Part Deux - The perfect weekend continues...

So yeah, to continue…

After we set up our camp, it was time for dinner. And in keeping with the ‘perfect’ theme, dinner was no exception… Oh yeah – and I mustn’t forget the BEER. (Side note: When packing beer up the trail, pay close attention to where the beer is located in your pack when taking said pack OFF – and flinging it on the ground… Yeah, we each had two 16oz beer cans that we were packing up the trail, but I unfortunately only ended up with ONE upon arriving in camp… One of them developed a rather large, gaping hole in the side of it on the way up the trail. Sigh…) So anyway, about that dinner…

Paul and I had decided to trade off with making dinner and the first night was up to him. One thing that’s awesome about camping in late Spring is the ample supply of snow. AKA: The Refrigerator. Because of this fact, we were able to keep all of our fresh food items cool in the snowfield located conveniently next to our campsite. And fresh food items, we definitely had. Okay, I thought I was doing good because I brought a couple of oranges along, but Paul pretty much trumped my meager offerings. Not only did he have fresh veggies for the fajitas that he made, but also had eggs, cheese, tofu, etc. Damn! How do you compete with that?!

So, I mentioned the fajitas. Yeah, umm, suffice it to say that they kicked major fajita ASS. I mean, they’d kick major fajita ass if we had them in town, but to have them in our very exclusive, mountain-top restaurant was awesome! We had fresh veggies, cheese, AVOCADO, etc. – All grilled together atop our trusty campsite friend, the MSR stove. (More adventures with the MSR stove to come…) I can’t tell you how good they tasted after our day of hiking adventures. And to sit in the perfect spot, watching the perfect sunset over the perfect mountains, with the perfect iPod DJ mix was PERFECT. Yeah, I think we were pretty pleased with the situation…

After dinner, we tidied up the campsite. Well, okay – Paul pretty much cleaned things up – I was slacking a bit… BUT – in my defense, my night of cooking and clean-up was still to come… (Insert sense of foreboding *here*) ANYway – the campsite got cleaned up – however you wanna slice it… And with everything set-up, cleaned-up, etc. we set upon doing absolutely NOTHING. And yes, it’s everything it’s cracked up to be! To kick back at the perfect campsite, with tunes, the lingering sunset, a little Maker’s Mark and some great company – yeah, that’s just good stuff.

While the sun was carrying out its VERY long descent into darkness, the stars slowly came out to shine. And shine, they did - WOW! After living in the mountains for a time, you get used to seeing an amazing display of stars. There’s no city light to intrude upon the natural glow and the stars just seem to sit on top of each – layer upon layer! However, I haven’t been living in the mountains of late and I’d forgotten a bit about how amazing of a display they are… I must say I was VERY grateful for this re-education. In addition, I have to say this particular display of stars was well, STELLAR. I’d look away from the sky for a few minutes and when I looked back up, it was like a whole new universe of stars had displayed itself. Crazy! We also saw a couple of great meteorites. I was a bit sad, however, as I didn’t get to see the one Paul saw. He said it had a sparkly trail behind it and everything – one of the coolest ones he’s seen! Damn – I missed it! The one that I saw was great, don’t get me wrong, but it didn’t have a sparkly trail behind it. Bah… :)P

I don’t really know how long we hung out that night – time wasn’t really of any importance… Plus, the weather was amazing and even though we were at 5600’, it never seemed to get cold! We watched the stars, tracked some satellites and observed the frightening amount of “faces” displayed on the surrounding peaks. (I’m serious – it was crazy! We kept seeing faces, profiles of faces, etc. displayed in a sort of relief on the surrounding peaks. There were a couple that were particularly amazing! I kid you not – Abe Lincoln lives on the top of one those peaks – I ain’t lyin’!) Okay, I mentioned the beer and Maker’s Mark, but that’s not the point - There were FACES in them thar hills!

Okay, I feel I must also mention at this time, Paul and his pimped out seating arrangement. I mean, the hammock was bad ass enough, but he also had a special Thermarest chair with him. Yes, I was very jealous of that chair and I admit it – I coveted it allll weekend long. Basically, it’s a cover that goes over your Thermarest and converts it into a chair-like setup. Not only are you sitting on a padded surface, but it has a BACK on it! (Which, after hiking all day, is a glorious thing…) Damn Pauly D and his pimped out ride!

So yeah, we’re hanging out, diggin’ the perfect spot - Club Perfect, we decided to call it. It was pretty much a club setting, after all. We had drinks and party favors, we had very groovy lighting, we had an awesome DJ, we had a VIP room – it was pretty much a full-on hot spot! However, we have both agreed that we will be adding a disco ball to our next Club Perfect event. Anyone know where I can pick up a packable disco ball!? Let me know…

Anyhoo – after hours of entertaining ourselves at Club Perfect, it was time to kick the drunks out and head for home. (I.e. Blow out the candles, hang our food in the tree and stumble over to the tent…)

The tent was pretty stylin’, I might add. We brought in the camp candle and hung it from the tent eaves and Paul set up the iPod and speakers at the entrance of the tent. Since it was so warm and there was, at that time, an unusual lack of bugs, we didn’t even have to close the tent flap! It was awesome! From where I was lying, if I looked out of the tent and up a little bit, the Big Dipper was right there! Perfect! When I was little and on road trips with my family, I’d entertain myself by looking out the back window at the stars, with the Big Dipper as my guide. It was pretty nice to look out my tent window and see an old friend… AND Abe Lincoln… (Dude – I'm serious – ABE LINCOLN!)

The first day of this very perfect weekend ended quite perfectly – Watching the stars, listening to tunes and being content in the knowledge that there was NOTHING that we had to do the next day… Right on.

COMING NEXT: Green chili breakfast burritos, French press coffee, Dayna forgets the sunscreen, snow beaches, Dayna drops the spaghetti… TWICE… And more!! Stay tuned!