Posts Tagged “road trip”
Jan
25
2010
Wrong Turns, Mishaps and Motosat Problems With a SmilePosted by Rene in Boondocking, Full-Timing Tips, Live, tags: Boondocking, California Desert, Full-Timing Tips, lifestyle, MiFi, road trip, RV lifestyle, satellite, Slab City, Tripawds.comWe hit the road yesterday for the first time since early December. And as with all first days on the road, things didn’t go quite as smoothly as we would have liked. We are definitely rusty. First, we missed our exit to the Slabs, and almost ended up in Quartzsite. Drove about 25 miles out of our way. Next, when we were in search of water, we took a wrong turn and drove another 10 miles in the opposite direction. The small road we were on was so flooded from the recent rains, we couldn’t find a dry enough place to turn around.
As I proceeded to clean up the mess, Jim tried to turn on the Motosat dish. Guess what? That pain in the ass dish is acting up again, and won’t go up. Thank Dog we have Internet redundancy with our MiFi setup. If we couldn’t get online to manage Tripawds, we would be on our way to the nearest service shop. Apparently our F2 motor is dead . . . again. All this, during our first day back on the road. In the past, I might have fallen apart at so many mishaps in one day. Because when you’re new on the road, multiple screw ups in one day happen a lot, and they can be upsetting. At least to me they were. Jim’s always been a little better about not letting them get him down. But after almost three years on the road, I’m happy to say that we are both able to handle these things with a smile. A few cocktails also work wonders. Good thing we’re stocked up.
Nov
24
2009
Phase II of Our JourneyPosted by Jim in Full-Timing Tips, Live, Our Story, RV Tech, Work, tags: maps, road trip, RV, WordPressGoing seasonal certainly has put the trip into roadtrip. After a couple quick months in our new mountain home, it was exciting to get back on the road, but it’s kinda weird to have settled right back down here at The Desert Rose while René is doing her time at Amazon. We are nowhere warm yet, so I wouldn’t say we quite qualify for true snowbird status yet. Leaving the house behind, however, officially signifies Phase II of our journey. So, we have a new Maps page to commemorate the occasion. All our original travel maps from Phase I are still available to show where we’ve been. And now you can see with a quick glance at our new full-time RVer visited states map.
I’m just happy I didn’t have to manually design this map. While my search for a WordPress visited states map widget for RVers ended with me wondering if I’m the only out there who thinks such a plugin would be really cool, I did come across a couple websites for automatically generating colorful RVer maps of visited states ready for use on any website!
So, 36 states down, only 14 to go – though I’m not sure how we’re getting the rig to Hawaii. Aside from leaving the mainland, and navigating a few congested New England states, we can now say we have been just about everywhere, except the middle. Well, that’s what this whole phase II thing is all about, or perhaps Phases III and IV. Now that we have a home base, what’s the hurry?
Sep
27
2009
I want a new iPod.Posted by Jim in RV Tech, Rants & Raves, Spending Money, tags: money, road trip, spending
In reality, we want a new iPod because the refurbished one we bought over two years ago no longer works. But we believe we need one because traveling cross country can drive one batty when forced to consistently fuss with the radio dial only to find the same static, classic rock, and religion. And two batty people can only take being trapped in a truck for hours a day with Eddie Money and Styx for so long. So, we are getting a new new Apple iPod Classic 120GB MP3 Player from Best Buy. Why an iPod? Why New? Why BestBuy.com? Why Now?
And the former is easily answered not only because I am a Mac Addict, but I did my homework. I had no idea iPods even came with such great capacity now, so we need not be selective now about which music we add. And I am still upset over the short lifespan of our refurb – the one we originally had to return for another unit. The same one in which I replaced the battery without improving it’s playtime. But there I go digressing again. I also I discovered certain lesser capacity third-party MP3 players cost even more than the Apple iPod. That, and because we don’t need an iTouch.
Sep
14
2009
Roastbeef Keeps His PromisePosted by Rene in Rants & Raves, tags: adventure, book review, lifestyle, road trip, sabbatical, travel
David Jerome is the exception, in his road trip adventure tale, Roastbeef’s Promise: When Your Dad’s Dying Wish Is to Have His Ashes Sprinkled in Each State, What’s a Son to Do? A stand-up comedian and former comedy writer for Jay Leno and other Hollywood comedians, Jerome shares the mishaps and adventures that happened to him on his travels across America in the mid ’90s. Slightly autobiographical and mostly so strange that you can’t possibly believe this stuff actually happened to him, Jerome tells the tale of Roastbeef, a shiftless, broke college student with an older father who’s ridden with Alzheimers. But Roastbeef’s dad isn’t just any old patient suffering from dementia. No, this guy truly believes he’s Franklin D. Roosevelt. Shouting presidential orders from his hospital bed, Roastbeef’s dear old Dad demands that upon his death, Roastbeef must spread his ashes in “all 48 states” (remember, there were only 48 states in FDR’s time). Always the dutiful son, Roastbeef humors his Dad and halfheartedly agrees to it. But when Dad finally dies, Roastbeef rises to the occasion and takes up the cause of keeping this unusual deathbed promise. He sets out in his crappy college-student car to literally dust every state with his Dad’s cremains. But hitting the road without much money presents challenges, and Roastbeef doggedly pursues his mission on everything from a moped to freight trains, while working odd jobs across America to help him fulfill it. From the time Roastbeef unknowingly befriends a pot dealer and gets thrown in the slammer, to hitching rides with pregnant brides and psychopaths, to being coerced into visiting a Tiajuanna whorehouse with his Dad’s old military buddy, Jerome’s dry humor never runs out of gas.
I really loved Roastbeef’s Promise For information about Jerome, check out Facebook/roastbeefspromise.com
Aug
21
2009
Downsized? Who, Us?Posted by Rene in Dream, Live, Our Story, Quality of Life, Simple Living, Spending Money, Work, tags: Full-Timing Tips, lifestyle, road trip, RV lifestyle, spending, travel
When we hit the road, we hired a moving company to store our stuff, thinking that someday we would be willing to pay to ship it to us, wherever we landed. But until the moving company actually put it all in their warehouse, we had no idea how much our storage bill would be. By the time we learned what the damage was, it was too late. The Horrors of Excess
The only problem was that I never actually saw how much space our junk took up, until we landed in Eureka for just one stealth night in August. When we arrived at the moving company’s warehouse with our 26′ moving truck, our jaws dropped.
I wanted to cry. All this time I thought that we had really downsized. Who was I kidding?! The excessive boxes of clothes, kitchen stuff, and knicknacks, was unreal. I kicked myself up and down the parking lot, cursing at our naivety in thinking we had gotten rid of all but our essentials. Eventually, the movers made it all fit. We left Eureka in less than 24 hours, and lugged it back to Colorado. Note to Self: Lesson Learned Two years ago, I thought we were keeping only the essentials. But I’m not the same person I was then. The road has taught me that I don’t need much to have an enjoyable life. I don’t need eight pairs of jeans, or three different sets of dinner plates to feel complete. Sure, it’s nice to have some of my favorite things back under our roof, like my card making stuff and my bread machine. But when it comes down to it, I’ll take the incredible journeys we’ve had over all of our material possessions any day. I always knew that our stuff took up five crates at 4′ x 7′ x 7, for a grand total of 980 cubic feet, but i never actually saw how much space that takes up until we landed in Eureka for just one night, to get our stuff into our moving truck.
Jul
24
2009
Mission Accomplished: Our Dream Mountain PropertyPosted by Rene in Dream, Live, Our Story, Quality of Life, Simple Living, Work, tags: Colorado, expenses, fulltiming, home ownership, lifestyle, road trip, sabbatical, spending
I’d like to apologize for our premature announcement. We didn’t get the house. Instead, we pulled out of that nightmare-waiting-to-happen, but only until our offer for a better property was accepted. We haven’t wanted to say anything, fearing that we might jinx the deal. But now it’s safe to spill it, since we are closing escrow Monday at 11 am. What Really Happened We are now the proud owners of a 3 bedroom 2 bath mountain home, on 4.98 acres in Red Feather Lakes, about 50 miles northwest of Fort Collins.
A few weeks ago we learned that our fixer-upper had a very questionable foundation lying underneath it. Cosmetic repairs are one thing, but buying a house with bad foundation can be a horrible mistake. The heartbreaking news brought back bad memories of our previous money pit, of which we had to put a $23,000 foundation underneath. I cried as we debated whether or not to move forward on the deal. That’s when we received a beautiful statue of St. Francis, from our friend Heather.
St. Francis was sent in honor of the 9 month anniversary of our Jerry’s departure, which happened on the Feast of St. Francis. Heather sent this to us on Jerry’s behalf, with an encouraging message essentially telling us to hang on to our dream. She had no we were already in escrow for the fixer-upper. “It’s out there,” she said, don’t give up. Days later, as we were just about to give up on our search here, we saw the listing for something that sounded too good to be true. Why We Bought It Priced way below market value, the sellers are divorcing and just wanted to dump their weekend getaway. As soon as we saw it, we knew this was the spot we’ve been looking for.
The house lies in a beautiful mountain subdivision with exorbitant HOA fees, but they get us year-round road maintenance, and all the fishing Jim wants on about a dozen private lakes and river frontage. We could live here all year if we wanted to. At 8400′ above sea level, Red Feather Lakes is a cool summer escape and a winter wonderland for Fort Collins residents. There’s a small community nearby with a couple of restaurants, a bar, a convenience store, gas station, and a post office. Many people live here year round, as Fort Collins is an easy drive to make. What more do we need? It’s as close to perfect as we can get, but there’s just one problem: Unlike the last place, which had a big flat space for RVs, this house sits on top of a gradual slope. and the driveway isn’t big enough for more than two RVs, at least until we do some grading. But, the good news is that the subdivision runs a nearby private campground with full hookups ($20 a night) for property owners’ guests.
Jun
23
2009
Bum Fights and Boondocking in GreeleyPosted by Rene in Boondocking, Dream, Live, Local Flavor, tags: Boondocking, Colorado, expenses, Full-Timing Tips, road trip, RV lifestyle, RV road trip, spending
I found this $5 a night campground in FreeCampgrounds.com. It’s located far enough off the freeway that there’s not a lot of noise, and what made it especially appealing, other than the price, is it is literally located in farmland, and sits right atop a decommissioned missile silo. You can even go on a free tour given by the caretaker, and go deep into the bowels of this creepy military space. As one of the only cheap boondocking spots between Loveland and Fort Collins, it’s a central place to stay for a night or two. But we pushed the limits of our tolerance for cheap RV camping spots, and stayed here for almost 3 weeks while we started our real estate search. It was mostly quiet, but one afternoon, we crossed paths with another camper, a sketchy character who had been staying at the park in a tent. She stumbled out of the bathroom and short of breath, asked me to call 911. I screamed at Jim to get the cell phone. As he went to get it, her likewise sketchy boyfriend showed up, and told Jim “Oh don’t bother, she’s just been drinking. She does this all the time.” Meanwhile, the woman collapsed on the grass, writhing and clutching her chest as if she’s having a heart attack. In short quick breaths she tells me “I . . . can’t . . breathe! Get him away from me!” Jim is stunned. I grabbed the phone and dialed. We didn’t know if this was going to turn into a domestic violence episode or what, but I made the call, not wanting to take the chance that this woman was really going to croak. While we waited for the paramedics, we realized that both she and her boyfriend were loaded, and both reeked so bad, like they had just hijacked a truck full of MadDog 20/20.
She demanded that they take her to the hospital, and the EMTs complied. They took her away in the ambulance, while her boyfriend was questioned by the cops. Suddenly, the lure of cheap camping had worn on my nerves. The next day after learning we didn’t get that dream property, I had a meltdown. Five dollars a night or not, I was done with that park, and wanted out. Once we left the Missile Silo campground, I was actually relieved to be paying $500 a month rent at a KOA campground in Wellington, just north of Fort Collins. As much as I hate KOAs for all of the franchised predictability they represent, my paranoia slowly disappeared as summer kicked off and hoards of happy RVers started rolling in. We’ll be hanging out in this trailer park with slightly more conventional people for the duration of summer, or until we find our ideal piece of land in the nearby mountains. This park is way more expensive and it reeks of the feedlot down the road, but at least it has a pool, and no bum fights either.
Jun
02
2009
Road Trip USA Takes You to the Real AmericaPosted by Rene in Attractions, Dream, Full-Timing Tips, Live, tags: book reviews, Full-Timing Tips, Good Eats, road trip, RV, RV road trip, spending, Tourist Traps
Even after two years of living on the road, Jamie Jensen’s book Road Trip USA: Cross Country Adventures on America’s Two Lane Highways has been helping us uncover countless hidden gems along the way. With our limited bookshelf space in the rig, this is one book that we’ll never let go of. See What’s Really Out There
The best part of Jamie’s books are their emphasis on finding the quirkier, offbeat attractions and towns across America. While there’s enough useful information about major cities and attractions to give you a head start on your research, Road Trip Nation will help you plan more unusual itineraries. Plan Your Next Offbeat Adventure
Music lovers will enjoy discovering blues festivals in the south, and cowboy gatherings in the West. Teetotalling travelers can find their way from the wineries of Westfield, NY to Napa, CA, to the world’s biggest six pack in Lacrosse, WI. They’ll also learn to steer clear of Shamrock Texas on St. Patrick’s Day, even though they could kiss an actual piece of the Blarney Stone in that town’s Elmore Park. Why stay away? Because Shamrock is a dry town. Road Trip USA It’s also a useful tool that teaches you how to properly pronounce town names before you arrive and look like a tourist. Learn how Sequim, WA is really annunciated (“Skwim”), or Cairo, IL (Ki-Ro).
Try Jamie’s Handy Pocket Guides for Short Trips Road Trip USA’s Pacific Coast Highway Guide As West Coast natives, we’ve frequented a lot of his selections in the Pacific Coast Highway Guide We wish we had these books when we lived on the West Coast, as Jamie reveals stuff about places we’ve been to but were oblivious to some local finds, like the Olympic Game Farm in Washington. We thought it was a repulsive canned hunt farm, but it turns out to be a home to retired Hollywood animal actors!
So turn off that satellite radio, drive off the interstates and onto the blue highways, and go find the real spirit of America, because believe it or not, it is alive and well. You just have to look harder these days to find it. But first, pick up your copy of Road Trip USA today. Stay tuned for a guest post from Jamie, about ways you can save money on the road while traveling . . .
May
25
2009
Road Tripping Hoboes: The Neighbors Nobody WantsPosted by Rene in Our Story, Work, tags: affordable, Colorado, real estate, road trip, rural property
Western Colorado is really our favorite region, but sadly, their real estate prices are completely out of reach for us. So we are focusing our search on the central areas, West of Pueblo from affordable Westcliffe, on up to pricier Red Feather Lakes, just West of Fort Collins. Some of these areas we had briefly been to last year, and others we were familiar with through friends.
We spent a great weekend together. Lilla and Neal introduced us to their weekend getaway town that they love, spoiled us rotten with their Cajun cooking, and entertained us with their dogs, Nadia, Captain and George. When the gang had to head back to Colorado Springs for the workweek, they graciously offered to let us stay on their property for as long as wanted. What great people! Since then, we’ve toured three different counties, and have learned a few things about looking for our land:
Some make sense for their locations, like, you can’t leave unattended horses on your property, or open a dairy farm. Other covenants border on fascism, and require minimum square footage sizes for homes, along with architectural plan approvals, supposedly in the name of keeping up property values. There are also many covenants that prohibit owners from living in their RVs on their own land, even if the subdivsion is mostly vacant, zoned rural and allows for livestock! “The county doesn’t want us to turn into a giant campground,” one realtor told us. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what we want to do. Get some land, park our RV on it for the summer, build a garage so we can get our remaining stuff out of storage in California, and then head back to warmer climates in the wintertime. Maybe we would build a house on it eventually, maybe not. We want to keep our mobile lifestyle, but have a home base for a few months of the year. Seems like a logical plan to us, but to a lot of uptight developers, they fear that we’d turn their tidy subdivision into Hooterville. We realize it’s a fine line between having a law of the land through covenants, and not allowing people who don’t respect their neighbors to move on in, but there’s got to be a happy compromise somewhere! We got a good laugh when we realized that we, trailer living road trippers, are the property owners that a lot of people don’t want next door.
May
18
2009
Mud and Music in Luckenbach, TexasPosted by Rene in Best of, Dream, Local Flavor, Watering Holes, tags: Luckenbach, music, road trip, RV, texas
How comforting it was to see that some things stay the same. Musican/bartender Danny Terry was still there, and Tuesday night, master fiddler and guitar player Levi Darr and friends jammed at the pickin’ circle. Poor Levi wasn’t so lucky that night. During a break he got served by the local sheriff for something, but without hesitation he returned to the pickin’ circle, looked at the audience with a cute smirk on his face, and lit the place on fire! Nothing like suffering to make creativity blossom. We had only planned to stay there four nights (despite the latest increase from $10 to $15 a night to camp in their field…ouch!), but Friday night after the big dance, those big Texas skies opened up. By Saturday morning, there were lightning shows, golfball sized hail, and three inches of water on the field surrounding our trailer. Later that day, I got the truck stuck in wet, soggy mud while leaving to go shopping, and that’s when we realized we weren’t going anywhere for at least another day. While there are far worse places to be stuck in, we were running out of waste water tank space, and after five days at the bar, the accumulation of smoke in our hair and our increasingly swollen beer bellies was getting old.
Another lesson learned in Texas: If the skies open up and you’re parked off pavement, move! Here’s a five-song playlist of the great bands we saw. |



Here’s another one of those “luxury” purchase decisions that make one contemplate that old want vs. need dilemma.
In the back of the book, Jerome promises that if any reader takes a photo of him or herself holding “



A few weeks ago we jumped the gun. In our excitement to actually commit to something tangible again, we told you about 

It fits our criteria perfectly. It’s a simple, affordable property that won’t get us into debt. It sits on manageable mountain acreage near a town we love. And it’s almost within 2 hours of a major airport (Denver). The house is 9 years old and has hardly been used. It’s in perfect working order; it even has running water and heat! Other than the ugly kitchen cabinet doors, we love it.
So, with many thanks to

When the EMTs showed up, Jim and I ran inside the trailer. From the window, we watched them go through the motions of attempting to treat the woman. After a while we realized that they were weren’t moving too quickly, and were actually smirking at each other while the drunken woman was still on the ground. It was obvious there was nothing wrong with her, other than alcoholism.














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