March-2-3, 2012
Amber, James, Andy, Myself; John, Ben and Colin Grace
We met at the Roosevelt and Altadena Drive trail head, leading down into Eaton. Before we left, we all weighed our packs for base weight. John is really excited about an ultralight goal so I thought weighing in would be a good start.
Once we were weighed we hit the trail with James leading. The walk up the Toll Road was easy, and no one complained. James discovered he forgot his sleeping pad and made no big deal about it. The night before, Amber and I offered to check his pack since we do a final check with each other each time, but James felt confident he had everything.
The forecast called for a night temps to be in the mid 40s, and Saturday to be in the 80s. Once we arrived at Henninger, it was dark and I discovered I had left my headlamp on and the batteries were dead. I had my backup light around my neck which helped. Good thing I had spare batteries.
We passed Upper Camp and hiked another few minutes to Fuji Camp where we were greeted by a few mountain bikers making a fire. If they were not there, Fuji would make a great site. They have water too. We turned around and went back to Upper since there was no one there. All of use began setting up camp.
Amber and James brought the BA tent less the Tyvek. I brought the poncho tarp and set it up near a tree. I recently bought a thermometer that records min/max temperate, so I laid it on a rock and let it do it’s thing till morning.
Once established, we began boiling water and making dinner. James, Amber and I all brought our own dinners; I brought Amber’s homemade chili, which we dehydrated; James made chili mac with refried beans, and Amber brought chicken soup. For dessert, I bought instant chocolate pudding, and let me tell you…, mixed with the Nito dried milk, the pudding was the biggest hit of the trip. All of us had our dinners and traded stories. James discovered he forgot his spoon. He said he really felt stupid but Amber help James think of ways to improvise so he found a strip of bark, whittled it down and made a functional spoon! All of us were proud.
After dinner we cleaned our tables and spoons, and added a layer of clothes. James discovered he forgot his gloves. It was at about this time, he agreed that a shake-down might be helpful next time.
Like the spoon improvisation, James made a soft, 3-4” bed of pine needles under the tent. He ended up having the softest night sleep ever. He discovered that the pockets in his down jacket made due for gloves as well. Nothing lost.
The main topic of conversation was mostly “lightweight” and choosing smaller, lighter equipment choices. Freezer bag cooking and our .99-cent mugs caught John’s attention, as well as our Super Cat Stove.
While we were moving things around and hanging the bear bag, the boys made a fire that we ended up circling around until 9:45PM when we turned into bed.
Andy wanted nothing of his new down sleeping bag; he wanted my bag. When I kicked him out of, and off my bag a few times, he went to Amber and James’ tent. James wanted Andy to sleep with him but I wanted Andy to learn to appreciate his “Apod” (Andy Pod) sleeping system.
Eventually, Andy came back to me and once I was in my bag, I escorted him into his bag, which he did without effort. He walked in and didn’t even turn around; his face was facing the end his tail was nearly sticking out. I cinched the bag up enough so he had plenty of air and called it a night. Andy never moved again until around 5am when he tried to get out and ended up rolling about two feet away from the butt pad he was on. I grabbed him and pulled him back. He was asleep and happy.
The morning greeted us well. Being Henninger, it never gets that dark because of all the city lights, but once the sun started coming up around 6:00, I got up. Amber was up too and we started taking down the tents.