We are sitting by the ashes of last night's campfire, sipping too-hot instant coffee from paper cups.

"I wonder," my husband says, "if there are any campgrounds that have WiFi."

"Honey!" I say. "That's ridiculous. You can't bring a computer on a camping trip."

"Why is it ridiculous? What about all the people camping in RVs, with their bathrooms and satellite TV?"

We get into a conversation about technology and getting away from it all and what makes camping, camping. He thinks it would be cool to be able to check e-mail or read the day's news from the picnic table next to the campfire; for me, not being connected is a big part of what camping is all about.

There's no question, camping has changed with the times. "Roughing it" used to mean cooking on an open fire and going without hot water and a toilet.

Now, it means going without Internet access, and even that is changing. With technology such as the much-hyped iPhone, campers can listen to music, surf the Web, check e-mail, send text messages and talk on the phone — as long they're not too far from an AT&T cell tower.

My earliest camping experiences were with the Girl Scouts, and they were a lot rougher than any of my recent camping trips. There were A-frame fires lit with one match, middle-of-the-night walks to the latrine and attempts to cook pancakes on a tin-can device called a vagabond stove.

Today, I use fire starters, camp within a three-minute walk from a real toilet and make pancakes on a propane stove. For me, roughing it means sleeping in a tent and eating a marshmallow off a stick I found in the woods.

You see all kinds of people at campgrounds: families with kids on scooters and Big Wheels, girls with hair dryers in the restroom, middle-aged couples holding hands.

Then there are the professional campers. They are at every state park, with their names carved on wooden signs mounted on a tree at the front of their campsite. They've got rugs spread out in front of their campers, tarps strung from every tree and gadget organizers that hang on the side of their screen-enclosed picnic tables.

As for us, well, we're learning from our experiences and gradually acquiring more gear. But we keep forgetting to get the red-and-white-checked tablecloth.

Camping at a campground is a blend of natural and manmade sounds: a car motor idling, the rip of a zipper, birds chirping, the chink of an ax against cement, a breeze rustling through the treetops, scraps of conversation, campfire sparks popping.

Now there are also new sounds. On a camping trip last weekend, I saw a woman walking to the restroom holding a cell phone. As I passed her, it started chirping the Lone Ranger theme.

In today's world of high-tech multitasking, it's becoming more and more difficult to unplug. Don't get me wrong: I'm no camping purist. I want my propane stove and charcoal grill and battery-powered lantern, and, when I'm away from my kids, a cell phone in case of emergency.

But I don't want to be able to check e-mail or surf the Web. For me, part of "getting away" is disconnecting from normal life in every way possible. No phone calls, no newspapers, no TV, no work, no mail, no e-mail.

Sure, a global-positioning system device would have saved my husband and me a few detours during our hike last weekend, but when you've got nowhere to be, what does it matter? The surprise twists and turns are part of what makes camping fun.

In the end, we all have our own ideas of what makes camping, camping. For me, it's a chance to slow down and do simple things: listen to the birds, look at the stars, sit around a campfire, go for a walk, take a nap in a hammock.

Camping is being at the mercy of your environment. You know you're camping when you hear a rumble of thunder and realize you'd better start putting everything you don't want to get wet into your tent or your car. Camping is having to improvise, not being entirely comfortable, relying on nature a little more and technology a little less.

Now if they come out with an iPhone model that has a flashlight and a can opener, maybe I'll change my mind.

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Lisa Miller is a freelance writer who lives in Oneonta. She can be reached at lisamiller44@hotmail.com.