Monday 8-31-26 Rainy Night, Hiking, Camping & Having Fun

 

Hiking through the Aspens

We had a great day.

It was overcast all day. At 4:30 the rain came and stayed around all night. The morning temperature was a cool 42 degrees and the high was 66 degrees. When the rain came in it dropped the temperature to 51 degrees.

Yesterday, while we were at Walmart we bought powder milk. Larry suggested we have apple cinnamon muffins in the morning. They're in a pouch you just have to add milk, that's why we bought the powder milk. We needed a half a cup of the milk to make the muffins. Larry and I worked together to figure out how much of the powder milk we needed. The box had three pouches and each pouch made one quarte of milk. It took us awhile but we figured we needed 1.5 tablespoons of the powder and half a cup of water to make half a cup of milk. I made the milk and let it set overnight. 

This morning Larry woke up his normal time and did his morning routine. I woke up at 7:15 to make the muffins because it takes 12-14 minutes to bake them. I had greased the muffin pan last night. This morning I just had to heat up the oven, mix the batter, fill the pan 2/3 full and bake them.  Our oven in the Minnie can be challenging. The package recommended to bake the muffins at 400 degrees but I baked them at 375 degrees for 12 minutes. The muffins tasted good except the bottom and the sides were a little over cooked but the center was very fluffy. 

After breakfast we went on a 5 mile hike. We started on our hike at 8:20 am, we usually get going by 8:00 am. The muffins took too long to bake. That was ok. We mainly hiked the Perimeter Trail for 4 miles and the last mile we took the Phat Loop for a half mile and the Peak One Campground trail to Pine Cove Campground for a half mile. We picked up the Perimeter Trail at the campground. The trail took us along the shores of Lake Dillon. At the beginning of our hike we met a gentleman and his dog. The dog let Larry pet her but she wasn't sure about me. She wasn't growling but she really didn't want me to pet her. We saw a couple of single skull rowers and a double person skull in the lake. We also saw a lot of Canadian geese swimming and a mother goose and her babies. The first single skull rower talked to the mother and her babies to get out of the way. She didn't want to hit them with her oar. It was nice to see people use the lake even though it's very low. We were about a mile into the hike when Ron texted Larry. Larry texted him back and said he had some time to chat. Ron just wanted to let Larry know where he was and that he tried one more thing on his generator. His generator is now working great. They figured it was bad gas and he also is 2,000 feet lower in elevation. Ron was one happy man and now he can relax and not worry about the generator. Once Larry hung up the phone we were back doing our hike. The perimeter trail goes for 6 miles but we only did four miles of it. We saw two gentlemen on the perimeter trail. One was going the same way as we were going. He had a bell, he rung to let us know he was behind us. We thanked him, that way we could get out of his way. The other one was coming towards us so we could see him. We also saw other bicyclists on a paved trail. that was outside the national forest. We rested a few time by stopping, there weren't any benches. The trail took us through the forest and out in the open. It was a great trail and didn't have a lot of inclines. It had some switchbacks to get us up a hill. After the switchbacks we came into a grove of beautiful aspens. We had hiked over three miles and came to the part of the trail, that turned to take us back to the campground. Before we turned we found a log to rest on. After our rest we continued our hike. As we hiked we saw a construction machine that is used to thin out the forest by cutting down trees. While we hiked we had noticed some trees were recently cut down. W figured this is how they help prevent forest fires in White River National Forest. We saw a beautiful woodpecker. The paved bicycle trail took us to the parking lot for the trails. When we got there we saw a group of six bikers just getting started. This is where we picked up the phat loop trail, which started our hike back to the Minnie. The hike was outstanding.

Dillon Lake

Dillon Lake and the hiking trail

A single lady rowing a skull

Woodpecker 

Tractor trimming the forest by cutting down trees

 By the time we got back it was time for lunch. Larry setup the solar panels and was pleasantly surprised they were putting out as much as they were because there was very little sun. We rested a bit and then had sandwiches for lunch. 

After lunch Larry asked Google: What causes muffins to burn on the bottom and sides and yet be cooked perfectly? It said the pan could cause the problem. If you have a dark pan it cooks faster. It also could be the oven temperature was too hot. I figured because I've had problems before, that the next time I'll bake them at 350 degrees instead of 375 degrees. The next time we're in Walmart I'll look for either a light colored pan or a silicone muffin pan instead of the dark metal pan I have.

I did the Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: Tri Peaks Mini of 5 games. It took me 11 minutes and 20 seconds to complete, which put me in 29th place in my group. I played Angry Birds Friends and Angry Birds 2.

After playing games I continued reading The Five Wishes of Murray McBride. While I did my thing Larry read.

        Reading is fun

At 4:30 the rain came in so we didn't go on our evening walk. We saw a group of high school children jogging on the trail threw the campground in the rain. We stayed in the Minnie reading. Larry finished his book and will start another tomorrow. I ended up doing 13,000 steps.