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A Newbie Couple Camps With an Ol' Desert Rat

There are some disparities that are made to poke fun at: men versus women, old versus young, northern Europeans versus Mediterraneans, city slickers versus rural hayseeds, and even newbie campers versus grizzled old "mountain men."

A long term bicycle club friend of mine visited my camp recently. She and her significant-other were embarked on their maiden voyage in a converted van. They don't know of my blog. So hopefully I can write about their experience with candor. Although it may seem like I am poking fun at them, their foibles and mistakes are no different than any other newbie, including myself at one time in history. They both have a lot of practical skills, and I suspect that their RV careers will be a great success if they keep with it.

The idea here is to describe a newbie's ideas, habits, and mistakes, in order to let the reader flush out the principles and draw their own conclusions. I will try to suppress my own shop-worn sermons.

They reminded me how difficult it is to be transitioning to RVing. "Honey, where did you put that spoon?"  Supposedly they have downsized from two middle class houses, and embarked on a life of 'Simplicity' and 'Nature'. But they still spent most of their time looking for crap. Which box is it?

Their van is not completely converted. They are still operating a bit like a weekend car-camper. That means cooking outside. This all seems very romantic until it rains or, more likely, the wind begins howling. All those boxes with troublesome lids, all that crap spread out over the mesa.

But we enjoyed having a fire at dusk, something that I never bother with, when camped alone. It essentially lengthened the winter day by an hour. How precious that hour is! There really isn't much heat that actually gets transferred to the human body, but it is wonderful anyway. She didn't care for my fire-building, though. She wanted to add 6 pieces of firewood at a time. I was building the fire on the down-wind side of the tallest rocks of the firepit. She thought the fire would look prettier if I put the wood on the opposite (exposed) side of the firepit.

How she came up with such a great meal from a one burner backpacker stove, I don't know. It seemed almost scandalous that these two liberal environmentalists would use paper plates! (And of course, I had to poke them on that, a little.) But of course, it made sense for people who are trying to minimize washing dishes. He noticed that I went into my trailer to retrieve a deep melamine bowl to hold the meal, rather than a flat plate. Here I finally had to shoot my mouth off: it makes no sense spending an hour cooking a delicious hot meal -- for a cold winter evening -- and then put it on a plate -- outdoors -- and watch it sag cold in 20 seconds. He bought it.

They taught me a fun board game to play inside their van. In fact, their rotating captain's chairs made for better seating in their van than I had in my trailer. But I was dressed in my insulated bibs, with a winter parka over the top, and a Thinsulated stocking hat. Then they would turn the engine on and run the heater. I finally had to say that I was getting nauseous. So I stepped out of the van, sat down on the gravel, and wrestled with removing my bibs, in the dark. Sure enough, somebody opened the side door of the van and almost bashed me in the head. I took every ounce of available willpower to resist screaming, "I can't live like this!"

Earlier in the day they disposed of some food on the ground. (They are good environmentalists back in the city, you understand, and like composting.) A couple hours after sunset there were two yipping screaming coyotes outside my door. They sounded like they were having a food fight with each other or some other animal, and somebody was dying. I am surprised that my dog didn't completely freak out.

Sure enough, at about 4 in the morning, the wind began blowing. I had to step out with a flashlight and weigh down some of that camping debris, so it wouldn't blow into the next county.

But the thing that surprised me the most was that my old bike friend didn't even remember to bring trail-runner sneakers so that I could show-off the canyon maze to them. So we stayed on top of the mesa, where the walking was easier. She had on some sort of goofy impractical female-type footwear, in a land of sharp gravel and cactus. But they liked the view. At least she wasn't wearing Teva sandals or Birkenstocks...

Comments

Steve said…
LOL ... great post
Anonymous said…
No pictures it didn't happen.
John V said…
Someday they'll have a carnivore bigger than a coyote sniffing around their food scraps if they keep that up.
Aren't those environmental camper van people the types who defecate in a bag and then save it for later disposal? Barbarians! :-)
No, the purist wouldn't use a plastic bag for their poo. They would use recycled paper bags.
Ed said…
Cynic that I am I don't think they are going to last long as van campers. They may become RVers but I doubt that it will be in the van.
Maybe so. But they will have fond memories of the chaos and adventure of their first transcontinental trip.
Anonymous said…
Thanks for sharing that entertaining experience. It made me realize how much I enjoy the creature comforts of my Lazy Daze. And kB, thanks for all the entertaining, challenging and informative posts in 2015. Happy New Year to all. Chris
Thanks for the tip o' the hat, Chris.

Surely, they will never be as comfortable in their extended van as you are in a Class C motorhome. But things will be a lot better for them when they are done transitioning, and reach some sort of steady state.
sooperedd said…
Leaving food scraps outside is a big no-no; definitely asking for trouble, but that should be common sense for any adult. I do enjoy the "ambiance" of a small fire, but the smoke and subsequent smell in my clothes I am not a big fan.

These kind of situations often remind me of "No Exit", Sartre's play that coined the phrase "Hell is other people". Spend enough time around the wrong people and it can quickly devolve into this. I also believe the reverse is true and "Heaven is other people"; those times are special.
Good, thoughtful comment, Sooper Ed.