Sunny with a slight chance of bears

It’s amazing the excuses one can find before venturing out on a camping trip.
“Says here slight chance of rain. What if we’re cooped up in the tent?”
“Where will we find a spot? It’s the 4th of July weekend and it’s going to be packed.”
“Lows are going to be around 40 – you sure the kids are going to handle this?”

Sometimes you just have to pack up and go, welcoming any discomfort in return for fresh air, open flames, an excuse to get dirty, and the invigorating threat of a bear attack. And so we did last Saturday, pitching camp at Shingle Creek campground along the scenic byway that is, uh, Mirror Lake Scenic Byway. Shortly after arriving, the kids busied themselves picking out the lumpiest possible spot for our tent while I jogged off to pay the site master. When I got back, they had already laid out the tent and were alternately confused and amused by the folding bungee-pole system. Considering our last (and their only) tenting experience was last summer in our backyard, I patiently explained every step in tentsmanship, including the physics behind arch tensile strength and how to put the plastic bone thingy through the loop to hold the door flap thingy open.

Meanwhile, Annie was readying our first outdoor meal of the day, sandwiches and chips, a meal which the children refused to accept on account of it not being prepared in a fire.
Kids: “Why can’t we start the fire yet?”
Me: “It’s 82 and sunny...”
Kids: “Can we start the fire now, pleeeease?”
Me: “We didn’t bring enough wood for a 10 hour fire watch, so no.”
Kids: “Can we just make a little fire out of these sandwiches?”
Me: “Well… er, no.”

Camping puts me in a wild kind of spirit. For example, I had my shirt off before I even helped with the tent, to prove how manly and protective I could be against the bears. This photo of me slouched in an uncomfortable folding chair just does not do my physique justice. Immediately the kids felt more at ease, while Annie was like “nice try dude” and tiny boy inside her was like “thanks for nothin’, wimp.” But I ask all witnesses: did any bears show up?

We milled around the site, grabbing kindling and extra wood for later and reading books or answering “no” to fire questions until Annie’s sister Heather and hubby Jake and son Emmett arrived. They brought additional, more comfortable chairs as well as a unique sleeping device called an “air mattress.” I would envy them later that night, at 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 o’clock in the AM, or every time I rolled over the giant tree stump under the tent. Or heard the faint crackling of a stick in the woods, a sure sign of lurking bears.

The afternoon got more exciting as we secured camp and headed 20 miles up the road (in vehicles) to the Lower Provo River Falls. It’s one of those rock-bottom river beds cascading down the mountain, like something you’d see in a movie. But it’s not your run-of-the-mill scenic overlook because while there is a small platform with a guardrail, there is also plenty of open space on which to run around and access to the river. So we spent almost 2 hours there. The kids saw a couple teenagers (they now classify anything they witness a “teenager” doing as either cool or dangerous) crossing the river at one flat spot and climbing up the wall on the other side. Of course, Preston wanted to try it and after I cycled through more excuses not to do it, we did it. He managed the slippery rock bottom and strong current on his own while Zoey held my hand across. We ended up making it okay with no ouchies!

The rest of the trip involved lots of fire tending, some hiking around the campground, stick wielding, log-bridge crossing, marshmallow rationing, and as I mentioned before, little to no sleep. But we made it. No bears attacked, we woke up and made campers’ eggs and oatmeal, and headed home to recover.

Later that night – as it was the 4th of July – we let the kids do some cracker-jack fireworks in the common area by our pool. Once we bought them they simply could not wait to strike matches and argue about whose spark fountain was better, so all incendiaries were burned out before dusk came. It wasn’t even dim. White and blue and pink showers of sparks, 3 feet off the ground in broad daylight. The true celebration of Independence Day, I guess.

Mountains Do

I primarily want to share some pictures and stories from several trips I took in July. We spent too much time in a car out of necessity, but lots of time outdoors on hiking trails, near mountain lakes and rivers, and had beautiful weather throughout. I spent more hours on roads called “Scenic Byways” than I ever had in my life. To me, scenic byways are code for “you may drive off a cliff because you can’t stop staring at the beautiful mountain scenery.”

The first weekend trip was to Annie’s mom’s log cabin in the Uinta Mountains. It’s a true log cabin, and it’s way off the beaten path. I had been up there back in January to go snowmobiling, where you can only actually get there via snowmobile. Since it’s summer, Annie’s plucky Jetta got us up the winding dirt roads with ease, although it’s much better suited to a 4x4 truck. The kids were troopers on the easy-to-medium difficulty hikes we did. At a gorgeous spot called Scout Lake, the kids ventured out onto some shallow rocks, when I spotted a little fish, maybe about 6”. It looked like it was frozen in place, not moving even the slightest. So the kids and I looked closer, and we could tell it was ensnared in some fishing line, wrapped around a stick. Zoey and Preston crept out closer, prodding the stick, and the fish would start straining against the line. Zoey got brave and dragged the stick out of the water, but it became clear the fishing line had cut into the fish’s belly and he wasn’t going to make it. So we left it. The kids were sad. After hiking around the lake a bit more, we were crossing that same spot when a seagull swooped down and nabbed that little dying fish right out of the water! It’s the circle of life, it’s the wheel of fortune…

The following weekend, Annie and I packed up my car and we headed up to Grand Tetons National Park for some tent camping, rafting, and hiking. The drive itself was great. The scenic byway on this trip included some 8% and 10% grades between eastern Idaho and Jackson, WY. Speaking of Idaho, we passed not 15 miles from Preston, ID – the setting for Napoleon Dynamite. We thought about stopping to play some tether ball, but we decided to keep chewing up miles instead. Jackson is a great mountain town, mixing the super-rich with real life cowboys.

As we entered the park, signs everywhere told us we were either going to burn down the forest, or get eaten by bears. This was going to be awesome! The bear threat level was Reddish-Orange. Fortunately, we found about the last available campsite in the park (after stopping at several others and getting sent away like so much touristy bother), which was at Lizard Creek on the north end of GTNP. Relieved to be out of the car, we cooked dinner on our small, controlled fire in the designated fire pit, then stashed everything back in the car. As I lay in the tent, I heard every crack of a stick or rustle of leaves clearly; sure the bears were going to find us among the 50 or so campsites.

Saturday morning, we packed up early, and drove south through the park, stopping along the lakes and several scenic spots. Our goal was to get a more desirable campsite, then go rafting. Annie knew of a campsite east of the park, in the Wasatch-Cache National Forest, but as we approached, it showed “NO FIRES”. So we backtracked to a site in the park called Gros Ventre (pronounced ‘gro vont’). It’s named after a river, and roughly translates to “Slightly less threat of getting eaten by bears”. After reserving our site, we headed back to Jackson, and got hooked up with Dave Hansen’s Whitewater, getting the last 2 seats on a 16 person raft. With several hours to kill, we walked around downtown Jackson. Thirsty, we stopped into one of those country-boy bars next to the rafting office. I swear, everyone there stared at us like we were aliens. After a longer-than-expected bus ride to the drop in point, we hit the water for my first rafting experience. It was somewhat of a joy-ride tour, mixed with four or five lower class rapids. The best part was a long stretch of calm river, where most of us just jumped in and floated next to the raft. Quite refreshing. We were pretty exhausted once we got back to our site, but had time to cook some bratwurst, corn, and chili on the fire. Being several miles east of the mountains, we had a great sunset view, too.

Sunday, we packed up and headed back into the park. After some much needed coffee and bagels, we visited the Jenny Lake campsite and took the ferry across the lake to some cool hiking trails and river falls. We decided to hike back, rather than boat, and the 2+ mile hike was tougher than expected, with lots of rocky terrain and hills. Best workout I’ve had in months. With legs slightly burning, we stopped at a great little pizza place in Jackson on the way out of town. We made awesome time on the way back to SLC, only stopping once in Blackfoot, ID. Sadly, we saw no bears during the trip. But we did see a heard of bison!

I gotta do more camping. It forces me to be outside and do things I wouldn’t normally do. We have at least 7 national parks within an easy drive from Salt Lake, so I’m sure it will become a more frequent part of my summers here.
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