definition:
poaching campsites: To "squat" or station one's travelling caravan on a previously unoccupied piece of property, after the obligatory check for "no camping" or "day use only" signs. This property may be a pull-off on the side of the road or the bank of a beautiful river with, miraculously, access for a 5th wheel. Either way it cuts out the pricey, rule-laden, and non-dog-friendly RV park middlemen.
We're not quite out of Oregon (Brookings) and already it's balmy t-shirt weather. The foliage has changed substantially as we've headed down the one-oh-one and we're amazed by the amount of green deciduous trees. Surely it's not January - must be spring.
Our first poached campsite was near a beach AND an river where the old folks were out in force with their poking sticks. "What are you looking for?" - "aggats". Well, nice as aggats are, Jon managed to find mussels! Hords of them. We packed as many as we could fit in our hoodie front-pockets and hurried home to boil 'em up for a delicious seafood pasta dinner. Jon did a little surf-perch fishing and spotted some gigantic mussels that were about 8" long! We left them alone because the little ones are the tastiest.
Poaching campsites is a lot easier when you are self contained. We left Washington on Wednesday after Jon managed to fix all the leaks in our plumbing system and fine-tune the electrical system (complete with our whisper-quiet generator). We are missing hot water but not too much. We now have an operating stove, oven, refrigerator, freezer, sink, toilet, and lights. The microwave draws too much electricity but we're surviving without it . We're living on the cheap. I've had my chef's hat on, and I'm soon to put on my baker's hat for some home-made bread, although I'll have to get Jon to agree to letting me snuggle a sourdough baby on cold nights...
(just kidding - see the video below for a tour of our camper)
We've become newly acquainted with the joys of Redbox and watched a movie for the first time on the trip - Public Enemies - pretty entertaining. Mostly we've been playing a lot of games and reading books. We're big fans of cribbage, scrabble, boggle. Add to your book list "Glass Castle"- never has a memoir put such a pleasant spin on the joys and adventure of homelessness, poverty, and hunger.
We've been on the quest for steelhead with zero success. I get bored after snagging my line and losing my lure twice in five minutes and opt for yoga on the river banks instead. Jon will never deter from his continuing mission - to explore strange new rivers, to seek out new fish, and new seafood, to boldly go where x-tra tuffs have never gone before. He is not even slowed by the gut-wrenching rib pain that started after our snowboarding adventure.
We did spend two nights in an actual state park on the ocean with cheap prices and long hot showers included. At night, we took a hike out to the lighthouse with our headlamps. Having seen many a lighthouse, I was surprised at how mystical they appear at night. The light looks like a giant crystal with 9 large rays spreading out like a god-like halo. Bailey was not so much interested in the lighthouse as he was in the porcupine - which we, luckily, caught on to before he caught a faceful of prickles.
As I write this blog, I am sitting in a coffee shop, eavesdropping on the old fogies as they expound on their theories on politics, economics, the dairy industry, the end of the world, global warming, and even structral engineering in China. Though not always well-informed, they are enthusiaticly opinionated, and very entertaining. This is the real grass-roots movement.
Received MARVELOUSLY FANTASTIC news the other day! My good buddy Kjersti, and her man Joel, have jumped the bandwagon and are travel bound themselves! They plan to leave ol' P-Town behind for some sailing, Alaska, and New Zealand! I'm still giddy with excitement!!!!! (more exclamation points? Ok - why not)!!!!!!!!!!
Loved the tour! Had no idea a 5th wheel had so many rooms!!
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