Bicycle Trip on the Iron Horse Trail

"Well, its only car camping," Steven said as we compared the sporting equipment we had brought. Altogether, we had two footballs, two frisbees, two bandanas (for Capture the Flag) and two decks of cards. We were being delayed because, although Alex had decided not to go on the trip at the last minute, he was still supposed to bring his assigned tent and two stoves. He came early to bring the tent, and then realized that he hadn't brought the stoves! We all had a nice little laugh, but had to wait for him to go all the way back home, find the stoves, and come back. When he came back, we were half an hour late. It didn't really matter though, because "Well, its only car camping."


There were a total of five scouts and two adults on the trip, and we all got out and stretched upon arrival at the camp, happy to be finished with the hour and a half drive. Even though we were supposed to do our biking that day, we were taking it easy. It was decided that it would be easier to bike after lunch, so we had some time until we had to go. Steven and I were once again tent buddies, and once again chose to not use a rainfly. While Colin rode around camp, Steven, Ian, Daniel and I threw around a frisbee. What we saw around us was much different than on our usual backpacking trips. Across from us there was a campsite with two people in it, and they had what looked like a portable cabin set up behind their dining area, which had a large cover set up over it. They had a radio playing music and were relaxed in big chairs. When I looked back at our campsite, we had our backpacking tents set up, but we still had one luxurious thing. New Coleman stoves. These were big and had "Electronic Ignition" printed on them. You pressed a button, and the stove came on. These were way better than our usual Svea stoves (If the Sveas were a bus, the Coleman's were Rolls-Royces), but it was too heavy to take on a backpacking trip. All of this looking and observing got a frisbee in my face because I wasn't paying attention to the game.


"Lunch is served!" Steven called out. Lunch was grilled cheese sandwiches, and Steven was our master cook. He always cooked meals for us because of his skill with a stove. Once we had all eaten a sandwich, we cleaned up the area, checked our tires, and made our way to the trail. We had decided to head to the town of Cle Elum, 13 miles away. We started the trail in the shade, but once we had gone around Lake Easton, we were enveloped in pure sunlight. The going got tougher as the bouncy trail shook us up like a smoothie. After five miles, we took a break. The most we had biked before as a troop was nine miles, and we came to the conclusoin that ten was enough. However, the wind picked up and it was a grueling stretch home. At one point we took a detour to get some asphault under our tires, and ended up going too far. We eventually found the place to turn to get back to the trail, and the asphault felt nice. When we finally got back to the trail, we all let out groans of pain, but then we continued against the wind. Soon, we came to the town of Easton, less than a mile away from camp. We celebrated and had ice cream, than continued to camp. We were back quickly afterwards, and the frisbee throwing began, until Ian suggested football. We made our way to a field with the football and played until 6:00, and then came back to camp for dinner, which was cheeseburgers and chips. We sat and talked by the campfire until dark, and then we crawled into our sleeping bags, bellies full and bodies warm.


The next morning was also lazy, and we cooked up a breakfast of eggs after waking at 8:00. We had to do a lot of scrubbing on the pans, but then we slowly took down camp. We finished taking down and cleaning camp by 10:00, and so we went back to the field to play football, but this time the adults played too. It was all good fun, and then we ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, were given Ho-Ho's by our leader, and then got into the cars, ready to come home.