My son and I flew up from the South County airport outside San Jose, CA. Fortunately, we were outside the TFR covering most of the bay area so we
were able to get an early start. The flight up was in beautiful weather and we arrived around 10am to a ramp quickly filling with airplanes.
The camping area was only a couple of hundred feet from the runway, so it was a great place to hang out and watch planes come and go.
After we reached quorum, we packed a lunch and some water and hiked down a dry creek bed to the Carson river where we found a nice spot to rest
and refuel.
After lunch, we hiked along the banks of the river for a bit while enjoying the beautiful weather and scenery. The dogs (and a few people) enjoyed
wading in the ice cold water.
A few of us headed back to camp early and relaxed in the hammocks. Feeling refreshed, four of us decided to tackle the small hill across the runway
from our campsite. You can see the hill on the left side of the first picture in this post. There was no trail up the hill, but the terrain was easy enough
that we reached the top in 30-40 minutes. We found a nice rock outcropping that we climbed up to get some good pictures. It's hard to see, but the
ramp where the planes are parked is the thin grey line at the left edge of the sun rays.
After dinner, we built a nice fire and sat around it chatting until early evening. With only the dim glow of the lights from Carson City to the north, the sky
was very dark and we had a spectacular view of the Milky Way. We were even able to spot a LEO satellite and a number of jets far overhead.
Tired from the days hikes, we turned in early. About 1am, I heard some noises outside the tent. After listening for a moment, I was fairly certain it was a
bear trying to get into one of the bear safes. Unless it came closer, there wasn't much point in going outside. About 1:30, the bear wandered over near
Leland's tent and started getting into his cooler. We hear him yell at the bear to try and scare him away, so a number of us got dressed and came out
to help. We found the opened bear safe near the fire pit, then spotted the bear just outside the campground. It stared at us and largely ignored our
attempts to scare it away; even heading straight for another tent at one point. We finally managed to get it to leave camp, but realized that we should
probably build a fire and have someone stay up to keep the bear away. Around 4am, we had a shift change and I turned in to get a little more sleep.
As the sun broke, we packed up our gear to fly as a group somewhere for breakfast. We stopped into Bridgeport (O57), but the wait was 1.5 hours due
to people flying in from the Backcountry Pilot fly-in. We loaded back up and headed to Paul and Louise's house in Dayton Valley (A34). We had a nice
breakfast in town and then headed back for a tour of their house and hangar.
After the tour, my son and I loaded back up for the flight home. We flew right by the south end of Lake Tahoe and had nearly 20kt tailwinds for most of
the flight.
We had a great time and really enjoyed meeting all of you. See you all next year!
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