We were all safely tucked in our sleeping bags in our tents when a bear came stumbling into our campground! At least that's what I thought had happened, but it turns out the wind had turned on the motion light and the dogs were just barking at the wind since the wind was howling at them. Every time these dogs started barking I was convinced they were barking at a bear or mountain lion. Even with all the false alarms, I'd still prefer to have the dogs with me camping.
This campsite my friend found had absolutely amazing views. It was truly beautiful up there. We could see four different mountain peaks still covered in snow.
The weather was perfect. It was so nice out it was hard to believe that it was April in the mountains. We were even lucky to catch an almost full moon.
I was a Boy Scout so I know the meaning of being prepared. Here is the gear I packed.
The main reason I embarked on this early season camping trip is fire. There will inevitably be a fire ban this year due to very dry weather. I wanted to make sure I camped while we could still have a fire as a camp fire is the most important part of camping. As we spend all night around the fire, it's hard to imagine what camping would be like without a fire.
We found the fire pit safely and smartly caved in to prevent the wind from spreading a fire. We got to work digging out the fire pit. We removed a ton of ash and repositioned the rocks. My friend showed me a neat trick where you can position the rocks to create a Dutch oven.
We chose to work smart instead of hard when it came to gathering firewood. My friend tied the winch on his 4x4 around large logs and dragged them back up to the campsite to be cut by a chainsaw. This was certainly easier than gathering and cutting by hand.
After all that work we did get the fire roaring. The fire kept us warm at night and we cooked our meals on the Dutch oven we had created.
When it was time to retreat to our tents, I took a rock that was warm from the fire and placed it in the bottom of my sleeping bag to keep me warm until I fell asleep. This is a neat trick, but ultimately you wake up with a cold rock at your feet.
When we were ready to leave, we made sure to put our campfire completely out by dumping all our water on it and caving the rocks back on top of it. We were also sure to take everything we brought with us and left the campsite just as we found it.
It was a great weekend of camping and I hope to get out more this year. Thank you for letting me share my camping trip with you. I hope you enjoyed reading about it.