Roads Less Traveled Can Lead To Being Lost In a Good Way

Living home free has its moments and on February 18^th there were a lot of them. I've been craving IHOP for months and decided that I was going to give into it in the town of Alamogordo, NM. Had the most delicious peach stuffed french toast that I almost couldn't finish. 

Victoria was a great trainee waitress who will be working the grave yard shift if she can handle it.

From there I went to McGinn's pistachio nut store. Where the worlds largest pistachio nut is. Don't listen to your GPS on this one. As it will try to take you to the farm across the road from the store. Inside you can sample different flavored pistachios and taste some wine. 

If I had a bit more money I would have gotten some of the chocolate and chili nuts and some of the margarita and lime ones. I did get a few post cards and a pin with the nut on it. Very friendly place.

Got a bit lost trying to find 70 east as I turned right instead of left out of the store. Once I got myself turned around and headed the right way I was able to see several historical markers along the way.

One of which is where Billy the Kid was still on the law abiding side and tried to help his friend arrest a couple of fellers.

I've added the Billy the Kid museum to my list of places to go to for my next time through. 70 is a beautiful hwy that is often just two lanes of traffic. I also want to go to the Inn of the Mountain Gods. There was still snow on the top of the mountain but I want to try a zip line and theirs is almost and hour long tour. 

Arrived in Roswell, NM. The UFO Museum and Research center is pet friendly and Marcuz the ferret was the only one awake so he got to go in with m

 

The Museum cost $5 and the only place you can't take pictures is in the gift shop. The people were friendly and couldn't get enough of Marcuz.

According to http://www.atlasobscura.com the McDonald's there was the only one built in the design of an UFO but from what I saw it has been redone on the outside to look more modern. The inside has lots of chrome. My only complaint about Roswell is that the internet sucks there and it is almost impossible to get online.

From there I was going to camp at a place in Kent but ended up on some really back road that was a truck route as well. I normally don't drive at night as the lights bother me, but I forgot two things one GPS can suck if you lose data connection, and time change.

So I was going by my van's clock not the phone's. I ended up in the middle of some where in TX heading west on I 10. I got off on exit 176 and somewhere around there is suppose to be where I was going to camp. As it was I spent the night at the abandoned gas station there.

I can't say I really slept as it is between I 10 which was heavy with truck traffic and the railroad tracks. 4 trains went through that night.

I awoke to a beautiful sunrise and the realization that I spent more on gas than I had intended leaving me with $8 and some pocket change and a ¼ tank of gas. I got headed back east and at exit 42 found a couple of places with gas at $1.75 a gallon. New destination Odessa, TX and hopefully some way to earn some money to get me to my beach.

Jo

Van vs RV and Security

Living in a van can be exciting as well as scary as hell. Figuring out how to support yourself and if you are like me your animals.

I am lucky in that I do have a small business online to help me some but it does take a lot of work and having to have some sort of access to the internet. I also have a go fund me campaign that I use when I can't feed my critters. I am sorry they come first. They didn't ask for this lifestyle anymore than I did.

So while I guess it is possible to become debt free living like this it is also mind tiring. Budgeting for the unknown is hard at times especially when you are doing everything right. Right now I am behind on my unit rent and my insurance because I had to dip into the money to fix my window... sort of.

Remember when I said that my window didn't work right when I was driving with the meter in? Come to find out the meter had nothing to do with it. Boyd decided that the window needed to go down. Not normally a problem except this time the window didn't go back up.

I had the fuses checked they were fine, the switch was fine, which left of course the most expensive part the window motor.

Thank the higher power for YouTube. There I found how to 1. change the motor once I can afford it and 2. how to get my window up.

I now have a ratchet set from big lots that is both standard and metric. I also have a window that is up all for the total cost of $10 and some finger flesh. Now mind you I did this in a busy parking lot and do you think any of the men going past me even thought to ask if they could help? Hell fucking no! Which is fine since this girl's daddy made damn sure she didn't have to rely on a man for anything vehicle related.

Now mind you the window went down on Sunday morning and I got it fixed on Monday afternoon. I boon docked at the casino. I wrapped the door with my tarp and I do mean wrapped. Leashes come in handy for more than walking your critters. I made sure that the tarp was out of the door mechanism and shut it. Unless you were one tiny snake you weren't getting past the tarp unless you cut it.

After spending some money at the casino and I walked out with more than I went in with always a good thing. I went to bed. Around 3 am security decides I need to be woke up to see if I am okay. WTF! I was sleeping!

Told him my windows don't work and I am fine. Then this knuckle head asks if I am traveling? Um What gave you that clue? The stuff in the back or the fact I WAS SLEEPING!

After wishing me a good evening he leaves now I have to try to get back to sleep. Now I don't have a clue if Rver's get this kind of treatment or not, somehow I don't think so.

Tonight I will have this posted to my passenger side window and the back of the van. Hopefully it will allow me a nice sleep without interruption.

Please Do Not Wake Me Up!

I am fine.

This is my version of an RV.

My windows do not roll down and I will not open my doors at night for my animals and my own safety.

My pets are leashed during the day and are allowed to be off leash inside.

I do not drive at night.

Waking me up only scares and disorientates me.

Once you leave it takes me hours to go back to sleep.

I only ask for the same curtsies you give Full Size RV's

Now if my vehicle is on fire, in immediate danger from flood, tornado, earthquake, or terrorist attack then by all means WAKE ME THE FUCK UP!

Have a pleasant evening.

Thank You for your understanding,

The mini RV (Van) Owner.

Jo

Is Van living for you?

So I wasn't sure what to write about until there were a couple of gals in my FB group asking about van living and how somethings were achieved.

Van living is not for those that don't like small places as the small area gets smaller as you add to your van.

I am living in a 2001 Chevy Venture. Before I started this journey it had all of it's seats which at the time totaled six now it only has the driver's seat. Makes it easy to say you can't give anyone a ride. I also travel with two cats and two ferrets which at times can prove to be a challenge, at least it did we shall see how it goes this summer.

One of the questions was how do you keep your food cold. At the moment I have a six pack cooler my dad gave me and while it does okay for a couple of days after putting cold milk no more than a quart which works for me being the only human living in the van. It also depends on the temperature outside. The colder the longer I get to keep my milk. Get use to drinking powdered milk which isn't too bad but for me the problem is that it only comes in a huge ass box.

Next was do you have a sink. For me my sink is a bucket that has water in it. Although there are other van dwellers that just use a spray bottle of water and vinegar, although at some point down the road I may add a sink to the top of the pantry once I don't have any cats. 

Cooking: Since I am terrified of gas I use a barbecue when boon docking in parking lots or parks and when boon docking on BLM land that has fire pits I use those with my own grill. Others use a camp stove or a hotplate. Once I get some solar I may look into the hotplate for days when it is raining outside.

Eating: Depends on the weather. Sunny I cook and eat outside. Right at the moment I only have one pot and two frying pans. I also have muffin tins and have figured out how to bake on the campfire using them and foil. I just recently acquired a coffeepot to use on the campfire which I love as I can make a full pot take out the guts and let it stay warm on the edge of the fire.

Rainy days I have this great coffee pot C loaned me. Heats water great so I can have cup of soup, instant oatmeal and coffee. Otherwise it is cereal with either real milk or made up powdered milk.

Restroom: two options you camp in a campground near the restroom or you get use to the bucket method. Since my budget at the moment doesn't allow campgrounds it is bucket method or digging a hole in the ground. Ladies having a funnel is a great thing as you can cup your front and pee standing up into the hole or into a jug if need be.

Bucket set up: place bag like you would for a trash can. Put in either a disposable diaper or a pet potty pad with about a cup of litter. Have something for a lid for order control.

Hole method: dig about 12 inches deep. Use but put toilet paper in a resealable baggy and take with you. When you leave fill the hole in and add about a shovel or two more of dirt.

Sleeping: When I first started living in my van my bed was on the floor but since December of 2015 my bed is now off the floor and on top of one of my cabinets.

Heat: Now this is a tricky one. You can either set your alarm to wake you up about every 2-4 hours to run your van to use the heater or get a cigarette lighter heater and use it sparingly otherwise you will kill your battery.

For me it is running the van during the day while we travel to somewhere else or get a good fire going if it is nice outside. Sleeping wise I have a mound of blankets which includes three sleeping bags and several heavy blankets. It also helps that I have one cat that likes to sleep under the covers and one that likes to sleep on my feet.

The ferrets have a fleece sleeping sack that I wrap in more fleece and two more blankets. Most of the time they move the extra blankets and pull the extra fleece inside the sleep sack.

Internet: Unless you are where you can access it via a restaurant or if you have a real cell phone with unlimited data, I have a tracfone, you are out of luck. Although I am looking into a mobile hot spot that is suppose to work in most places one of the disadvantages I see is that you have to buy what they call day packs and while inexpensive you can't turn them off so once activated you have 24hr internet then you need to activate another day pack. Still it might be worth it for me.

Get a volt meter that plugs into your cigarette lighter or power access portal. This is one thing I wish I had in the beginning as I kill my battery three times while in the middle of nowhere. Thankfully there was someone to give me a jump. Since getting mine I know when it hits about 11.5 I need to run the van for a bit.

But before you take off to your next destination pull it out of the cigarette lighter or your window won't work right. Lol found that out the hard way.

Space: This is where you need to decide what you need for your lifestyle. Everyone is different. For me I needed cabinetry that included a place for fabric, the sewing machine, my books, the pet food, water, food, the litter box, a place to put my cleaning supplies.

 

So I have a pantry/cupboard in the back of the van that I can access from the rear, and a long cabinet that is also my bed and where the ferret's cage can be. I can also access one section from both the

outside and inside. While at the moment most of the floor space is taken up with things I have accumulated in the last couple of months there is still space enough to let the ferrets out to play in a safe place and not worry about where they will be getting into.

Lighting: You can use the interior lights as long as you keep an eye on your voltage usage or you will end up with a dead battery. For me I have a dollar store led light for a nightlight and I was gifted a sting of solo cup lights that run on batteries. Which are actually quite bright and light up the van nicely at night. I am sure having some solar lights would be very nice but at the moment that is a dream.

Almost all the wood in my cabinets is reclaimed from my dad's scrap pile and only a few of the hinges were bought. Every night I am thankfully for my dad helping me with the cabinets and for storing the seats at his place should I ever decide to sell the van.

JO