Wednesday, October 28, 2020

Late Season Car Camping

Back in September, my husband and I agreed to try and spend one weekend outdoors, car camping, each month until the weather prevented us. Over the course of the pandemic, we've discovered that it's very important for us to have some time out of the studio apartment. And there's just something really restful about sleeping outdoors, especially when it's colder outside. 

Since it tends to be a bit colder in October, we chose a lower elevation destination. Still a bit high, but not up in the mountains. We went to the Murphy Hot Springs area near the Nevada border. It's right near the start of the Idaho Centennial Trail, so I'd been near there before, but this time we were going to drive down into the canyon and see if we could find the hot springs. 

Well, the hot springs are closed for Covid-19 - not an unexpected outcome. But there were a few BLM campsites available, and we chose Juniper Grove. The campsite was quite windy when we arrived near lunch, but also lovely. The East Fork Jarbridge River flowed by right next to the site, close enough to hear the water burbling over rocks. And we had the site mostly to ourselves at this time of year. 

I'd imagine it would be more crowded in the summer, when the spot would probably provide a cool relief during hot summer days. In autumn, it would have been too chilly without the dappled sunshine. We managed though - in part because we learned from our September trip that bringing tea and bouillon cubes would be helpful to keep warm. Whenever either of us got too chilly, we'd just boil up some water and slurp down something hot. 

The night was cold, but we both slept really well and woke up super refreshed. I hope we can find a good spot to camp in November; we're probably going to need some restful sleep right around the first weekend of the month. 







Yup, there was a pit toilet - thank goodness.



And the whole place smelled delightfully of Juniper.



What curious mushrooms, bursting from the trunk of the juniper.





The tent is firmly staked out to beat the wind - which did die out after dark.

A good spot to relax - achieved! 

Wednesday, October 21, 2020

Skillern September 2020 Day 2

We slept in. I didn't set an alarm or anything. The plan was just to get up when we got up and go from there. We had an easy 3 miles back to the car; no need to rush. 

I woke earlier than I would have hoped, but not much earlier than I expected, considering my bladder tends to wake me up before I'm done sleeping. I got up to water the bushes, and I was very quiet. Then I got back to the tent and was startled by the sight of the hikers from last night headed our way. 

I had made a point of showing my friend how I would put the pot on a carabiner hanging right outside my door. The idea is, if anything scares me in the night, I can just hit it and make a racket that would scare most animals away. 

Well, I managed to make quite a racket when I saw those hikers approaching, and I woke her up. I apologized and told her they were coming by. They headed up Skillern Creek, along a trail I've taken before. In fact, that's the trail where an elk cow came charging at Ambrose and I, only to stop, regard us for a minute, and then turn off the trail and cross the creek. 

She accepted my apology for waking her, and we both tried to fall back asleep. Tried being the operative word here. Neither of ended up falling back asleep, and after nearly an hour of desultory chatting, we agreed it was time for breakfast. 

Now, I hadn't specifically recommended that she bring a down jacket. Those things aren't cheap and I didn't know if she had one. I've got one for backpacking that I had with me, and I knew from my earlier trip outside the tent that it was pretty chilly. Too chilly, in my opinion, for her to wear just a fleece. So I told her to take the down quilt that she'd slept in outside and use it as a cloak. Not ideal, but sufficiently warm for the task. 

I got the ursack from where I'd tied it, about halfway between our backside campsite and the frontside campsite. Then it was time to do breakfast. We had talked about how much she loves coffee, so I decided to make her a big coffee. Well, technically, this was powdered instant espresso - my go to coffee these days. If she hadn't told me black coffee was her preference earlier in the week, I would have bought some instant latte powder, but this morning's coffee would be black. 

Naturally, I made the coffee first. Priorities! Then I did the Mountain House Raspberry Crumble. 

Now, you might say to yourself, isn't that a dessert, not a breakfast? 

And to that I say, breakfast is the first meal of the day, no matter what it happens to be composed of. If leftover pizza can qualify as breakfast, then so too can a dessert. Plus, it's not like this is much different from eating a Pop Tart for breakfast. 

While we waited for the raspberry sauce to finish rehydrating, I made my friend get up and walk a little bit. Not too far, just far enough so that we could look in the direction of the hot spring and she could see the steam rising up. I love when it's cool enough to see that steam rising, betraying the location of the spring that could otherwise be hidden. 

Having something hot and sweet to eat first thing in the morning, especially when it's chilly, is such a treat. The lunch and dinner from the previous day were packed individually, but this one we had to share a bag. I told her the tactic that Ambrose and I use - choose a number of bites to take and then alternate. I said three bites first, but then I took my first bite. It was very sweet, very rich and still quite hot, so I revised to two bites. 

A motorcycle roared up the trail at one point, carrying a man and a woman. They parked it by the trail, and then walked up the Skillern Creek trail. They were clearly hunting; the man carried a compound bow and both wore camo. I told them there were some more hunters that had headed up that way earlier this morning and wished them good luck. 

After breakfast, we talked some more while finishing up the coffee. Then it was time to break camp. I had her get the water this time to fill the dirty water bag, and then she got to filter her own water. We took the tent down together, folded it, and I started to stuff it in the bag to show her how it was done and then let her finish stuffing it in. 

I'm really not very good at keeping surprises secret. I told her about the "secret" roadside hot spring the night before while we were at the Skillern hot spring. And I told her as we were packing up about my intention to give her the pack that I had loaned her. It was the second backpacking pack that I ever bought, and I learned a lot from it about what I didn't want in a pack. But I never ended up using it very much, and I wanted her to have it and use it. 

When we were ready to hike out, I told her I wanted her to pick whether we did the high road or the low road on the way back. I mean, I would make the safety call - if the crossing on this side did not look good to me, I would veto and we'd take the high road. But it was up to her if we tried. 

We hiked on past Skillern Creek, and I noticed something hanging in the trees to the creek side of the trail. Several bags were up there; I figured it was from the hikers from last night, though I couldn't figure out why they'd store gear in the trees here. 


Goodbye, hot springs!


Never seen a tree growing so much gear before ;)





At the junction of low road and high road, my friend picked the low road, and I grinned. I'd never gone that way before, and it was so special to me that I'd get to experience something for the first time with this friend, on this trip. 

The junction is far enough from the first crossing that you can't see it. We had to walk a bit farther before I could take a look at the crossing and determine its safety. The depth was reasonable, ankle to mid-calf, and not too fast flowing. I deemed it safe, but told her that I would go first to demonstrate how to cross safely. 

We both adjusted shoes before crossing. She had brought shoes specifically for stream crossings, and I was taking off my socks and the liner from my shoe. We also needed to lengthen our trekking poles a bit, and then put packs back on. I explained that while I learned from Ambrose that you should do stream crossings without fastening the pack straps, that there were arguments to be made for keeping it fastened. See, if it's unfastened and you fall, you can easily bail out from the pack rather than letting it drag you into a drowning situation. But an unfastened pack balances differently from a fastened one, so crossing with it unfastened can impact your balance, and with a crossing this shallow, a fall would just get you wet. This creek was not sweeping anyone our size away any time soon. 

For demonstration's sake, I did leave my pack unfastened at this first crossing. The flow was low and slow enough that I had to remind myself to demonstrate good technique instead of just forging forward. Good technique dictates maintaining three points of contact at all times, moving only one foot or trekking pole at a time, and I mostly did that on this crossing. 

Then it was my friend's turn. I took pictures, of course, but I also decided that I could do a video. I don't often do videos because that mode drains my camera battery at a terrifying rate, but we were headed home and I didn't need to conserve. I managed to turn the video on at exactly the perfect time.  


Once we were both across, I suggested fastening our packs and leaving on the crossing shoes - if they were comfortable enough to hike in. I figured we would be crossing back soon enough and it would be a pain in the butt to put everything back only to have to take it off again. Little did I know how smart that choice would turn out to be. 

The low road was quite pretty. Less exposed of course, and through forest instead of up on the side of a hill. I saw thimble berry bushes, but the only remaining berries were wizened and not good examples of the berry. 

Much sooner than I expected, there was a crossing. But it was not the crossing I expected. It was at the wrong angle and way too soon. I could see that the trail it crossed to was not the trail near the junction. Instead, the trail snugged up under the high road for a stretch and then crossed back again. 

The third crossing was probably the most challenging. A large rock had contributed to form a deep pool that we had to avoid, and even where we crossed it was deeper than the other crossings. But she got across with no problems. 

There were a few camping spots along the trail, including at least one fire ring. Over all, I rather liked it. It would certainly be a cooler hike than the high road, which could be nice in hot weather. Really, we should have taken the low road in when it was hot and the high road out in the cold, but it worked out. 

We could hear a motorcycle when we got close to the last crossing. She headed out first (as she had for every crossing after the first one), and I waited off the trail in case the motorcycle came by.

When we finished the last crossing, we sat down and got our hiking shoes set up again. She had boots to put on, and I had socks to put on and liners to put in my shoes. The shoes are not waterproofed, so they shed water pretty quickly. And I squeezed them a bit to get the excess water out. My feet were still pretty damp for hiking, but nothing I couldn't handle for a couple miles. 

The Low Road

Careful crossing demonstration.

Successful first ford!

The low road is rather pretty.

Crossing number 2.

Hazy light reflecting on the water of crossing 2. 


That rock made a deep spot in the water.


Not too deep to ford!

It only came up to my knees.

Campsite along the low road.

Last crossing!

Very hazy still.



We continued to hike, not running into too much of interest on the way. Except for when I saw an orange thing in the trees and had to go investigate. I like to bring litter out of the forest, but this was a broken orange bucket filled with dried cement or something like it. Too heavy for me to carry, especially on a trail where motorcycles can much more easily reach and pack such a thing out. 

All dry and back on the main trail.


What's over there? Well, there's a bucket... but why? Beats me.

Just before we got to the trailhead, we saw someone hiking out. The man was alone, but it was his pack animals that drew our attention. We both wanted to take pictures, but my friend wasn't sure of the etiquette, so I just asked him if we could take a picture of his pack train. 

Because I've seen pack goats here in Idaho, and I've seen pack horses, but I'd never, until that day, seen pack llamas. 

Llamas!!

Whoop! She made it!

Back at the car, we got ready for the roadside hot spring. Her swimsuit had dried sufficiently from the night before, and I was just going to wear my bra and underwear, because that's the way I roll. But I did make sure my clothes for afterwards were accessible from the front seat. 

We also unpacked the other loaner gear from her pack so as to be ready for her to take the pack home. Then, after a grateful visit to the pit toilet (well, my visit was grateful), it was time to hit the road. I still wasn't paying much attention to the time, and that felt great. 

I was paranoid about missing the spring, but the sign really helps in that respect. She swung the car around so as to be parked facing the correct way, and then we got out. I went ahead to put the plug in the spring - there's a plug that's left out so the tub stays low, and I put it back in to bring the water level up.

That spring is pretty small. Two people who like each other can fit in it, maybe three if they're all really close. Or really small. We sat next to each other on the spring's bench; it's a bit slimy, but I just ignore that. 

There were huge dragonflies dancing around us, with an orange-ish color that I didn't recall seeing before. And a hawk perched on a tree across the road at one point. A few cars drove by, but most of them didn't notice us. The parked car, sure, they probably saw that, but in the spring we were not very visible. 



The hot spring was hotter than Skillern had been. We got out before overheating, but just barely. I had to go chug some water right after; it really made me realize how dry I'd gotten. We got dressed and then it was back to the car. 

Once we hit Fairfield, it was easy to see that the smoke was worse than the day before. Foothills disappeared into the haze. The view was constricted, quite unlike how it usually is. I kept taking pictures to show Ambrose, because I knew he'd appreciate how smoky it was from what he couldn't see. 

After a while, I put on some music from my phone. I wanted to share some of my music with her, and some of the songs sparked conversation. At one point, I learned that she had not heard of They Might Be Giants, and so I had to put on one of their albums (Severe Tire Damage). I was only a little self conscious of my singing along. It's something that I love doing, and I have a hard time NOT singing along when I hear a song I like. 

She got me safely home, and she talked about how she wants to bring her boyfriend out to Skillern. I was so happy to have had a successful trip, so much so that she wants to pass on that experience to someone else. I guess that's how backpackers are made. 

Wednesday, October 14, 2020

Skillern September 2020 Day 1

For a few years now, a co-worker and I had been talking about taking a backpacking trip together. She had only ever been on one backpacking trip, and it did not go very well, due to a combination of factors including smoke. Nothing I could do about making the weather be not smoky, but I really wanted to put together a nice short trip that would wipe that bad experience away. 

Naturally, my first thought was of Skillern Hot Springs. Not only is it a short hike out (about 3 miles), a well-maintained trail, and with a hot spring at the campsite, but it was where Ambrose took me for my first backpacking trip. I knew it could be a great experience; I just had to figure out how to pull that off while being the one in charge! 

In some ways, the trip started before either of us left the house. We coordinated what gear she had and what gear I'd be able to loan out about a week in advance. I was providing meals; she drove - a nice opportunity to get her Subaru onto some dirt roads. And on a Saturday morning, we met up at my place, got her packed in the pack I was loaning her and headed out. 

It isn't a super long drive from Boise to the trailhead at the Canyon Transfer Camp. We chatted the whole way, some about the trip to come, but more about work and life. With the pandemic making us work remotely since March, it was actually the first time we've seen each other in person for nearly six months. I half expected to feel a little awkward, but I didn't. 

The drive was uneventful; I was glad that she is what I consider a safe driver. When I'm in the car with an unsafe driver, I get very anxious. There's a "secret" hot spring on the road that didn't have a sign when I first went to Skillern. I figured now that there's a sign, it wouldn't be a surprise, but we drove by the sign without her noticing it, so I would get to surprise her! 

When we got to Canyon Transfer Camp, we parked and took care of some business at the trailhead before hiking out. It wasn't crowded, but there was one truck parked in the lot, and several of the campsites farther from the trailhead were occupied. 




I had been mentally preparing to restrain myself to a slow pace, but that turned out to be not at all necessary. She led the way with a great pace that I actually had a little trouble keeping up with before I got warmed up.

We hiked out a bit less than a mile before stopping to cook lunch. I picked a spot where we'd get some shade and led the way off the trail. I was looking for a spot that was decently flat, shaded, and didn't have too much debris. The spot we ended up at mostly fulfilled those, and had the bonus of being right next to Big Smoky Creek so we were able to enjoy the water with lunch, which was Mountain House Chicken a La King. 

So nice not to be the only one with a camera :)


We saw a snake!


And spotted a bird.

Properly fueled, we continued on the trail. There's a spot where this particular trail splits, and you can choose to take the high road or the low road. Going high, which is the only route that I've ever taken, you have to do some steep climbing, and the trail can be a bit scary if you look down too much, because it's very exposed. Going low, you have stream crossings, and, in years past, the first one has always looked way too deep for me to cross. 

This year, the low road stream did not look too deep, so I decided to keep an eye on the far side and then consider offering the option of low road for the way back. The way out, I definitely wanted to go high, in part to stay dry, and in part because I knew that route. 

She successfully climbed and conquered the high road, and the far side stream crossing looked sufficiently low to make an attempt the next day. 

I always seem to be surprised by how far it is from the end of the high road to Skillern Creek. I expect it to be right there, but it isn't. There's a good bit of walking before the trail crosses Skillern Creek. When we got there, I was glad to see that the water was low enough for us to use logs and rocks to cross. Score again for staying dry. 







We chose the back campsite and I started leading her through camp chores. I tried to be conscious of talking through the steps for the chores, and I included her in them. Like with inflating the sleeping pads; it turns out that my new sleeping pad's pump bag fits on my old sleeping pad, so neither of us had to blow, but we each inflated our own. Once that stuff was complete, on to getting water. I demonstrated how the life straw works, and how the Sawyer filter works. We used the Sawyer for this trip since it is easier to get water in bulk that way, but the life straw was her personal filtration and she needed to know how to use it. 

After we'd completed chores, it was still too warm to head to the hot springs. I hadn't been able to banish the smoky weather, though it wasn't too bad. So we headed over to where Skillern Creek crosses the trail and sat with our feet in the water and talked. A tiny little fish came by and provided minutes of entertainment with its antics. A couple of motorcycles went by, but we were off the trail enough that we didn't need to move for them. 

Then, when it had cooled a bit, we headed over to the hot springs. I must admit, I hadn't been there in a while, so there were new developments. New little trails down to the springs, a new tub... I took the wrong little trail down, but did point out which she should take if she comes back. 

Part of the magic of the Skillern hot springs is that you have to climb over rocks, and it looks like you aren't going anywhere, and then POOF! Like magic, you find a pool that is hidden from the trail above and has a view to the water below. 

The water was cooler than I prefer, but it was just right for my friend. Usually, I'm at a hot spring with my husband, and he will always be the one to say it's time to go. This time, I was at a hot spring with a fellow bathing aficionado. We stayed for more than 2 hours before my stomach grumbles became too loud to ignore and I, yes I, was the one to say we had to leave. 






Can you see our entertaining fishy friend? 

That inflation bag is called the Schnozzle Bag. 

Totally new addition to the Skillern hot springs.


POOF!

Truly, a great pool.

Back at camp, we got right to cooking dinner (Mountain House Chicken and Dumplings), and thence to eating. We continued to talk over the meal and after, until I got cold enough that I wanted to retreat into the tent. And we continued to talk in there, even after it got dark. 

Even the smoke couldn't bring us down at the hot springs.

Right around when we were going to go to sleep, we noticed a light coming from the direction of the trail. It was late to be getting company, but company we were getting. If I were by myself, I might have just ignored it. If I were with Ambrose, I probably would have ignored it. But I was with someone on a what was essentially a first trip. I made the call to go over and say hello, because if we said hello, we could see who the company was and show them we were here and unafraid. 

We walked up to one guy sitting at the side of the trail just as several other headlamps started flashing from the trail. Said hello, explained where we were camped, and wished them a good trip. I think they were surprised to see us, but they were polite. 

And then we went to bed. And to sleep.