February Miscellany

Last weekend I went winter-camping with a bunch of friends from Zombie Squad. This was our 3rd time doing this trip and yet again, we had a great time...


A newcomer to the trip decided to build and live for the long weekend in a quinzee...to build it, he made a huge pile of snow on the pond in front of our campsite, waited for it to settle and compact a bit, and then hollowed it out.


There were 13 brave souls at Polliwog Pond for the camping trip, and we had some nice walks, some spirited gear comparison, some world-class campfires, a nighttime low of -13 degrees, and some vodka infused with a down-market SPAM analog.


On one of the walks, we came across this set of trees encased in the ice-fall from a nearby set of cliffs.


Food and drink prep and was a big part of staying alive and happy during the trip, and we had lots of fun working on our food and stoves in the cold and snow.


This shot of some of our campsite shows the variety of camping accommodations that people used during the weekend: tents, tarps, teepees, hammocks, bivy sacks, and a Quinzee.


One of the guys brought some eggs along, which froze solid...he peeled them like hardboiled eggs, chopped them into bits, and then fried them until the melted and cooked.


It was a fun time for all of us.


My friend Bryce fell asleep beside the campfire during the last night, while the snow was falling pretty steadily.


This is a group picture of the 11 people who made it all the way through the 4 day ordeal, including Steve inside his quinzee.


Besides a good time in the snow and cold, the campign trip also doubled as a fund-raiser for the Tri-Lakes Humane Society, the shelter where Miles and Cedar lived before they came to live with us...everyone brought stuff from the TLHS wishlist...I dropped it off with Ben the day after the trip.


Gail and Ben and Miles reading on the couch before bed...


Ben loves baking bread with me, and we got to talking about yeast and how it works in food and drink, and as a result, we went online and found a recipe for Sourdough Starter...we started it, and will be working on our own sourdough later on this week, and through the coming decades, using this starter...


We put the soupy mix into the oven with the light on (just having the light on keeps the well-insulated oven warm enough for the fledgling yeast colony to grow) and let it rise/mature...it'll go for 2 days before we transfer it into the fridge for middle-aged mellowing...