“God, it was hot! Forget about frying an egg on the sidewalk; this kind of heat would fry an egg inside the chicken.”
― Rachel Caine
The week got off to a rough start with temperatures exceeding 90 degrees and my internet going out. When I arrived at my new spot I had fairly good internet and phone service, but on Sunday night, for no apparent reason, my internet failed completely. I feared it might be my Verizon Wi-Fi router, but my phone service was quite limited as well. I could send texts but not with any attachments. I couldn’t access the internet, either from my laptop or my phone. So I suspected the issue was with Verizon, and not my devices. Maybe too many people were trying to access a single cell tower over the July 4th weekend? I don’t know. Fortunately, I was able to access another, unsecured wi-fi signal of someone nearby. I worried that once they left, or turned off their internet router, I too would have to leave to find a Verizon store to see what was going on. It took a few hours, but I eventually realized that the “other available network” that was unsecured and anybody could just hop on, was MINE! I had somehow reset my wireless router, and it no longer had the same name nor required a password for anyone to connect to it. I tried to reach Verizon, but it took forever due to the holiday. I finally got through, but they couldn’t help me because everyone THEY needed to talk to was off for 4th of July. Finally, on Wednesday, I got in touch with the manufacturer of my wireless router and their tech support got me back up and running and secured in no time at all. Such a relief.
I spent much of last Sunday and Monday trying to find a place not too far away that would be just a little cooler. I had hoped that moving to a higher altitude would mean lower temperatures, but the only place I could find that was cooler was Seattle or some beaches in California. Seattle is about 21 hours away and at my driving pace (an hour and half a day is my usual limit) it would take me two weeks to get there. Heading west to the coast would require me driving through triple digit heat. So I continued to search, with no reasonable prospects of cooling off. I may opt to head to a motel with a swimming pool and AC if it gets much worse.
I thought that this place (Coconino National Forest, still) would be packed for the holiday weekend, but by the 4th, nearly everyone had cleared out and by the 5th I was there in my section of the forest, totally alone. It was actually sort of nice to have such a huge section of forest to myself and Cosmo and I took many walks. I sat outside and read at times, but even in the shade, it was often uncomfortable if the air was not moving.
I developed a rash (or so I thought) the day I left Marshall Lake. I at first thought it was mosquito bites, but I never saw or felt a mosquito bite me. And the “bites” seemed always to be in clusters. I believed for a moment that I could possibly have shingles, but the “rashes” were not consistent with the look of shingles, and they were mostly on my arms and legs and did not spread. With the help of Google, I finally decided that the bites were from chiggers. They matched the photos I found, and I was in tall grass, the perfect place for chiggers to “hang out” until they found me. The bites were extremely painful and itchy. Mike, the guy next to me also had the same bites. I did my best to stay out of the tall grass, but I was surrounded by it, so I wasn’t very successful. The bugs seemed more active at night, so I started putting on light, long pants when I went out, and I sprayed all exposed skin with a natural bug spray I’d bought last summer. Both precautions seemed to help a little bit, but I still would end up with a few new welts each time I went outside. Mother nature seems to be conspiring to get me out of the forest, but it is quite beautiful, and all areas within a few hundred miles have much hotter weather, so I decided to stay put for the time being.
I drove into town to get some supplies and fresh water (the water supply at my usual place had a sign on the faucet that said, “Temporarily Out of Service.”) When I came back, I moved down the road a couple spots farther than I’d been, and found a totally level opening in the middle of tall pines. I set up camp there.
The tall trees provided some shade in the early morning and late afternoon, but still offered enough direct sunlight from about 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. to totally recharge my solar batteries. Being somewhat back from the main road also offered some relief from the dust stirred up by the few vehicles coming and going. It’s a big spot, with lots of room for a second rig (or even a third). I started thinking back to all the camping friends I had during the winter at the various places I stayed, and I felt a wave of nostalgia come over me. And even last week at Marshall Lake, I knew quite a few people and always had someone to hang out with.
Lessons From The Road: I seem to need a precise balance of alone time and camping near friends, or at least friendly people. At Marshall Lake I had a bit of sensory overload, with so many nearby people interacting with me on a daily basis. Down the road at Ashurst Lake (current location) there is Mike up the road, but he works during the day and often goes to his condo at night when it is too hot or too “buggy.” (He lives in Flagstaff, and sets up a campsite nearby to go to some nights when the weather is good.) I don’t need much company; an hour a day of face-to-face conversation would be ideal. Sometimes I make do with exchanging waves and “How are you doing?” with anyone Cosmo and I pass on our walks.
This is my third summer of living in my van. Each summer has gotten progressively hotter than the previous, and so far, I’ve not been able to figure out a solution to the heat. When I arrived outside of Flagstaff and saw snow still on the mountain, I thought I’d solved it, but the New York Times and the Weather Channel have confirmed that this past week has set records for heat on the entire planet. So apparently there is no escaping. The upcoming week will be nearly 10 degrees hotter than this week here in the forest. I’m not sure it will be tolerable if it gets much hotter. I may check into a cheap motel, crank up the AC and watch HBO for a couple of days.