Thought I would share some pictures from my solo trip over 5 days. I look forward to these solo trips as I can do whatever I want at my leisure and at my own whim. I also get a chance to test some new gear, work the kinks out of some existing gear and as always, find a few things that need to be improved, changed, added or deleted. In any case, it was great and rewarding time by all measures and I am looking forward to my next solo full week solo in just over a month from now.

1) First night camp. For years, this is my usual stopover spot when traveling in this particular area. It is fairly well hidden and the short trail in, is not on any map that I have ever seen. The campfire ring has been there for about 10 years perhaps longer and although I have a love/hate thing with stone campfire rings, I will usually make use of it, however I will not make a new ring just for the sake of having a fire. There is just enough room here for a small tent and thats about it.




2) Night time on the river. This was around 9:20 pm.



3) Just after day break, around 6:10 am.



4) Some scenery in the area that is accesible by old FSR roads then hiking up to. This high country sees snow on the ground until August. The snow on many of these surrounding mountains though is year round.



5) The other side of the pass at about 3400'. This is the same pass I wrote about in a post here a few weeks ago.



6) The .gov and forestry service provide rudimentary and bare bones campsites. Many times, it may just be a fire ring and spot for a tent. One good thing about many of these campsites is that they are isolated and see little to no people at all. This particular camp just had a fire ring and a spot for the tent. Without building a large fire, the grill is too high to be all that effective so a little improvising helps to lower the kettle to be much closer to the flame.



7) Another camp spot. I had hiked up an old and overgrown trail(s) to this spot. It was almost 3 hours of sweat filled exertion that I would not want to do again...I pitched camp here in an old fire break which was exposed to the hot sun (around 90F) but had a nice breeze to keep the mosquitoes mostly at bay. The only other choice would be to find a shaded area in the trees but be eaten alive...In any case I rigged up the sil-tarp and I always carry 100' of nylon rope which comes in very handy when there are no nearby tie down points. I then put some surveyors tape on the rope to make it more visible so that I did not close-line myself in the dark if and when I got chased by a bear, sasquatch or a couger...and I am not referring to the 4 legged cougars.



8) The view from here was great. This is the front view. Notice the dark clouds rolling in? That was another reason for the sil-tarp as it did rain later that day.



9) Backyard view facing roughly NE.