Camping on the Smith

Last Thursday morning we headed north for a three-day camping trip on the Smith River.



The Smith is a pristine, undammed river. The water is crystal clear. We camped at Grassy Flat. which is near where this photo was taken.



We brought our bicycles – my vintage Schwinn newspaper bike and Kim's Trek Navigator. The Schwinn has the mother-of-all baskets on the front, and was handy for hauling essential supplies like food, wine coolers and lawn chairs down to the river.



In the evening we played Canasta, cooked over the campfire and stargazed.



The Goddess worked her magic.



We enjoyed our own kind of fireworks.







The next morning we went on a hike and visited a serpentine bog with a rare plant called a Darlingtonia, aka a Cobra Lily.



Because there are few nutrients in a serpentine bog, these plants eat meat. Flies and other bugs are lured into the large bulb with a nectar. They're then slowly sucked down into the plant and consumed. This raises an interesting question: Assuming such a plant were edible, would it be kosher for a vegetarian to consume it?



Nearby we inspected a "mine test hole," probably dug in the 1930s.

There were many other interesting photo ops, but I was relaxed and lazy most of the time and didn't bother. I soaked up a lot of sun and read an adventure involving Navajo officer Joe Leaphorn, a double homicide, a heist, a stolen helicopter, a woman corrupting a priest, a militant American Indian outfit and a cave wired with dynamite and full of scouts. Damn, that's a lot of plot twists to pack into a little paperback!