AzDesertRider
01-14-2008, 10:29 PM
The V-Strom?s first camping trip.
January 5th after a short Saturday, work day we (Strom & me) rode out of Yuma and up to Alamo Lake Arizona for an over night campout. The lake is about 150 miles north east of Yuma, the ride was very scenic and quite a pleasant surprise. I had a couple of bouts with very light rain during the ride and made it to the lake about 3:00pm. After arriving I toured the ranger station & the camp sites on the west end of the lake. They seemed to domesticated with paved roads & tent pads so I road over to the east side of the lake & found a dirt road that lead to some primitive camps that suited me just fine.
I set up the old Ozark Mountain (Wal-Mart) tent, and then headed back to the Ranger station to buy myself a bag of firewood, cutting or gathering you own wood was prohibited. With fire blazing, I made my dinner of cup o soup & jerky, kicked back in the new Kermit chair & enjoyed quiet solitude and fire until well after dark.
As soon as I went to bed it started to rain. After all these years, this was the first time the tent was in real rain & I was plenty worried it was gonna be a wet night! I kept checking the walls. Floors & corners, much to my surprise there were no leaks at all. It rained off & on for most of the night
On the ride out I remembered that I had forgotten to pack my current book, so I picked up a cycle trader during a fuel stop. After spending some time checking out all the perfectly good bikes people are selling I turned out the new Gaz lantern, laid back on the new Sevylor air mattress and drifted off to sleep while listing to the rain pounding on the Ozark tent. I had been asleep for a cuppla hours and at some point there was a small spot where some condensation had formed & finally dripped?hitting dead center in the middle of my forehead! Man, that?ll make you sit straight up! Moved the mattress over a little & went right back to sleep.
Sunday morning came & I was up & prepping my tent and gear for travel before sun up. I put on a pot of coffee & started working on getting the fire going. I had protected the remainder of my fire wood from rain but was having a hard time finding kindling to get it going. I decided to take a log & whittle my own kindling out of the dry wood. The plan worked perfect & I had a great fire in no time. Breakfast was fresh coffee, cup of noodle, granola bar and some jerky. Being a little bored I played with the camera & tripod for a while, getting some camping action shots of myself, (dork ...lol...) On the road by 10:am, I decided to take a detour & rode the 8 mile dirt road up to Palm Canyon to take some great Sonoran Desert pictures.
The new stove, lantern, air mattress & Kermit chair make camping a true pleasure! Not once did I feel like I was roughing it or doing with out. Gonna do another over nighter Jan 19th weekend. Alamo Lake is a great place to camp, but I can?t wait to do a multi day trip. After seeing how Keith (blues traveler) eats in camp, I will be working on expanding my dining menu on future trips.
January 5th after a short Saturday, work day we (Strom & me) rode out of Yuma and up to Alamo Lake Arizona for an over night campout. The lake is about 150 miles north east of Yuma, the ride was very scenic and quite a pleasant surprise. I had a couple of bouts with very light rain during the ride and made it to the lake about 3:00pm. After arriving I toured the ranger station & the camp sites on the west end of the lake. They seemed to domesticated with paved roads & tent pads so I road over to the east side of the lake & found a dirt road that lead to some primitive camps that suited me just fine.
I set up the old Ozark Mountain (Wal-Mart) tent, and then headed back to the Ranger station to buy myself a bag of firewood, cutting or gathering you own wood was prohibited. With fire blazing, I made my dinner of cup o soup & jerky, kicked back in the new Kermit chair & enjoyed quiet solitude and fire until well after dark.
As soon as I went to bed it started to rain. After all these years, this was the first time the tent was in real rain & I was plenty worried it was gonna be a wet night! I kept checking the walls. Floors & corners, much to my surprise there were no leaks at all. It rained off & on for most of the night
On the ride out I remembered that I had forgotten to pack my current book, so I picked up a cycle trader during a fuel stop. After spending some time checking out all the perfectly good bikes people are selling I turned out the new Gaz lantern, laid back on the new Sevylor air mattress and drifted off to sleep while listing to the rain pounding on the Ozark tent. I had been asleep for a cuppla hours and at some point there was a small spot where some condensation had formed & finally dripped?hitting dead center in the middle of my forehead! Man, that?ll make you sit straight up! Moved the mattress over a little & went right back to sleep.
Sunday morning came & I was up & prepping my tent and gear for travel before sun up. I put on a pot of coffee & started working on getting the fire going. I had protected the remainder of my fire wood from rain but was having a hard time finding kindling to get it going. I decided to take a log & whittle my own kindling out of the dry wood. The plan worked perfect & I had a great fire in no time. Breakfast was fresh coffee, cup of noodle, granola bar and some jerky. Being a little bored I played with the camera & tripod for a while, getting some camping action shots of myself, (dork ...lol...) On the road by 10:am, I decided to take a detour & rode the 8 mile dirt road up to Palm Canyon to take some great Sonoran Desert pictures.
The new stove, lantern, air mattress & Kermit chair make camping a true pleasure! Not once did I feel like I was roughing it or doing with out. Gonna do another over nighter Jan 19th weekend. Alamo Lake is a great place to camp, but I can?t wait to do a multi day trip. After seeing how Keith (blues traveler) eats in camp, I will be working on expanding my dining menu on future trips.