Cold Weather Camping

[cheesy]

The Maggot and I went on an over night camping trip this weekend with the Chicagoland Coleman Collectors Club, of which I am a member of dubious standing.


I live in the northern part of Kane County IL and the camp ground was in a members back yard in the southern part of the county, about a 25 mile trip. I opted to run down IL31, which used to be one of two the major north/south routes through county. That has been replaced by a four lane monstrosity named Randall Rd, also known as the Kane County Speedway. But I digress. IL31 is now a pleasant two lane run through the county with plenty of easy curves and mild speed limits that follows the west side of the Fox River.

I rode a bit farther down IL31 than my destination to visit with a bicycle pal who just moved into the area from south central IL and is still trying to get used to suburban living. Dropped a few things off to him and headed back north to the camp site. I took a bit different route that passed several open fields and soon realized what a good wind block that IL31 is and Peck Rd is not. There was a 25mph west wind, with gusts to 40, that had me wrestling the bike for the next 10 miles.

Got to the camp site and set up my little tent and got down to drinking beer and working on revitalizing old Coleman lanterns and camp stoves. I have a pretty good collection of these things myself but the bike limited me to what I could bring with. All I had with me was an Optimus 99 backpacking stove that I bought new in 1980.


Some guys brought a lot more.



As I didn't bring along anything that needed repair, or fettleing as we call it, I opted to help our youngest member (18) with getting his 52 year old British Tilley lantern running. I say opted, but I was sort of volunteered, because I am the only other member in the group with a working Tilley. It took us most of the day but we got it. I just didn't get a picture of it running.


After everybody got done fettleing, we had a nice campfire going with many stories told, true and otherwise. Soon after the pic was taken, my boot started smoking.


I hit the sack about midnight. I heard some of the young folks talking awhile longer, then the next thing I knew was there was sunlight steaming into my tent. I rarely sleep that well when I'm camping. Stuck my head out and it was 25F. Brrrr. At least there was no wind.

I had the Maggot parked it backyard and it was covered in frost. I ended up moving it into some sunlight to thaw out and dry before I loaded it up. We had a really good breakfast and broke camp. Before we all went our separate ways, we sat around a new campfire to plan the next meet up.

I left about 11, and again aimed myself towards IL31. It was such a nice morning that, somehow, I rode a few miles past my place just get some more saddle time.

The weather is still supposed to be somewhat decent this week, so I'm going to try to get one more week of riding in.