Category Archives: Camping

Weber Baby Q Carrying Bag

 

The Weber Baby Q grill has been a centerpiece of our camping trips for at least 20 years. At first the grill was stored in our camper. Inside storage left odors in the camper even if stored outside of the living space of the camper.

So for nearly 20 years it has been stored it in a plastic container. It is stored in our garage. Before each trip, it is moved to the camper. Even though the storage container was similar in size to the grill, it was kinda big and bulky.

It was finally time to search for a better option, an option that wasn’t available in the past.

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The Desert in Bloom

Finally getting our lives back into normal mode. More about that later.

Southern California received an inordinate amount of rain the first three months of this year, which we desperately needed.  Instead of being able to use my telescope every night at home, as in the past, I only had about 12 good nights for telescope use in the first quarter of 2023.

As many had hoped, some of our deserts experienced a wildflower super bloom. As the bloom reached its peak, the Coachella Music Festival opened. Along with the reported 250,000 fans that attended the festival, hordes of social media people descended upon our desert to take selfies and trample flowers.

Being rational people, Joyce and I left for the eastern Mojave Desert for a couple weeks of camping solitude.

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2022 Camping and the High Price of Gas

Today the average price of regular unleaded gas in California is $6.32 per gallon

The national average is $4.90 per gallon for regular unleaded.

What’s Up With That?

Will this stop us from camping this year? Why is gas so high?

No, we will continue camping. 

Why gas is so expensive is a complicated matter, which I will delve into towards the end of this post.

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Early Mojave Halloween: Witches & Spiders

We had been home only two weeks from our 2-month trip. It was time for another camping trip because, well just because.

Most years we are camping on Halloween to avoid the little beggars and extortionists who knock on our door on October 31st. Last year, due to COVID there were none. This year we can’t go camping that weekend due to my son getting married that weekend.

So we headed to the high desert for a pre-Halloween trip.

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A Camping “Shakedown” Trip

It has been about 10 months since we went camping. We have never gone that long between trips. This abnormal behavior was due to Joyce breaking her ankle in 3 places back in September of 2020.

Joyce’s ankle is healed and it was time to renew our habit of “excellent camping adventures.” Since the camper has been sitting for nearly a year, I decided a short trip of around 5 hours each way for 5 days was a good starting point.

But there was one problem: last year’s problem of full campgrounds has extended and even gotten worse in 2021. To compound this, we wanted to camp the week leading up to the 4th of July weekend. What a mess! Continue reading A Camping “Shakedown” Trip