Picnic Anyone? ME!!!!

Sunday, August 15th 2010

Today, I didn't feel well again.  Still have this horrible cold.  Throat is still sore, ears hurt, nose stuffy combined with sinus headache.  I couldn't go and teach nursery and share my horrible gems with the children.  

So I asked the family if they wanted to go on a ride and have a picnic.  Since both Pilot and Angel have the same cold it was an easy sell.  Hubby did have to find a substitute for his Sunday School class but that was easy because his co-teacher partner was able to take that duty over.

And we packed up some food and headed for the Alpine Loop.  

First we went up to Tibblefork Reservoir and on up to Silver Flat Reservoir.  Then we went a short way up American Fork canyon following the river.  This is the river that fills most of Tibblefork Reservoir.  I think it would be fun to camp up the canyon in a non improved place.  Someday........

So we then looked for a picnic area and they were all full!  There weren't many open as we went up the canyon from Timpanogos Cave area, but I thought we would be able to find a spot on our way down.  No Go!

So we headed up towards Timpooneke and didn't find anything that direction, so we just went to the campground that is reserved for TERT on the weekends.  

Our TERT friend had already left and so we pulled out our stuff and got ready to picnic.

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Here is Pilot's Rocket Stove.  We cooked the dogs over the stove on my make shift grill, aluminum foil to the rescue.  I was planning on using the stove to light the charcoal and then use our roasting sticks.  But that did not work out.  

Maybe it was too windy, or maybe it was that I had not tested the stove out and made some useful tweakings on it.

I didn't have the fuel shelf made yet, so I made one from foil. It did not hold up to the weight and stuffing of the twigs.  I also did not have a grill, so when I decided to cast the roasting sticks away, I didn't have a backup method of cooking.

I also tried putting charcoal on foil and then roasting the dogs, but the wind was interfering too much and cooking on the stick was futile.

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The picnic worked out fine.  Of course I improvised and made-do and everything was fine and we did have fun.  Family Fun is the most important part.

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Now the next photo will show you how far I have come from that Sunday just 8 days or so ago.  

Here the stove is back home.  It is sitting on my dead gas grill.  I am recycling the grill and will be remodeling it soon.  I use it all the time as a charcoal grill, but I have grand plans for it's future.

Back to the Hotdogs!  

I found a nice small heavy grill with a handle that works nicely on the Rocket Stove.  I also found a pan that has an inner hole in the bottom just the size of the inner fire can.  This helps funnel the heat up towards the grill.

This setup worked really great.  The hot dogs were done very quickly, just a couple of minutes.  They were actually overdone.  But that is because the cook took off for a couple of minutes.  Bad cook, bad cook.

I made a fuel rack/shelf out of a vegetable can.  Hubby de-lidded the top and bottom from the can.  Then I cut down the seam to open it up.  I bent all the edges over for safety, as cut cans are very sharp.

Then I slid it into the rocket stove.  It works great.

To cook the hotdogs, we used 3 small pieces of wood/kindling for the fuel.  Amazing!  I even pulled the last 6 inch parts that didn't burn out and doused them to use next time!

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