The Reward

Its done. Well at least for the most part. The past year and probably a few thousand man and woman hours spent thinking, designing and crafting, cursing when it breaks, and recrafting our adventure-mobile and its finally hit the road.

On April 19th, Liz, Ziggy and myself packed the Subaru Outback and said our goodbyes to our host Mark Fulton. The camper was already packed and ready for the road. We hesitate. Its been so long thinking about this final moment.

And then we left.

I had planned out a few spots to stop to get to our first campsite. First along the way was Great Falls National Park in McLean, Virginia. The historic location was a meeting grounds between native Americans and the colonists. It also hosted a canal used to bypass the rapids and falls that cascaded that section of the River. We pull up to the entrance and much to our surprise, the $10 admission was waved for this week for all National Parks including forests, monuments, coastal zones etc. SCORE!

The Subie and Camper get parked in the way back nose bleeds and we walk to the visitor center. Ziggy managed to keep his cool most of the time while other dogs walked by. The paved trail took us to numerous lookouts along the rapids and falls. Our favorite was lookout 3. Some visitors were nice enough to take some pictures.

Moving onward, the Roamin Gnome travelled south into Virginia which I am told is for lovers. The highway takes us to a local road. Then a nice winding road through George Washington NF and then to a dirt road. We have a quarter tank of gas and w just turned down a dirt road for our first night with the camper. Meanwhile its rounding 6:30pm. The Subaru handles the rocky road like and champ and the new axle provides a nice ride for the house on wheels and its contents. The road continues and a few miles and then we see it.  A sign pointing us in the right direction for the Little Fort Camp Ground. A short drive through the 8 site campground tells us which spot to park the gnome. Backed in and beautiful, we staked claim to the roomy and private site 6.

Our first time unpacking it all and we did fairly well. The sun was still setting and we had more than enough light to make camp including awning placement, hammocks and the cook station. Liz whipped up and amazing meal using the following canned items: Chicken from Costco, black beans, tomato sauce and BLANK. Cooked on the cast iron skillet and served with chips, sour cream and shredded cheese; the only thing that could make it better would be bacon. Eat, clean and rest. The tie dye bed is made and we turn in for the night.

The next morning, we awake to what sounds like a chainsaw right outside our camper. WTF! We sneak a look through the bed windows and its an official park employee trimming the bushes around the drop toilet. We at least he meant no harm. The guy does his job and then walked up the trail. As he approaches, he asked if I had a jumper. Apparently the office installs radios in their work trucks that continually drain the battery. Smart!

After the jump, he thanks me and introduces himself. Charlie has worked for the parks system for 15 years and loves it. Retired navy, he was the kindest guy who gave us the hot tip to a natural spring well nearby and the Firetower up the road. He also gave us two smokey the bear bandanas and gave Zig some doggie biscuits. Aside from Charlie and another woman camping, we had a very secluded and enjoyable day thus far. After a leisure stroll of the campground, we begin to forage for a snack. Our guide books i.d. dandelion root and violets are good grub. The violet heads can be plucked and eaten on the spot. The dandelion roots need to be cleaned and cooked before serving.

In the afternoon, another couple miles of dirt/gravel roads lined with campers and scary shacks led us to the fresh water spring. We fill our water jugs and the 5 gallon shower for later use. On the way back to our camp, we drove up the fire tower road and then followed a short trail to reach the base of the Woodstock fire tower. I was able to muster the confidence and beat my fear of heights to summit the 50 stairs to the top. The  view was fairly stellar and showed the valleys of the region along with a serpenting river.

Back at camp, we unpacked the water and fell victim to a leisure lul. For dinner we had mac and cheese with sauteed dandelions (which were really bitter)oh well. That night slept well.

In the AM, we broke camp and packed it all in to head for Shenandoah. We entered through the north gate waiving the $20 entrance fee and drove Skyline Drive for the 30 something miles till the Luray exit. Unfortunately, due to a massive wildfire in the southern portion of the park, a majority of the route was closed and the vistas were hazy due to smoke wafting. Hopefully the firefighters can get the blaze under control but its a pretty big one.

We exited Shenandoah through the Luray exit and drove Route 211 to 81 and then right through the center of Harrisonburg which is a tight circle in a busy area. Great for a pop-up to zip through. Our next campsite was once again in a length of George Washington NF at Hone Quarry. This one night stop by a stream was a great for the night with the small fee of 5$. During the night, we went frog hunting and came across this Fowler's Toad who was very photogenic.

In the AM we wasted no time packing up to head out before the rain came through. With camper and family packed in, we headed south once more to head for our next camp, Oronoco Campsite outside of Buena Vista VA. We plan to set up base here for the next few days (sans cell/wifi reception) before heading out to our first WWOOFing experience starting next Monday at Sylvanaqua Farms in Earlysville VA. We plan to spend a week with this endeavor before moving on to the next leg of our adventures. Stay tuned and thanks for reading.

What to do with No.1 and No.2

Living in a 30 something year old pop up camper has its merits. 

Merit 1: It was cheap

Merit 2: It was in 'decent' shape

Merit 3: It was portable

One flaw is the lack of facilities, ie bathroom stuff. 

For some time now, people have been asking what we plan to do with number one and number two. The option to go into the wild and dig out a cat-hole is always a possibility but sometimes you want a little privacy or the elements are not in your favor. Well, we weighed the options and it seemed that the most responsible thing to do, would be utilize a composting toilet. There are many on the market if you do a simple search but they can range in price from $35 to upwards of 100. But what makes it so expensive?

Well the issue with waste is that when combined, the urine and feces together make a biological hazard; namely due to the urine (ammonia). When you keep the two separate however, the potential for catastrophic disasters is greatly reduced. These composting toilets are specially designed to do just that, separate the one and two. Why couldn't we just do that?

With a couple trips to the hardware store, we had all the things we needed.
Materials:

1. 5 Gallon Bucket
2. 5 gallon bucket toilet seat (bought on Amazon)
3. Biodegradable kitchen bags (bought on Amazon)
4. Coconut Fibers/Saw dust (bought on Amazon)
5. A funnel (Size and design is up to the user)
6. Small length of aquarium tubing
7. 2 Rubber stopper
8. Bottle for liquids (We used Gatorade)
9. Feminine urination aid [Go Girl] (if desired)

Instructions:

• A hole was drilled in the rubber stopper to accommodate for the insertion of the aquarium hose.
• The stopper was plugged into the bottom of the funnel
• The funnel was cut to size and screwed onto the bucket and the position and height for its main user.
• A hole was drilled at the appropriate height and size to run the tubing from interior to exterior of bucket.
• Another rubber stopper was drilled to accommodate for the hose at the bottle end of the tube.
• A 1" hole was drilled into the cap of the Gatorade bottle.
• Biodegradable bags will line the interior of the bucket 

• Expand coconut fibers with water to be spread on top of each deposit to reduce smell and aid in decomposition.

• When the bio-bag is full, it can be trashed or buried.
• When the bottle is full or after each use, it can be disposed of outside.

And that't it, at least in theory. We will see how things really work out when we test the setup on the road. The bucket setup fits nicely in an old milk carton and will be strapped to the trailer tongue securely for transport and storage.

Gnome Getting Psycadelic

For some time now, Liz and I have been holding onto our whites. We went to Ikea and bought a white duvet cover and pillow cases and we also got some dish towels/bar rags. Moving back to Harrisburg with the Fulton fam, we uncovered a stash of Tie Dye materials from Kathryn. With her permission and guidance, we went through the process of making some colorful art out of these blank slates.

Prior to starting, Liz watched numerous YouTube videos of hippies in their basements showing how to fold and band the desired patterns. We decided to try a mandala pattern on the duvet cover and go for whatever felt right for the rest of the items. Before applying bands, we bucket washed the whites in a mixture of water and Soda Ash which can be bough in bulk in the pool supplies of most department or pool stores. The ratio for the mix we used was ~1 cup soda ash to ~1 gallon of water. We really soaked them for a good half hour (or how ever long we played Halo Reach for). 

After we squeezed out the water, it was time to fold our patterns and apply bands. I went gung-ho in my own special patterns while Liz attempted more traditional styles. The duvet was so large, we called it our baby Alli-guitar.

Dye was applied following the process of ROYGBIV being sure to avoid running colors together in a mega mess; not to say some areas came out a little wonky. After dye was applied, each item was placed in its own plastic bag for the dye to set for the next 24 hours.

Fast forward to the next day and we are stoked to see our artwork. We started with the smallest rags first. The process of cleaning them is fairly straight forward.

1. Turn on cold tap
2. Place cloth under water
3. Wring out 10,000,000 times.
4. Let sit for 20 mins
5. Wring out another dozen times.

As you can imagine, this took some time to do all the towels giving us a new appreciation to those stalls that have hundreds of tapestries for sale. It was a near painful process which took about two hours of rinsing to complete. Once they were all rinsed, they took a cold spin in the washing machine followed by a dry session.

And without further ado, here's the outcome.

And the Duvet

DO AC

This past Friday, Liz and myself took a trip to Atlantic City. Our friend group was in town and staying at the Borgata for the weekend. Coming from Harrisburg, we packed a lunch and hit the road in the AM (11ish) but instead of direct routing to AC, I had a couple places to stop along the way to show Liz.

Since we have been dating, I think I have visited Susquehanna U (Liz's alma mater) a half dozen times. Its a beautiful campus in the heart of the quaint town of Selinsgrove PA. It was time for Liz to see Stockton University since we would never be any closer than a trip to AC. 

We took the grand tour of the campus starting with the housing on the north side of Lake Fred. Each housing unit was detailed with its pros and cons in my day and it was great to see they had expanded their solar array over the parking lots on this side of the lake; formerly, panels were only located on the freshmen parking areas to the south.

Parking in front of the Arts and Science building, we started our walking tour from the beginning. Walking through the halls which I spent four years in, I came to realize that numerous professors had since resigned or were no longer a part of Stockton's teaching staff. Alot of the names on the doors had since changed but the maps and diagrams on the walls were still the same from 5+ years ago. . . Might be time for an upgrade.

The tour continued down the serpentine academic building which runs A-H wing. Around the time of my graduation in 2011, the indoor pool on campus was being reconstructed into an Art Gallery. The reasoning for this, or so I'm told, was due to the fact that even though Stockton had a pool. it was intentionally designed inches short of regulation size to prevent the school from having a competitive swim team. Darn hippies and their non-competitive nature. Anyways, we made our way through the newly installed Art Gallery which featured about a dozen artists works within the two story space. Liz and I found one artist (Lisa Rickerhauser) who featured stunning pieces of her portfolio done in a similar theme of pastel colors of animals. We were fans

Rounding out the Stockton tour, we walked through the Campus Center which is also a newly constructed building (within 5 years). This one was operational in my time and features a food court which replaced the sheit one over in G-Court. The marble columns and wooden acoustic architecture stunned Liz since she did not expect such grandeur from my little Stockton.

We made our way back to the car and grabbed our lunch so we could have a cold and windy picnic on the benches surrounding Lake Fred. The foot path around the lake gave us the opportunity to sit and have a bite and also see a big box turtle in the water. I reminisced the times spent zipping up and down the path on my crappy huffy bike from Target, narrowly avoiding students while trying to not crash into the lake. Good times.

Back to the car once more, we left campus to our next pit stop; Forsythe Wildlife Refuge. Forsythe is a bird sanctuary in the tidal marshes of the Atlantic Coast. There was a 4$ entrance fee upon entering the facility. From the looks of it, the facilities on site had been greatly improved since I had been around and construction on a new building was taking place. The Subaru had no issues getting down the rocky sand-packed path which loops the sanctuary in an 8 mile loop. On the track, we saw three nesting osprey pairs on the nest stands overlooking the Atlantic City skyline. It was great to see that so many birds were using the facility as humans intended. The osprey is a bird of prey which calls this area of the state home and also the Stockton mascot. KA KAWW!

Unfortunately, Liz had packed her camera with a dead battery and no spare. The image above is for reference and taken from Stateparks.com We also saw a dozen or more great white egrets, some small terns, a three-some of Bufflehead, some water turkeys (Anhinga) and of course dozens of common gulls.

Here's a link to the Forsythe Wildlife Refuge Osprey Cam.

Osprey Cam

Upon completing the drive, we hit the road once more for the short remainder to AC. We parked in the Borgata parking garage and met up with friends; friends who convinced the six-person group to bolt across the speedways of AC to reach the Golden Nugget across the road. Frogger skills kicked in. The name of the game was Blackjack and the GN gave cheap folks a shot at 'affordable' betting with $10 minimum. With our unemployed status, Liz and I were only able to play a few hands before defaulting to the slot machines. Liz tried her hand at a classic 777 one-armed-bandit while I performed magic on Kitty Glitter penny slots. I personally only lost $24 which is great compared to many who are unable to stop the craving for the lights, bells and whistles that these machines put out. This was Liz's first AC experience and over all, she really didn't find the allure of the gambling mindset; probably since we don't have much money to blow.

Around 7, we packed ourselves up and got the car from the lot. Only 5$ parking! Not too shabby. We took a short drive down the strip and parked on California Ave to hop onto the boardwalk for a moment for expensive 'cheap' pizza and a view of the surf. The beach was nearly empty aside from a few shadows in the far distance. As the sun set, we shared an embrace on the beach before getting back to the car for the 3hr return. Overall, it was a nice start to our journeys and something we should remember for a while.

Stay tuned for the upcoming departure on our much larger road trip. 

Right now, we have a working plan for the Southern Route. Harrisburg to TN thus far with stops at waterfalls in Virginia, hiking in Shenandoah NP, Lost World Caves in WV, FOAMHENGE, The Great Smokey Mtns NP in NC/TN down to our first WWOOFing hosts at Blue Ridge Co-op in Glenville NC. Then we turn around and head up to Shade Gap PA for SHAREfest followed by camping with the gang in Poconos for Memorial day.