Fremont Lake - we head north

We leave Browne Lake reluctantly, wondering rather if we have found the most perfect campsite, and whether we will regret leaving this place behind. But in truth we have probably exhausted its attractions and it is time to move on. Our plan is not to go far, and just find somewhere on the lake at Flaming Gorge within an hour or so of Browne Lake. I am tired, so let Eliza drive for a while.

As we drive on, though, we realise that the best part of this Park is now behind us. We are now back in the desert, and all the camp sites are full of people with huge boats that use the lake for general gadding about. We drive on, for miles and miles and miles, and ultimately resolve just to give up looking for somewhere nice, get some miles under our belts and see if we can get up towards Jackson Hole, and the attendant delights of the Tetons and Yellowstone. The kids end up watching Star Wars in the back. Eventually, the desert gives way gradually to green stuff, and Sarah spies another lake on the map which looks good and should have some camp sites around it. More following our noses, but as the afternoon turns to evening, we find Fremont Lake campsite and Site number 11. A corker this one, with a great firepit and terrific view of the Lake. The bear warning signs are getting more and more serious and I wander down to a neighbouring site to get some intel from the locals. The message is yes, there are bears here, and yes they are grizzlies, but you should be just fine. The chap I ask eventually admits to having been “cuddled” by one at some stage in the past, so I am not sure that his advice was super-trustworthy, but we sit outside by the fire anyway and indulge in some Pinot Noir from a it further west. The kids simply go feral.

Flaming Gorge – we enter bear country

We leave the world of “hook-ups” behind and head for the wilderness. A “full hook-up” is an RV-er’s term for an arrangement whereby one plugs in one’s water, electricity and plumbing to an assortment of various plugs next to your site. All very convenient, and it means that you have the facility to shower, wash up, charge our multitude of electrical appliances, toast bread, and most importantly make coffee. I am in charge of the plugging and the unplugging. The girls help me here and there, and Monty loves watching the black and grey water emptying process. Other than driving the Reconnaissance Vehicle, these are my only jobs. At the first RV site (Zion), I was given the laundry job too, but I applied Clarkson philosophy and lost all the clothes. Completely disappeared – mountains of kids’ underwear and a couple of Sarah’s shirts. I am not given this task again.

So entering the world of camping proper is a different kettle of fish. In a 30 foot RV, it is never going to be roughing it exactly, and we still have our gas fridge and cooker. However, we no longer have our electrical mattress inflaters (separate) and the kids seemed to have played with them before we left the world of hook-ups, so Sarah is now committed to sleeping on top of a convex mound, while I slumber at the bottom of a concave pit.

We left Moab with a plan to head for somewhere where nobody else goes and we found it – Browne Lake in Flaming Gorge National Recreational Area.
The weird thing about this one was that Sarah saw some pictures of a campsite on the internet in the Flaming Gorge area that looked cool, but there was no clue where this place actually was.
We stopped here and there and looked at a few places (Eliza , ibid), but finally found this site on a lake 10 miles down a dirt road off the main highway.
We were up at 8000 feet or something so the morning temperature in the Reconnaissance Vehicle went from well over 100 degrees (Moab) to 55 degrees (Browne Lake) overnight. In due course, at Yellowstone this reaches 43. We stayed here for a couple of nights and only on the second day Sarah realised that our very site was actually the one from which the internet photo had been taken. A great, peaceful place where we spent the days walking, playing in the lake, hunting for bears, collecting firewood and generally having a very chilled time.

Flaming Gorge - Eliza’s Blog again

Mima and I woke up and then Monty and we all went to give Mummy and Daddy a hug and wake them up too. We took a picture of my shoes which got chewed in Las Vegas by an escalator. Daddy said "that could have been messy Eliza".
Then um Monty and Mima went back into their beds and started to play. But I stayed with Mummy and Daddy and kept on hugging them. I was very very very hungry and my tummy started hurting. Daddy went to make breakfast with Mima and Monty while I was with mummy. I went to eat a banana because I was so hungry but then I started feeling a bit sick and Mummy tucked me up in bed. We had no medicine so Mummy couldn’t give me any medicine. Daddy didn’t know that I felt sick and then Daddy said ‘are you alright?’ and I said ‘I feel sick’ and daddy said if you eat some breakfast then you might feel better. I tried to eat some breakfast but then I felt even more sick. Mummy brought me a bowl and I was sick in it straight away. It was all bananary and mummy said ‘ Well you didn’t like that banana much did you.’

Then Monty and Jemima and Daddy went out for a bear hunt and to get some wood for the fire. I fell asleep and mummy was on the computer and then a humming bird flew in to the RV. Mummy tried to wake me up to see it but I was fast asleep. Then the Humming bird got really scared and Mummy tried to catch it and then she caught it and she let it outside. Before she let it out she took some pictures of it and it was a very beautiful humming bird and it was making little tweety noises and Mummy felt very sorry for it.

Then I woke up, Mummy said that she had seen a humming bird and that it had come in and that she had caught it and let it go again and she said ’ do you feel better?’ Then Mummy said do you want something to eat. Do you want a cookie or some pasta or some grapes or an apple and I said “oh yes please” and then I was better.
Later on we played on the bridge.