Flapping Freezing

View from Lava Point

Woke up this morning to snow!  At 7800 something feet we thought it felt rather chilly last night.  The wind was blowing a gale, the tent was snapping like a cowboy's whip.  At 10PM we heard a car pull up, peaked out the window and saw people walking through our campsite and a car parked smack next to us.... Memorial weekend has now been dubbed whacky weekend - it sure makes people do some crazy stuff!  Yes, we weren't using the tent site and we had planned to offer it to someone looking for a site but to just turn up and take use of it unannounced?  Maybe a post for How Rude!  They disappeared early so we didn't have to deal with them but whoa, weirdness.  As I mentioned it was freakin' cold so we stayed under the covers for awhile longer.  When we were planning to get up we thought it had started raining but no, it was snow.  Luckily just a light snow but we decided to hightail it out of there to get to some warmth (and coffee) - the Jeep told us it was 33F (0.5C) when we left at 8:30 - brrr!  As we headed down the road the sky cleared and the sun came out - mountain micro climates, one must be prepared!

So to catch up on yesterday - the National Park campgrounds were full but we did managed to snag a tent site at an RV park in Springdale, right on the river which was rather pleasant.  Stuck our feet in [the river] with some Two Buck Chuck ($1.99 Charles Shaw White Zinfandel from Trader Joe's - not bad at all!)  Cooked up some delicious sausages and into bed for some reading once it got dark.  We were told to check with reception at 9:30AM to see if there were any sites available - nope - so we headed into the park to see if there were any sites at the first-come first-served campground - nope, full since 8:30!  Whacky weekend.  So we headed west and then north up to Lava point, a free 6 site campground and we got lucky.  We were there at 11AM so wandered up to the overlook and down Barney's trail before cooking up some grilled ham and cheese sandwiches for lunch.  Yum.  We decided to have a relaxing day rather than driving around and not being able to find a campsite...  We met and chatted with a middle aged couple who had sold everything except what was in their car and were travelling around hiking and biking, already for several years now.  Awesome.  We knitted and read, up in our tent because it was blustery and a little nippy outside, cooked dinner to keep warm and were then in bed reading just after 8PM.  The great thing about camping - early to bed and early to rise, it does feel good.  It's amazing how much you can get done before lunchtime!