At the end of my last post, I said I would write about towing the RV camper outside the storage lot and onto a real street and would talk about taking the camper to an RV shop. Well, I will share those things, but not in this post. And this is my blog, so I get to do things like change my mind. 🙂 We’ll talk about those things later, but first there’s winter and Christmas and a day trip in the big white truck to Lake Wynoochee in the Olympic National Forest to scope out the area for possible camping.
We had a “real” winter this year, with snow and really cold weather. Winters in the Pacific Northwest of the USA aren’t always so chilly, but this one did have some of that nice white stuff that lasted several days at a time … not too much that it hampered anything I was doing, but it did give me a chance to try out the 4X4 capabilities of this big white Dodge RAM truck.
Heck fire, that truck hardly knew there was snow under her tires! Admittedly, there wasn’t a great deal of snow, but every other vehicle in the complex where I lived had significant trouble with the incline of the pavement out/up to our gate and then onto the street. Not so this big white truck. She’s a pro.
A portion of my back patio.
Christmas was fun, like it always is. My Christmases are relatively quiet because I like them that way with special time spent with special people. I love Christmas.
But I could hardly wait for Christmas to be over this year. A friend of mine had readily agreed to go with me on a one-day road trip over to the Olympic Peninsula in order to check out a campground on the shores of Lake Wynoochee north of Montesano, in the Olympic National Forest. We had to wait for a nice weather day, but one finally came around and off we went in the big white truck.
A National Forest campground, Coho Campground is right on the edge of Lake Wynoochee. It’s such a beautiful area. After exploring all around the area by truck and on foot, we ate our lunches while sitting at a picnic table in the day-use area of the campground (yes it was that warm out, even tho there were still small piles of snow around) and we just sat in silence as we looked at the lake, enfolded by the surrounding forests, with mountain peaks in the distance (tho the mountains seemed so close). It was so peaceful there.
After lunch, we explored some of the back roads. The big white truck clambered over gynormous huge tree trunks! (Ok, maybe this one wasn’t THAT big of a tree trunk.) We were checking out back roads on federal land in hopes of finding boondocking campsites (free with no amenities) and we found lots of them.
On one of the many forest service roads that surround Lake Wynoochee, we found the boondocking spot above. It was the very first boondocking site I’d found. This was exciting, honest. 🙂 On most federal land (and some other land) one can RV/camp in “dispersed” sites or in “boondocking” sites. There are no hookups. There isn’t a Park Ranger nearby. Sometimes there is NO ONE nearby. Sometimes they’re a bit rough. This one had a bit of garbage spread around, but we cleaned it up, with gloves on. This type of camping is free, although there can be maximum stay limits. The general rule is that there must be a fire ring in the site, not just a cleared spot of land.
As we drove up and down a few more forest service roads, we found more boondocking spots. Wow, they really do exist! I put these spots in my notebook for future reference for sure!
Along one forest service road, we noticed these two streams and took a little video. How pretty and what a perfectly positioned confluence for photography.
Because it was still late winter, the actual RV/tent campground area of Coho Campground was closed and the gate was locked so we didn’t get a chance to explore it. But we drove away happy, each of us hoping she would be back. Not surprisingly, I added this campground to my list of preferred camping destinations for 2017. And yes, I did get back there for five excellent days of camping in August, 2017, but that’s another story for another day.