the campings

ok, so at this point i have pictures and videos and stuff and it's just honking pointless for me to try to put this stuff in any kind of sensible order for you people, so i'm just going to post is as it's ready.

by now i am home from my thanksgiving campings.

i stayed for two weeks on site 4, which you can look up on the map if you want.

i chose site 4 very carefully, since at thanksgiving you can pick any campsite you like, because nobody is camping but you, not even on the popular sites.

i wanted to stay somewhere close to a boat launch, because in cold weather things can go very bad very fast and i am still sort of experimentally camping in this way. none of the sites near the moscow launch were suitable because some poor sites to begin with, some are a forty minute paddle from the boat launch, and at that end of the reservoir it gets dark mighty early in the day on account of the placement of the mountains, and many of the sites offer very little protection from the wind.

also you never know when the channel will freeze. and how much would that suck?

yeah, and the sites off the dam boat launch are either poor sites with no outhouse, or a pretty far paddle over the widest and choppiest section of the res, so even though site 7 had good protections from the wind, it was not a top choice.

which really narrow down the practical choices to sites 3, 4, 5, and 6.

4, 5, and 6 are pretty well sheltered from the wind, but a little slopier than i like in a tent site.
. 3 is acceptably sheltered and the prettiest site, but it poses some difficulty for making dry foot landings with the boats, and in november and december you really WANT to be able to make dry foot landings.


only sites 3 and 4 have outhouses. ok, so site 4 it is then.

site 4 is less roomy than a lot of the sites. to compound this closed in effect, it has recently had a large amount of blowdown to the extent that the crew that built the outhouse had to go in with a chainsaw and make a path.

they did not really clear the blowdowns, nor the brushpiles.

this was actually an asset in my eyes.

first, i love to have a project.

second, that is a LOT of free firewood, even if you have to work for it.