camping

Mystery in the Mud

 in Arizona / Snowbirding / travel / Wildlife/animals  tagged camping / desert / donkeys / Imperial Dam / Senator Wash / tracks / travel / Yuma Arizona by

Outside Yuma, Arizona—not far from the Mexican border—my husband and I got lucky in finding a dispersed camping spot along the Senator Wash lake front. The reservoir water level had receded, leaving extra beach space, and I spent hours soaking in the view while walking a swath of dried lakebed. Strangely, the mud had dried into zillions of baseball size pockmarks. I wondered if some special property of the soil caused it to dry with depressions. Had some aquatic species somehow excavated indentations? Too small for people tracks…dog, coyote, bobcat, deer? Maybe, but probably too small, and anyway, that many […]

Critter Fix

 in camping / Colorado / Travel tips / Wildlife/animals  tagged camping / mice / pests / prevention / Rodents / Travel tips / Tucson Mountain Park by

Inches from my head was a critter scratching, skittering, gnawing, hellbent on creeping me out and doing a fine job of it. I wondered if it was looking for a secret passage through the propane tanks, storming the storage compartment under our bed, or using the headboard as a jungle gym. Wherever the intruder was, it was not the nature I’d come to commune with. Other pests we’ve picked up  over the years have been more considerate-except that mouse that built a nest on our pickup’s engine and started a family overnight. The festive looking light strings I noticed under […]

Lost in the City of Rocks

 in New Mexico / Snowbirding  tagged camping / City of Rocks State Park / hiking / hoodoo / New Mexico / peak / travel / volcanic activity by

New Mexico’s City of Rocks State Park sounds vaguely interesting.  Not true; it’s a Don’t-Miss! Ancient volcanic showers of pumice and ash melded into a slab of rock that then eroded into a labyrinth of channels like streets and allies, tunnels, and caves. Many of the passages called to my inner child. If only my knees weren’t so cranky, I’d crawl in and explore. I longed for a few grandkids to help me enjoy it vicariously. In the distance an evocative peak invited a creatively framed photo, preferably involving a hoodoo. Sure enough, as we left the “city” I spotted […]

How Do These Holes Happen?

 in camping / Snowbirding / Texas / Wildlife/animals  tagged Big Bend National Park / camping / Ernst Tinajas / fox / hike / hydrologic holes / pond / rock formations / snowbird / trail / travel by

I hadn’t expected anything like this when we hiked to one of the highlights recommended in Big Bend National Park.  Tinaja is Spanish for pond, so I’d assumed oasis which would naturally be a big draw in arid Big Bend.  The formations were even cooler though, especially when a fox trotted into the canyon and left a deposit in my path.  (Apparently he was delivering a message: get outta my yard!) On seeing the tinajas, the holes’ symmetry made me wonder if people had somehow bored them.  But who would have taken so much trouble, and why? A month later […]

Midnight Raid

 in camping / Snowbirding / Texas / Wildlife/animals  tagged Big Bend Ranch State Park / camping / raccoons / Rocket City Trash Pandas / Texas by

Camped along the Rio Grande in Big Bend Ranch State Park, we were pretty much alone in the campground and miles from most everybody.  The night was dark and chilly, so when I heard a clank very near the camper, I stayed in bed and listened rather than leave my warm covers to peer into darkness.  After a bit there was ticking on roof followed by a trill that made me think of a cricket though it was clearly not a cricket. Then there were sprinkles on roof.  Had the ticking only been raindrops?  What could the trill have been?  […]

Batty Bird

 in camping / Colorado / Wildlife/animals  tagged bat / bird / camping / gnat / hatch / mountain stream / travel by

As I cooled my trail-weary feet in a Colorado mountain stream, I noticed a small creature flitting above the water about tree top height. A glut of recently hatched gnats no doubt inspired the critter’s erratic hover.  The flier was bat-sized, a little small for a bird, and its flight was bat-like as well.  Yet the evening seemed too early for bats.  I watched for several minutes trying to distinguish bat or bird and finally got the right angle to see that the head was bird-like. Shortly after that, as I sat beside our camper, something flew just over my head and apparently clung briefly to the side […]

Moving On

 in camping / Canada / Newfoundland  tagged camping / Newfoundland Ferry / restless travelers / shark habits / travel by

A fellow Newfoundland Ferryboater commented on the miles that Steve claimed we’d put on our trailer. I said that Steve is the kind of guy that likes to get there…and there, and there, and there.  The man’s wife upped the smart comment bar by saying: “He thinks he’s a shark and has to keep moving or die.”

A Favorite Dad Story

 in camping / Colorado / Wildlife/animals  tagged boy scouts / camping / Colorado / Father's Day / fishing / Grand Mesa / mosquitoes / No Market for 'Em / travel by

“We scouts raised enough money to stay on Grand Mesa for two weeks. The Mesa is the highest flat-topped mountain in the world. It’s beautiful country; forests of blue spruce, ponderosa pine, and aspen with flowery meadows in between. The flat top collects rainfall in three hundred sixty lakes and a zillion marshes. Those wet-lands make for a whole lot of hungry mosquitoes, but we scouts were tough. After two weeks of eating the fish that ate the mosquitoes that feasted on us, we were all blood brothers, and there was no mystery left in the circle of life.” Thought […]

Heavenly Weather

 in Gratitude / Newfoundland / Peru / Snowbirding  tagged camping / Incas / Kansas / Newfoundland / Pacha Mama / Peru / spiritual offerings / tornado / travel / weather by

In a valley of the Peruvian Andes, our guide, a descendant of the Incas demonstrated his people’s ceremony for making offerings to the sacred mountains. He arranged three coca leaves in a fan and held them to his lips while he faced each mountain in turn and spoke its name then placed the leaves on a boulder. The timing of our late-April visit was suggested by our agent, an attempt to sidle between the rainy and hot seasons. The weather did cooperate nicely for our trip, but who’s to say whether that was luck, professional timing, or because we’d paid […]

Urban Alaska Adventure

 in Alaska / Wildlife/animals  tagged Alaska / Anchorage / camping / city park / moose / river trail / travel / urban wildlife by

Our Anchorage campground, bordering two noisy highways, was a dreary necessity, but it backed up to an alluring river trail.  The leafy woods had me so enamored that even the debris from a couple of squatter camps didn’t deter me.  Down the way, the trail led me meandering through a wide-open park.  After weeks in the wilds, the sprawling green seemed unrealistically civilized, and then unreality took an Alaskan turn.  Between the soccer fields and playgrounds and spandexed bikers, Daisy and I came across a moose grazing on a willow thicket, maybe six feet off the path.  With her homely head hidden in the willows, she might have passed for a large horse, but I saw enough to give her wide berth.  Messing with moose, I’m […]