Amenities

Exploring our campsite the next morning, I was quite taken with the CCC camp we were next to. They were camping there while doing trail work so we hardly saw any of them. They got back to camp in the evening and were usually asleep by the time we finished dinner. What caught my eye was their hot water heater. That's a 40 (?) gallon garbage pail over the fire, and a chimney with spark arrester on top!

Up the trail in the background are the scenic restrooms. They offer a lovely view: 360 degrees! They are shielded by the trees, but little else. In actuality, of course, they are nothing more than a seat over a pit. Hey. This is real camping, after all. We're in the back country. Scenery is everything.

Even better, though: we had running water! Not in the privies, but where it counts: the kitchen and the horse trough. There's a natural, 365 day spring. The water is delicious.

Speaking of delicious, so was our food. Thanks to Shannon's inventiveness we ate well indeed. First night she kept it simple, and we had spaghetti. With venison. Delicious with salad and some garlic bread. It was so windy that she used a Coleman stove inside the tiny bunkhouse. There are four bunks, but most of us slept outside for the night.

The first night was restless. The wind was strong, making the tents flap alarmingly. The horses don't like wind, so they were moving around the pasture a lot: hoofbeats all night. False dawn really looked like dawn, so I slept fitfully from then on, grateful for a nice warm sleeping bag. I wasn't getting out unless I had to.

By daylight we could see the lupine in camp: all blue, but some were pinker than others. On my computer screen I can tell the difference, but  I am noticing that colors once posted  to the blog are less than stunning. So click to biggify, as always, and enjoy! Hint: first pic is the pinker variety.