Yurts reduce camping to simple pleasures
By Marla Jo Fisher – The Arizona Republic
Friday, 7 p.m. I feel
darn smug, sitting here around the campfire, watching the last crimson and
amber rays of the dying sun reflect gently off the lake.
Unlike us, everyone else in this campground is hurriedly setting up their campsites.
Not me.
It’s been only 15 minutes since we arrived at Cachuma Lake, in the Santa Ynez Valley east of Santa Barbara, but we already are sitting around our campfire, drinking our first glass of Chilean Merlot.
I’m so pleased with myself because I had the foresight to book us into a pair of yurts. You’re probably asking what a yurt is.
I learned about yurts while reading a fishing magazine in my mechanic’s waiting room.
I already knew about Cachuma Lake, the picturesque cobalt-blue reservoir on scenic California I54 in the Los Padres National Forest.
Designed after the homes used by nomadic tribes in Mongolia a yurt is a round canvas tent.
On a bluff overlooking the water, the most beautiful part of the campground, the yurts at Cachuma Lake are made from a waterproof canvas skin hung over wooden scaffolding, with a wooden floor and surrounded by a wooden deck.
They have windows with canvas flaps that can be rolled up, electricity and a fluorescent light, and are furnished with wooden bunk beds with waterproof foam mattresses, and resin tables and chairs.
Now, this is camping in style. You even get an electric heater to ward off the evening chill.
Outside the yurts, each campsite has a barbecue and a fire ring, and is pleasantly shaded by huge old oak trees.
“The view is strictly five star,” I think as I imagine how much we’d pay if this were a luxury hotel instead of campground. Probably about $400.00 a night, instead of the 50 bucks per night each yurt is costing us.
We finish the wine, talking in the dark around the campfire until it’s time for bed. We sleep comfortably on the thick foam mattresses, listening to the gentle lapping of the lake on the shore.
Songbirds awaken us, and we rise feeling rested and relaxed, enjoying the peace and serenity.
After breakfast, we walk to the well-stocked campground store and buy propane for our camping stove, noting the other amenities, including a gas pump to fuel up your car.
Sunday brings another blissful morning, with the lake shrouded in mist, which burns off as the day wears on. We are so lazy that we almost miss the wildlife tour of the lake on a pontoon boat that leaves from the marina.
Afterward, it’s time to pack up and head home. It’s a simple matter of gathering up some personal items and stowing them, the cooler and stove in the car. If we’d been willing to eat all our meals at the grill, we could have dispensed with cooking altogether.
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