South Prairie Lake was frozen over. The large meadow across the road was filled with several feet of standing water, but the adjacent meadows were dry.

There was more ice on the road above the junction. If I had fresher tires and ice screws I might have made it to where we camped on Lost Creek last year. Instead, Walter and I waited at South Prairie by the launch site while Andy continued up to the bridge. Returning shortly, he said the ride was exciting; the potholes sent him sliding in unexpected directions across the sheet ice. He didn’t think my bike would make it that far and laughed when I suggested his KLR might make it all the way into the campsite on the creek.

We turned around and dropped down to a lower elevation and made lunch. I wanted to field-test my new BioLite Campstove 2. Andy looked for mushrooms while I fussed with the stove.

The jury is still out on this gadget. When it works, it works as advertised, burning hot and clean and generating electricity. It works better with pellets than twigs. I cooked up some bacon and warmed slices of soda bread to make sandwiches. Then I smothered the flames when I added more pellets. A choking plume of smoke made re-igniting the stove difficult, but I managed to get it going again with several chunks of fire-starter.  Disaster averted, I put a pot on and warmed our eggnog.

We finished our lunch and packed up. The valley was shrouded in smoke from slash fires and the sun was setting as we returned home, riding along the edge of the cliffs above the Columbia River.