30. Do an overnight pack trip as a family.

 After Erik and I had such a great time backpacking, we wanted to have the kids at least try it this summer. So we spent a couple weeks amassing the supplies to get a family of four into the back country. We bought the girls nice new kid-sized packs. We found another two-person tent online. Erik found himself a new warmer sleeping bag. I invested in dehydrated eggs, peppers and onions. We got the girls some camp utensils and some inexpensive sporty (wicking) clothes.

 

Then we made a big ol' mess in the living room as we figured out where to stow everything. The name of the game was lightweight and as minimal as possible. We filled the girls' bags with their sleeping bags, thermarests and clothes, including their life jackets for swimming in the lake. Erik and I carried everything else. Tents, food, fishing poles, etc.

We got up early and drove down the Bitterroot to Bakers Lake, near Trappers Peak. We'd done the hike on a Saturday the week before to scope out the location. The trail was only a little over a mile, but was mostly uphill. We figured we'd take lots of breaks and take it slow and easy for the girls' sake. Almost immediately Lindsay was complaining about the hike. Kera was pretty miserable too, but she hardly made a peep. We stopped so many times to rest. At first I was patient with Lindsay, encouraging her that she could do it, etc. But about halfway there when she kept saying "I can't do it" I got fed up with being gentle on her and told her to "Buck up" or "Put your big girl panties on and stop whining". I wasn't mean, just firm. I knew she could do it and all her talk about not being able to do it wasn't helping her.

Well, it took us a good two hours, but we finally made it to the lake. Once there we hiked an additional little ways around the lake to the other side where we'd scoped out the best camp sites.

Erik and I set up the tents and stuff while the girls chilled out on these big rocks. Lindsay was reading. (Yes, we packed minimally but books are a necessity in this family!)

It was a beautiful day and the lake is just gorgeous.

We spent the rest of that day chilling out. We swam a little, which was great, and ate our snacky lunch and cooked our camp dinner (tuna and mashed potatoes, surprisingly tasty!).

A couple of friends came up with their dogs that night, which was cool. The girls loved playing with the dogs. They had to leave the next day for work, but we decided to hike up to the other two lakes higher up from Bakers.

The beginning of the hike goes through a really moosey creek area.

The hike to Middle Lake wasn't too tough and the lake was beautiful. The girls definitely did better hiking without their packs, although we still had to have a couple "talks" about how there shouldn't be any whining.

Middle Lake

Once we got to Middle Lake, we decided to tackle the crest up to Gem Lake.

Scenery on the way

Gem Lake really does look like a jewel. My camera did not do it justice whatsoever. We sat on the grass and ate our lunch with this incredible view.

Then Erik did some fishing.

The water was so clear.

The wind came up and we got chilly, so out came the sweatshirts. I think Lindsay's hat and gloves are leftover from the night before. We hiked back down to Middle Lake,

and Erik tried his hand at some more fishing.

While the girls and I snacked and sang songs together. We played "Bad Singer Idol" and tried to compete to see whose singing was the worst. I totally won.;)

That night some other friends of ours came up, this time another family of four. The girls had fun playing with the boys, who are pretty near their ages. 

We hiked up to the other lakes again this day. I tried to take a nap at Middle Lake because I was seriously exhausted. The night before the temps up there dipped down below freezing and both Lindsay and I didn't sleep good. Our bags were not warm enough and we hadn't brought enough clothes. I wanted to cry in the middle of the night and really wanted to go home. But, I decided to push through and enjoy the day with our friends. I did learn from that, though. You can never pack too minimalistic to not include long underwear and/or some wool vests or coats and there's nothing like a good sleeping bag.

We came home and ordered me a warm NorthFace bag so I never have that problem again! There's nothing as miserable as not being able to sleep because you're cold. 

The hike off the hill was pretty easy. We had less stuff since we'd eaten for 3 days, so I took a majority of the girls' extra stuff, leaving them with just their sleeping bags and mats. Then, we were going almost all downhill, so the actual hiking was much easier. Lindsay hiked up ahead with the boys and talked the entire time, not whining once. Kera stayed with me near the rear and only complained of her legs being "trembly" at the end, which mine were too (that darn downhill). 

All in all, it was a fun and good trip. It's definitely not the girls' favorite form of camping, but there were parts they really liked and so I think we'll probably do it with them again. I'm very grateful to be able to mark this one off my goal list! :)

Our Adventures in Back Country Camping, Day 3

Since it took us forever to get there and since we had time commitments on Sunday, we decided that Saturday would be the day we packed up camp and headed out of the mountains. We'd tossed around the idea of staying at the campground at Lower Miner Lakes that night and heading home on Sunday, but decided to play that one by ear. So, we woke up on Saturday, had our camp coffee and freeze-dried eggs and began the long process of re-packing everything. We wanted to put everything away correctly and as dry as possible, so we spent some time laying things out in the sun, rolling up air mattresses, etc. It was right around 11am by the time we were finally geared up to hit the trail out.

This is me before heading out

A view back at what we were leaving

  

Me and Erik. He's eating sunseeds which is why he isn't smiling. He was happy, I promise. Well, for awhile at least. His ankles started to hurt and so we decided that when we got to the green bridge (remember, the one we neglected to turn at on our trip in?) we would stop and put our feet in the cold water for a bit. Hiking out was mostly downhill, so the hiking part wasn't hard, I felt like a million dollars. But I think he ended up with more weight in his pack on the way out and his ankles sometimes hurt on hikes, so together that made him kinda sore. Nearly two hours later we made it to the bridge.

The bridge you need to turn at to get to Upper Miner Lakes which isn't signed!

We ate some jerky, gorp and carrots while soaking our feet in the refreshing water. It was pretty cold you couldn't keep them in for more than a couple minutes.

It was a pretty spot for a breather, though. I dipped my hat as we were leaving and Erik dipped his t shirt and hat. That felt pretty refreshing. The sun was intense on our hike out and it was quite a bit warmer than our hike in. I was grateful we were going mostly downhill, going uphill in that sun would've been not much fun.

We crossed paths with three groups of hiker and one group of mountain bikers on our way out, which would be the only ones we saw the whole time we'd been there besides the helpful hikers on our way in. We didn't see one person the whole time we were camped back there, it was nice! We made it to our car after another 30-40 minutes after the bridge. It felt so good to take off my boots and put on my chacos and to sit in the comfort of the car. We still had to drive out on that unmaintained road, which took nearly an hour, but hallelujah we made it out without damage to the car and without me having a panic attack. 

Once we'd made that far we decided to just continue on home. The Lower Miner Lake campground was not very pretty compared to where we'd just stayed and it was $7/night. We decided we'd much rather just go home, take showers and rent a movie. So, we stopped in Wisdom for a burger and fries before heading home.

And you know what we talked about nearly the whole time we hiked and drove home? About what equipment we needed for the girls to join us when we do this again, because we will be doing it again. Although my legs are tired and I had moments of anxiety, this whole trip was just a wonderful experience. I loved camping out in the woods away from everyone and everything. I loved cooking over the camp-stove and fire. I just enjoy being in the beauty of God's creation. I cannot wait to do it again!

Our Adventures in Back Country Camping, Day 2

Despite less than stellar sleep the first night, our second day dawned clear and beautiful. We whipped up some coffee and freeze-dried eggs, which were actually pretty tasty, using our awesome single burner dual fuel stove and then got the lay of the land a little bit more.

Our campfire area. Someone put a ton of work into making this area really cool. The benches are secure and level.

View towards the far end of the lake from a bench

Our little home away from home.

View of the lake and rocky peak from our camp area

Another view of the peak and lake

After breakfast and some down time, we loaded up some snacks and fishing gear and hiked down to the end of the lake. Those aren't glaciers, just huge piles of snow that hadn't melted off yet. 

The lake was so clear

And the rocky peaks above just looked super cool. So, once you hike to the end of the lake, you can turn and scramble up this:

To get to another Upper Miner Lake that's even higher up and supposedly has great fishing. It looked really steep but not super long, so we ventured up. 

Erik is such a great hubby and wore the pack containing our lunch and fish gear.

We had to stop quite often to rest due to the steepness, and I snapped a few pictures of the lower lake as we ascended. Once we got about halfway I had to stop looking down though, as my fear of heights was making me feel quite anxious. I had to just focus on looking up towards our destination and putting one foot in front of the other.

We finally made it to the pretty upper lake.

We had a snack/lunch and Erik set up his fishing pole while I looked around a little.

But Erik didn't get any fishing in. Just about the time he got done setting up his pole, some dark menacing clouds started rolling in over the peak above us and a pretty chilly breeze came up. We hadn't packed our rain gear (duh!) and didn't want to get stuck in a thunderstorm that high up, so we packed up our gear and headed back down the steep hill. We stopped in some trees for shelter from the rain at one point, and then continued on. The rain made the logs and bear grass slippery, so we had to be even more careful on our way down. I used quite a few trees and clumps of bear grass to grasp as I inched my way down. We finally made it down. I was tired and had had enough of the mosquitoes and it was still kinda raining so I decided to take a nap. It was pretty relaxing just laying in our tent and exactly what I needed after the morning's excitement.

After my much needed catnap, Erik thought we should jump in the lake. We didn't swim, but just jumped in and out real quick like. It was so refreshing and pretty stinkin' cold. 

Once we were dry, we decided it was probably time to do some fishing and catch dinner. Erik set me up with a pole, bobber and Chernobyl ant fly and cast it out for me. Before he'd even got his fly rod set up, I'd caught this nice sized Brook trout. It was beautiful! And it was the only one I caught that night! Erik caught two more smaller brookies and we figured it was enough for dinner. I whipped up some instant mashed garlic potatoes to go with the fish and we had quite the feast. 

I snapped these pictures while Erik was catching the other two fish:

The beauty of the lake, trees and the rocky crags up above was just jaw dropping, and the pictures just don't do it justice.

It was gorgeous there. After dinner we cleaned up camp and just sat, looking at the beauty around us as we chatted until nearly dark. It was such a great day spent in an absolutely beautiful place. My legs, especially my calves, were pretty tired yet again and this time my whole body followed suit and I slept like a rock all night.