Camping and Koi at OFFF 2012

It's about time we went back to OFFF.  It's been a few years and during that time we gathered 'grown-up' camping equipment so that we could camp in a semblance of comfort:  largish tent and self-inflating queen-size air mattresses for starters.  We had one lantern and a few flashlights, but were lacking a stove, another lantern and, who knew we would need one, a heater.  These we borrowed from good friends and we will use the coming year to invest in our own.

We checked the 10-day and the 7-day forecast and here's what we were expecting: 75/52, mostly sunny.  Here's what we got: 64/48, heavily overcast Thursday/Friday, rain Thursday night, and then 68/50 and sunny on Saturday/Sunday.  We moved the kitchen into the tent and refreshed the  propane canisters twice, as that little heater was getting a workout.

We called my son, who lives in Portland, to meet us at the campgrounds and help us set up the new tent, which was way easier than anticipated and left plenty of time for beer after.

 

 

Friday dawned cloudy and gray, the tent dripping and the ankle-high grass soaking our jeans on the way to the outhouse about a block away.  Note to selves: consider a travel toilet...

Evanne was camping w/ Tazo about 30' away; she had minimal goals for the free day: get a pedicure, visit the dahlia gardens and get some 'hammock time'. 

 By 10:00 Friday we were all three sitting in the nail salon, Evanne with her feet in a tub and Peggy and I having our fingernails done.  In Oregon they have a law: you must buy a 'nail kit' which includes an emery board and a buffer for hands plus a callus buffer for feet.  $1 or $2.  Or you can bring your own.  We love this, for obvious reasons.

By 11:30 we were at Swan Island Dahlia Farm, which we walked through for at least two hours.  Think of the Tulip Fields in the Skagit Valley, squared.  Bigger blooms, taller flowers.  And a Koi pond!  The Koi are for sale, just fyi.

Koi Pool

Waterfall

Crowd

Big head

Big mouth

Bigger mouth

Orange

Orange and Gold

White and Yellow

After dahlias and Koi, we stopped at a fruit/vegetable stand, checked out the Canby Ferry on the river,

 

meandered back to camp, fixed chicken sandwiches and then spun for awhile.  It was the only long-term spinning time we had for 3 days because on Saturday things got really busy: 

OFFF officially opened for the weekend.