Here are a few images from our trip last week to Oregon, Idaho and Utah. The rock is the same rock my dad and I sat on 40 years ago and had Sharon take our picture “Memories”. We traveled over 2550 miles and had a great time met a neighbor of dads while in Beaver all in all a great trip!

Our Jeep on the bench in the sage brush above dads place

AspenTrees higher elevation on the Face of the mountain.

Aspen trees and log fence at the first lake on the “Loop”.

The rock dad and I sat on years ago for Sharon to take our picture.

Dad and I in the 70’s on his small farm in North Creek Utah on a trip with Sharon!

Many years ago on his last farm

The rain has begun the leaves are turning color and fall is here. We enjoy many fall colors here in the PNW and as you drive around the foliage changes and so do the colors.

Fall colors

We took the new Jeep out for a road test in Capitol forest to see how she would do. We aired the tires down to 25 lbs as we were mostly on gravel roads and wanted to have a smother ride.

Here we had reached our goal Capitol Peak just below the radio towers.

We reached the peak just below the radio towers.

Since we were at the top and it was lunch time we parked and had a sandwich and enjoyed the fresh air and views.

This is truly what a tree farm looks like yes clear cuts replanting and harvesting a needed resource and trails for hiking, four wheeling, horse back riding,Trail bikes and  really just about any means of transportation you want!

Sadly all fun events end and this is the way back out to one of the main highways and back home. Near the end of this power line right of way is parking and restrooms for those that trailer their four wheeler’s or trail bikes. Maps for this area can be had at the DNR website or any DNR headquarters!

We went to Mount Rainier, Randal, Packwood Morton and surrounding areas on a one day trip. We packed a lunch and ate it in a rest area just out of Packwood. The new Jeep did well and was averaging almost 19 miles per gallon. We only saw one deer and a few birds but the scenery was great as usual with the fall colors just starting. This was a shakedown trip preparing for a longer trip to Beaver Utah and surrounding areas.

Parking lot at a beautiful waterfall!

Mount Rainier hiding in the clouds

Reflection Lake on the east side of Mount Rainier

One of the tunnels on the way to Packwood from the Mount Rainier park.

The Firebox Nano on it’s first test run making soup with less than 2 ounces of Alcohol and simmered for over thirty minutes with the Esbit stove. The soup was comprised of my own dehydrated vegetables and Beef Jerky and the stove combination worked as advertised and had a lot of fuel left when the soup was finished.
Yes I used the simmer ring after the soup came to a boil, the liquid was over 3 cups and the vegetables and water were direct from the refrigerator.
I personally will use the stove with the Alcohol burner only and not wood as I see it as a quick hot drink or soup type meal stove at this time.
I know it would burn wood just fine but I have a larger Emberlit that can also use the alcohol stove or smaller pieces of wood so now I have a wood burner and an alcohol burner for emergency use along with a Jet Boil that I plan to use for actual cooking.
But to have a fire box stove that will fit in my shirt pocket is very nice!

Ready To go

The flame doing its job

Almost done

Ready to eat

A different direction from all of the food. This is a visitor I captured a picture of in my neighbors yard a while back. It was completely unafraid of me and let me take a series of images before leaving to hunt. Enjoy.

So I was tired of the cost of store bought Cedar Planks and decided to do my own. I bought cedar fence boards and made my own. Sanded them until glass smooth and cut them to lengths that I could use for individual pieces.
The fish picked up the aroma of the cedar and a bonus was that the skin sticks to the board so serving is simple. Great for Salmon also!

So we did the Dino turkey legs again and they came out moist and tasty. We could not finish one leg each so we removed the left over meat and made turkey salad for sandwiches. MM MM good!!!

So we had not done any beef ribs on the smoker/grill yet and we had to do something about that. I used the same basic plan as I do for pork ribs called 3- 2- 1 which is 3 hours on smoke, two hours swimming in apple juice wrapped in foil and one hour unwrapped and basted with sauce (sets the sauce). The corn went in during the last part of the cook and was delicious and tender.

Beef and corn on the cobb

So we did a meal together using the Pellet smoker for the chicken and Sharon did the Peanut Butter sauce and noodles. The chicken thighs were smoked/cooked skinless and had a good barbecue sauce applied as they cooked.

Skinless chicken thighs smoked/grilled and Peanut Butter sauce over noodles with a crisp salad. Does not get any better than this!