Thursday, April 14, 2011

Santa Fe & A Glimpse Into "Van Life"

The chilly weather in northern Texas should have served as a warning. Santa Fe was much colder.

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After walking around downtown Santa Fe, we drove about 15 miles up into the Pecos Wilderness Area which is part of the Santa Fe National Forest. Ad you can see there was a lot of snow on the ground.

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The main trail was packed down pretty hard but if you ventured a foot to the right or left you might sink down to your thigh.

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The trail topped out at over 11,000 feet.

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Rebecca claims that this is the first snow angel that she has ever made but I don't believe it.

A good friend who is traveling and living out of his vehicle as well has been asking me to post some "Van Life" photos. Here is a typical day for those who live in the Big Green Ho, aka Peppy.
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We wake up between 7:30-8am to Pirate smacking her lips together because she is hungry and thirsty. If you don't feed this dog by 9am then it is guaranteed that she will throw up. She sleeps at our feet on her bed but often wonders into the front seats to look around. When she hops back into bed she always pulls the curtains off to the side and lets in the early morning light.

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Rebecca likes to park next to a patch of grass or "lawn" as she calls it. First thing to do after crawling out of bed into the cold is to feed the dog and let her go to the bathroom. Her food is stashed under the console between the front seats, but her meds and gear go behind the front seats in the tub with the blue lid.

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Next, we start to roll up our curtains using shoelaces I had at the bottom of my closet. They are mostly pink and bright yellow.

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After the curtains we make the bed. One sheet and two blankets. We also have sleeping bags handy if it gets really cold but we have only needed them once. It stays pretty warm once those curtains are rolled down.

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Now that the bed is made and the sweater is on, Pirate goes back in the van to relax while we eat.

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On the passenger side of the van behind the seats are the Food Tub and the Misc. Tub. The latter holds dishes, tupperware, yoga mats, a hammock, and extra water bottles among other things.

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Breakfast is usually cereal and fruit. We buy the 3 pack of rice milk and we split one to use in our cereal. Since rice milk does not have to been refrigerated until opened this works out perfectly. We have a small cooler with ice packs but we usually eat leftovers the next day.

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Now we are ready to play.... or drive to our next destination.

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On this particular day we were driving from Rifle, CO to Arches NP which is about a 6 hour drive. We stopped for lunch on the side of the road. We had PB&J and a left over salad from the night before.

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Most nights that we sleep in the van we wake up to a Walmart parking lot and the sound of big RVs. Some mornings however, we wake up to the sun rising over something like this.

Sunday, April 10, 2011

Houston, TX

Houston was all about the family. First we stayed with the Holt's.

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Grant's baseball game.

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Tracy, Jack and Kate. We also got to see Jack play basketball but our camera battery died before we could take a single picture.

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While Grant stayed to watch the other high school teams play, Rebecca and I meet up with her other sister and some more neices and nephews.

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Pool baseball.

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Cousin soup.

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Pirate leaving evidence.

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Kate making thumbprint art in Rebecca's journal.

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Watching Kate at her hip-hop dance class was a blast. That girl has some attitude!

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Houston Skate Park.

After leaving the Holt's we went to have lunch with Rebecca's Great Aunt & Uncle.
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Kimberly, Uncle Frank, Aunt Betty, Connie & Rebecca

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In Katy, TX at the Redmon's, we got to see one of Rachel's track meets. She is the anchor of the 4x200 relay. They took first place.

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Brett made two nice plays in the infield and got the game ball!

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Paige showing off her skateboarding skills.

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Nikki likes to carry around his girlfriend to show her off.

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After Houston we drove north to Amarillo to check out Palo Duro Canyon State Park which came highly recommended by Rebecca's Great Aunt Betty. It is the second largest canyon in the US.

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Rebecca and Pirate at the trailhead to The Lighthouse. As you can tell by Rebecca's outfit and thermometer it was a cold morning.

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The Castle on the left and the Lighthouse on the right.

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We were really surprised when the trail continued and actually climbed up to the base of the 310 foot Lighthouse. Even more shocking was the fact that no one had carved their name in the soft sandstone.

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Sunday, April 3, 2011

Austin, TX

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We arrived in Austin and stayed with our good friends Amity and James. Austin has a non-profit called Austin Pets Alive that is dedicated to making Austin a no kill city. This is Harold. We visited him and a few other special guys a couple of times while in Austin. This friendly guy almost came with us on the rest of our trip.

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Ruby is around 3 and she lives with Amity and James. It took Pirate some time to figure out that Ruby likes to play rough.

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We ate lots of yummy vegan food while in Austin. Fried avocado tacos at Torchy's.

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At Mr. Natural we had tofu and sunflower seed tamales and some other tofu dish that I can't recall what it was called.

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More good vegan food at Mother's Cafe. Here is James and Amity. Amity's sister, Emmaline, was also in town visiting.

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Boys vs Girls Game Night. We played Catch Phrase, Taboo and then Pictionary. Good times. (The boys won!)

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We left Austin for Enchanted Rock right as SXSW was kicking into gear. Enchanted Rock State Park has a pink granite pluton rock dome that raises about 425 feet above the surrounding terrain. We came to hike and try to do some climbing.

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This is the view of Little Rock from the parking lot.

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To the right is the Big Rock with tons of hikers making their way to the top. It was a Friday and Spring Break so it was packed.

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Walking to our climb which was overrun by a guide group of well over 50 teenagers. They took up every top rope or sport route under 5.11. We had to hike further in and try to find something suitable to climb.

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This was the next spot we tried to climb. As you can see, it is pretty much all slab. Not my strong suit.

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Pirate at the base of our route. Super hot and very little shade. I would love to try this place again during a less crowded time. They actually closed the park around 10am because it had reached it's capacity. Crazy.