A return to Hawk Creek 4/12-4/14 2024

For those that follow our trips reports you have seen that sometimes we go back to the same spots to spend some time. Sometimes it is because of convenience as well as a place we enjoy. The forest roads are still too soft to travel on although they are really close to being okay now. So we decided to go back to Hawk Creek campground north of Davenport Washington. The campground has 20 sites and they are suitable for smaller RV’s. So a truck camper is perfect. We arrived to our site after work that Friday and quickly got things set up.

Most sites are close together at this campground. With our end site we had a bit more room and no site across from us helped as well. It would have been nice if someone did not park the car blocking some of our view, a spot they should not have parked but did anyway. But over all our spot was pretty good for a campground. Soon night was upon us and we spent the rest of the night around a nice campfire.

We had a good night sleep as it was pretty darn quite in camp. Heck, we were even one of the last people to go inside that night. An unusual thing since we go to bed earlier most of the time. After breakfast we set out to do what we wanted to do. The whole reason to come to this campground was to get our kayaks out and do some paddling out on some pretty water areas. The little waterway outlet from Hawk Creek into the Columbia River is very pretty. Then farther out to near the Columbia there are some great sandy beaches.

A spot I wanted to go to would be a 2 mile paddle from camp one way. There was a little button hook bay to enjoy if we could get it for ourselves. Luck have it, we did have it to ourselves. We hung out there for an hour and half or so. Even took a little cat nap on the sandy beach.

It was a very peaceful spot to spend some time. Just a 2 mile paddle to the spot and it was worth it. It was time though to get back to camp and make some lunch.

Once we got back to camp we started up a campfire. This trip we are continuing our, over the campfire cooking tryout. If you read the previous trip report you read that we have never really cooked anything over a campfire. We are enjoying trying it out as a change up to what we do. For lunch we would make jalapeno and sweet pepper poppers over the fire.

The peppers turned out pretty good. I ate them all and even cooked up the remainder of them for lunch. Our next attempt Joanne made little cherry pie pockets over the fire.

The little pies were tasty. Joanne said she would use puff pastry next time instead of pie dough. But either way we ate them up, no problem.

We then just hung out at camp for the rest of the day. Soon it would be time to start dinner and once again, we would cook over the fire. I got the tripod ready and Joanne got the pot out to make dinner. We would make lasagna for dinner.

For the lasagna we used no bake noodles. It was cooked over the fire for about 40 minutes. The meat was precooked over the fire before putting it in the pot. Overall, a very successful cooking attempt for all three items we tried to make. The lasagna could have used a little more sauce at the bottom to protect the noodles on the bottom layer more. They got slightly overcooked but was still able to eat them, no problem.

We are enjoying trying out something different for cooking. But very soon we wll stop cooking over the fire as the weather will be too warm. When it is hot, I do not want to be around a fire. Besides that, it will not be long and there will be fire restrictions going on for the summer months until mid fall or so. But for now, it was fun and delicious.

Sunday morning we would have breakfast and enjoyed the views while staying warm with the propane fire.

The Hawk Creek waterfall was just a short walk from camp and you could easily hear the falls from camp too. That morning we would do the short jaunt over to the falls to take a look at them.

We would then get the kayaks out for a short couple mile paddle that morning. Mostly floating and watching birds in the Hawk Creek channel.

After the time out on the water we got our things packed up to head home. One question I get is how we transport the kayaks. Our camper is big enough that we carefully set them inside the camper. While not ideal, it works. How to haul kayaks with a truck camper is always a topic of discussion.

Another great trip out for the weekend. The weather was amazing and perfect. It was time to go back to work for now. The next weekend we will stay home and the grandkids are coming over to visit for the weekend. After that and another work week, we will be back out, exploring our region for the weekend.