I had signed up for a wild edible plants walk for Sunday afternoon, so I wanted to camp nearby, or at least so that I could hit the walk on the way home. I ended up in Massachusetts at Beartown State Forest. The name sounded a bit ominous for my first Northeastern camping experience, so I took the excuse to try out my new bear canister. Here it is, with my water bottle for scale.
Planning meals when everything has to fit in a bear canister (and no cooler!) is tricky! Because one of my goals for the year is to go backpacking, I tried to plan meals for this trip as if I were backpacking. Not all the meals we ate were backpacking, but I thought I did a pretty good job keeping us from being hungry. While camping, Hiking Buddy and I ate:
Friday Dinner:
hotdogs and potato salad (OK, this wasn't "backpacking food," but we had leftovers we needed to eat)
Saturday Breakfast:
oatmeal and instant coffee
Saturday Lunch:
Bean, cheese, and salsa burritos (I froze a container with everything in it, and it had thawed perfectly for lunch)
Saturday Dinner:
Pine Valley Couscous, a backpacking recipe from "The Lip Smackin' Vegetarian Backpackin' Cookbook"
hot cocoa for dessert
Sunday Breakfast:
oatmeal and instant coffee
The Pine Valley Couscous was really good! We might even eat the extra serving as a side dish one night this week. On Sunday, we ended up going to a diner in the nearby town for eggs and hashbrowns... I have a hard time resisting fried potatoes!
The campground at Beartown was pretty nice, and I would definitely consider going back there. It did have a bit of a weird set up. Our campsite was really big, and on the edge of some woods with only one neighbor. I wanted to show it off with pictures, but my camera battery mysteriously decided to die as soon as we pulled in! Anyway, we had a nice campsite, the campground over all was nice, and they had really nice composting toilets, which is something to appreciate when camping.
The first night, I laid awake listening for sounds of bears searching for food in the campground. After a while, I fell asleep, only to be woken by a soft snorting. I was instantly wide awake. What was that? Certainly not the rummaging of the ubiquitous chipmunks at our site. There it goes again! That sounded closer. Silence. Again! Wear is it? By the picnic table? By the car? By the tent?! SNORRRRT! HOLY COW PLEASE DON'T EAT ME, BEAR!
Oh, wait, Hiking Buddy is snoring.
I really freaked myself out good. Ha! The next night, I wore earplugs, and slept through the night. The first morning, I did enjoy listening to the morning symphony of birds. During my trip to Beartown, I heard and/or saw:
1. Pileated Woodpecker
2. Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker
3. Red-bellied Woodpecker
4. Black and White Warbler
5. Blackburnian Warbler
6. Great Blue Heron
7. Barred Owl
8. Cedar Waxwing
9. Robin
10. Catbird
I think there were more, but I forgot to write them down right away. It was a good feeling to be able to lay there, half-awake and cozy warm in my sleeping bag, and identify birds by sound. I definitely couldn't do that a year ago, or even a few months ago!
On Saturday we had a nice time hiking some of the trails at Beartown. I tried to find a geocache up a muddy ATV trail, but no success. All in all, it was a relaxing and fun camping trip!
On Sunday, we went on a wild edibles plant hike sponsored by the Columbia Land Conservancy. It was led by wild food guru Russ Cohen. Again, no camera, or I'd show you lots of pictures! It was a really great walk, and I learned a lot. Did you know you can use wild grape leaves like the non-wild ones? I had never thought of that before. I'm not a huge fan of stuffed grape leaves, but I might just have to try WILD stuffed grape leaves. He also showed us what parts of cattails you can eat. Yum!
No comments:
Post a Comment