camp out

Idioms

Sleep outdoors; also, stay somewhere for an unusually long time. For example, “We camped out in a field this night” (George Washington, Journal, March 18, 1748). In the early 1900s, the expression was extended to figurative uses, meaning simply “to stay somewhere for an unusually long time,” as in She camped out at the stage door, hoping for an autograph.

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023