Father's Day Camping

I married a camping man.  I don't think I could have married a man who was NOT a camping man, as it was such an integral part of my upbringing.  When we married, the majority of things on our registry were camping/outdoor gear.  I guess that says it all.  For Father's Day, he again wanted to spend his special day away from people and in the mountains.  Easy enough! That was a win-win for all.  Hailey started showing the tiniest symptoms of a cold the day before we left, but it wasn't too bad.  Unfortunately, she was pretty dang sick on that first day.  Sore throat, lots of head congestion, lethargy, etc.  It's silly now days that people flinch so easily at the first sign of a virus.  People fail to remember that viruses of millions of varieties live in great abundance all around us; viruses that are not COVID-19.  And for most of us, our immune systems are fantastic at [eventually] fighting off everything that comes our way. And our best line of defense is constant exposure.  So, Hailey had to simply fight this off, which she did over the course of a few days.  Lucky for her, it got her out of a lot of camping duties such as setting up, cooking, cleaning, gathering wood, starting fires, and breaking camp.  She spent a lot of time lying in the hammock and just chilling.

We camped again at one of our favorite spots in the Cache National Forest.  Absolutely beautiful mountains and river.  I hated that we only had three days, but Cody couldn't take any more time off work.  We spent all of Sunday setting up and getting our kitchen in order.  I've been doing this for so long that I have a camp kitchen system down to a science.  We made tin-foil dinners and wittled skinny tree branches for roasting sticks.   

Who needs matches when you have flint, steel, and a Chudda?

Cody wanted to defend his title as "Smart Ass Champion."  And late into the night, he did just that.  He's quick and has a wealth of useless trivia swimming around in his brain.  I, on the other hand, am extremely analytical and over-think things, so I'm not nearly as fast.  Cody seems to live by Acoms Razor.  If it seems like something simple, it probably is.  It's probably the most likely and simplest answer.  And so he wins every dang time. 

It got pretty cold at night, and like I always do camping (and every other night of my life), I didn't sleep all that well.  But we still got up and made breakfast burritos and hash browns for breakfast, and ate way too much. 

After lunch, we set out for a hike up the canyon.  Hailey, of course, stayed behind and not wanting her to be alone in the wilderness, Ethan was assigned to stay with her.  He wasn't too keen on hiking that day, so it turned out fine.  And then Devin decided to stay back as well, because he'd caught a silk worm and was busy making it a home.  The hike we chose ended up being incredibly steep and arduous.  Lucky for me, the round of steroids I'd finished the week before was still lingering in my system, so my lungs did exceptionally well.  Two years prior when we did this hike, I had a massive asthma attack shortly after starting.  This time, I was prepared.  I was incredibly proud of Chudda for wanting to go, even though she was very worried about her hand.  She'd been hiking two weeks before and had a terrible accident with her hand when a boulder fell on it. This time, there was no such incident. It was about three miles up, and when I say "up," I really mean it.  It was nothing but steep lactic acid inducing switch-backs.  But like most difficult hikes, it made for the most incredible views and reward.  But poor Angus.  His little legs kept going and going and going but when we made it down to the base, he just stopped and looked at us like, "You expect me to walk all the way back to camp now?!" He stood there, not wanting to take another step, and I couldn't blame him. 

We were going to do Hawaiian Haystacks for dinner, but we were pretty beat.  So hotdogs it was.  No one complained.  While there was still enough sun in the sky, we took our poles down to this place on the river just beyond the dam where the water is fairly still.  No one caught anything, but it was still a lot of fun. I think my favorite part of camping is after the sun goes down and it's just the campfire, marshmallows, and conversation.  When we finally retired to bed, we still didn't want the night to end so we played several rounds of Bullshit and Uno.  Ethan slept in his own tent (because he's going through that phase of wanting to pretend like he's a lone man in this world) and he went to his tent while the rest of us stayed up and played games and talked.  

The next morning, it was pancakes, bacon, and sausage.  Is there anything better than the smell of breakfast being cooked over an open fire?  I don't think there is.  We eventually had to break camp, and we hated to do so.  We kind of dragged it out as long as we could.  But still not wanting the time to end, we made a stop at Crystal Hot Springs on the way home.  It was kind of spur-of-the-moment, and we had no place to put Angus.  Ethan didn't feel like swimming in the mineral pools (I can't blame him- it was hot and they stunk like an old penny) so he stayed outside and kept Angus company.  We eventually made it home and I've spent the last two days unpacking, inventorying, and re-organizing all our hear.  Next time, we will go for longer.  It's so much work that two nights doesn't suffice! 

I'm always a beauty camping in the morning!  Ha ha.