stupid moon

The Perseids hit the same time as the full moon. We drove up near Table Mountain north of Ellensburg, not all the way to the top as the forest was getting intense, and it was already getting dark since we started late.

Anyway, we found a decent pullout with evidence of other campers (broken glass, I hate beer-swilling morons) and got our camp ready. I forgot the silnylon but it didn't matter. We had a thick pad underneath our RidgeRest and inflatable mattresses, then our sleeping bags and down jackets. I also pulled on a light wool shirt over my t-shirt, and wool long johns under my hiking pants. With a wind jacket I was very comfortable. It was windy for sure; we passed a windfarm on the way out, and could see its lights well into the night.

The point was to see meteors, which we did. Unfortunately, because of the full moon, you couldn't see much. It wasn't much better out there than it would have been on a clear night in Seattle (which it wasn't), because the moon was so bright. We didn't need flashlights or headlamps most of the time. The few shooting stars we saw were rather bright, naturally, as we wouldn't have seen them otherwise. But around 3am we decided we may as well head back home. I put the car in 1st gear and started the drive. It's really steep up the mountain, but super flat back out of the FS land.

Anyway, the area is nice, and we plan to camp there again. Also, we wanted to see if we could stand to be out of doors without a tent, and apparently we can. The tarp wasn't necessary at all for this outing, but it's less than a pound so in the future it'll rock. Thanks to the 14mph wind at 40F there were no bugs, but the wind was a bit nippy out of the sleeping bags. Might just bring a little bit of bug netting with the tarp if we want to try that kind of thing again.