Camping 2014

We planned, postponed, dreamed, longed, ached and waited for this day! And it finally happened. We made it up the mountain!

Notice the puddles. It had been raining almost every single day so we took the 20% chance as a good sign. I mean we live in a dessert--for sure it cannot rain every single day. The reservoirs are at all time low levels. How much more rain could we really honestly actually receive?

Scott was a busy man up the mountain. He chopped down a couple trees by hand due to the fact our second hand chain saw failed to start. He has pretty impressive axe skills. Hitting the exact same slit every single time. It was amazing to see his skills. He claimed to have developed them on the oil rigs where he had to hit small wing nuts and that he learned really quick to hit the right exact spot. 

We spent a whole 7 minutes setting up our tent. It is so wonderful. I just love the thing! We had our entire camp set up in less than 30 minutes. I had Scott take a pic of me in my new Yellowstone zip up hoodie. I love that thing so much! Soo comfy. So long and so wonderful! 

Thursday we set up camp. Thursday between 1-6 it rained. We totally took a nap in the awesome dry tent!

About 6 we made a fire and ate dinner. We decided to try some freeze dried meals. So all we did was heat up water, add to pouch, stir, wait, eat. I loved it. The food is tolerable and so much easier than busting out the potatoes, onions, dutch oven and coals. We waited about 10 minutes for dinner to be ready instead of the hours of dutch oven waiting. I am a huge fan now of these dinners. They are the only way to go camping and relaxing. For me who is not the biggest fan of dutch oven due to all the onions and potatoes involved in every single dish. I hate the clean up, trash collection from peels, and cans etc. The pouches of the freeze dried meals are so wonderful!

After dinner we had a small fire for a couple hours while we each read our books and enjoyed the night. Then it started to rain about 8 pm. We just went to bed. It rained for the better part of the night. We woke the next day to a very soggy morning!

Here we are before 7 am. Suzie had been all around the camp smelling whatever had crossed our camp during the night--many deer prints, but I am sure racoon etc. She quickly became soaked from running around with her nose to the ground. 

The sun is finally rising and starting to warm us up and dry everything out!

Suzie loves being 'camp dog' She is on the look out even though there is a ball right under her feet. 

Friday morning was amazing. It was quiet and still. There was some fog nearby that quickly dissipated after the sun rose. We sat by the fire until 11 am talking and reading. It was a wonderful morning! We went for a drive after lunch and saw many cows and one crane. it was a great drive. We found other camp sites we would like to try next time. 

We got back to camp and made another fire and Scott in his wisdom suggested cooking some hot dogs really quick since the clouds were getting darker. We cooked our hot dogs and the rain started. We shoved the remaining dogs in our mouths and quickly put stuff up. We then went to the tent to find shelter. It rained for a few hours and then about 7 pm it stopped. I went out to the drenched fire and wrote in my journal. We contemplated packing up and going home (in hind site we should have), but chose to spend one more night as planned. So far we had not gotten too wet. The tent was holding up quite impressively! Then at 8:15 pm the rain stared and did not stop until 3:05 am. We tried to sleep. Scott did pretty good, I failed. Even though my eyes were closed the lightening was quite blinding. I spend the night counting seconds between lightening strikes and thunder rolls. The thunder was so wonderful. It echoed back and forth on the hills and sounded longer, deeper and much more threatening than if I was at my home. Sometime after midnight the wind started blowing and part of our tent was up rooted due to saturated ground and the steak not being able to find purchase. We fixed the fallen tent and noticed the tent had reached it's saturation point. We had small drops falling in. Nothing too serious just enough to make the blanket damp in a few spots. Once daylight came and we could see better we noticed a puddle. We think it came between the awning and the front door where there is a small gap and the wind much have been just right to allow the water to run right in. All in all we had a dry camp considering how much rain there was. We got out of bet about 7 am and dilly dallied and enjoyed the morning. Promptly at 8:03 am it stared raining again. Hard. Scott sent me and a shivering Suzie into the tent while he packed everything up. Then I put Suz in the car and helped Scott tear down the tent. We were packed and heading down the mountain by 8:41 am. Our goal was to come down the mountain about 9 or 10 am so we were right on schedule. Vernal was having rain so we piled everything on the deck and will dry everything out Monday. What a smokey, muddy mess we are! 

It was fun nonetheless. It is so wonderful to unplug and detach and just breathe mountain air.