I finally spent a night in my hammock, and not in the backyard, either.

Today I did my very first ever charity ride (bicycling) and since I could, I decided to spend Friday night only an hour from the start, instead of two and a half.

I stayed at Lake Solano County Park, which has a campground. As soon as I got out of my car, I was greeted by a large peacock, tail folded up and dragging behind him as he sauntered past. I had gotten there after the gate was closed, so I carried my stuff to campsite 45.

It was not a great pick (I called them up in Feb and reserved it sight unseen) but I found a couple of trees to use.

I got there late enough I have no pictures, and I didn't get any the next morning since I left before dawn.
I'll try to make up for the lack of pics with long ramblings instead.

I had two choices for tree-pairs (remember, my car was at the gate so I could not use that for one "tree"). One pair was on a slope and just a shade too close together. I like a lot of sag in my Warbonnet, but this was r'dic'u'lus.
Fortunately for my peaceful night of rest, the other pair of trees were OK. A little too far apart but OK. I was starting to feel like Goldilocks.

I started up a pot of water on the old propane stove for my experimental shelf-stable cooked-rice-in-a-bag boiler-bag meal. It worked out OK. I snarfed it down with some lemon flavored tuna fish (also in shelf-stable packaging).

The two winning trees were on either side of the asphalt parking pad. Since I was not parked there, it was OK. I put the tree straps as high as I could but I would have liked them a foot or so higher: I had a bit of a ridge in my WBBB.

I also realized that I had neglected to bring my small foam pad to use under my feet, since I was using my (overkill for the mild night) Crowsnest 3/4 underquilt. So I folded some spare clothes up and stuffed them between the layers. Worked great for the mild temps of Friday night (probably only about 50F).

I pitched my JRB tarp since there was a chance of rain, but only staked down the side facing the street. Gave me a bit of privacy from the evening parade of restroom visitors but still let me enjoy the moonlight and cool breezes. No rain at all.

I crawled off to bed around 8:30, reading for a while and then just listening to the night and enjoying my hammock time.

Not poetry but hopefully descriptive:

Mosquito heaven but not as bad as it could be.
The sound of the creek nearby.
Intermittent breezes coming through the trees like tiny well-behaved freight trains.
Pot on the breeze. Duuuuuuuuuude.
The 3am beanie decision.
Telepathically connected (wireless?) peafowl sounding off from all over the park nearly simultaneously.
"Hey, look at that funny leanto thing!"
Tree limbs silhouetted against a sky flooded with moonlight, discernible even with my glasses off.
If a nearly deaf Siamese cat designed a car alarm that said "Meow Meow", it would sound like a peafowl.
Sounds of cars and trucks rumbling over the warning strip on 128.
One lonely cow, sobbing its little bovine heart out.
Peacock imitations. Sorry, kids, you are not nearly obnoxious enough to qualify for avian-hood. Don't try anymore on my account. Please.
Percussive strolling (hard soled shoes?).
Soft shuffling feet like a blowing leaf.
A military cadence marching along.
Toddler at 1am.
The cow finds a friend to talk to against a background of crickets or frogs.
A 5am car alarm alarm. Mosquito netting prevents sub-orbital launch of startled hammock-dweller.

I drove into Napa the next morning and had a great time at the fundraiser. I rode my recumbent trike 25 miles around part of the beautiful Napa Valley.

Here's one picture for you.


And you can read all about the biking event in my blog. Which refers to this post. Which refers to the blog. Oh, wait, and a to a photo album! Be careful or you will start surfing in circles.