking. An outdoor LAN party in the middle of nowhere, near a tiny village called Sleen, in the Netherlands.

Or, to be more precise: a campsite called “De Kibbelkoele,” hidden deep in the Dutch countryside.

A small group of us — me and two friends — decided to give it a shot.

And well… the rest is history.

WAN ’99

Only one of us had a driver’s license back then, and he had to make several trips to haul all our gear to the campsite — and back home afterwards. I still haven’t thanked him enough, even after all these years.

So uh… thanks, [LFG]BadBoy!

WAN ’99 was fun — but it was cold. We were hopelessly underprepared. No lights in our army tent… except for the stroboscope I happened to bring (yes, really). We had to share a 10 Mbit connection with over ten computers.

And did I mention it was insanely cold — even by Dutch July standards?

One evening we were literally sitting in our sleeping bags behind our computers. Oh — and there weren’t nearly enough toilets on the campsite.

So when nature called for a number two… well, it was often quicker to grab a roll of toilet paper, walk into the woods, and donate some fresh fertilizer to a nearby tree.

WAN NULL – The Perfect Plan

In the meantime, I had gotten a job, passed my driving test, and basically leveled up from the poor student I was the year before. My friend and I knew what to expect this time — what to bring, and more importantly, what not to bring. Someone lent us a tent, and off we went again!\

WAN NULL is, in my humble opinion, still one of the best editions I ever attended. The spot we ended up on… well, let’s call it destiny. That field turned out to be shared with my old friend GMC and some of the Chaosnet crew. And somehow [SA]Tyrone and his buddy ended up pitching their tents there too.

And then, on Friday, we suddenly heard a familiar voice next to us — swearing like his life depended on it.

My friend and I looked at each other. We knew that voice.

We both opened the tent, looked to our right and said:

“Hey, Bastaard!”

He turned around, confused:

“Huh?! Hey — Brain! Hey — Dexter!”

One of our lasergame crew had just randomly set up camp right next to us.

Over 400 people attended that edition, and we all brought way more computers, gear, and random crap than the organizers had planned for. And well… somewhere along the way, the massive generator that powered the whole event almost ran out of diesel.

And later that week, we got hit by an insane thunderstorm — one for the books. Also worth mentioning: at some point, we literally buried an old computer from Tyrone somewhere on the terrain.

It had served its purpose… may it rest in silicon peace. After all, it didn’t quite survive being dropped from four stories high — hehe.

2001 – The missing year

We were hoping for WAN 2001, but unfortunately, it never happened. In the meantime, a different crew organized the very first edition of Campzone — near Biddinghuizen.

And… we missed it 🙁

Campzone 2002

No more WAN! So we went to the second edition of Campzone instead — the festival that spanned two full weekends and the week in between. Eleven days in total.

Wow.

We only joined for the final weekend. But my friend Dexter had a new upgrade in mind: a real mobile home, which we could borrow from a family member.

I had hoped for something relatively modern. But… it turned out to be almost as old as me. 🙂

Dexter in his natural environment!

We got fairly drunk that Saturday and started making silly plans — like buying the mobile home and converting it into a full-blown mobile LAN party rig.

And so… we did!

Campzone 2003

The caravan was ready. Fully rebuilt, rewired, and reimagined — just days before its maiden voyage.

And there was Dexter again — in his newly revamped natural environment.

Campzone 2002-2006

The Biddinghuizen era!

After 2006, Campzone moved to a new location — and wow, the 2007 edition was one to remember.

Swampzone 2007

Yes — not Campzone, but Swampzone.

Rain, thunder, more rain… and then even more rain. The field simply couldn’t handle that much water, turning the entire terrain into a swamp.

Water. Mud. Cold weather.

Welcome to Swampzone 2007.

2007-2016 ( Best / Eindhoven years )

The field was improved after 2007. After that the field was good and Campzone prevailed!

2017 – 2018 ( Kronenberg )

Unfortunately, the terrain at Best was turned into an industrial zone — so we had to move again. This time to Kronenberg, Limburg.

2017  is an edition I’ll never forget… I got sick on the very first day.

Somehow, I caught a stomach bug — and it pretty much ruined my first weekend.

2018 was also an extreme edition.

Different kind of extreme this time… but definitely memorable.

It got hot. Really hot.

Temperatures climbed up to 40 degrees Celsius.

During that event, one of the most memorable photos was taken.

Looks great, doesn’t it?

Hard to believe we didn’t all melt that year.

2019 – Veghel

Another great edition, this time on a field near Veghel, also another really hot edition!

Meet [CBJ]!

I haven’t mentioned them yet, but we first met somewhere around 2008 — and joined their field in 2009. And from 2010 or 2011 onwards, we basically parked our caravan inside their main tent.

Dexter, Brain & Brody — proudly powered by our very own electrical outlet 😛

2020 – COVID.

2019 turned out to be the last Campzone edition — at least for now.

Then COVID hit… and everything came to a halt.

2023 – Restart attempt

The Campzone team made an effort to bring it back in 2023 — this time on yet another new field, near Zoetermeer. Unfortunately, not enough tickets were sold during the presale period, and the event was cancelled entirely.

Since then, there haven’t been any attempts to reignite Campzone 2024 or 2025…

CBJLAN XXL

Since 2020, the crew from [CBJ] has been organizing an XXL edition of their regular LANs during the summer — as an alternative to Campzone.

 

I’m afraid we’ve seen the last edition of Campzone, to be honest.

Campzone may be gone — but the memories will stick, like mud in 2007.

And luckily, CBJLAN XXL continues!

[CBJ]Brain out!