Memorial Weekend Campout - Part I

Three days after we returned from Salt Lake and the family visit, we headed out on the first campout of the summer. Wahoo!! I have so many cool pictures that it's hard to decide which ones to post. So that I can get more in (without being too boring) I've broken up the post into parts.

Campout 2007 #1: Part 1 - From Byers Lake to Chatanika

After work on Wednesday (the 22nd), I headed home to pack some clothes and help finish packing what was left. We ended up hitting the road a few hours later than anticipated, but made it to the first stop (Byers Lake) before midnight. Set up only necessities, & started a fire. It had been raining so things were a bit damp, but it was still an enjoyable evening.

Mossy Tree at Byers Lake

Mossy Tree up Close

The next morning, we headed North. Destination: Chatanika - which is about 40 miles outside Fairbanks (which is about 350 miles north of Anchorage). Before getting there, we stopped at a Memorial Site - fitting, since this is the weekend before Memorial Day. Very awe-inspiring and humbling. We never would have known the place was there, except that Greg & Brian were reading the Milepost and watching for caches. (A great benefit to GeoCaching is that you end up places you've never been before...) I'll have to look up the name of the place and add it as a note to Part II.

Memorial

View from Memorial

Interesting Flora at Memorial

From there, we drove to Cantwell and had lunch... we were *starving* and the food really hit the spot! When we left home, it was cloudy and threatening rain. The farther North we drove, the clearer the skies were and we had much warmer temps! By the time we hit Fairbanks, temps were close to 80 (leaving home, they were around 50) and there was blue sky everywhere... a good omen for our trip!

View just outside Fairbanks

Eek! A Bee!!

Greg & Brian stopped at Freddie's in Fbx to get some missing supplies, and the rest of us headed off to our new site: Upper Chatanika. Once we were unpacked, it was fire time! And time to think of dinner - Hobo Dinner, to be exact. Ya know: hamburger, potato, carrots, & onions wrapped together in tinfoil and set in the coals. Mmmmm.

Enough for now - I'll post Part II tomorrow, since it's almost 11pm and I'm still catching up on sleep... =)