As we do at the end of each year, we spent the last two weeks (and New Year’s) of the year camping. Leaving home on Dec 20th the forecast was rain, rain, and more rain (L.A. got over three inches) and desert lows in the 30s. Is this camping weather?
Continue reading Camping Weather and some thoughts on 2019 & 2020
We recently returned from an extended camping trip in the Southern Sierra Nevada. It was our almost annual marriage anniversary camping trip. We have gone camping to celebrate our anniversary every year except twice, when Joyce wanted to go on a cruise instead.
Joyce had never been camping before we met and has become an avid camper. In fact, starting next year (after I finish remodeling the house) she wants to go camping several months each year. If you are a frequent reader of our blog, you know we prefer to camp where there aren’t many people and of course where there is no electricity, cell phone service, Wi-Fi and all the other “amenities” of civilization.
Continue reading 17th Anniversary Camping Trip & Some Thoughts on Marriage
You know what I’m talking about — almost every Wal-Mart, Big Box Hardware Store, and even many convenience stores have those cages where you can exchange your 5 gallon propane tank for a “full” tank.
So, is it a good deal to exchange your tanks?
The short answer is No. Continue reading Is it a Good Deal to “Exchange” Your Propane Tanks?
So we got home from our end-of-summer camping trip on September 20th, or two days before the official end of summer, which marks the beginning of autumn. I like to call it autumn because that name is derived from an old Latin word, autumns. Autumn entered the English language about 700 years ago.
Of course when we think of autumn, changing colors in forests and the falling leaves often come to mind. Poets often wrote about this colorful season and soon it was referred to as “the falling of leaves.” So about 500 years ago, in the English language, this was changed to simply “fall.”
In the desert, unless there are cottonwood trees nearby, there isn’t a “falling of leaves” during this time of the year. But there are balmy nights, and the night sky becomes darker and clearer. So with this in mind, I headed to the high desert a few days after our trip to Lake Mead.
Continue reading The First Camping Trip of Autumn — or is it Fall?
We’ve been at Lake Mead for over two weeks. Many people couldn’t stay in one place this long. I can. There is plenty to do and see – one just needs to learn how to slow down and take a micro-look at their surroundings. Every day Corky and I walk and explore. I see eye-candy, Corky smells dog-candy.
Today we are sitting by the lake. It will be the last day of this trip. Time to go home.
I have often written here about Lake Mead Recreational Area. What first attracted my attention were the vast wilderness areas, potentially prime backpacking destinations that became achievable due to the proximity of water in Lake Mead. Often times getting to the lake and water isn’t an easy task, and for the inexperienced can result in bad outcomes, to include death. However, sometimes a little risk returns huge dividends. I wrote about some of these backpacking trips in:
The Eye Candy Backpacking Trip (2014)
Often camping trips with Joyce spark an interest for areas to explore via a backpacking trip. Other times camping trips inspire me to explore the history of an area. Lake Mead Recreational Area has ticked of all these buttons. From backpacking trips into the backcountry and numerous tours inside Hoover Dam, the area just mesmerizes me. Continue reading The Seventeenth Day after the Day After