good looking twins, big things and chef womper

June 20th

I packed up the bike (as usual) and headed back up the highway where i saw a sign for Twin Falls the day before when i came into town.

Got up the road, and up this path. uphill. ack. i need to get in shape. round is a shape. hah.

I was intercepted by this sign.

a trail (left) which would take 1-2 hours each way, or look at the falls(right)... a few minutes walk.

I chose right. it was uphill the whole way and i got winded. smoking doesn't help i guess.

looks like i'm getting closer.

Huzzah! what a pair of twins. nice to see, worth the short walk.

wouldn't like to walk 2 hours just for this though. heh.

closeup

Rode down south a bit more and got to Houston. crap. too far south?

When i was pulled over someone pulled in behind me and came to talk to me. they just wanted to tell me that my backpack was blocking my tail light and couldn't see when i braked! oops. Good thing they told me, wouldn't want someone to rear-end me because of that. adjusted the backpack and off i went into town.

where i saw this, a relic of the 16th through early 19th century of New Spain (now mexico). The grinding wheel was used in mining to crush ore while beasts of burden pulled it around in a circle. The fine particles were then separated to extract the silver by mercury amalgamation. This was presented to the town of houston from the town of Real de Angeles.

now you learned something. heh.

looked kinda neat/creepy. it was in the same park.

Looks like the fountain was off that day. looks like a bunch of salmon trying to go up river perhaps?

A giant fly fishing pole! more towns should have stuff like this.

Seems like Houston is cowboy country after all. they had a few like these around town

I rode for a bit more and was pretty hungry, so i stopped in where there were a lot of cars (they all left by while i was eating) This is in Burns Lake

I had the lunch Special 'A'. it was fairly cheap.

came with a cup of soup. really good soup.

almond chicken, chow mein and sweet and sour pork.

seriously, one of the best chinese dishes i've ever had. the almond chicken was crispy and done properly, the sweet and sour pork was actually sweet and sour and the chow mein was... different. never had that before, like that and it was really good. upper left corner was a shaker of roasted sesame seeds. more restaurants should have that. hah.

I rode back south and headed to the visitor info place. I knew i'd see something big there. hah. Mr PG, the wooden dude in prince george. I didn't stay in town long, since i just wanted to make a lot more miles and head south, i just took the picture and ran.

A bit further south, saw this. Quesnel gold pan. More roadside attractions. love these things, and by the looks of it, they work. i'm at the roadside, taking a picture. didn't stay in town though. wanted to get to a campsite before it got too dark.

I got to the campsite at about 9:15 or so, quite late by camp standards. It was raining quite a bit for the last few hours mostly on and off, but my olympia suit was starting to get wet. i hate putting on the rainsuit when it's light rain because i start to feel like Ralphie in the movie "A christmas story".

at least i can't shoot my eye out.

I set up the tent, put everything inside that i needed to, put all the other stuff i needed in the vestibule of the tent (it works!) and put the bike cover on the bike. I put on my rain jacket on instead of the motorcycle jacket and got the boonie hat on. it started raining even harder.

earlier in the day i had picked up some supplies too cook over an open flame. one problem, i had no wood. I walked around looking for the camp host. In B.C. the park host comes to you to register you for the campsite. I couldn't find the host, so i just had to wait. I looked around for some dry wood i could burn and couldn't find any, but started a small fire with sticks and anything else dry that would burn. no luck on dry stuff, but i did manage to start a small fire but it was a pain keeping it going since everything was so wet.

By this time the host came around and i paid her for the site and bought a bundle of dry wood from her. hurrah!

At 10pm it was pitch black and i had to cut the wood to make a fire. I needed to use my headlamp to see anything... oh vin diesel, where are you...

I got a good fire going, and made a simple camp supper.

ingredients:

1 rib eye steak

2 small potatoes

1 stick of garlic butter (with chives)

garlic ms. dash

hot sauce

Cut potatoes and put in tin foil. add a lot of butter. wrap up the tin foil.

put steak on grill. heh. i'm a chef.

end result

quite enjoyable, the steak was cooked medium. kinda hard to cook in the dark, over an open flame without cooking implements.

lessons learned. when cooking over an open flame, a long pair of tongs would be very useful, to turn the steak and potatoes. it would also help when you accidently drop the steak between the grill and it lands right onto the hot coals. heh. yes, i admit, i dropped it right into the fire. I should have put the steak on later, letting it cook less, and put the potatoes on for longer, to soften them up more.

all in all, not bad for a first attempt.

It was dark since 9:45 so at 11:30 it was complete darkness and time to go to bed. it had stopped raining by then, but you could tell more rain was in the forecast. ugh.

at about this time i was letting the fire die out and was heading to sleep when i heard this bone chilling howling. no clue if it was just dogs, or coyotes or wolves or something else.

you hear the fire more than anything, but around the 1/2 way mark you can hear it faintly in this video. in person you could hear it clear as day. creepy.