The weather was great, 60s and 70s with a light breeze. Very enjoyable. Not too hot in the day and not too cold in the night. We have a 6 person tent and it served its purpose of keeping us away from the elements.
We cooked over a fire, which is one of the reasons we like White Tank park as it is not always common to be allowed to have a fire in the desert due to wild fire concerns. I wanted to continue to teach my children how to start a fire with a ferro rod and a spark. We used cotton balls soaked in petroleum jelly as the tinder. It worked well and the kids were super excited.
I also bought pocket knives for my kids and one of our goals was to learn knife safety. There were no injuries!
On the gear side, I tested out my Condor Bushlore knife. Let me just say that I like the knife. It probably will not make it to the AT because it is slightly too heavy. But, it is a very serviceable camp knife and generally good cutting tool. One item to note is that I did get the blade slightly reprofiled when I purchased it several months ago it is different than straight out of the box. I did not do a lot of heavy batoning of wood, but I did feather some small sticks for the fire and cut open a lot of packages along with preparing the dinner and breakfast. It worked really well and performed all duties easily. As has been reported on many knife sites, the sheath is well crafted and heavy duty. It was a pleasure to carry on my hip. After the moderate wood work and the general camp duties, the blade was doing well. Although I did hit it with a diamond sharpener to keep it extremely sharp.
Overall...great trip as I spent time with my kids and generated more interest in hiking, camping and finally the AT. My sons brought up the trip on the AT with excitement. Even though 2 years must sound like an eternity to them. There are so many joys of just getting out there.
We cooked over a fire, which is one of the reasons we like White Tank park as it is not always common to be allowed to have a fire in the desert due to wild fire concerns. I wanted to continue to teach my children how to start a fire with a ferro rod and a spark. We used cotton balls soaked in petroleum jelly as the tinder. It worked well and the kids were super excited.
I also bought pocket knives for my kids and one of our goals was to learn knife safety. There were no injuries!
On the gear side, I tested out my Condor Bushlore knife. Let me just say that I like the knife. It probably will not make it to the AT because it is slightly too heavy. But, it is a very serviceable camp knife and generally good cutting tool. One item to note is that I did get the blade slightly reprofiled when I purchased it several months ago it is different than straight out of the box. I did not do a lot of heavy batoning of wood, but I did feather some small sticks for the fire and cut open a lot of packages along with preparing the dinner and breakfast. It worked really well and performed all duties easily. As has been reported on many knife sites, the sheath is well crafted and heavy duty. It was a pleasure to carry on my hip. After the moderate wood work and the general camp duties, the blade was doing well. Although I did hit it with a diamond sharpener to keep it extremely sharp.
Overall...great trip as I spent time with my kids and generated more interest in hiking, camping and finally the AT. My sons brought up the trip on the AT with excitement. Even though 2 years must sound like an eternity to them. There are so many joys of just getting out there.
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