“Where crows gaze vigilant on wires
Where cattle graze the grasses
Far from the digits of business hours
The moon clock wanes and waxes.” ~ Joni Mitchell
On Sunday, it rained all night long. I feared I’d awake to find I was in a lake or mud pit, but when we finally got moving and went outside, the ground was spongy but not muddy. Everything seemed so green and fresh after having at least some rain nearly every day this week. After breakfast, we walked down the road which was getting more and more impassible with each storm and with each off-roader who purposely drove roughshod over the soft soil and made harsh turns in order to skid and fishtail and leave deep ruts in the already difficult road. I met my “Next door neighbors,” and they were worried about getting their pickup truck out. It didn’t have 4WD and they needed to be home the next day for work. As we were talking, another man walked back and they shouted at him, asking if he had any luck. He said he found someone with 4WD who was going to come down and try to tow him out. They explained that he’d come by earlier and said he was stuck in the mud way down the road (in a spot that I’d considered moving to later this week.) Before we’d finished our conversation, the 4WD pick up came skidding and sliding up the dirt road with the “stuck van” being pulled behind by a long, yellow rope. The truck pulled him to the next road that was gravel, and less likely to capture his tires as he drove down to a real paved road.
Most of the “weekenders” left Sunday morning before the rain. Those of us here on a more permanent basis were outside, wandering around, assessing the roads, and sharing stories about the rain and mud and our future plans. We cheered and gave “Thumbs up” signs as the 4WD truck passed us and towed the van out to civilization. It felt like an informal neighborhood street party.
On Tuesday, I decided to go top off my propane and water. The RV Park where I go to do this is 10 miles down the road, toward Flagstaff. One of my neighbors informed me that there is a Basha’s Grocery store just a few miles past that and much closer than driving to Walmart Super Store (as it turned out, there was a Walmart at the other end of the parking lot where the grocery store is.) At the RV park, a young man named Cade filled my propane for me. He was very nice and quite conversational. I asked where he was from, and he said he lived in Flagstaff. He is homeschooled and seemed quite intelligent. He works at the RV park during the summer and stays on one day a week in the off season. I asked about Basha’s, and he said it was close and had everything I’d need. I drove the extra 7 minutes and bought some fresh fruit and vegetables before going “home.” When I got to the dispersed camping area, I drove back to the spot that had gotten so muddy. The mud had dried, and the ground was solid as cement. Everyone had left. I was the only person on this road, and I could choose whatever spot I desired. I wanted to go farther down the road to a spot I’d scouted a few days back, but the road was destroyed from the 4WD truck towing out the van.
There were deep ruts filled with water and mud. I’ll try again the next time I move.
The cows were out in full force this week. Perhaps they too are enjoying the lack of humans in the area. The van was constantly surrounded on all sides most of the time, and when we went for walks, they often lined both sides of the road. They were sometimes lying down, but stood up and stared us down as we walked toward them. They don’t seem aggressive in any way, but they also don’t seem inclined to back down. They stand their ground and face us as we walk toward them. We haven’t walked past them yet, as Cosmo goes nuts when he sees them and I fear he might incite an altercation, so we just turn around and go back the way we came.
With no other people here, all the wildlife seems to come out. I’ve seen crows, robins, woodpeckers and bluejays. I hear coyotes howling just after midnight. (If I don’t hear them, Cosmo howls back, assuring that I wake up and join in the early a.m. chorus.) Unfortunately, I’ve also seen “cow parts.” As we explored the meadows and clearings, I came across multiple cow (I assume) bones. One cow leg still had the hoof and fur and was mostly intact (although it was clearly missing the rest of the cow.) I’ve seen other bones the size of my femur, so I’m pretty sure they weren’t leftovers from past campers BBQ. I also came across a spine with ribs still attached. I wondered if these were animals that died and then other animals made a meal of them, or were they taken down by coyotes or something else. It makes me pay a lot more attention when I go out at night. If something took down a cow, it could certainly take down ME.
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Wednesday Cosmo and I took a long walk—probably a mile in each direction. We were the only humans in a mile radius. It was heaven. I hoped against odds it might be a quiet 4th of July weekend. That was not to be. In the afternoon, a pickup truck pulling a big rig turned into the vacant spot closest to me. They immediately turned on loud Mexican music, with an “oompah bass” seemingly comprised of tubas. It was so loud it rattled my windows. More of their group arrived, the music continued and nearly all of the later arrivals were towing off-road vehicles behind them. There were 6 in all, and as much as I hate the off-road crowd, these were the worst I’ve had to endure. They rode through my campsite, playing loud Spanish techno music until late at night. They seemed intent on causing conflict, or maybe they just realized they were setting Cosmo off and were enjoying that. More of them arrived Thursday morning. Their vehicles looked to be straight out of the movie Road Warriors, and they sounded like riding lawnmowers carrying on-board chain saws. These were the loudest most obnoxious neighbors I’ve ever had in all my years dispersed camping. My usual course of action is if I don’t like where I am (for whatever reason) I simply move. I walked the “road” only to find the crowds were thick if I went in the direction of the main road, and going the other way, there was very bad road, very few clearings, and they were already occupied anyway. I decided to tough it out and do my best to make it through until they leave on Sunday. The situation reminded me of when I lived at the beach in Delaware. In the winter we were able to enjoy the few local bars and restaurants that remained open off-season. We knew our neighbors and the wait staff at restaurants. The bartender poured our favorite drink when he saw us walk in. The cashiers at the grocery store knew our name. Then summer hit and the masses swarmed in, bringing their entitled attitudes, rude driving habits, and everything else we hated about tourists.
This feels a lot like that. But I console myself with the fact that they have saved all year long to come out for a long holiday, and I on the other hand, live here. I resent that they trash the roads, and I’d bet $100 that they leave lots of garbage behind in their campsite. I’ve run across this sort of invader before. It saddens me, but that’s just the way it is. I find it strange that they leave to escape their hectic lives in the city, and then they bring everything that is bad about their hectic lives with them.
There is a total fire ban in all of Flagstaff. No open flames. No campfires. And definitely no FIREWORKS. I got out of my van just before midnight and took this photo:
Who needs fireworks when you have this cosmic light show?
Lessons From The Road: This week I celebrated 3 years on the road. I have lived in the van longer—the first 9 months after I bought the van, I lived in it full time in my back parking lot so I could get used to the small space. I moved out of a 4,500 square foot warehouse and made sure I had everything I needed in the van. I tweaked things for those 9 months, sometimes bringing something new into the van, sometimes getting rid of things I realized I didn’t need. I have been thinking a lot this week about how I’ve changed after three years living in a forest or a desert or by a river or lake. I think it tends to make me much more tuned into nature. I spent most of my life living in a city and visiting nature when I could get away; Now I live in nature and visit a city when I must.
It rained all night again last night, and when I took Cosmo out to pee in the morning, I was aware that the ground was spongey, but not muddy. Nothing stuck to my flip-flops. Just a few hundred yards away was my previous spot that turned into a mud pit after just an hour of rain. I wondered why this spot stayed solid when the other spot did not. That led me to wonder how primitive tribes must’ve figured that stuff out. They probably had learned where to set up camp and where to avoid. They probably passed down that knowledge for generations, until we mostly lived in permanent houses and no longer needed to assess if where we were sleeping would be muddy or just spongy after a night of rain.
Another big change is my awareness of the night sky. I have always been fascinated with astronomy, but it has taken on a new, more personal meaning since I spend most of my life in dark sky areas. I’m usually aware of the moon phase, although I cannot for the life of me understand how the sun and moon can be “out” at the same time, and the part of the moon that’s illuminated doesn’t appear to correspond to the sun’s position in the sky. I am aware of the change of seasons by the comings and goings of constellations. I suspect that ancient man knew that winter was coming when they saw those three aligned stars of Orion’s Belt.
I’ve also started to be aware of the many different flowers in the forest. My friend Leslie taught me that I could take a photo on my iPhone, swipe up and it would give me all the photo information (date and time taken, shutter speed, f stop, etc.) as well as the name of the flower/plant. I’m so enjoying learning to identify all the different flowers.
My schedule is less determined by a clock and more and more determined by sunrise and sunset (although I suspect after 67 years of conditioning, I’ll never fully be able to give up my clock). I wake up at dawn most days (which is before 5:00 a.m. right now) and go to bed several hours after sunset (around 10:00 p.m. now, which is much later than I go to bed in the winter). I spend more time outside when the temperature is accommodating, and I stay inside when it’s too cold or rainy. I eat if I get hungry and I take a nap if I’m tired. That’s a very different schedule than the one I had when I was working full time.