Elke has been organizing a winter yurt-camping weekend for many years. The first time I went, I was in awe of Dan for sleeping outside! in a tent! in the winter! (the rest of us stuck to the yurts). In subsequent years, though, I got mighty sick of sleeping in the yurts - I was always too hot, I didn't like how messy everything got, and there was snoring and once even a demand for a night light. The yurt weekend was always at a busy time of the year, and it was a long drive, and I just stopped going.
Last year, I started going again, but I slept in a tent myself. And it was the best thing ever. I could hang out in the crowded, warm yurt in the evenings, ski during the day, eat bacon, and sleep in my own space. Brilliant. Dan's style of yurting had caught on with a bunch of people by then (and Kevin outdoes us all by just sleeping outside, no tent!)
This year, we showed up in time for the last snowmobile shuttle in. I was feeling pretty smug about all the warm clothes and the fleece liner I brought for my sleeping bag and the forecast: this was going to be the best sleep ever. Moreover, there was no shortage of bacon in the cooler, and I had both skis and snowshoes. I was ready to do it again!
That is, until I went to set up my tent this year. The poles, as always, gave me grief in the cold, but I popped into Jim's hot tent and got warmth and help. I marched back to my campsite in the snow and finished setting up just the inner tent, and then, with a flourish, unfurled my sleeping bag. This was quickly followed by a sinking feeling: I'd packed the sleeping bag in a gloomy garage, with my mind only half on the job. And I had half the sleeping bag I needed: I had packed a summer bag, size small (which is fine, for summer, given that small means short and I am short... but in winter, I like to shove my water bottle and various other things I do not want to freeze down into the extra toe room). I realized it would be a chilly night, and decided not to think about this until after dinner. After all, it was time to hang out in the yurt and drink some beer and eat some food and listen to politically incorrect jokes. Weekend. I am needing weekends lately, there is always too much to do and no time to just turn off and stop thinking about it.
It was a cold night on Friday. Oh man, was it a cold night. The thermometer apparently registered -23, which is by no means the coldest I have ever slept out in, but is definitely the coldest I have ever survived without my big puffy winter bag. I lined the space between my fleece liner and the wimpy bag with jackets and spare long underwear and shirts, and of course I wore a whole lot of clothes and my toque to bed. By the end, I had assembled such a complicated system that the thought of leaving the cocoon at any point to pee was ... well, it wasn't an option, and I didn't have to. Mind over matter. Mind, however, did not turn off so well, and there wasn't so much sleeping.
Ah, but whatever. There was bacon at breakfast, and the sun came out, and the chickadees landed on outstretched hands - which, kind of a cool feeling. I went for my first ski of the year, on the back loop of the yellow, on my own. I came back to find Chris doing all the dishes from the night before, and hung out with him while he did the domestic thing. Then I joined him for a walk to the lake to check if John, intent on ice-fishing, had caught something as good as bacon. He hadn't, but he'd attracted a bunch of other people, and we hung out for a while. Then, I got hungry, and made my way back to the yurt for some lunch, and then there was another turn on the back yellow. It was good. It wasn't until days later that it became clear that somehow, my energetic poling (probably, I'm not sure if it was the poling) actually got a rib to pop out of place in my back. I didn't feel it until the chorus of angry muscles made life miserable back home.
The second night - not as cold as the first. Still not particularly comfortable, but at least I did not have frost buildup on the top of my toque. Perhaps it was -15. In any case, there was bacon (and french toast, and sausages, and eggs, and probably some other stuff but that is what I went for) in the morning.
And then the weekend was over, and I fell asleep in the car as soon as I turned the seatwarmer on. (No, I was not driving at that point!) And then it was Monday and I was in class and wondered why it felt like somebody was viciously stabbing me in the back, but all in all, you know, it's still worth it. I'm going next year. With my winter sleeping bag, my fleece liner, and a spare sleeping bag in the trunk just in case. You never know...
Posted by Johanna at January 26, 2010 09:29 AM