Can you dig it?

My beautiful tri-color potatoes!

What is it about canning jars that makes them so beautiful?

 Guess what we did last Sunday?

That's right, me and two of my favorite gal pals canned!  It was super fun.  Anyone who knows me knows that it is just next to impossible to keep me inside when the weather is nice.  Add in the word "kitchen" and I am definitely AWOL... So you know it takes some fun friends to keep me by the stove top on one of the last of the nice fall days!

Lisa and me "stirrin' the pot"

Jamie, Lisa and I spent the day cooking and canning salsa and potatoes.  I have only one photo of Jamie, as she moves pretty quickly and absconded with the photo taking device early on in the proceedings.

There's Jamie! Moving so fast her hair is in a twirl!

Lisa brought her salsa ingredients chopped and ready to go.  I had big plans to make salsa too, but when I went to harvest the last of my tomatoes in the little greenhouse... well let's just say that not looking at them for a week in hopes that the frost hadn't frozen them is not really an effective strategy.  Think cheap, thin plastic bag filled with water- that was the consistency of my enormous, yet inedible tomato beauties :(

Lisa needed a couple more cups of peppers for her salsa, so she started cutting up some freebies I had gotten at work.  She even tasted them and said they were not hot at all.  She gave me a little piece and Holy Smacks!  I had to spit it out.  I thought they were anchos, but apparently they were jalapenos!
um... yeah, I didn't take the finished jar of salsa that was generously offered (I have zero tolerance for hot stuff!)

Here are some beautiful photos of the salsa!!

Hot stuff baby, woo hoo...

Pretty pretty!!

One thing I have to tell you is you must be very careful when working around boiling water and hot canning jars.

Notice my rapt attention on the boiling hot jar...

Lisa is a little more careful here, filling the jars!

Jamie spent the morning scrubbing and peeling the potatoes from my garden.(Thank you Jamie- you're the bomb!) 

I love canning potatoes (you MUST pressure can them!).  Well, I don't know if I love the canning part, but I love having ready to heat and eat potatoes for the rest of the year!

Here they are all scrubbed up and the scabby ones peeled, ready to be chopped into chunks.

 

Here I am sporting my cute new apron that my sister got me for my birthday!

Into the pressure cooker with you!

And just a short 3 hours later...

Just to clarify, the taters don't get pressure canned for 3 hours, but you have to:

1. scrub, peel, chunk them (Only the scabby ones got peeled, the rest got to retain their beautiful unblemished skins)
2. Par boil them for about 2 minutes (which really means about twenty minutes from the time you drop those babies in a water filled pot and turn the burner on)
3. pack the jars with parboiled potatoes
4. remember that you were supposed to boil water to pour over them
5. boil water
6. ladle boiling water over the potatoes in the jars
7. realize that you didn't put enough lids in the heating water
8. put lids (mostly heated up) and rings on
9. remember that you should have turned up the heat on the pressure cooker burner
10. put the jars in, lock the lid down, realize you will have to spin the whole pot around so that you can read the gauge
11. wait for the water to boil inside the sealed cooker (steam has to escape through the little valve for 10 minutes before you seal it)
12. Remember that you never turned the heat up
13. Turn up the heat
14. Frantically run around trying to remember where you put the weight that seals the cooker steam valve (amazingly, it is in the box with all the canning stuff in a bag labeled: Pressure Cooker Regulator)
15. Drop the regulator on the steam valve and wait for it to build to 12 pounds (this takes way longer than you would imagine...)
16. Freak out a little because you forgot that the plug thing on the front is supposed to pop up- it is not the emergency pressure relief valve.
17. Fiddle with the temperature control knob trying to keep it at 12 pounds for then next 40 minutes.
18. Move it off the burner to cool, so you can get the lid off without an explosion (I don't remember exactly, but it seemed like an hour)
19. Repeat from step 3 for the next batch...

EAT PIZZA!

 We had chocolate cake too, but apparently we were too busy eating it to photograph it!!

All in all a very productive day and big thanks to Jamie and Lisa for coming over to make it happen.  I will think of you every time we eat potatoes this year! (well, I'm sure I will think of you all at other times too, but you know what I mean!)

The "Bob" Part 2

Water crossing/Drink break- the horses and mule are pretty good at crossing water.  Although Sapphire (the black and white paint in the lead) is kind of a stream hog when he is thirsty!

Lest you think we spent our whole trip lounging around camp, here are some highlights of the actually riding.

This is a pretty typical view for me on a pack trip.  I bring up the rear, give updates on the state of Mule's packs, and generally lolly gag around.  Brian, on the other hand, is in charge of navigation, addressing potential disasters on the trail (think back packers, bicyclists, moths, other things that might potentially eat a horse- never mind bears) and handling the mule.  It can get a little dusty in the back, but I am not one to complain!

The long and dusty trail.

Pretty sure this is Big Prairie... especially because of, well, the big prairie.

Lots of water crossings.

Of course there are times when I can trot up next to Brian:

And times when I can't (or won't!):

This is probably one of our least favorite trail features. Sheer cliff on the left, steep face on the right and footing that is, shall we say, less than perfect...

This was also very steep, but with good footing.  See how it was a little windy up here?

And this is a pretty typical view from the front:

Ears and trail...

A little bit different water crossing.

Pack Bridge at Big Prairie

 My husband jokingly asked me if I would like to lead Mule across this bridge.  Last year on our Bob trip, I wanted to lead Mule.  We did great until we stopped at the foot of a similar bridge to read a sign.  When it was time to go again, I did not pay attention to where the lead rope went.  Well, it went right up the back of my horse's legs and under his tail.  Suffice it to say,  my horse was not at all happy about that.  Some bucking and tearing around ensued, I ended up on the ground and my horse's hoof (complete with metal shoe) connected with my skull.  Minor concussion aside, it was still an awesome trip.  But, I did decline to lead Mule this time...

So, this bridge might not look all that impressive, after all it is no Golden Gate.  But, bear in mind that no motorized vehicles are allowed in the wilderness.  Every stick of wood, bolt, cable, everything... was brought in by pack animals. It's starting to look a little more impressive, isn't it?

The quick summary of camps:

Thursday: Trailhead (we covered this in The "Bob" Part 1)

Friday: What we have named "Ice Box Camp", near the top of Hahn Pass- it was mighty cold that night:

Frozen water bucket

But, lots of grass!

Saturday: Big Prairie.  As ridiculous as it seems, and quite accidentally, we camped in the exact same spot that we camped in 2 or 3 years ago when we rode through here!

Yeah... that's me, being campy.

And even though, we were miles from any road, there is this:

and this.  People get to live here during the summer!! Doesn't that sound awesome?

And this.  although we did not see the draft horses that would pull it...

 Sunday: Danaher Meadows.  We intentionally camped in the same spot this year as we have in the past, because, although there is a lotta, lotta grass here, water is a little harder to find.  Unless you want to camp in the swamp, which was not on our agenda...

Our view from our campsite.

 This is where we heard the wolves howling. and where the big herd of mules appeared outside our tent in the middle of the night. Coincidence?  I don't think so.  The mules actually disturbed me more than the wolves- my horse LOVES mules.  He has jumped out of the electric corral to meet up with them before, so taking no chances, we got up early to saddle up and ride!

Lunch break.  We only tie to trees for short periods, when we are right there to watch everyone.

This was (another) Big, Long day.  I think we did 26 miles this day, part of it over an enormous pass!
The Hoadley/Stadler pass went on forever...

Top of the pass.

Then, going down the other side!

 At the bottom, we stopped at this forest service cabin for a break.

Glad to have a break.

This is another typical scene: my horse stands patiently, while I root around in every pocket, every bag to find something I most likely left at the trailer...

Monday: Back at the trailhead.  So happy to be back at the trailer (no tent to set up), with a wooden corral (no electric corral to set up) and a truck to take us to dinner (no sausage, cheese and crackers for dinner!). As you can imagine, we slept well that night!!

Well that's about it. Already have our trip planned for 2012!  and hopefully another trip to Wyoming (think Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid...)

I hope you enjoyed this trip summary.  I have another tale to tell, but it is from home base (and involves some pretty happy sheep!!)

Happy Indian Summer.

The "Bob" Part 1

so, the railing is in the way, and ridiculously enough blocks the most important sentence about Bob Marshall but, here it is.  This sign is in Ovando, MT

Every year, Brian and I go on a 1 week horse pack trip in the Bob Marshall Wilderness.  We look forward to it from the time we get home one year to the day we leave the next.

This year we almost got skunked.

 Not literally, but you know what I mean ~ we almost didn't get to go.

Traditionally, we have gone the last week in July, to try and get in after the snow melts on one end and beat the fire season on the other.We have done really well with this timing and so planned the same thing for this year.

Well this year we had other fish to fry during that last week of July.  Namely this:

Yipes!

Yes, moving 1204 square bales, by hand, three times (load from field, unload from trailer, stack) kind of sucked the wind out of our sails.  (Don't be impressed with me- my dear husband did 99% of this). 
I may have let the trip go, but Brian is not that kind of guy.  He convinced me (thankfully!) that we should try it over the Labor Day weekend.  So I pleaded with my work to have the Friday before and the Tuesday after off and away we went!!

Yay! Away we go!!!

We left after work Thursday and arrived at the Monture Creek trailhead at 11:30 pm, in the pitch black.  We have never been to this trailhead before and so being dazed and exhausted from the 6 hour drive, made a premature turn and ended up in the Outfitter's Camp.  We did not know this until the next morning, although we were a little amazed at the number of horses in the corrals there- luckily we pack our own corral, so we were set up in under 45 minutes and fell into bed.

This photo is from our Pee Wee Creek trip, but shows our corral set up nicely!  And that beautiful white trailer in the background?  Most fantastic sleeping accommodations- ever!

We woke in the morning to the sound of tractors and lots of people moving around.  When we ventured outside, we realized that we had camped inappropriately.  Outfitters pay a lease to be able to use the Outfitter Camp and they do not take that responsibility lightly (rightly so).  We located the public area, made some apologies and moved over where we should have been in the first place!

They have beautiful facilities at this trail head:

Four wooden corrals...

with troughs for hay.

Happy, happy, hay-eatin' boys

Sorry, you have to bring your own cute cowboy.

The summary (if you are already tired of reading about this) is:

• 88 miles
• 4 days
• beautiful scenery (rocks, rivers, trees and the occasional grassy meadow!)
• wildlife (elk, deer, bear sign, wolf howls)
• 2 horses
• 1 mule
• 2 happy campers :)

The long story:
We travel pretty light- Brian calls it backpacking on horseback. So, no cast iron pots, no wall tents with stoves and cots, no big screen TV.
We do not suffer however- this is our house (big bonus- it's mobile!):

From trees...

to rivers!

And our bedroom:

Yes we do have an inflatable mattress.  If you think we're sissies, you ride a horse over rocks and mountain passes for 22 miles and then sleep on the ground!!!

Dining room:

Stables:

Complete with tack room:

For evening entertainment, we have something better than Survivor.  It's called Nature!

Fall beauty...

Now, personally I love these tipped over trees.  The root configurations are so fascinating.  My horse, however, is convinced that this is an H.E.M. (horse-eating-monster)

Waterfalls...

We were captivated by this little whirlpool.

See how it sucked the yellow flower in? 

Well, I am out of time today, but there is more (much more!!) to tell...

So until next week- Happy first day of Fall!!