Hi, I’m Eddie, Julia’s husband. Periodically I’ll hijack Julia’s blog and post about interesting stuff (or interesting for me!).
I’ve only been camping once. A fun experience, but I wouldn’t ever recommend camping in the mountains in Arkansas in winter unless you’re better prepared than I was. Seeing the beautiful weather in NM during the summer and having my one experience to rely upon, Julia and I decided to drive to Jemez falls campground with our puppy Eve.
We found a campsite and I went to fill up my water bag but the forest service had turned off all the water to the campground! Apparently the wells are too low at this point in the year.
We hiked down to Jemez falls, which are pretty spectacular, even in the dry NM summer. However, neither my wife nor I remembered to bring a camera! I dutifully snapped a picture with my cellphone and then we headed back to our campsite.
At our campsite, we decided to start a fire so Julia could start cooking dinner. Trying make a fire in our fire pit in Texas is relatively difficult for me. However, in NM during the summer lighting a fire is as easy as touching a match to almost anything around you. My wife and I had a fire roaring in no time.
The lack of water was really bothering me, so I drove off to try to find a gas station while Julia started dinner. She remembered making food in girl scouts and called them hobo-packs. Essentially these were potatoes, carrots, ground beef and cheese wrapped in aluminum foil and then thrown into the fire. However, I forgot to pack the most important part: the cheese! When I returned from getting water I found out there was no cheese *facepalm* So I headed back to the gas station to get some cheese. Luckily it was just a few minutes away (and totally worth it in retrospect).
When I returned Julia had already put the packs to cook in the fire, but when she pulled them out she put in copious amounts of cheese and threw them back in. When she finally deemed them done, they were delicious!
One thing Julia had been really interested in for this trip was taking time exposure pictures of stars. She set up her camera and her hand trigger for the shutter and went to work. By 11 PM she had some great pictures and we were both exhausted. We tucked ourselves away into my tiny two person backpacking tent and went to sleep.
It was a great day!