Olema Camping: Year One

While Lindsay had a small break between jobs back in May, we decided to go spend time in the "wilderness" over in Point Reyes, Olema Ranch Campground, where my family has been camping for bajillions of years.  It was really nice just to get away and spend a lot of time doing nothing.  

Costco had this SUPER cool camp stove...wait, did I say "stove?  I meant stove and OVEN!  Check this bad boy out - I was so stinkin' excited to try this thing out.  We'll consider it an addition to the food storage portion of the garage, you know, for when the world ends, which is why we needed to buy it. Right?  We made this really yummy and SUPER EASY chicken bake thingie from the back of the Stove Top box.  Here's the recipe.   If you ever get tired of wieners and beans while staying in the wilderness, then this is a great substitution...with this nifty camp stove, of course!  Our neighbors enjoyed it too, mkay!

Corn on the cob?  Fresh from the fire!

 

Here's my little wilderness goddess heating up her rib eye!

There's really a lot to do around Point Reyes.  Stinson Beach is a mere 20 minutes from the campground while Muir Woods is about 30 minutes.  SF is 45 minutes away.  Trails GALORE leading to the beach, mountains, etc, begin about 5 minutes away.  The little town of Point Reyes is super close and has cute little shops.  One thing that I hadn't done in probably 10 years was visit the Point Reyes lighthouse.  It's about a 45 minute drive on a windy little road out to the peninsula.  You drive through a few dairy farms where the cows roam on the street with you.  Here's one little friend that was holding up our drive...

Once you get to the lighthouse grounds, you walk about half a mile to get to the visitor's center...which is the beginning of a stairway consisting of 300 stairs!

We're blocking the stairs but you can see the lighthouse in the background.

Here is another view of the stairs from the bottom.  I remember climbing these things as kids and loving it, thinking that was the coolest thing ever!

Here's a closeup of the lighthouse and a peek at the inside.

We walked one of the trails beginning at the Bear Valley Visitor's Center which lead us to a cliff on the ocean.  Fantastic!  The trails were beautiful and green.  It was about a seven mile round trip walk/hike.  Here are some pictures of the journey, including one of a us in a tree poking our heads through a cute little heart shaped hole.

Aunt Tammy joined us for a few days.  She and I got in a game of Phase 10 while Lindsay tested her mad fire building skills. I was VERY impressed! 

Overall, a very fun camping trip!  

Be sure to ask Lindsay about the raccoons...