finally doing some real camping

Some Antelope next to the road on the way to my property. They look pretty scruffy because they're still shedding their winter coats.

I had a good day driving out to my property, traffic was light and the weather was perfect. I stopped at the Walmart in Woodland Park where I used to live, bought some ice for my ice chest, another gallon of water, and some real camping food, like pastrami to make sandwiches and a big package of Reese's peanut butter cups, real camping food, because I'm not living in an RV right now, I'm camping.

By the time I got to my property it was a little after lunch and as often is the case in the summer it was kind of windy and starting to cloud up. I actually considered this a good thing because I wanted to test the Coleman tent in adverse conditions, after all anything will work if the weather's perfect.

Even with the wind blowing about 15 miles an hour the Coleman instant tent went up in a couple of minutes just like it's supposed to. I staked out the corners quickly to keep it from blowing away, and put my stuff inside to help hold it down. Normally I don't bother using guy lines but the wind was blowing so hard I guyed it out. About that time it started sprinkling a little bit so I got out the fly and tried to put it over the top of the tent, and things started getting more difficult.

Any real camper will tell you to set up a new tent in your backyard before you ever take it camping and that is wise advice. So I set up the tent in my daughter's living room the day I got it but I never bothered to put on the fly, after all it looked simple enough, but what is simple in your backyard becomes a real test of your mental and physical skills during a rain squall when the winds are blowing 30 miles an hour.

It would've been fairly simple with two people, but by myself it became a real Keystone cops operation with me running from corner to corner hooking up the fly while the corner I just hooked up blows off. I managed to get it on but it took way longer than anything else I've done while camping today.

All in all I'm happy with the size of the tent. When I started looking at six man tents I thought they were going to be way too big, but if I had gotten anything smaller it would've been a big disappointment. By the time I get my cot set up, my folding chair set up. My ice chest and a few other odds and ends in the tent there's not a whole lot of room left. I've learned that the six man designation means that six mummy bags will fit in the tent on the floor if they're touching each other.

                                       theboondork

the road to my property. It's still about 2 miles away at the foot of those mountains. this road dead ends at my gate.

some real Colorado boondocking. not as luxurious as the Arctic Fox but comfortable nonetheless.

this is what it looks like in a six man tent that That one person is actually living in. I think it's about perfect for one person. I'm having trouble envisioning five more people in here

rain squalls would blow in over the 39 mile mountains making everything wet, windy, and chilly for 10 or 15 minutes, Then the clouds would blow on past and it would get sunny again for a while.