overlander

Yukon Gold

The first thing I said as we drove back into Yukon was, “Wow, the skies are just as big as when we left!” Yes, it’s the same sky as everywhere else, but somehow in Yukon I was constantly aware of the magnitude above me more than other places. It’s beautiful.

It was an exciting time to be my camera, because I had that thing working full time during our drive through Canada. The fall colors were really beginning to explode, and I filled up the camera to capacity every day. I’m sure if Andy asked you to quote me on the trip it would be a three-way tie for, “That YELLOW!” “That RED!” and “That ORANGE!” And that’s only if gasps don’t count.

After spending a few weeks high up in wintery weather, the temperate fall was a welcome change. Scout and Gracie also got to spend more time outdoors, so everyone was enjoying Yukon to the fullest.

On our original trip through Yukon, Andy had mentioned wanting to pan for gold, and as we drove farther through the province, we realized we still hadn’t tried our hand at fortune-hunting yet. We found a nice spot to pull out by the river, took our pot lids, food scoops and a very excited doggy down to the water, and got to work.

It was a lot of fun and pretty exciting, even though we didn’t see any sparkly signs that we were in a good spot for panning. We wished we’d started sooner in the trip, because I could have panned for hours and hours in any river around.

Scout had other plans for our time outdoors and tried all his best methods to convince us to throw all the sticks he found by the river.

So on the walk back to the Turtle, we threw sticks, played hide and seek behind the trees, and then on the last leg Scout just bounded up and down the path with general Border Collie joy.

Farther down the road Andy wanted to check something under the hood, so we pulled over for a riverside picnic. Though the Yukon is so wide it looks like a lake!

We panned for gold again after lunch, but no luck. We did see a fresh bear paw print in the mud near us, so we decided to make it a quicker stop and get back on the road.

We could see some storms ahead, which made the light moody and surreal.

When the most spectacular rainbow poured out of the sky, we followed it for a full 15 minutes before it evaporated back into the air.

The storm moved all around in the distance, and when we stopped outside Taro for the evening, we could actually see the sheets of rain traveling east along the riverbank.

It never hit us directly, so we basked in the after-storm light and played outside until the sun went down.

Everyone had a successful day, I think.

We had to try one last gold panning session before we left, so we played outside for a bit before packing up.

As I put the panning implements in the Turtle, I laughed at how instantly messy it gets in there, between the toys we keep out to use later, the mud we inevitably and consistently track in, the rocks I can’t stop collecting and have no room for, the boots laying on the floor that we removed to change into “gold-panning shoes”, the travel pamphlets shoved into the front console, among the other regular chaos specific to Turtle life.

I decided to take a picture for posterity, since in 20 years we’ll want to remember the reality of our lives and not just the pretty pictures immediately post-clean-up. Right as I took out my camera, Scout came running to the door to see what I was up to, and the smile on his face and mud on his paws inadvertently made the photo complete: the reason we live this lifestyle, messy as it may be. At the end of the day, we all have that goofy smile on our faces.

There weren’t many gas stations around, so we stopped in Taro for a fill-up and an ogle at this awesome orange beast.

Then back onto beautiful Highway 4 toward Watson Lake, which we’d be passing through one more time on our way into British Columbia and Alberta. But first we had to stop at what was to become our Favorite Campsite Ever, a free pullout on postcard-worthy Finlayson Lake.

Due to the burn ban, we hadn’t been able to have a fire for months, and it seemed like fate that the ban had been lifted right as we came upon this site, complete with cut firewood scattered around for the taking.

We were sitting just a little elevated from the water, overlooking the lake. There was no one around except the two people flying sea planes nearby. It was crisp, cool and clear, and we were on cloud nine that we got to live there for a whole day.

It was such a perfect spot that I took a quick video of the fire so that in future years we can relive the moment.

If we didn’t have the winter weather nipping at our heels, we would have stayed for days. But that chill wasn’t far behind, so we moved on toward Watson Lake.

We thought it would be fun to go visit our signs at the Signpost Village, especially because it’s not too often these days that we’re somewhere familiar. There they were!

Then on we drove into the endless green and gold mountains and valleys of British Columbia.

We had a garbage bag to toss, so we pulled over at a viewpoint to use the waste bins, and accidentally stumbled across this vista.

And this was the view from the other side of the parking lot! Beautiful British Columbia, indeed.

And then to add even more icing to the British Columbia cake, we stopped at Liard Hot Springs and accidentally had the time of our lives. We’d read about it over and over while researching the area, but didn’t think much more of it than “Sure, we could stop at a hot springs; that sounds nice.”

It was wonderful. It’s a provincial park and not privately-run, so for starters it’s really affordable. The day use fee is just $5 per person, but the hot springs fee is waived if you’re camping, which is $26 a night. That’s actually a little on the spendy side for boondockers, but it’s also really nice to have water and garbages at your disposal now and then, in addition to the free hot springs. So we paid for our site, got settled and then went straight to the hot springs.

It’s a beautiful walk down the boardwalk to the springs, over the warm marsh that is very popular with the wildlife, especially during winter.

For a developed hot springs site, this one is surprisingly untouched in all the best ways.

There are bathrooms, changing rooms, and a deck, but other than those few comforts it’s just a lovely pond that’s a piping hot 110-120 degrees at the source and then cools the farther away it travels from there. So the upper pool stays super toasty, and the lower pool is a perfectly warm and slightly deeper swimming pool.

We loved it so much we spent a few hours there on our first trip before going back for dinner and some travel planning.

The Anti-Project always has other plans, but luckily she has a short attention span and was soon on the prowl for buggies while we got a little work done.

As we planned we decided we weren’t ready to leave the hot springs already, so we decided to stay another day, then went back for our night soak. Liard doesn’t have closing hours since it’s a natural springs, so we got to soak until late when we were ready for bed.

The next day was another sunny fall day, perfect for multiple trips to the hot springs.

That night as we splashed around the warm lower pool and visited with some other travelers, the Northern Lights came out in enormous green flickering bands that twisted and arched from one side of the sky to the other over our heads. We laid on our backs and floated in the steaming water, watching the lights and laughing out loud at how perfect it all was.

When we got back to the Turtle, it was late and we were all warm, cozy and ready to snuggle up. While we got ready for bed, Gracie crashed out under her own personal quilt that my niece Ava made for her before we could even make it up to the loft!

With plans to return as soon as possible—especially in the snowy winter months—we got everyone ready to move on.

Gracie’s preferred and self-appointed travel spot is in a clothes bin in the closet, which is kept open for her as we drive. Usually when it’s time to go she hears the engine start and hops into her spot, but if she doesn’t sometimes we have a conversation about it to give her a chance to get in before we start moving. And it’s adorable.

And with the huge skies of the Yukon in our rear view mirror, we set our sights on the road ahead.

The Road to Alaska – Part 8: Feelin’ Fall-y in Denali

Our adventure of a lifetime was in full swing by the time we left Anchorage for Denali National Park, which was our second park in Alaska so far.

Alaska has 8 National Parks:

Denali
Wrangell St. Elias
Gates of the Arctic
Kenai Fjords
Glacier Bay
Katmai
Kobuk Valley
Lake Clark

Due to the terrain and undeveloped nature of the state, however, only two are accessible by car: Denali and Wrangell St. Elias. We’d stopped at Wrangell St. Elias on our way to Valdez, but didn’t spend much time there since we were working with a bit of a deadline and the park is so huge that it could take hours just to see a small portion anyway. We did take a little walk through the park and saw both the namesake Wrangell and St. Elias ranges, and had even camped out with a beautiful view of the mountains the previous night.

Denali was the next on our list, and we couldn’t wait to get in there and see some wildlife and hopefully Denali (a.k.a. Mount McKinley) itself. They say on average only 1 in 3 visitors gets to see the mountain, as it’s often socked in by clouds or fog, and we had a cloudy forecast. So we arrived with fingers crossed and bought our tickets for a bus tour the following day. I didn’t know this before we went, but Denali National Park is only accessible to the public for 15 miles of the 92-mile road into the park. You can drive in as far as Savage River, but after that all tourists—other than those staying at Teklanika Campground—must pay for a bus tour in order to access the remainder. Some of the tours can last as long as 12 hours, but we went for an 8-hour ride since we had a doggy at home who would need to go out. It was a chilly morning, and the windows were steamed up for the beginning of the trip, but soon they cleared and we could all sit back and watch the fall colors roll by.

It’s been startling how quickly the season has advanced as we travel north! It has accelerated the timeline, but luckily I love fall and I’m exactly in the mood for it.

On the way to the Visitors Center that would be our turnaround point, we stopped a few times and got to hike around, use bathrooms, and take pictures.

Along the drive we saw ptarmigan, Dall sheep, moose, Arctic ground squirrel, and a mama grizzly bear and two little cubs in the distance running along fast! There was much speculation as to why they were running, since they’re so close to hibernation that they should be conserving calories. Our guide guessed that the mama could smell a male grizzly nearby and she was trying to protect her cubs. We stayed and watched for a long time, and still they ran and ran until we lost sight of them.

We continued on to the Visitors Center, and had a little time to walk to the lookout and admire the view.

Then back onto the bus, where we had fewer people since many had started hikes and would take another bus down later. So for the whole trip back we had great views on both sides of the bus, which really came in handy when a big male grizzly was sighted on the opposite side of the bus. We hopped over and I took some pictures that are grainy, but still fun to see.

We’d found a nice spot to park for the few nights we’d be in town, so we went back and settled in for the evening, taking the animals on a nice walk and even snapped our first 4-person selfie with the pets.

The next day we went back to the park and took a walk around Savage River, which was moody and cozy in the drizzle and fog.

During the summer the park has three daily demonstrations with their sled dog team, which we had timed our hike’s end to attend. I was so excited to see the dogs. They are actual working dogs who spend the winter helping the rangers get around and haul supplies to the cabins and outposts around the grounds. Since the park is a designated wilderness area motorized vehicles aren’t allowed anyway, but additionally the dogs are part of the history of the park and actually much more reliable than vehicles.

They are bred not for appearance in any way, but for their athleticism, double coat, closeness of paw pads (so ice doesn’t pack between them), bushy tail (to keep them warm when they sleep outside with tail over face, creating a warm pocket of air), and a trait where their arteries and veins are very close together which helps keep their blood warm as it travels around their bodies. But their appearance is still pretty darn cute too.

They were so sweet and eager to run. The trainer told us that they harness two fewer dogs to the summer “sled” for the demonstration than they do for the winter sleds, because if they didn’t she’d end up in the ditch!

Andy of course loved the sled.

We would have loved to stay extra days to climb all the mountains and watch fall continue to move in, but we’d planned a trip up to the Arctic Ocean and every degree counts when you get close to freezing. So we pressed on Northward for what was to become one of the greatest adventures yet!

The Road to Alaska – Part 6: Anchorage, AK with Friends

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times (I may have actually said it a thousand times): one of the best things about Turtle Life is the flexibility and freedom to visit our friends and family. And during our time in Anchorage, we were lucky enough to be able to spend quality time with both friends and family!

First we spent a week with Andy’s longtime buddy Sam and his wife Sara. Sam is a professor and has the summer off, so we took full advantage of his schedule by having a full week of fun.

Andy and I had caught some salmon in Valdez and kept two to bring along, which Andy prepared in his famous marinade and Sam grilled up for us.

*A tip if you like delicious things: Sam also BBQ’s up frozen seasoned hashbrowns as a side dish, which were so good I just got jealous of myself when I saw this picture of the hashbrowns I was about to eat when I took the photo.

Sam took us on a field trip to the fish hatchery, where we saw loads of spawning salmon! Pictured are only two, so please just take my word for it that there were a bunch.

Sam, Sara, and their son Oliver took us for a crisp and refreshing rainy-day walk up to Portage Glacier.

We hadn’t seen snow in a while, so we had to take advantage of the wintery playground and make ourselves a slide. I paved the way with the classic bum slide, and Andy immediately took it to the next level, as he is wont to do.

On the way home, all our dreams came true when we spotted a moose grazing right by the road in town!

We were really beginning to believe the area moose were a rumor created by the Alaska Chamber of Commerce.

And luck was really on our side—or else the COC had gotten wind that we were on to them and planted that moose in two spots so we wouldn’t spread the conspiracy theory around—because a day later we saw another one!

This one was on a walk through a beautiful park on the way to the beach. She had been grazing on the trail blocking hikers, and the locals who warned us about her presence smiled curiously when I threw up my hands and cheered about a moose on the trail. Somehow they could tell right away that we weren’t from around there.

We stood up the hill from her to admire her moose-y cuteness, then walked on to the ocean since it’s weird to stare at a moose all day. And what a day for the beach!

Another highlight of the trip was the delivery we had waiting for us at Sam and Sara’s place! After catching so many fish in Haines and Valdez, we decided we should spring for a vacuum sealer so we can pack more of our fresh fish and berry picking surpluses into the freezer and keep them for even longer. I was super happy about our newest purchase, and Andy was even a little more so. (Sam and Sara, I’m aware that I’m grossly underselling Andy’s excitement about this purchase, but if I did his joy any justice everyone would think I was exaggerating.)

Well of course we had to test the thing out. An hour and 50 vacuum bags later, Andy had made it as far as testing out vacuum sealing tortilla chips just to see what would happen, and suddenly it was bedtime.

When we got back to the Turtle for the night, we found that someone had caused a little trouble back at home. The culprit still remains at large as we try to gather more conclusive evidence.

On Monday Sara was back at work, so Sam took Andy and me on a beautifully sunny and very fun walking tour of Anchorage.

I’ll have you know that we had way more than a week’s worth of fun that week. Sam and Andy are two peas in a pod, and it’s awesome to see your sweetheart having fun like the old days with his buddy.

Although we tried our best to convince Sam to blow off another week’s commitments to goof off with us some more, he somehow decided to take the responsible road. Go figure!

Before we moved onto the next leg of the Anchorage Adventure, we needed a little battery-recharge, at which point it became apparent which of our friends are helpful when it comes to naps . . .

And which aren’t so much.

Oh, and in case you’re still wondering what happened to the vacuum-sealed tortilla chips . . . they were all ground to corn crumbles, except for one, which stayed completely intact!

Weird and worth the suspense, right?

The Road to Alaska – Part 2: British Columbia, Eh?

Greetings from Beautiful British Columbia!

It’s been an exciting first few weeks in Canada as we make our way north to Alaska. We’ve covered some ground and have been really enjoying watching the landscape change and become less and less familiar. The road signs are more frequently featuring moose, and though we haven’t yet spotted one yet, we did see a sleek little silver fox slinking around a park as we pulled in for the evening in Prince George! So that will tide me over for quite some time.

Our first adventure over the border began in Vancouver, BC. I briefly mentioned our stay in Vancouver in my last post, but now that I have all the photos uploaded I thought I’d fill you in further on the fun we had while we were there. Especially since, despite the fact that both of us have lived in Seattle, neither had ever been to nearby Vancouver so we were really looking forward to seeing the city.

One of my favorite resources as we visit new cities has been the online Atlas Obscura site, which suggests interesting attractions that aren’t found on most other “Things To Do In _______” sites. This time I told Andy that I was going to take him on a surprise tour of Vancouver and lead him to all the spots I thought sounded fun without telling him what they would be. He’s a good sport and agreed!

Our first stop was the VanDusen Botanical Gardens, which was one of the loveliest botanical gardens I’ve ever visited. The grounds are enormous, and the circuitous layout lends itself to a full day of wandering through paths and gardens reminiscent of Alice’s Wonderland.

Check out this delphinium garden:

Ok so if I’m being honest, the gardens were lovely, but the real reason for going here was something that’s been on my to-do list for as long as I can remember:

A hedge maze!

It’s one of only six Elizabethan hedge mazes in North America, and it was so much fun and more challenging than we gave it credit for going in.

Afterwards we went to the Granville Island Market, which my uncles in Seattle had highly recommended to us. It took us some time to find a spot to park, and it came in handy that Andy is a wizard. Look at this park job!

We wandered around the market and were totally in love. It was a bustling throng of people and the wonderful smells of hot espresso, cooking meats, fresh flowers and herby soaps. After picking up some darling wood map pins, we had lunch at a tiny Chinese restaurant downtown and then hit the road for the next stop on the secret tour . . .

The Steam Clock in Gastown. It’s a working steam clock built in 1977, which you can look inside and see the gears and levers moving. We were even there to hear the hourly musical whistles blow. In honor of the clock, we popped into nearby Steamworks Brewing Company for a beer.

Next we walked a number of blocks to the Marine Building, a remarkable Art Deco building that was conceived to look like it had risen from the sea, and it truly does. I mean it looks like something from a movie . . . oh wait, it is! To my fellow nerds out there, it’s also been featured in a number of movies, as the Baxter Building in Fantastic Four and for The Daily Planet in Smallville. Fun!

Afterwards we walked to see the Digital Orca sculpture, which we weren’t able to see up close due to an event that had the terrace roped off. (If you look closely, you can see empty glassware at the tail.)

It was a full day in Vancouver, and we left very satisfied. But after over a month staying in cities, I’d been so looking forward to getting back outside, and was happy to arrive at our next campsite at Gillis Lake. We stayed two nights, and got plenty of reading and swimming done.

When we woke up the morning of third day, the entire forest was flooded with smoke, which we later found out was due to dozens of forest fires throughout BC. A handful of towns had been evacuated, and the road we’d planned to take was closed. So we rerouted and drove through Kamloops to Prince George, windows rolled up to minimize our smoke inhalation. It was so thick my eyes watered, and you couldn’t even see the mountains beyond the freeway through the grey. And in the areas that we could see a fair distance, we saw fires licking the mountainsides. It was unreal.

We spent a two days in Prince George, or “PG” as the locals call it. (Which is pretty cute for a city in Canada, where everything is sweet and friendly and very “rated PG”.) When we got to town, we went to one of the best Railway Museums we’ve been to so far, and that’s saying something! We go to a lot of railroad museums, apparently.

We rode the little train around the grounds, and got to go inside most of the cars and engines. Andy had more fun than all the other museum-goers combined.

We stayed until they closed, then walked right next door to Cottonwood Island Park. I’d read that a local artist sculpted little pieces right into the trees, and as you walk through you can treasure hunt for them.

It likely comes as a huge surprise to nobody that my favorite was the gnome houses.

We stayed the night at the park’s lot and that’s where we saw the silver fox!

It’s a poor picture, but it was the best I could do at twilight while squealing with joy.

Over the next few days, we found ourselves in more picture-perfect campsites, all of which are free! We stayed a few nights at Co-op Lake, where we noticed a strange bubbling at the shoreline. As we got nearer to investigate, we saw that it was a massive mob of tadpoles!

We all had a wonderful time there, reading, hammock-ing, swimming, fetching frisbees in the lake, pouncing on bugs, paddling out to the middle of the lake in our floaties and watching the clouds roll by.

We then moved to another great campsite at the Eagle Creek Opal Beds, where we went on a gorgeous hike, hunted for—and found!—raw opals, discovered and ate the huckleberries along the path, and then hiked up a hill at midnight where we saw the Northern Lights flickering on the horizon. It was a pretty magical spot.

Scout even remembered how to pick huckleberries!

I could have stayed in any one of those campsites for weeks, but there is much to see in these parts, so we pressed on. We wanted to see Prince Rupert, a darling coastal town in northwestern BC, even though it was a few hours out of the way. On our way there, other things happened and they looked like this:

When we got to Prince Rupert it was a brilliant sunny day, which—we were informed by the locals—is not usually the case. We walked all around town, in and out of cute little shops, through the Museum of Northern British Columbia, and ended up on a bright patio overlooking the ocean.

We looked down and noticed crabs walking along the ocean floor, and the next day’s plan was born. After all, we’ve been carrying our crab traps around for over a year!

The next day we got our licenses and some bait, and headed down to the docks, where we discovered the depth off the edge was around 80 feet! We spent the entire afternoon into the evening sitting on the dock, chatting with locals, fishing, and reading books. We caught three crabs, one was a keeper, and Andy caught a small flounder.

So all in all the day was a success, and as we packed up we were treated to a perfectly picturesque coastal sunset.

Today was our last day in Prince Rupert, and we visited the North Pacific Cannery Museum on our way out of town. We accidentally stayed three hours, and enjoyed every last minute.

We’re now back in Terrace, BC, heading north for some serious camping way-off-grid, so the next post will be on the other side of the wilderness when we have service again. And though the silver fox was a superior thrill, here’s hoping that next post will include some photos of a moose. 🙂

The Alaska Road Trip Begins!

Well hello there!

A lot has happened since the last time I updated the blog on our roving whereabouts, wild shenanigans and general goings-on, and if I could, I’d catch you up completely on what we’ve been up to since I last reported. But as I sit here writing this post, I realize how long that could take, as we’ve been moving at breakneck Turtle speed for the last few months! (Of course I’m not referring to miles-per-hour speed, as that remains as slow as ever. I’m talking about how much ground we’ve covered, which for us has been a lot in an uncharacteristically short amount of time.)

Instead, I’ve decided to pick up where we are at this moment, which is the beginning of such a fun adventure that I think you’ll agree this is the best place to begin. Because we just crossed the border into Canada, which (in our minds at least) is the official beginning of the Overland Trek to Alaska!

The general plan is as follows:

The Timeframe: A month driving up to Alaska (July), a month exploring Alaska (August), and a month returning home (September). We’d stay longer, but we’d like to stay ahead of snowy road conditions and by October the roads can start to ice over.

The Route: We are going to loosely follow what some travel guides call the “Gold Rush Route” on the way up, and then follow the Alcan Highway which ends just north of Montana, so we can drop in to see family at the end of the journey.

Must See: Denali National Park, Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, The Cook Family in Anchorage, Harding Ice Fields, Kenai Peninsula, and a moose. (It doesn’t matter which one.) Other than that we’ll play it by ear, as is our general travel style. There’s a lot of Alaska up there and we want to see as much as we can without moving so quickly that we forget to relax and enjoy the quiet moments that we’ve come to love most during our travels. I’ve been surprised to find my sweetest memories are the little surprise spots we stumble across between official destinations, and we try to make sure we leave room for improvisation for that reason.

Aaaaand, honestly, that’s as far as we’ve gotten. It’s tricky to make new travel plans while you’re in the midst of traveling and enjoying your current location! So we’ve become accustomed to making detailed itineraries a day or two in advance and then making more general plans where the upcoming weeks and months are concerned. It’s just no use trying to nail things down when we could see an interesting road and end up somewhere completely different than we’d anticipated!

We just arrived in Canada yesterday, and already we’re just charmed to pieces. It’s very familiar of course, but different enough that we’re excited to see what unexpected twists we’ll encounter as we go.

Unanswered questions include:

How different are the regulations regarding boondocking? Can you stay overnight at any turnout or viewpoint along the highway like you can in the states we’ve visited in the US?
What are “good” prices for fuel and propane? Our brains are already so tangled by conversions, and then by the time we work out what the prices are in US Dollars we realize that we don’t even know if the price is good or bad for the region we’re in!
We were surprised by the questions they asked us at the border, but they let us in so who are we to complain? They had a lot of questions regarding our lack of jobs, even though we explained we were living off of savings, and wanted to know what jobs we had before we left them for life on the road. The agent asked to see bank account balances to ensure we had enough money to cover our trip, which makes sense. He didn’t ask about pets, even though we did have all the documentation for Scout and Gracie including immunization records, etc. The one we’re still puzzled about though is that he asked how many guns we own. Not how many we were carrying with us, but how many do we own anywhere in the world. Interesting, right? The answer is none, so I’m not sure what the outcome would have been had we said we had an arsenal somewhere in the states. But again, we’re not here to tell the man how to do his job, especially since we crossed over in very little time.

Today we went to Vancouver, BC and had a great time at the Granville Island Market and VanDusen Botanical Gardens before hitting up a few points of interest including the steam clock, a “metaphysical supply store,” the Digital Orca, and the Marine Building. All awesome.

We love Vancouver!

And now that we’re all up-to-date on the current adventure, here is a sampler platter of the aforementioned shenanigans we’ve been into the last month or two, for those who like pictures of cute animals, lovely scenery, fun friends, and other general niceness.

A Busy Few Weeks: The VLA, ABQ, Boise, The Bisti Badlands, Four Corners, & Mesa Verde NP

Our current location is generally a mystery to anyone trying to keep track of us—including us—mostly due to the fact that we’re so busy having fun that I forget how long it’s been since I last updated the blog or Instagram! I promise that by the end of the next post both you and I will be completely caught up.

As I type this, I’m sitting at an adorable cafe and sweets shop in a town that, I announced immediately before consulting anyone else in the Turtle, we will one day live, even if just for a season. This place is a dream. But we’ll get to that next time. We have so much to cover right now!

We left our last story outside the Very Large Array near Socorro, NM, having a delicious evening treat of a pie sampler from Pie Town. We found a great pull-out to stay the night just a few minutes from the VLA. That night before bed, we watched Contact with a view of the VLA right outside our window! It was awesome. In the movie, the VLA plays a prominent role in Jodie Foster’s research and makes a really dramatic background. And it’s just as impressive in person.

The VLA is an astronomical radio observatory made up of 27 antennas that are each 82′ in diameter. They’ve helped with the investigation of black holes, quasars, pulsars, planets, and loads more. It’s astonishing to see them up close.

(Not quite sure what I was up to in this photo, but it’s the only one I’ve got, so you’re stuck with my unexplainable dance number.)

After getting our science on, we made our way back to Albuquerque where I had a flight to catch in a few days to Boise to visit my girlfriends Beth and Lexie.

But first, Andy and I had a mission: to get poolside as soon as possible. I’m not sure how we got the idea in our heads, but suddenly we couldn’t live without a swim. So we headed to the only RV park in Albuquerque that had their pool open before Memorial Day—American RV Park.

We came for the pool and stayed for the lovely park, yummy continental breakfast, clean showers and laundromat, and beyond-friendly staff. We really did stay another day. It’s a great park that I can’t recommend highly enough! We realized that it had been over a year since we had stayed in an RV park, which was fun because we’ve really gotten the hang of boondocking and have saved lots of money by not going to parks unless we need to take advantage of their amenities. Turtle power!

We stayed two nights, and the next day I left this guy:

To hang out with these guys:

It was a bunch of fun. We painted the town red, and even got dressed up to go watch the Kentucky Derby.

After a whirlwind few days, I was back in Albuquerque and the four of us were back on the road. Andy and I went to a fantastic mining museum in Grants called the New Mexico Mining Museum, which has a replica uranium mine underground. The man at the front desk had worked in mining for about 35 years, and had worked his way up from the bottom to be the head of his mine and even got an award for safety, with the longest time without a death in the mine or serious injuries. He had lots of information, was adorable, and gave me a goldstone to remember the mine by.

Outside of Grants, we stayed at the Joe Skeen campground near El Malpais.

I was happy to be reunited with this guy:

And this guy:

We drove to the Bisti Badlands wilderness, where you can stay overnight in the parking area for free! It was especially appreciated that we got to stay after we climbed for hours over the crazy hills that changed in appearance every few minutes. It felt like a walking tour of 10 different planets.

It was a hot day, and when we got back to the parking lot, we relaxed in our chairs and read books with Scout and Gracie. Gracie has become a real champ with her harness and leash these days. I think she’s figured out that sometimes it’s her only ticket outside, so she wears it without any problem, and even comes to my feet meowing when she hears me get it out.

The next day we made it to Four Corners with beautiful skies above us.

Then we drove on toward Mesa Verde National Park. The landscape on the way to the park was a destination unto itself. I swear this is not a painting.

In the last year, we’ve been to two other cliff dwellings sites: Bandelier NM and Gila Cliff Dwellings NM. We really enjoyed both, but agreed once we made it to Mesa Verde that this is our favorite site so far.

In the park are 600 beautifully preserved cliff dwellings of the Ancestral Pueblo people, many of which you can tour or see clearly from various vistas. Depending on the site, the tours are just $5 or $10 each, which gets you 1-2 hours of information and a walk right through the dwellings. You can see petroglyphs and pictographs, the different styles of construction each group used, and the actual tools they used to grind corn and make food. And the views are so vast and unreal that we both said more than once that we’d pay just to hike the trails on the mesa! There are also self-guided tours you can take, so we did all of those too.

Our second day there, as we parked at Balcony House for our tour we noticed another van that could be the Turtle’s long-lost cousin, so we parked by it as we often do when we see a van we like. After traveling around for the last year and a half, we’ve found that we can usually tell by someone’s van if they are kindred spirits, and our track record is pretty good so far. This time was no exception! We ran into Gary and Kiki as we returned from our tour, and found out that they’re just starting out on their full-time vandwelling adventure (though they’ve already been on many, many adventures of other sorts). We’d all already purchased tickets for the same tour the following day, so we got to hang out even more during the Long House tour.

We super enjoyed getting to know you guys, and I’m certain that our paths will cross down the road. (When they do, we’ll let you know what Turtle theme song we came up with; hopefully one as cool as Birdy’s.) You guys were a pleasure to hang out with. Stay in touch! 🙂

After the tour, we did a quick 6-mile loop on top of the mesa to check out the other cliff dwelling overlooks.

We would have loved to stay and visit (both the park and the new friends) longer, but the storm clouds were rolling in and the skies were getting darker. Our first rule of overlanding is “Never Drive at Night”, which is comparable to driving in terrible weather, so we hit the road to make it to Durango, CO to find a spot before the weather hit.

We hung out in Durango for the evening, a town that I already loved and knew Andy would too. The weather was unfortunate, with frigid winds and constant cloud cover, but we had a great time anyway. If you can involve pizza in the plans, Andy is a happy camper.

If you can also include a free trip to the coolest railroad museum ever, Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad Museum, he will be even happier.

And if you really want to make his day, cap it all off with a little performance testing at the highest altitudes the Turtle has ever attempted. . .

Which, unbeknownst to us, was the next leg of the trip. And one that would bring us to where I sit now, in my new very favorite town of all time! But that’s up next.

Let’s Refurbish a Van – Part 6: Roof Rack (by Andy)

A post by Andy

{Note: The work detailed in this post was completed over the summer of 2015, before we moved into the Turtle. I am just getting the time to write the post now.}

So, we have stuff to carry. And we want a place to store our solar panels. And we want to stay cool. And, if possible, look cool. So, we need to put together a roof rack…

Here are a few pictures of the old RV when we got it. It had an aluminum ladder that was old and worn, along with the typical RV aluminum tube luggage rack at the back- all bits with some of the mounts loose. We also had a big plastic storage box bolted to the top, but it was cracked and would certainly leak. As you can see, there was also one solar panel and a mount for what I’m pretty sure was a TV antenna. Good stuff, but it was all pretty worn, as it had all traveled for close to 30 years and more than 250 thousand miles.

We wanted our rack and top equipment to do a few things for us:

Have a dry and accessible place to store camping and fishing and other fun gear, out-of-season clothing, and some spare parts and equipment.
Have the rack removable, so we can maintain and fix the roof when the need arises.
Have a location to mount the planned solar panels.
Design the rack to provide us shade.
Have a system that we can change, add more solar to, move things around, etc.
Be able to fill and seal up all the holes prior people made when mounting things to the roof, and have a system where moving forward we will not be drilling into the roof any more.

Anyway, roof racks look great! I hear they can be useful too. In truth, we have pretty limited room and storage inside, so having a bit of room up top for our extra supplies and garage-like stuff was essential for a successful voyage.

$safari-van-roofrack-back-retro-roof-rack-cartoon-style-isolated-white-view-61268999$

So, to the step of getting the old stuff off and sealing up the holes. Pretty much unbolt the bolts and pry everything else off. I then used fiberglass impregnated epoxy body filler for all the big holes (I love epoxy!), maybe adding wire to support it as it cured. I then added Geocel Proflex on the seams. I read about and tried a few things, but to date, it is my go-to for exterior sealing. Here is a link.

For the (many) smaller holes, I would first clean and fill with the Geocel, then screw in a stainless steel screw the size of the hole, then cover the head of the screw with another layer of Geocel. It is a technique I read about on the internet, and it seems to have worked well so far. Again, it is not worth buying any hardware but stainless or grade 8. It does cost a little bit more, but use the savings you get for doing this yourself to get the good hardware. Plus, you don’t have to worry about some interior rust and redoing the work down the road. After sealing the holes, I put down Rustoleum on all the modified spots. The following pictures show the antenna hole through the roof, and some of the removed parts scattered in the yard.

We were lucky enough to have a friend who worked for Yakima who gave us a VIP discount card for one purchase. With the card, we got 12 A1 rain gutter towers, 6 78″ crossbars, 12 wide body rain gutters, end caps, two 12-peice lock core sets, a Loadwarrior basket, and some cargo nets. A truly impressive amount of wonderful Yakima pieces at a great savings. Boxes and boxes of sweet components!

From REI, Amy and I used our one-item 20% member discount and each of us bought a Skybox Pro 12, shipped to the Portland REI for free. We got the long and narrow boxes to configure end-to-end, and not take up too much roof area width-wise. We effectively have the roof racks for 4 vehicles, all to put up top the Turtle. It added up to a lot of initial investment, but it has been working well, and added an important comfort to be able to store a reasonable amount of things to make our small world flexible, and I think it actually has a sleeker look being made from components—as opposed to a custom-fitted rack. Since we were doing all the work ourselves, we decided to invest a bit more on some nice new hardware. After popping down to REI and loading our new Skyboxes (in their own boxes) onto the top of the old Scout, we stopped for a bite in downtown Portland. Seems fairly reasonable to me, but I imagine to some people we made a sight…

The sky boxes, along with the other hardware, sat in the house for quite awhile. After stripping and sealing the roof, it was only logical to finish painting the Tutle blue, then do the white roof paint, and then finally get to the point where we could install the new roof rack. Consequently, this is what our place looked like for quite an amount of time. (As you can see, our front room was used to store a number of Turtle parts until they were ready to install.)

The pictures are few here, but after most of the painting was finished, I mounted the wide body mounts. I measured, marked, measured again, checked, and had the geometry figured out. On the corner of the Turtle roof, I would drill my two holes, fill with Geocel, cover the mounting surface with Geocel, align the bracket, screw in two (you guessed it) stainless steel lag bolts, then cover the seam and outside with Geocel. After it all cured, we repainted with the Interlux. It looked nicer with the black brackets and shinny bolts before the sealant and paint, but I didn’t want to risk it. And, just so you know, the asymmetric spacing along the length of the roof is due to needing to align the crossbars so they will not interfere with a roof vent when open, but also allow for the mounting points of the skyboxes. Here are the brackets installed:

It is a nice feeling to know that at any point we could unlock (all keyed alike, now) the 12 towers, unscrew, and remove the whole rack if we had to do some maintainence on the topside. Anyway, the pictures are limited at this point, but following are some involving the tower, crossbar, and rack install.

You might notice that the Yakima basket lost out to the solar panels. The basket is in the storage unit presently, and it would be great to get it up there at some point. When we were building and installing the rack, though, the geometric logistics were far too difficult for the time allocated. Anyway, to install the solar panels, I bolted two pieces of 12′ 6061 T6 aluminum square tubing to the crossbars with stainless steel carriage bolts and nuts fitted through the Yakima Universal Snaparounds.

I picked up used ones super cheap here. By the way, ReRack in Portland are nice people and can save you some money on roof racks, so check them out if you are in the area. Back to topic, after getting the aluminum properly spaced and installed, I then drilled and screwed the solar panel brackets to the the aluminum. That step was a breeze. Solar panels installed, photo taken probably a month in.

As to keeping it all cool. We planned on (and did), paint the roof surface with a couple of coats of Interlux topsides white boat paint. We actually painted the roof vent covers white as well. The assumption is that paint will reflect much of the sun’s heat, and be able to withstand the UV rays. So far, everything looks pretty good up there. We have some cracks in the paint where the caulking we used was not completely cured before we painted (I don’t blame the paint, we had time constraints), so we have some washing and fixing of some seams to do. Otherwise, all looks pretty good. A common approach for keeping a bit cooler is to have a couple of roofs, effectively carrying your own shade along with you.

The above old-school Rovers have a second roof with an airgap for passive cooling in the hot sun. (Side note, did anyone notice the tall skinny tyres the rovers are running on?) With the spacing added from the rack towers, and mounting the solar panels and boxes above the crossbars, we have a impressive air gap and continous shade on over 50% of the roof.

Currently, there is a middle strip free for walking, in which I will fit an additional panel at some point, then simply make some cheap synthetic or plywood panels and paint them white to increase our shade to close to 100%. So far, though, we have been to the Badlands of South Dakota in the summer, and have stayed with the ambient temperature with thoughtful venting and minimal electric fans.

To me, the goal is not to be cooler than the outside, all we need to do is not be hotter than the ambient temperature in all kinds of weather.

Oh, almost forgot, we want to access the roof! We need to clean the solar panels, get stuff into and take stuff out of the boxes, check on all the paint and seals, and most importantly, be able to climb up and yell with arms outstretched like you are in a movie! Anyway, the ladder…

We actually bought a car roof rack ladder as a start. The almost $200 ladder (seems crazy) was well worth the money, in the time saved. It always feels pretty weird to buy something new, remove it from the box, then start cutting it right away. So, the ladder, welding, adding more rungs for the proper length, and fixing the folding function.

Some close-to-final pictures here. We started with a 9-rung foldable ladder, and ended with a 12-rung rigid ladder that bolts to the bumper and the top rack. Again, it was designed to bolt to the bumper and rack, so it is removable…

I’m pleased with the removability of the ladder, because we crushed it a bit when we backed into a tree one day, about a week after it was finished and installed. The ladder was subsequently unbolted, straightened, and remounted. From the side, it now does have a bit of ripple (below the designed joint and by the spare tire)—this is what we call life.

To sum up a bit, up in the boxes right now we have a few fishing poles, extra wire and parts and unfinished projects, cloth for sewing projects, extra window insulation, snow shoes and masks and fins, river tubes, my old tent. A pair of driving lights I have yet to wire up. Some cheap speakers I plan on installing in the doors. You get the picture. We call it our attic.

We have a completed rack now. It holds our solar panels, is our attic, and still has room to exapand.

Let’s Refurbish a Van – Part 4: Curtains

Of all the updates one can make to an RV, in my opinion the most drastic change for the least amount of effort is the curtains. It’s a way to infuse color, pattern and texture into the small space, especially in a vehicle like the Turtle, which has zero wall space for art. We almost have zero wall space for walls! Even if you aren’t a world class seamstress, it’s a simple shape to tackle, and honestly nobody even notices if your hemlines wobble a bit. I really encourage you to give it a try!

When we got the Turtle, I knew I wanted to plan all my color choices around the curtains. It’s the best place for statement patterns, and I love-love-love a bright and colorful interior space, so I wanted to see what was available before making further paint or fabric decisions. Actually, it was the first decision I made at all, and I think I had the fabric in hand within the first week of owning the Turtle! I love a whimsical graphic print, and the green shade is so friendly and cheerful.

When picking your curtain fabric, I highly recommend choosing outdoor fabric. This may sound obvious, but the selection of outdoor fabric is often pretty slim, and the allure of an entire store full of pattern and color choices seems like a fine trade-off for less sturdy material. But the outdoor fabric won’t fade as quickly as other fabric. It’s also mold and mildew resistant, which doesn’t seem like a big deal until you’re boondocking on the Oregon coast and the hygrometer reads 93% humidity and the windows are weeping and mold is knocking at the door. The last thing you want is to find your curtains flocked with green fuzz! Ours stood up to the damp like a champ.

Something to keep in mind about outdoor fabrics, though, is that due to their durability, they are slightly more stiff, and don’t bunch or ripple like regular fabrics. But if you take that into consideration, you can work around it by reducing the ripple a bit or giving your curtain rod span a few extra inches to account for the thickness when the curtains are pulled open.

As you can see, I opted for a gentle ripple, and at the top and bottom it’s still pretty thickly bunched. Additionally, since we don’t have a ton of room on either side of the windows in the Turtle to add rod span, that extra fabric to make the ripples does take up a little window space when they’re pulled open. So it’s good to pick the fabric you like, then decide how you’re going to mount the rods and how much the ripple will affect the length of each panel.

With that in mind, it’s time to determine yardage so you can buy that awesome fabric you found! What I needed to consider with our curtains was the fact that the Turtle’s walls are curved, so I’d need rods on the top and bottom to avoid them hanging far from the wall at the bottom. (I’d actually recommend this even for straight walls, as it keeps more light out and doesn’t blow around.) So I hemmed pockets on top and bottom, and made a double-fold hem on all sides. The double-fold isn’t necessary, but it’s a nice detail. Just fold the hem over, press it with an iron, then fold it over again, press it, pin it, sew it down! Do this to all four sides before sewing the pockets so the rods can slide through.

Then fold the top and bottom pockets over, press them, pin them, sew them! This part can be tricky if you’re using two rods, as it needs to be nearly perfect so that the curtains stay taut but don’t pull on the rods or just not fit altogether. Even after explicit measuring, I ended up spending some quality time with my seam-ripper as I tried to get the fit just right.

Oh, did I mention I had a hard time getting the fit right? Yes I did. It was difficult getting them to not balloon out, and when I took them in they strained the rods since they were a little too short. In the end, I had to make another pocket and sew it to the top of the curtains. This made it easier because I could adjust the pocket right on the rods and pin it in place before sewing it. If I did it again, I’d just plan on approaching it that way to save a headache! Luckily I love the way it looks, and if anyone asks, you can tell them I totally did it on purpose.

For the rods, I bought some dowels from Home Depot and some wood end pieces from JoAnne for the finials. Cheap! Andy sanded, stained and varnished them for me, and screwed the finials into the dowels. The benefit of doing it this way was that we could cut them to the exact size we needed inexpensively, and the wood end pieces already had holes through them, so screwing them in was really simple.

Andy’s genius came in handy as we tried to figure out a way to mount the rods. He found some utility tool hangers at Home Depot that fit our rods perfectly and hold onto them tightly enough that they don’t slide back and forth. We painted them white, and done!

For the tie-backs, I just sewed a strap with some navy fabric I found in the remnant bin at Mill End, and attached one end of each to some stainless steel eye screws I’d screwed into the wall.

The other end I attached to stainless steel S-hooks.

They wrap around the panels to hold them back, and then when the curtains are open, we just re-hook it so it stays out of the way (and so Gracie isn’t as tempted to bat it around).

And there you have it! Inexpensive custom curtains that make a statement, liven up your small space, and are a nice splashy backdrop for pictures of your pets.

If you have any questions about the process, let me know! As with any How-To post, I’d be happy to explain any parts in greater detail to help get you started on your own project. 🙂

A Very Montana Summer

Greetings from Montana!

It’s been a while since we checked in here, and today is a great day to update the blog as it’s stormy and raining outside here in Seeley Lake. Andy is busy working, and I’m doing my best to keep Gracie from trying to curl up on top of my keyboard as I type this. If any portion of this blog isn’t up to standards, you can take it up with her.

We’ve traveled a fair distance (by Turtle standards anyway) since our last post in South Dakota! We made it to Billings after a quick overnight in Gillette, and headed to Riverfront Park right when we got into town so Scout could catch some sticks in the Yellowstone River.

Then we went to Scheels to ride the ferris wheel! If you’re ever passing through Billings, be sure to check out this perplexing sporting goods store. It’s a mix of an outdoor store and a carnival, and just hilariously bizarre. We rode the 3-story ferris wheel, saw animatronic presidents, got our pictures taken with some wild animals, and also got our fishing licenses.

Then we spent a few days with our friend Grant, who I went to high school with, and who is staying in Billings for the summer. We went to Alive After 5, rode our bikes all around town, and sat on the patio at Thirsty Street for a beer. Check out this place for sure; not a lot of places in downtown Billings have patios, and their patio gets great sun, plays good music, and the beers are super tasty!

We did a lot of bike riding, even though the temp was in the 90’s the whole time we were there! We had to pull over one day so I could run around in some sprinklers for a while. We took the dogs to Pioneer Park, had nachos on the patio at The Granary, and stayed up late playing games and gabbing outside in the grass. Fun times with Granty!

One night we also came across this extraordinary line of garbage cans, which Andy was so taken with we had to take a photo with them. It really was an impressively long line of pristine garbage cans. (It doesn’t take much to keep the three of us entertained.)

We also spent a few days with Blake and Martha, who always show us a great time! We went to a Mustangs game, and Andy offered to hold little Harper’s mitt for her. . . then wore it the whole game. She was too busy with her ice cream sandwich to mind.

We had lots of great meals, the boys stained the deck, and Martha and I snuck out again for a beer while the boys watched Harper. I secretly think they just wanted to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Harper is a good patsy.

Then we moved on to Bozeman to visit my mom and sister Kari’s family for a few weeks. We even timed it just right (accidentally) so we were able to see my Grandma and Uncle Brian while they were in town visiting! They were only able to stay for a day and a half, but we got to spend lots of time sitting around sipping coffee and sharing stories. What a treat! Plus Grandma finally got to meet Gracie and Scout, who had never made the trip to Newberg with us when we would visit her there. I only realized after they left that I never got a photo of all of us together! Bummer. So instead, here’s a photo of a Bozeman sunset.

We also got to see a new baby Lipizzan pony! My sister and her friend and all their kids were going to see her, and Andy and I jumped right on that bandwagon. She was so sweet and funny, leaping around at top speed on those spindly little legs. Lipizzans are a special breed of horse with a fascinating history that we learned about from their owner while we were there. They are dressage horses who are super nimble and can perform some incredible dance moves cued only by tiny twitches in their rider’s bum and legs. Crazy!

Then we went to the Museum of the Rockies, where there was a Pompeii exhibit that we really enjoyed. And their dinosaur bone collection is simply incredible.

That weekend, David and Kari invited us to an evening fishing trip up Hyalite Canyon. We picnicked, Scout swam, and David kept very busy helping the kids bait the hooks and reel in all the fish they were catching! The beginning of our trip was quiet on the fish front, but after we moved to another spot by the dam we all had better luck.

Scout and Gracie love being at my mom’s the most, as they get lots of attention and total run of the place.

My niece Bella and I went for pedicures one day, and both of us are now sporting some killer sparkles. Bella even has fireworks on hers!

When we got back to their house, the kids had an impromptu clothes-on pool swim.

We ate like kings while we were at Mom’s, as she’d just cleaned her BBQ, and Andy installed a few parts to get it looking and working like new! So there were lots of fancy dinners off the grill, including a feast of salmon, steak, and chicken with ginger asparagus and grilled polenta for just the three of us. We could get used to spoiling ourselves like this.

On our way out of Billings toward Seeley Lake, we stopped for the night in a gorgeous spot in the middle of nowhere, and also made some fishing stops along the way.

We decided to reach Seeley via Garnet, so we could visit the Garnet Ghost Town. The roads there are treacherous, and when we saw the caution sign, we decided to see what the Turtle was made of and just go for it! (Ok, Andy decided. I just said yes and wiped off my sweaty palms.) There were some seriously steep hills that were knuckle-biters. Andy was thrilled.

Neither of us had been to Garnet Ghost Town in over a decade, so we were excited to visit. We got there Saturday evening, and after the first 15 minutes, we were the only ones there! It made it really easy to use your imagination and picture what the town was like during the mining boom, when all the buildings were still standing. But the remaining buildings are well preserved, and they provide lots of information about the town and residents’ lives there.

You can boondock at the ghost town for free, so of course we did that! We returned to the town the next morning to see the inside of the buildings that had been closed by the time we arrived the day before, and then drove on into Seeley Lake in time to celebrate the 4th of July with the other 3,000 people who come yearly for the parade and fireworks! We just happened to be boondocking right on the parade line, so we were able to easily pop our camp chairs up and watch the festivities with zero preparation or stress.

After the holiday visitors took off we had our pick of the camp sites, so here we are now right on Seeley Lake. We hiked around the campground and harvested the abandoned piles of wood the holiday crowd left at their sites, so we’re all set to stay here for the next four days! In the next post, you can look forward to some sweet woodcarving projects, much like this impressive hot dog stick Andy made yesterday! We’ve got the time and plenty of sticks, so we’ll see what we come up with. . .

	Blue Turtle Crossing on 3 Months in Baja: San Felipe t…
	Blue Turtle Crossing on 3 Months in Baja: San Felipe t…
	Blue Turtle Crossing on 3 Months in Baja: San Felipe t…
	Kevin Wood on 3 Months in Baja: San Felipe t…
	Don Herington on 3 Months in Baja: San Felipe t…