Travels with Walter: The Cold Season

Walter on the cold camping trip

Wow, time just sort of flies by. It has been an unusual winter. Bilateral knee surgery in December put a damper on my normal winter activities. I am not even sure what I did over the past 4 months. I went on one VERY cold camping trip in January and a sort of cabining trip in February (or was it March?). No skiing or snowshoeing. I guess I have been too scared of mucking up my knees. But the days are growing longer and warmer. We have had an early Spring in the Inland Empire and I am ready to party. If it were not for the wind, cold water and the fact that I have only had one day off since the beginning of April I would have been out in the canoe this last week (with wetsuit on, of course...I'm not completely insane).

But, I at least wanted to chronicle the few things I did manage to do this winter. Now what were they?

Our "living room". Note the space heaters and luxury items.

This is a weird little tent thing that I picked up for about $90 many years ago. It was marketed as a place to store and ATV when out camping (huh?). We slept in the Suburban though with the small heater and still froze our butts off in the 15 degree cold.

Lovely river

Arlo's first camping trip. He really had no idea what to think about it.

Day camping at Riverside State Park

Walter ready for a nap.

Tofu weenie roasting on an open fire

Really cold and windy hike out by Hog Lake. We took all four poodles and they had a blast. We were the only fools out there.

The kids found some horse poo. Yummy.

Love

Elliot found a deer bone. He carried it along for over a mile. I finally had to take it away and bury it under a rock. He was a total nut about it!

Walter and I went on a hike to a place that I cannot remember the name of. It is a county conservation area and was an old farm. We had a nice time. Found a hawk nest up in a pine tree (knew it by the mad hawk that was yelling at us).

My cute blurry boy

First time I have ever seen western blue birds out hiking. They are dazzling.

Nancy and I had to get out of town before we went crazy so we rented a cabin at Farragut State Park in Idaho. It is about the size of our bathroom, but we spent 3 wonderful nights there. We went on a couple of hikes but for some reason I did not take any pictures. Oh, well.

Spent a lot of time sewing this winter. I guess it is what you do when you get old and are recovering from knee surgery. This project is a lightweight backpacking tarp.

Here is the tarp up and in the front yard for some seam sealing.

My teepee prototype with a little fun thrown in.

I have also been fooling around with non-petroleum burning cooking devices. This is an alcohol stove made out of two aluminum cans and a cat food can as a base and pot support. I have been working on small wood burning ones too and am planning on making a small wood burning tent stove out of #10 cans. The weather is getting better though so that may be a project for next winter.