Tag Archives: travel

Traveling in COVID Times

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Almost surreal.

This past Monday, I headed out for a six day trip to California and back. The goal was to deliver my helicopter to a friend in the Los Angeles area. He’ll be leasing it for the next two months and I’ll get it back in mid May. I flew my helicopter down, accompanied part of the way by my friend, and took an airliner home. It was the first time I’ve been in an airliner in about two years.

I thought I’d blog briefly about the hotels, restaurants, and airports I stopped in along the way, mostly because the experiences were so unlike what I’ve had in the past.

The Hotels

The trip required a total of five nights in hotels. Across the board, all hotels required masks in the lobby and other public areas.

The first two nights were in McMinnville, Oregon, where I had stopped to get the helicopter an annual inspection prior to delivering it in Los Angeles. I stayed at a Comfort Inn for about $100/night. The room was comfortable, with everything I needed to get some work done while I waited.

On one full day of my stay in the area, I went to the Evergreen Aviation Museum, which I hope to blog about elsewhere. Afterwards, I went into town to grab a bite to eat — more on that later.

Evergreen
The Spruce Goose at Evergreen Aviation Museum was one of the highlights of my trip.

When I got back to my room, I was surprised to see that it had not been freshened by housekeeping. I later discovered that housekeeping services for stay-over guests is something I shouldn’t expect these days. I’m not sure why; maybe they are trying to reduce the exposure of housekeeping staff to potentially infected rooms? I wouldn’t have minded so much, but by not freshening the room, I came back to the same full garbage pail I’d left with the added aroma of that garbage and no coffee for the morning. While I like clean towels and a made bed, not getting those wasn’t a hardship at all.

The breakfast room was pared down beyond reason. They didn’t want you sitting in there, which I could understand, and they made it easy enough to take food to go (and add to your in-room garbage collection). But they lacked a lot of the easy (and safe) basics, like instant oatmeal, cereal packages, or a toaster for the bread, which was placed, unwrapped, in a self-serve lucite box. So yes, you could get a piece of bread or English muffin that everyone may have breathed on, but you couldn’t toast it.

The next night was spent at a Red Roof Inn in Susanville, CA, which was also about $100 for the night. That hotel didn’t even have a coffee maker in the room. And since the hotel consisted of multiple buildings, getting coffee in the lobby in my lounge clothes was not an option. Fortunately, there was a Starbucks across the street, which we hit on our way back to the airport. I’m a sucker for their double smoked bacon sandwiches and can tolerate their lattes.

The last two nights were spent at the Los Angeles Airport Hilton on Century Boulevard. At $125 per night for a 12th floor room that overlooked runways 25L and 25R, I really enjoyed just sitting in my room in the morning and evening, watching the planes go by. (I even live-streamed the action for about 90 minutes.) This is one of the old, soundproofed hotels between the runways on Century, built in 1983. As one Trip Advisor reviewer said, “This is a Hilton, built when Hilton’s were top of the line.” If you stayed in Hiltons back in those days — as I did for my business travel in the late 1980s — you know exactly what he’s talking about. The Hilton name used to mean quality and this hotel is from that era, although it was renovated in 2013. Solid rooms with nice furniture. Giant mirrors for checking your image before going out to that business meeting or a show. Hell, even a lighted makeup mirror in the bathroom. It did lack a few of the amenities you’d find in a modern business hotel, such as additional outlets and USB ports. And it didn’t have the microwaves and fridges I’d had in the other two hotels I stayed in. But my room was large and there were enough towels for both nights of my stay.

View from my Room
I paid $10/night extra for a room facing the runways. Does that make me an #AvGeek?

What was weird, however, was the cold emptiness of the lobby, with minimal furniture — basically a handful of high-top bar tables and chairs — and no lingering people. The second floor, which probably gave access to the pool and hot tubs I could see from my room, was closed. One of the restaurants was closed; another had opened for the first time in a year that very day. Room service was not available. Even that notebook full of hotel information, menus, and area details was missing. Stickers on the elevator floor instructed you to stand in a corner if you were riding with someone else.

Yet the airport shuttle service was completely packed in the morning with so many people waiting that I actually walked a block away to the Marriott to get on their shuttle, which quickly filled up. I guess social distancing only applies when it’s convenient.

Eating Out

I fully expected to do all my dining outdoors or in my room. I had no desire to eat in an enclosed space — and yes, that includes tents erected in parking lots — with a bunch of maskless strangers. (Eating in contributed greatly to my in-room garbage collection.)

I went for a wine tasting in downtown McMinnville. It was outdoor seating and very pleasant. Afterwards, I found a restaurant with outdoor dining in little pods (for lack of a better name). They were small, individual tents, open on one end, with just a single table and four or six chairs in each. I felt pretty safe in there with my mask off, especially since I ate early in the day and may have been the first person in there since lunchtime.

I ate a ton of fast food before getting to Los Angeles. McDonald’s breakfast, Starbucks coffee with breakfast, KFC dinner. Okay, so maybe that’s not “a ton.” But it’s a lot more than I usually eat in a week.

The only time we ate indoors was at the airport restaurant at South Lake Tahoe. We were two of only six customers when we arrived. The server wore a mask the whole time. We didn’t linger.

For dinner at the Hilton, I had to go to the restaurant in the lobby, order my meal to go from the limited menu I was permitted to look at, wait at one of those high top tables in the empty lobby, and take the food upstairs with me. I discovered that my food wasn’t as described on the menu, but it tasted okay. I wish it had been hotter and I was glad I had wine with me. I could have eaten in the restaurant — there were hardly any people in there — but why take a chance?

I had breakfast and lunch at the Los Angeles Farmer’s Market the next day. The last time I’d been there was in the late 1980s and I could not believe how much it had changed. Yes, the charming, closed in area of vendors still existed. What surprised me about the area is how they’d built an entire shopping center around the old Farmer’s Market. I had coffee and a french pastry for breakfast and later had empanadas and an Italian pastry for lunch. In all cases, I found a table off to itself, unmasked, ate, and masked back up. Everyone in Los Angeles was wearing masks inside and out. They apparently get it. (I admit that it took me a little while to get into the habit of wearing a mask outside.)

LA Farmer's Market
At the LA Farmer’s Market. This part is what I remembered from 30 years ago, but I remember it being a lot busier.

I had a snack later at the Santa Monica pier. Again, I ate outside. It was pleasant.

Santa Monica Pier
I killed some time at the Santa Monica pier on a gorgeous day.

By the way, I used Uber to get around Los Angeles. I had to agree to wear a mask before confirming my ride. All the drivers were masked and most windows were open. I didn’t share a ride with anyone.

(And seriously: how do Angelinos deal with all that freaking traffic?)

The Airports

I was at two kinds of airports during my trip: small general aviation and large commercial.

Mask use was hit or miss at the small airports, most of which were in rural areas where folks tend not to worry too much about the virus. But everyone I saw in Tahoe and Los Angeles was wearing a masks, inside and out.

At LAX, announcements warned that if you didn’t wear a mask in the terminal, they’d kick you out. I had to wait 15 minutes (at 6:30 AM) to get into the Alaska Air lounge — I think they were trying to discourage visitors by making us sign up and wait. When I got in, I was asked to stay masked unless I was eating or drinking and then to mask up afterwards. There was plenty of space between groups of guests. At one point, about half the people in there weren’t masked; they made an announcement and then followed it up with a person going table to table to remind people. This was my first visit to an Alaska Air lounge and I enjoyed it.

On the plane, it was the same thing: wear a mask or get kicked out. Of course, they couldn’t kick you out during the flight, but I can only assume that a troublesome passenger would be met by police on landing. I was flying in first class, which included a meal. (I could swear I ordered a sausage and egg wrap, but what I was given was an egg salad wrap. At 8:30 AM. At least it tasted good.) We were told to mask up as soon as we were finished eating or drinking.

I did notice that some of the first class services I’d come to expect were missing. There were no drinks before takeoff while the plane loaded. The flight attendant didn’t offer to hang up my jacket (although I wound up wearing it during the fight anyway.) There were no hot towels before the meal. There was no alcohol other than beer or wine — this seriously bummed me out because I really look forward to bloody marys with breakfast in first class. Besides, who drinks beer or wine in the morning?

Everyone wore masks at SeaTac and, again, there were regular announcements telling you to do so. It’s a federal law. (Thank you, President Biden.)

I had high expectations for the Alaska Lounge at SeaTac, which is, after all, Alaska Air’s hub. I was disappointed. I had the worst bloody mary I’d had in my life — seriously, bud, you only need a drop of Worcestershire — and the only food choices were apples, oranges, a salad, or tomato soup. Service was definitely lacking — I got the distinct impression that the staff simply didn’t care. (The LAX staff was worlds better.) Access to the lounge had come with my First Class (not upgraded) ticket, but I can only imagine how bummed out I’d be if I’d paid the $25 day fee for the privilege of getting that horrible bloody mary.

My flight from SeaTac to Wenatchee was the same as usual, but with masks. They used to offer a beverage service but had stopped long ago. Hell, it’s only a 20-minute flight. Is it really worth handing out cups of bottled water on a flight that short? I don’t. The only drawback is that Alaska had cut the flights to Wenatchee to just two a day and the other one arrives near midnight. This early afternoon flight was packed. I sure wish they’d add back a few flights.

Vacationing During COVID

I should remind readers that this was not a vacation for me. I made the trip for business. I would not have gone if I didn’t have to.

But it wasn’t like that for a lot of the folks on the airport shuttle from hotel to LAX. More than half of them were going on vacation with their kids in tow. At least one family was going to Hawaii.

The only thing I can say to that is WTF? After spending nearly a week sweating behind a mask every time I was in public — which was nearly all the time — I can’t imagine going on a vacation for more of the same. Why not wait until the pandemic is over or more people are vaccinated?

Are people absolutely nuts?

Anyway, I’m glad to be home with my pups and the projects that keep me busy here. I’ll venture down into town once or twice a week as necessary. I have no plans to travel again until May — when it’s time to bring my helicopter home.

Going First Class

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Sometimes spending a little more on your comfort is really worth it.

I was brought up in a lower middle class family that, in my later teen years, was upgraded to middle class after my mom’s divorce and remarriage. I struggled financially to live on my own for a while after college, and then struggled a little less when I began living with my future wasband. It wasn’t until I was in my late-thirties that I began earning what I’d consider a very good living.

Living when money is tight — but not tight enough to actually cause you to miss meals, get evicted, or turn to payroll lending storefronts to meet financial obligations — teaches you frugality and comparison shopping skills. You quickly learn that if you need to buy something, you need to shop around a bit to get the best deal. You need your money to go further. This becomes a mindset, something you do naturally. Something you can’t imagine not doing.

Travel on the Cheap

Even when my personal financial situation started looking very rosy, I was stuck in that mindset. That was especially so when I traveled for business in my early years as a writer. I was a regular speaker at Macworld Expo in San Francisco, Boston, and later, New York. I even spoke twice at the event in Toronto.

Macworld did not cover my cost to travel to these events. Its only compensation was free unlimited entrance to the show, snacks and swag in the Speaker room, and a Speaker ribbon that often led to more swag at booths. (The Press ribbon, which I earned by writing for some tech magazines back then, actually worked better.) The cost of airfare and hotels was on me. This was a pretty big financial burden, especially when I traveled to expensive San Francisco from the New York Metro area.

So I shopped for airfare. And yes, I’d even stoop to taking a non-direct flight or redeye if it could save some money. And then I shopped for hotels, winding up with satisfactory lodging within walking distance from the venue.

The crazy thing about all this was that my travel related to the event was a business expense — no doubt about it — and I could write it all off on my taxes, which I did. (Contrary to what some people think, writing things off on your taxes doesn’t mean the government pays for it. It means that it reduces your taxable income. So if you spend $1000 on a trip and your tax rate is 28%, it’s like getting a 28% discount on that expense.) But I was still in that watch-every-penny mindset and even though I could afford better flights or lodging, I just couldn’t see spending more when I could spend less.

That all came to a head one year on a San Francisco trip.

Seeing the Light

Macworld Expo in San Francisco was held in January. While the weather in San Francisco in January isn’t nearly as frigid as it is where I lived in New Jersey, it could be cold. I’d booked a room at the Victorian Hotel — now the Mosser Hotel — on 4th Street, less than three blocks from Moscone. (I think the hotel was just beginning its name change process back in those days — maybe 1998? — because I remember the new name.) I’d stayed there at least once before, so I knew what to expect. (Or thought I did.) The hotel was popular with speakers because it was relatively inexpensive. But it was inexpensive for a reason: it was old and in sore need of renovation. (I hope it’s been fixed up since then.) It did have a good restaurant on the ground floor, though: Annabelle’s was the name. (Funny the things we remember.)

On that particular year, San Francisco was cold and so was my room. The heat — a radiator! — simply did not work. I called down to the desk to see if they could do anything and they sent up a bellman with five blankets. I slept under a pile of seven blankets for the next few nights and dreaded showering.

I remember thinking to myself: What the fuck is wrong with you? You can afford a better room that this! Isn’t your comfort worth it?

The answer, of course, was yes. The next few years, I stayed at the W across the street from Moscone, where I was introduced to modern rooms, feather beds, and other very nice treats.

Airline Travel

The airfare lesson took a bit longer to kick in.

I admit that I stopped doing flights with connections unless there was no other option early on. (My wasband, however, did not. I remember one year when he paid for his family to come to Arizona from New York for Christmas. He bought them tickets on an airline called ATA, which was really cheap, probably because it only had like four planes. The flights had a stopover in Chicago, but not at O’Hare like a normal airline. They stopped at Midway. As anyone could expect in December in Chicago, weather moved in and the plane got suck at Midway. Then there was a mechanical issue. The delay was long and when his mom and sister finally arrived in Phoenix, they were extremely travel worn and cranky — can you blame them? The punchline: he only saved $50 per ticket over a direct flight with another airline. And yes, he could afford the $50 per person.) I’d had enough experience with the problems that arise when you have connecting flights and unnecessary stopovers. Why make a trip more difficult than it needs to be?

Of course, I usually fly out of Wenatchee these days and Horizon only operates a turboprop to Seattle, so all of my flights to anywhere other than Seattle have at least two legs. That can actually work out to benefit me, as you’ll learn in a moment.

(The only trip I occasionally do that I can’t avoid three flights is to visit my sister in St. Augustine, FL. The closest airports are Jacksonville and Daytona and the last time I went there no direct flights from Seattle. That meant flying from Wenatchee to Seattle to Atlanta to Jacksonville and then doing all that in reverse on the way home. No matter how you slice it, you’re traveling for a whole day.)

A few years back, when I was still doing frost control work in California from January and into March, I had a contract where I could stay home until called out. The call would come at 3:30 PM, which is when the hyperlocal weather forecast the grower subscribed to would be released for the evening. As I talked to him, I packed. When I hung up, I booked a flight from Wenatchee to Sacramento. As I was driving to the airport, I booked boarding for my dog, Penny, and dropped her off. As I waited at Wenatchee airport for my flight out, I booked my hotel and rental car. I’d arrive in Sacramento before 9 PM, get my car, and go to my hotel. In the morning, when I was released from standby, I’d book my return flight, check out of the hotel, and go home, picking Penny up along the way.

Every time I did this trip, I earned four legs on Alaska Air’s frequent flyer program. I did it six times in one season. That put me into MVP status. Suddenly, when I started flying Alaska Air, I’d get automatic upgrades to First Class at least 75% of the time. I enjoyed that for a year and a half — and I was doing a lot of airline travel back then. It spoiled me.

First Class is the Way to Travel

You have to understand that First Class isn’t just sitting in a bigger seat at the front of the plane — although, admittedly, that’s a real bonus. It’s free luggage check in. It’s often (depending got how you got to First Class) entry into the Alaska Lounge at SeaTac and a handful of other airports. It’s boarding first. It’s having a flight attendant take your jacket and put it on a hangar (and return it to you later while taxiing to the gate). It’s not having to shuffle down the aisle, hoping there’s space in the overhead bin for your bag. It’s having a drink — whatever you want — as everyone else boards. It’s having a warm towel to clean your hands, more drinks, a hot meal, and often a warm-from-the-oven cookie. It’s not having to worry about someone’s brat kicking the seat behind you or the jackass in front of you reclining his seat so you can count his hair follicles. It’s civilized and comfortable. It makes airline travel bearable.

Honestly, if you spend enough time on long flights — which I consider any flight over two hours — in First Class, you’ll wonder how the hell you managed to fly coach all those years.

Well, that’s how it was for me.

Good things don’t last forever and eventually my status as an Alaska Air MVP lapsed. I was back in the world of regular travel and I can’t say I was happy about it.

But what I discovered is that if I buy my ticket far enough in advance and I’m flexible about travel dates and times, I can often buy a first class ticket for just $100 to $300 more than coach. Here’s a random example for Alaska Air; in this case, if I were going to visit my brother in New Jersey, I’d be buying that First Class ticket leaving Wenatchee at 6:25 AM (keeping in mind that I’m a very early riser):

Fare Example
Would you rather spend five hours and 20 minutes in First Class or stuck in coach, rubbing elbows with some guy with body odor while a kid kicks the back of your seat? Oh, and don’t forget the ability to wait in the Alaska Lounge in Seattle for the two hours between my flight from Wenatchee to my flight out to Newark. Yes, it’s worth an extra $272 to me.

While I realize that not everyone has a few extra hundred bucks sitting around to piss away on air travel, I usually do. I don’t travel by air that much anymore and I want my experience to be as comfortable as possible. I travel alone now, so I don’t have to buy a ticket for traveling companions or worry about what they might be able to afford. I’ve come to realize that my comfort is worth the extra money.

Travel in Comfort

As I get older, I’ve come to realize that my personal comfort is important to me. If I can afford going First Class, I will.

That’s why I’m flying First Class from Los Angeles to Seattle next week. (There is no First Class on Seattle to Wenatchee legs.)

If you’re in a similar situation — older, traveling alone, money in the bank — and you’re not treating yourself to First Class travel when it’s available, why the hell not?

The Great Loop

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I read a book about a trip I’d like to take.

Although it’s still very much winter here in North Central Washington State, my mind has been somewhat consumed with boating these days.

If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you may remember the post I did some years ago about an ill-fated trip to a friend’s house out in the San Juan Islands. (It was an ill-fated post, too. The friend I wrote about seemed to take great offense at what I’d said about him and another friend apparently read between the lines and thought I was blogging about her. My response to both: Really?) In the post, I mentioned my friend’s boat, which I really liked, and how I wanted to get a similar one.

Ranger Tug R-27
Spending four winters in a row in a truck camper has really prepared me for long-term living on a boat this size. It’s basically my camper on a boat.

Over time, I discovered the 27-foot Ranger Tug that I have my eye on. This boat has all the comforts of home — well, at least all the comforts of my truck camper — in a towable package. That means I could store it in my garage between long trips out on the Columbia River, Lake Chelan, Roosevelt Lake, the San Juan Islands, and the Inside Passage. I could even take it south for the winter — imagine spending December and January on Lake Havasu in Arizona?

I also began thinking of other adventures where I could take such a boat. I immediately thought of the Intracoastal Waterway up the east coast of the US. And then maybe up the Hudson River. And the Erie Canal to the Great Lakes. And wouldn’t it be amazing if I could find some way down the Mississippi back to the Gulf of Mexico and around the Florida Keys back to my starting place?

What I had just imagined was something that actually existed and had been accomplished by many people: the Great Loop.

The Great Loop

Per the America’s Great Loop Cruiser’s Association website,

The Great Loop is a circumnavigation of the eastern U.S., and part of Canada. The route includes the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, the New York State Canals, the Canadian Canals, the Great Lakes, the inland rivers, and the Gulf of Mexico. “Loopers” take on this adventure of a lifetime aboard their own boat.

Great Loop Map
Here’s the map of the route. Note that there are two ways to get from the Hudson River to the Great Lakes, two ways to get through the Great Lakes, two ways to get from Illinois to the Gulf of Mexico, and two ways to navigate Florida. This makes it possible to do the trip a number of different ways.

The website has a wealth of information about this roughly 6,000 mile journey, including many resources for learning about the route and points of interest along the way. Honestly, the website can tell you a lot more about the Loop than I can; I’ve only begun exploring it.

A Challenge, An Adventure

If you know me well, you should know that I live for challenges. I’ve had three successful careers (so far) for a reason: I get bored easily. After an initial start in the business world as an auditor and financial analyst — what was I thinking? — my writing hobby turned into a career as a freelance writer. When that generated a bunch of fun money, I learned to fly helicopters, bought a helicopter, and turned that into a career as a helicopter pilot. These days, I’m keeping myself amused by learning jewelry skills and techniques, but I can’t really call that a new career — at least not yet. (Maybe in a few years?)

In each case, it was the challenge that drove me, even if I didn’t realize it. I always want to learn and do new things. I want to get good at them. When I can actually earn a living doing them, I’m rewarded and motivated to do and learn more.

Taking a boat on a 6,000 mile trip on rivers, oceans, canals, and lakes — now that’s a challenge.

I’ve always been a bit of an explorer. I bought a Jeep to explore the desert on the ground. I’ve used helicopters to explore the desert, mountains, canyons, lakes, rivers, coasts — you name it — from the air. In the past, I’d done boating trips with a focus on exploration: a rafting trip down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon, a house boating trip on Lake Powell, small boat trips on the Hudson, East, Harlem, Colorado, and Columbia Rivers, a 12-day cruise up the inside passage on a small boat. Imagine how much I could explore on a Great Loop trip!

Of course, there are hurdles to jump. Getting the boat and learning to pilot it safely and effectively is the first big challenge. Learning what I need to know to plan and execute a long boat trip is another. This isn’t something I would do without proper preparation. But as I research the things I need to know, I realize that it’s definitely doable. A real goal for my post-retirement years.

Reading First Person Acounts

I started my research about six months ago, before I went south for the winter. I searched for books about the Great Loop. There are a lot of them. It seems that many people who do this journey like to write books about it.

There are different ways to do the trip and a lot of them depend on the size and style of the boat you’re doing it with. I wanted to read books written by people kind of like me — not super rich, motoring in a smallish boat. (Yes, 27 feet is considered small for this trip.) A lot of the books out there were by couples in giant yachts and I didn’t want to read those. Chances are, I’d have a budget for the trip, which meant I wouldn’t be able to spend every single night along the way at a full-service marina. I’d have to boondock (the RVing word) or lie at anchor (the boating phrase) for at least half the nights. So I wanted to read books by people who had similar experiences to what I might have.

I sampled a few books in Kindle format and wasn’t very impressed. One of the drawbacks of this age of self-publishing is that anyone can do it — even if they can’t write. One book sample read like an infomercial for the book, with lots of repetition and apparently no editing. Another was similarly uninteresting to me, although I can’t remember why. But a third…well, I thought that had promise. I bought it and read it yesterday.

A Book Review

Crossing The Wake
Here’s the book I read first about motoring the Great Loop.

Crossing the Wake: One Woman’s Great Loop Adventure by Tanya Binford is almost the kind of book you might expect. The subtitle tells you that the book is about a woman’s trip doing the Great Loop and hints that she’s doing it alone (which she mostly did). I tend to shy away from women’s books because I have trouble identifying with the themes they usually include: the trials of motherhood, dealing with sexual discrimination, and fighting male dominance. This book, fortunately, didn’t have much of that — although it certain had more than enough for me. Unfortunately, as I discovered while turning page after virtual page, it didn’t really have what I wanted to read, either.

You see, although the author wrote this book about her journey, it read more like a catalog of fears, challenges, and social activities than a travelog. With virtually no boating experience, she decided she wanted to do the trip. To prepare, she moved from the Arizona desert to the coast of South (I think) Carolina and bought her young adult son a boat. Over and over again, she tells the reader how little confidence she had in her skills while she let her son do the piloting. She shares many anecdotes about needing the help of a man to do one thing or another. Yet she buys one boat after another to learn what she needs to know and build her skills. That’s admirable, but I don’t believe she had the skills she needed when she finally started the trip.

The first part of the book explains what she was doing for a living — she was a psychiatric registered nurse who was able to meet with patients through video calls (this was before the pandemic) — with side stories about some of her patients, co-workers, and bosses. It also covers some of her preparations, with lots of details of the (mostly) men who helped her and the (mostly) women who worried about her doing the trip on her own.

The second, longer part of the book was about the actual trip. Here’s where the definition of “solo” gets hazy. You see, although she was alone on her boat for most of the trip, she also traveled among other “Loopers” who she would see, on and off, throughout her trip. The book is one story after another about meeting this couple/boat here and that couple/boat there and having “docktails” and dinner and shore trips with all these people. It was a social report. There were very few details, especially in the first part of the trip, about navigation, points of interest, or the traveling itself. When she did try to give details, she fell short or used incorrect names. (It’s New York Harbor, not Hudson Bay (which is in Canada); the New York Thruway, not the New York Expressway and the Tappan Zee Bridge, not the Tappen Zee Bridge. These are the things I caught because I know them; how many other mistakes did she make?)

Along the way, she confirmed, over and over, that she was in way over her head on this trip, lacking either confidence or skills that she really should have had. And if that wasn’t bad enough, halfway through the book/trip she admits that the autopilot and radar don’t work properly. (I cannot, for a minute, imagine taking a boat on a 6,000-mile solo trip without an autopilot, let alone drive a boat in unfamiliar water in fog without radar yet the author did both.) Yes, she survived the trip, but I felt that she struggled with her own shortcomings to do so.

What did I want from the book? I guess I just wanted more details about the trip itself. More about navigation, overnight stops (other than to name them), unusual boating/navigation rules/situations. She did provide some of this, but not nearly as much as I wanted. Instead, I was treated to her stories about her bullying her mom on part of the trip, men who made passes at her, and her emotional turmoil when another boater she’d had a fling with found another non-boating woman and married her.

And frankly, I found her side story about a patient who had killed herself when she (the author) left her job to start the trip disturbing and unwelcome.

If the author happens upon this blog post and reads it, I’m sorry to be so brutal. But I’ve filed this book with most of the other “women’s books” I’ve come across. I probably should not have read it.

Did I get anything out of the book at all? Yes. I learned that a woman with very little experience driving a boat slight smaller but similar in style to what I want to buy completed the trip by herself.

If she could do it, so could I.

Making Plans

So I’ve set this up as a new goal for myself: motor the great loop before I turn 65. I have just over 5 years to:

  • Get back in shape. I’ve let myself go a bit and that’s causing aches and pains that I simply should not have at my age. Time to slim back down, get more exercise, and prep for being able to walk a very narrow gunwale.
  • Buy a suitable boat. That Ranger Tug is looking good, but I do have a friend trying to talk me into something else, so I’m not 100% sold on it yet.
  • Spend a lot of time on the boat to become an expert on handling it. This might sound weird, but to me, flying a helicopter in most conditions is like driving a car. I’d like to get like that behind the wheel of a boat. Practice — especially practice in challenging conditions like wind, currents, and rough water — makes perfect.
  • Spend some time with a boat mechanic. The goal is to learn the basics of what might break and how I can fix it — or at least enable to limp to a marina for a real fix.
  • Learn everything I need to know about navigation on the Great Loop’s waterways. There’s a lot to learn — including navigation on Canadian waterways.
  • Prepare the boat for a very long trip. That includes a last-minute tuneup of the engine and other systems and packing the gear I’ll need (and leaving behind the gear I won’t).
  • Get the boat to a starting point, launch it, and get under way. Whether I do this alone or with a travel companion depends on what’s going on in my life when the time comes to start.

Chapman Piloting & Seamanship
Chapman Piloting and Seamanship is the bible for learning about boating in the United States. I’ve got this book in print and in Kindle format and have been reading various chapters to immerse myself in boating information.

A lot of this actually ties in nicely with a related goal: getting my boat captain’s license. I’d like very much to be able to make a bit of income with this boat since it’ll cost so much to acquire and operate. (But still not as much as a helicopter.) Even if I make enough to cover my personal boating costs, I’ll be very happy. But to legally do that, I need the proper boat captain’s license, which requires experience on the water, training, and passing scores on a test. I’m already beginning to study for all that.

But whether I become a boat captain or not, motoring the Great Loop is a set goal. Let’s see if I can do it.

What’s Good About Being Home

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It’s the little things.

I’ve been home from my winter travels for nearly four full days now. The initial euphoria has worn off, but I’m still thankful for the little things that make being home such a joy after living in a truck camper in the desert (and beyond) for three months. Here’s a quick list:

Water that I can use freely, without conserving every drop. I don’t generally camp in campgrounds with hookups, full or otherwise. That means that I have to haul water when I need it. Needless to say, the less water I use, the less work I have. I’ve gotten very good at conserving water when camping — my 30-gallon fresh water tank can last a week or longer if I try hard to make every drop count.

Heat. Yes, my camper has a heater, but the heater requires propane and battery power to run. Battery power is usually only an issue in December and early January — or on cloudy days — when there’s less daylight per day. My solar panels do a good job at keeping my battery charged, but running the heater at night can really suck those levels down, potentially damaging the batteries. Since I also use propane to power my fridge, heat my water, and cook, I like to minimize its use for heating. As it is, I burn through about 4 1/2 gallons of propane a week. Refilling a tank requires me to remove it from my camper, get it filled, and then reinstall it. (I have two tanks.)

Hot water all the time. To save propane (see above), I only heat the water once a day, in the morning. I use it to wash myself and my dishes. If there’s any left, it’ll stay warm until evening.

Clean clothes every day. In an effort to minimize trips to the laundromat, I will often wear t-shirts and always wear jeans more than one day in a row. (I brought along enough underwear and socks to last two weeks, so I wouldn’t have to double up on those.) Getting clean clothes meant a trip to the laundromat, which isn’t a terribly pleasant place to hang out. The only benefit to using a laundromat vs. doing your laundry at home is that you can do it all at once, using as many washers/dryers as you need.

Washer/dryer on the premises. See above. If I spill coffee on a white t-shirt, I can throw it right into the wash to get it cleaned before the stain sets.

Shower every day. My camper does have a shower and I’ve learned how to shower using a minimal amount of water — I estimate about 3 gallons per regular shower and 4 gallons if I’m also washing my hair. As I mentioned above, my goal is to minimize water and propane (in hot water) use so if I wasn’t dirty, I didn’t shower.

Comfortable places to sit. My camper is small — after all, it sits on top of a pickup truck! It has limited places to sit; basically I can sit at the table or prop myself up to sit up in bed. Neither is very comfortable. At home, I have sofas, a recliner, stools at my breakfast bar, and chairs at my dining table.

My Truck Camper
Here’s my truck camper, squeezed into a tiny spot in the Arizona desert. It’s the ability to get into tight spots that made me choose this kind of camping setup, but it does have its drawbacks.

Microwave. Simply said, you do not realize how much you use a microwave until you can’t use one. My camper does have a microwave, but the camper needs to be plugged into power to use it. Yes, I have a generator and yes it was plugged in full time when I was parked at my main camp over the winter. But I didn’t run that generator unless I needed to. After all, who the hell wants to listen to it? I don’t. So I went without one for most of my time on the road.

Dishwasher. I’ll admit it: I use a lot of paper plates when I travel. Regular plates mean more dishwashing which means faster water consumption. (See above.) I got a real satisfaction out of loading my dishwasher and turning it on this week — even if it did take three tries to get it running.

Comfort!
This photo says it all: lounging in comfort on the sofa in my living room with my pups, watching TV with the heat on. There’s no place like home!

A television (or two). I don’t watch much television, but I do admit that it’s nice to be able to sit in front of one now and again to unwind, kill time, or just catch up with the latest episode of the Mandalorian or British Baking Show. Or even to watch a movie or documentary recommended by friends. My camper does have a television — and even a DVD player! — but it was seldom worth firing it up, via 100w inverter — to see what my antenna could pick up. When I had an internet connection, I often watched videos on my iPad at bedtime. I much prefer the 65 inch 4K Samsung in my living room, or even the smaller, older, seldom used HDTV in my bedroom.

Indoor space. When it all gets down to it, there’s nothing quite like home to give you the living space that makes you most comfortable. While I really enjoyed the outdoors during my travels, I still spent a lot of time in the very limited space of my camper, especially when the weather was bad. It’s nice to have to walk more than three steps to get to the bathroom or bed or kitchen area.

Recycling. I’m a big proponent of recycling and I just can’t seem to do it easily when I’m on the road. At home, I’ve got a big recycling bin that gets emptied every two weeks. I make more recyclable garbage that regular garbage. On the road, it’s sometimes a challenge to find a place to dump the garbage I make.

My winter travels are comfortable enough, but not nearly as comfortable as being home. I travel south every winter to get sun and (slightly) longer days and I’m glad I do. But I’m also happy when I get home and back to the comforts I really appreciate.

Snowbirding 2021: Driving Home

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The drive is longer than it needed to be but shorter than I expected.

Map Route
Here’s my route from Death Valley through Nevada.

After too many days with bad Internet (in Tecopa) and no Internet (in Death Valley), I plotted my trip home on a paper map that I found in my truck. The map, an oldish AAA map of western states and provinces, showed just the level of detail I needed, with Arizona, California, and Nevada on one side and Oregon, Idaho, Washington, and British Columbia on the other. I had a highlighter in my “Office” box and used it to trace lines. My goal was to explore a mostly new route, trying to get on some roads I hadn’t driven on before. Eventually, however, I knew I’d have to end up on Route 97 in Oregon, which was least likely to be affected by snowfall. I did not want to get delayed by snow in mountain passes on the way to the Columbia River crossing as I had been the previous year.

In hindsight, I’m not sure why I bothered to explore new roads when I had no intention of stopping along the way. At this point in my winter travels, I’m in GO HOME mode and I pretty much motor along with the goal of getting home in the fewest number of days. I don’t regret the route I chose, but I wish I hadn’t selected it while in that mode. Hindsight = 20/20.

Plotting the Drive

Humboldt WMA
Google Maps satellite view makes it look as if I camped in the middle of a dry lake bed. I didn’t. My site (marked with the X) was along a canal, surrounded by trees.

I started writing about my drive home in my previous blog post, where I considered Solo Travel. At the end of that post, I reported that I’d parked in a campsite in the Humboldt State Wildlife Management Area (WMA), which appears in the most recent iteration of Google Maps satellite view as a dry lake bed. It was not dry. Not only did I have to negotiate a single-lane road of mud with deep tire tracks from my predecessors — with a 3200 pound camper on the truck and at least 3000 pounds in a trailer behind me — but there was water on both sides of that road for the entire 2-mile distance. My campsite about a mile down another road was along a well-defined and full canal, complete with a boat ramp and water fowl.

I guess this proves that you really can’t trust satellite view for accurate information. (And yes, I brought some of that mud home on my truck.)

Not that it mattered anyway. I use an app called Ultimate CG which draws on a database of publicly owned, noncommercial campgrounds throughout the country to find potential campsites when I’m traveling with my camper. (My friend Bill, who travels a lot more than I do, uses a similar app called AllStays, which seems to draw on the same database but adds other confirmed overnight parking spots.) When I’m in transit — in other words, on my way from one point to another — and just need a place to stay for the night, I’m not too picky. Although I could stop at any truck stop for the night, a lot of truckers keep their rigs or attached refrigeration units on all night and it can be noisy. I prefer a quiet spot, especially one where I can let my pups out to do their business without worries about traffic. That’s how I wound up at Humboldt.

It was exactly what I wanted/needed for the night. Dead quiet after the wind died down and super dark. No one else came into the “campground,” which was really nothing more than a parking area by the boat ramp with a restroom (that I didn’t use). The weather forecast claimed I could get snow overnight, but in the morning, when it was light enough to see, I saw that the fresh snow had stopped about 500 to 1000 feet above my elevation.

Snow Level
I could see in the morning that the snow level had stopped 500 to 1000 feet above my elevation.

Saturday’s First Leg

My first order of business after securing the camper and loading my pups into my truck was getting fuel. According to my truck’s mileage computer, I had 62 miles left before empty. Another app showed me there was fuel in Lovelock, 11 miles away. I backtracked through the area, glad that the muddy part of the road seemed drier and a bit less slippery. I drove through farmland — mostly dormant alfalfa, I think — to town, navigated to a truck stop with the cheapest diesel, and filled up. The pump stopped at $75, which is relatively common, and I dutifully re-inserted my credit card to get the pump going again to top it off. (It would be a good thing that I did.)

I had plotted a route through Nevada and into Oregon that would take me on I-80 to Winnemucca and then on a series of smaller numbered routes through northwestern Nevada and into Oregon, meeting up with route 97 south of Bend. Easy enough to follow. I programmed it into Google Maps and got on my way.

The first hurdle to jump was the snowstorm. It started as flurries and got heavier as I went along. Soon, the road surface started to get covered. I passed a flashing light saying that I needed chains or snow tires to continue. I had neither; my truck has all-terrain tires and I’m not sure if that’s good enough to meet traction tire requirements. Visibility dropped. So when I saw an exit up ahead, I got off the freeway. I’d driven less than 20 miles.

There was a gas station at the exit but a sign for a restaurant at the end of the ramp pointed away from it. Maybe I could wait out the storm with some breakfast? I turned left, went under the freeway, and saw nothing but a road thick with snow going off into the distance.

Snow
Put yourself in my shoes. If you were driving a truck with camper weighing roughly 12,000 pounds and towing another 3,000 pounds in a snowstorm without snow tires or chains on any wheels, would you have driven down this country road?

I pulled over onto a snow-covered shoulder and consulted Google maps. The restaurant was up the road. I didn’t want to drive that far. I shut off the engine and went into the camper with my dogs.

Trucker
It’s nearly impossible to see in this zoomed-in shot, but this guy was wearing shorts. His dog is hidden behind some of the weeds.

The nice thing about traveling with an RV is that you have all the conveniences of home with you wherever you go. I pulled out the kettle and made myself a cup of tea. I watched the traffic go by on the freeway, including snow plows that shot streams of wet snow high up and away from the road. I watched a few cars and trucks come down from the freeway, park for a moment alongside the ramp, and then continue on their way to either the gas station or back up to the freeway. One of these was a big semi. A guy in shorts got out with his dog. I watched him watch his dog scamper about alongside the road. Then they both got back into the cab and the truck drove away.

My pups were bored. They didn’t know what we were doing there and had no clue what that white stuff coming out of the sky was. (They have very limited experience with snow.) They looked out the window and bugged me a bit while we waited.

Rosie Lily
Rosie and Lily were bored while we waited.

The snow stopped rather suddenly and it got brighter out. I put away the kettle, transferred the remainder of my tea into a travel mug, and left the camper with my pups. They ran around a bit in the snow before letting me put them in the truck. I made a U-turn, got back on the freeway — which had been plowed and was completely free of snow or ice — and continued on my way.

From that point on, I started monitoring the outside temperature; I’d once hit ice unexpectedly on a mountain road and didn’t want that to happen when I was traveling at 65 mph with a load. But the temperature stayed above freezing — and even got into the 40s — for the rest of the day.

I got off the freeway in Winnemucca, a typical large Nevada town with plenty of casinos and other places to leave money. I would have stopped at the Pizza Hut — I’m a sucker for those meat lovers personal pan pizzas — but it was still closed at 10:05 AM. (Who knew?) So I just followed the signs for route 95 north and kept going.

I turned left onto route 140, which went due west straight as an arrow as far as the eye could see. A sign at the turn said something like “Next Services 66 miles” and if I’d been thinking clearer, I would have stopped for a photo. Folks back east have no idea how far apart some towns can be out west and are often amused by signs like that. The road cut straight across the flat desert, between a number of dry lake beds, reached a tiny rock outcropping, bent slightly to the right, and cut through more flat desert. The whole time I was driving, I could see weather up ahead: thick clouds that seemed to brush the desert floor. Rain? Snow? I had no idea. All I knew is that the wind was howling and my truck’s computer claimed I was getting less than 10 miles per gallon.

I passed alongside one of these weather squalls and some rain hit my windscreen. Then I was through it.

A few cars passed me during that 66 (or whatever) miles. I passed a few going the opposite direction. There were a handful of what looked like ranches along the way. Then the terrain started getting hillier as I approached the town of Denio and the left turn to stay on route 140. There was a sad little gas station at the intersection. I kept going. Another sign said something like “Next Services 75 miles.” The road here wasn’t flat and dull. It climbed into the hills.

I’d gone about 50 miles when I started wondering whether I’d have enough fuel to get to my planned fuel stop at Lakeview.

I watched my mileage rate decrease until it was less than 9 miles per gallon. The hills were really making the truck work and the curves made it nearly impossible to coast downhill safely. There were a few spots with very steep — think 8% and 9% — downhill grades where I needed to work not only the truck’s transmission — Tow mode automatically downshifts as needed for engine braking — but the brakes. Getting behind a very slow compact car in one of these areas prevented me from coasting down as fast as I might have. What looked like it might be a gas station in Adel didn’t have any signs for diesel.

To further stress me, I’d come into patches of weather like snow or rain. At one point, near the end of the leg, when my truck’s computer said I had less than 30 miles left until empty, I came upon a busy ski area with lots of traffic in the area. I was behind a huge truck bearing alfalfa that crawled along the road. I watched those miles tick down and wondered how long it would take Good Sam to bring me 5 gallons of diesel after I called.

I reached the intersection of 395 and turned left, toward town, behind that hay truck. I’d asked Google where the nearest diesel was and it told me I’d need to go 5 more miles — exactly what my truck said it could do before empty.

2 Miles Left
Can you read it? 2 miles left!

Then I saw the green numbers lit up on a gas station’s fuel price sign in the distance. Diesel! I pulled in behind another vehicle at the pump. At least if I ran out of fuel it would be easy enough to get it into my tank. My truck’s computer said I had 2 miles left until empty. Whew!

In my defense, when I got off the freeway in Winnemucca, my truck’s computer had told me I had almost 100 miles more range than Google told me I needed to drive. But the headwinds and the windy mountain roads really increased my fuel consumption. So even with my rule of making sure there’s 100 miles of wiggle room between distance and calculated range, I almost didn’t have enough fuel for the drive. Lesson learned. I guess.

Lakeview into Oregon

After fueling up, I immediately made a wrong turn. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize it until I’d gone about 10 miles.

You see, for some reason my phone decided that even though it had a 4-bar LTE connection, it wasn’t going to connect me to the Internet. So instead of programming the next leg into Google, I had rely on signs — imagine that — to point me in the right direction. I should have realized that something was up when my next destination — the relatively big town of Bend — did not appear on any sign. But Klamath Falls, also on route 97, did appear so I turned that way.

But as you might have surmised, I like being able to keep track of how far it is to my next destination. So I pulled over and fiddled with my phone, trying to get it to connect to the Internet. When that didn’t work, I took out my marked-up map, flipped to the correct side, and took a close look. That’s when I realized I was on the wrong road. I was on Route 140 heading west. I should have been on Route 395 heading north.

To be fair, either one would have taken me where I needed to go. But the correct route would have dumped me much farther north on Route 97, saving time.

I made a U-turn. My phone came out of its stupor a short while later and I was able to program Google Maps for Bend via routes 395 and 31. I continued on my way.

With the stress of a nearly empty fuel tank gone, the drive was much more pleasant. Route 395 wound through a hilly area before forking off to the right at the junction of Route 31. I went left and found myself driving on a very pleasant road that soon dropped me into a lake-filled valley. The mid afternoon sun lit the countryside with a gorgeous glow as I motored along a cliff face along the bank of Summer Lake. I had passed up the Summer Lake hot springs — along with others along the way — and I started thinking how nice it might be to do a road trip bouncing from one hot spring to another on a long, circuitous route.

Eventually, the road climbed up into the mountains and entered a national forest. I had plenty of fuel, but it was starting to get near time to find a place to park for the night. The national forest would be perfect, but the roads were snow covered and each turn into the forest had a yellow Area Closed sign. COVID? Seriously, I don’t understand the logic of closing outdoor recreation areas when being outdoors is so much safer than being indoors in close contact with others.

About 10 miles short of La Pine, I found a slush-covered forest road without a sign, drove in, and eventually found a spot where I could back my trailer into a cleared area (in the snow) with my truck’s nose pointing out toward the road. I shut down, let my pups run around for a while in the snow, and then went in for the night.

Campsite
The view out my dining area window just before sunset.

My campsite had internet access via cell phone and I caught up on email and texts with various friends. I updated my house sitter with my estimated time home: Monday instead of Sunday. I watched a few videos on YouTube and Disney Plus. (I’m still not sure about WandaVision.) I was in bed before 9.

The road had some traffic that seemed alarmingly close to my rig. I was startled by the sound of a train’s horn that seemed so close I honestly expected the train to be visible from my window. (The crossing was less than 1/4 mile away; I passed it on my way out the next day.) But by 9 PM, it had pretty much settled down. I worried about my 1/2 filled propane tank having enough gas and my batteries having enough power to keep my heater going overnight; I expected it to get down into the 20s. I put an extra blanket on the bed. I slept as good as usual.

The Last Leg

In the morning, while I sipped my coffee at 5:30 AM, I plotted my route to my next expected overnight stop: Maryhill State Park in Washington. It was only 3 1/2 hours away.

What? That close? How long to get home?

Google told me I could be home in 6 1/2 hours. I did some math. If I got on the road by 6 AM, and had two fuel stops, I could be home before 2 PM.

To say I hustled to get out of there is an understatement. My bed, my shower, and my dishwasher were calling me while the rest of the amenities of my home were waving encouragingly in the background. I had my pups fed and in the truck by 5:50 AM.

The slushy ground that had been so easy to back into the night before was gone, replaced with a hard icy surface that had no desire to let its trespasser go easily. I spun wheels in 2WD and 4WD. Crap. How embarrassing would it be to call Good Sam for a 10-foot tow?

Traction Plates
You know the Girl Scout motto, right? Be prepared.

But no call would be necessary because I was now prepared. After an incident in sand back in late November, I’d bought a pair of heavy duty plastic traction plates. They were in the back seat area of the truck. I grabbed a lantern from the camper and deployed the orange plastic devices in front of each of my back wheels. Then, for good measure, I locked the front hubs and put the truck in 4L.

12,000 pounds of truck pulling 3,000 pounds of cargo trailer out of an icy patch of ground at 30°F? No problem. The truck immediately started moving, crawling out of the crunchy ground as if to say, “What the hell are those orange things for? I don’t need that shit.” I pulled onto the road, put my flashers on, and retrieved the traction plates. Then I unlocked the hubs, got back into the truck, shifted into 4H, and got on my way.

The rest of the drive was uneventful. I passed through one deserted looking town after another. It was early on a Sunday and I couldn’t even find a Starbucks in Bend that was open. I drove at the speed limit as the sun came up on a cloudy day. I was on Route 97 by now — a road I’ve been on many times before. (It was my primary route when driving from home to the Sacramento area of California during my frost control days.) As usual, I passed one point of interest after another without stopping. (Maybe I can visit them on my hot springs road trip?)

I found a great price on fuel in Madras, where I’d planned to stop anyway, and topped off the tank. Again, it took two credit card inserts because the fuel pump stopped at $75 the first time. I let the girls out to do their business.

I’d seen a sign for Black Bear Diner in Madras and even found a parking space on the road near it when I got there, but I decided that I didn’t want to spend time eating in a restaurant — or even going into a restaurant in an area that was still showing so many Trump signs — so I opted to stop at a Starbucks up ahead. (I’m a real sucker for their Double Smoked Bacon breakfast sandwich.) But that Starbucks was in a Safeway supermarket and it didn’t have breakfast sandwiches. I wound up getting a breakfast burrito at the deli counter.

I went back to the truck and ate in the parking lot while using the Fred Meyer app to place a grocery order that I could pick up on my way home. I was 262 miles away. Technology for the win!

More driving, more miles put behind me. Route 97 in northern Oregon winds through a number of small farming communities but not much else. The terrain is a combination of rocky formations from Oregon’s volcanic past and grass-swept plateaus, some of which still had some snow on them. When I saw the wind turbines in the distance, I knew I was getting close to the river. A long, downhill glide down a canyon deposited me in Biggs Junction, where I normally buy fuel on my way south. I didn’t need fuel yet so I didn’t stop.

I did stop on the other side of the river, in Maryhill State Park. They had a nice wide parking area with grass where I let my pups out for a quick run and pee. We stayed less than 10 minutes before getting back on the road and climbing up out of the Columbia River Valley toward Yakima.

I tried calling my sister and actually managed to talk to her for a short while before I lost the signal in some hilly, forested terrain on the Yakama reservation.

More driving. I’d finished the recorded book I’d been listening to since leaving Tecopa and listened to a few podcasts.

As I descended down into the Kititas Valley, I started thinking about ice cream. I turned east on the Interstate, not interested in braving Blewett Pass with my rig. In Vantage, I exited the freeway and stopped at Blustery’s for a chocolate banana milk shake. It cost me more than $8 (!) with tax but was exactly what I needed. I sipped it all the way to Quincy.

I stopped at Fred Meyer for my groceries. It was a real pleasure to restock for the week without having to go into the store. Does Fred Meyer realize that we actually buy less — thus saving money — when we don’t go into the store?

Meanwhile, I’d updated my housekeeper and others about my revised return date and time. A neighbor suggested that I stop at her house before going home so I could scout my driveway entrance. I drove down my road, which was remarkably clear of snow and ice, and drove up to her house. She greeted me with a container of soup so I wouldn’t have to cook that night. Her husband loaded me up into his new 4WD truck and drove down to my house for a look at the road conditions. I immediately noticed that the road got worse right after the winery, which was about a half mile from my home.

My driveway is about halfway down a pretty steep hill. It’s a left turn that starts with a little downhill part and then curves to the left before straightening out. To make the turn with my trailer, I’d have to go wide. The snow was on half the road — the left half. It was also on my driveway. That meant I’d have to drive slowly down the hill, come to a stop (or near stop) before my driveway, and make a very controlled left hand turn into my driveway, crawling down the snowy slope until I got onto the straight part.

I told him I could do it and we went back so I could give it a try.

Back behind the wheel, I took the downhill part of my road in 1st gear with 4WD turned on. I successfully came to a stop just short of my driveway, but then my truck started to slide. I stopped again, it slid again. One more time. Each time this happened, I got a little further down the road, ever closer to my driveway entrance.

I realized I had a choice: I could continue down the road, make a U-turn somewhere, and then approach from downhill. I’d done this successfully before with bad road conditions. Or I could take my foot off the brake and keep it off and let first gear roll me into my driveway.

I opted for the second plan. Mentally crossing my fingers, I released the brake and guided 15,000 pounds of truck and trailer into my narrow, snow-covered driveway. The ice crunched under my big wheels. My truck stayed on course without slipping. A look in a side mirror showed my trailer following it in faithfully. Then I was in the straight, flat part, heading for the concrete pad in front of my big garage door.

I was home!

Happy Ending

I got home this year a whole month earlier than last year. A lot of people are surprised by that, mostly because I came home when it was still cold and snowy.

What most folks don’t seem to understand is that I don’t stay away in the winter because of the cold or snow. I stay away because of the darkness.

The days this far north are short. There’s a whole 6-week period where the sun doesn’t clear the cliffs near my home and I get absolutely no direct sunlight. I left home roughly six weeks before the winter solstice, when the days are shortest. Doesn’t it make sense for me to return home six weeks after it?

First Light with Fresh Snow
Here’s the view out my kitchen window this morning as I was writing this. We had fresh snow at higher elevations (including my home) overnight.

And, for the record, I like snow. (Cold, not so much.)

I might even get some cross-country skiing in — if I can finally get the new top on my Jeep.