It's day 170...It's also 10/23/2019....and we're in Beatty Nevada

It's day 170...It's also 10/23/2019....and we're are in Beatty Nevada

Some habits....turns out......die hard....oh well.....gotta at least try to be informed....so a quick scan of the news to start the day.

No surprise, I guess..... that across every network...the top story was the Impeachment investigation into President Donald Trump....and also...no surprise that as I listened to a couple minutes of each....the news...becomes very different....very quickly. Listening to folks on NBC, CBS, NPR, or even the BBC.....I'm told things like...."the plot to collude with a foreign government was born in the white house." "The presidents betrayal of the American People", And then the speculation begins...A journalist on NBC posed the question..."if the president did this in Ukraine (ya know....attempted to leverage US Foreign aid to Ukraine in exchange for dirt on the Biden campaign)....then where else in the world is he doing it....It's a peak into who Donald Trump is as a president....the journalist went on.

Meanwhile....over on Fox News...one journalist posed the question....how can a president be expected to run a country when he can not even speak confidentially with his counterparts in other countries...he went on to state that it was an administrative coupe de tah.....an attempt by the left to remove the president from office....a few more minutes into that broadcast and I'd heard the words attempted coupe no fewer than 5 or 6 times.....

So I'm left with the same question I always am....who's telling the truth.....I first thought....I'll just go listen to the phone call...and decide for myself.....uh...nope....not allowed to do that....or at least I haven't found it yet.....I am able to read transcripts of the call...but each one I have found....is marked with disclaimers warning me that this unclassified document, as released to the public...does not contain a verbatim transcript of the conversation....but rather an accounting of the conversation by others......so why am I reading it....I wondered?

Why is the simple truth....not so simple at all to get to?

The single largest cable news agency, by number of viewers is Fox News....and they are telling their audience that the Democrats...Led by Nancy Pelosi have staged a coupe in an attempt to get the President out of the white house.

Nearly all other news agencies are inferring that the President of the United States has betrayed the American People....has done it before....and will likely do it again.

Flipside I guess......all 6 news agencies I scanned this morning found consensus in reporting on the Safety concerns with the Boeing 737 max following two fatal crashes.... and the congressional investigation into the company continues.

And for a second year in a row....California is being ravaged by wildfires. over 7 thousand fires have been recorded...and 250,000 acres of forest lost.

It's a pretty awesome way to start the day.....confused.

In reality...not confused at all about our adventure....and where we are headed.....south. No winter on our calender this year.

From Schurz we trekked 167 miles south on highway 95 until passing through Goldfield. Along the way we passed Walker Lake and the Hawthorn Army Ammunition Depot…That place was huge! Miles and miles of bunker looking structures housing the worlds largest ammunition stockpile. Some of the buildings appeared to be built into the ground…leaving one to wonder if they are in reality much bigger than they look. There could be more underground that above? Interesting to ponder, google, and read about…

The Facility's actual name is the Hawthorn Army Depot and it spans over 147,000 acres of Nevada's desert region...signs everywhere warn that no photography is allowed....so I'll let the folks over on the Youtube Channel "Joint Munitions Command" tell us all about the facility.

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I even read one article about theories of an underground submarine base in the area that is connected to Walker Lake... Of course the article was written by a guy on his way to Las Vegas for a UFO convention.....so yea...there's that.

Continuing south I saw a sign that Said Death Valley, and Scotty’s Castle next right. Took that right only to be greeted with signs stating the road was closed 25 miles ahead. Some reading that night explained that flood damage had closed the roads and would likely not be restored until next year. Oh well…another time maybe. Pulling off in a large graveled area to turn around…but as sunset on the Cedar Mountains brushed past in the windshield …it hit me.....We’ll stay here tonight. Large graveled areas, as I have discovered are the perfect camp sights. For the most part level…open…and usually far enough from whatever road we just pulled off of so as not to listen to the hum of semi’s all night long, and let the boys run about freely…This one had a massive pile.....I'd guess at 200 cubic yards of pea gravel piled in the center of it…clearly a staging area of some sort for whatever work had closed the road 25 miles up ahead. Tonight we will grill some steaks......with the Cedar Mountains in our backyard. 🙂

The following day...and a few more miles down the road we would do a quick stop in Luning for a stretch of the legs and a sandwich. Luning...gave us yet one more example of a town that had seen better days. All through this area of Nevada the gold rush came in hard…and it appears.... left even faster. Many communities like Luning would come to be known for other minerals as well. Here in Luning, it would be magnesium mines that would fuel the towns economy through the 1950's....when local mines and processing facilities would shut down and the towns population would shrink from several hundred....to the 80 folks that call Luna home today. Lookin at a map...this place is about as rural as it gets I spose.....3000 or so folks in Hawthorn a few miles back up the road.....for anything bigger.....these 80 folks trek around 130 miles...to Carson City.....with a population of around 55k.

Continuing south on 95.....it happened again. You really do find the coolest stuff....completely by accident. This time...the discovery would be Beatty Nevada…self proclaimed “Gateway to Death Valley”. The first thing that caught my attention was the donkeys....lot's of donkeys.....just wandering around town freely....and nobody seemed to care....or even be paying attention. Did a quick check of the weather...40's at night...and 70's during the day....dang near perfect! We'd spend several days camped just outside town on a piece of BLM land.....and tons of exploring....in a place called Death Valley.

800 or so folks call the place home today....and like most every other town in the area...it was born during the gold rush in 1905. As prospectors and miners flooded the area in the thousands.....they of course brought their pack mules with them. Throughout the gold rush....and on into all mining activities in the area these mules...or donkeys....would be an essential element the mining business. As the population left the area once mining dried up....many of these donkeys were simply released into the desert. They adapted to their surroundings and living in the wild.....and it seems....have no issue wandering around and comingling with the human folk either. In recent years....authorities have had to begin implementing population control methods as their numbers climb....and safety becomes a concern. Signs everywhere remind me politely.....please do not feed the donkeys.

Since starting this adventure I've learned a ton...and met several folks that have done this full time RV thing for years. One of the most surprising things I'd learned is just how many of these folks there are. I'd done some initial on the topic and read that some 1 million folks in the US live in an RV full time. The truth is....I don't think anyone really knows how many of these folks there are out here. I've met all sorts of different folks....from different walks of life out here....retiree's.....remote workers.....traveling nurses......even freeway construction crews and pipefitters that move from job to job in their RV.

On this little stretch of BLM land....just off Vanderbuilt Road in Beatty Nevada.....I'd meet a different kind of full time RV'er

“Hi, I’m John…we’re outta Kentucky”…I heard a soft voice say as I sit enjoying my spot in the shade on this 72 degree afternoon in the desert. In contraction to the voice, I looked up to see a a big burly guy in shorts and a tank top walking my way. 6’5” if he was an inch…and built like a linebacker. Mustache, spindly grey beard, bald head, and huge grin across his weathered face all came into focus as he walked into our shade and put the afternoon sun to his back.

I’m Craig…how ya doin man? I said as I offered a handshake..... “I’m great” he replied…just wanted to give ya the scoop on them wild donkeys”. Scoop? I asked. “Yea”, he said as he pointed off at the little donkey lying on the ground flanked by two grey ones. “He’s all but dead”. Dead? Really? I inquired. “Yea…that older one there is still nursin…mama aint got enough for both so she’s rejecting the little one” As he was explaining the pending demise of the little wild donkey a bespectacled lady, scarf wrapped around her head shemaghn fashion…minus the part covering her mouth…wearing a one piece sun dress of sorts…that flowed in the afternoon breeze to the ground and met up with the birkenstock sandles, walked up and chimed in…”we tried to get some milk in him a little while ago…he took some anyways…was doing a little better….but won’t make it through this night if he don’t get some more. “Where you from?” Kentucky John interrupted, his partially toothed grin pointed in my direction. Tacoma I responded. “Washington?!” the shemagh clad lady blurted with excitement….”I’m from Yakima” she proudly stated. Practically neighbors…I grinned. She extended a hand my direction… “I’m Cheryl”. Craig here…I replied. For some reason I was associating names with places…so in my head I had just met Kentucky John and Yakima Cheryl. Soon I would encounter Ashland Joe, Crotchety Old Idaho Pete, and Kentucky Donna, yep, Kentucky Johns wife.

“Tarantula”! “John…we got a TARANTULA”! Was suddenly shrieked across the campsite by Kentucky Donna. This would, as you can imagine, throw the entire scene into chaos. Crotchedy Idaho Pete, who had barely just ambled onto the scene, shook his head, turned around and ambled back towards his trusty little shanty on wheels…as he did so he grunted “they aint poisonous you know”. Hearing this Kentucky Donna retorted…”well I don’t like’m anyways”. This was my signal to take Dougie and head back to the safety of our slightly larger shanty on wheels. As we walked away Yakima Cheryl advised…”watch those donkeys with your dog there now” Pardon? “Ya…they’ll kill him…just for fun” she stated…continuing…”then drag’em around the campsite just to show ya what they done” “What on earth is she talking about.....is what went through my head…thankfully, what I actually verbalized was something to the effect “really?” “Oh yea”…she responded knowingly..”.they associate dogs with coyote’s…closest thing they have to a predator”. As the donkeys stared in our direction I picked up the largest rock I could find and we cautiously walked back to camp. Kentucky John watched after us…spider chasin stick in hand. Some googling later would indicate to me that there was some truth in what Yakima Cheryl had told us…but for the most part it was an exaggeration. None the less with tarantulas, rattle snakes, potentially dog killing donkeys, and a very colorful band of road warriors in our midst…we would approach things from a whole new perspective from now on. “Dammit” I muttered as I dug out my shoes and took off the flip flops. “I hate it when I have to wear shoes”.

Our afternoon and evening was spent watching activities ranging from Kentucky John herding the alleged tarantula away from his camp with his spider chasin stick while Kentucky Donna intermittently holler’d “just kill it John”…to Kentucky John and Yakima Cheryl attempting to get milk into the dying wild baby donkey. All watched from behind the sunscreen and safety of our slightly bigger shanty on wheels.

As darkness fell Kentucky John and Yakima Cheryl were still trying to get milk to the baby donkey while keeping the others distracted…I went to bed…In the morning…not a Donkey to be seen, specifically, not a dead baby donkey.

There were several lessons in this day. More curious to me were the patterns that were forming on our adventure. This was my first encounter with such colorful…and diverse folks and I like it. What I’ve figured out is that my experience to date had been following along the paths of the “vacationers”, rather than folks that actually choose to live out here. Our time, when not driving, has been spent either staying in the backyards of welcoming friends and family….or camping at that perfect spot we so often find…which was typically alone. When faced with no other option there would be the occasional RV park…but that crowd is very different. They are definitely not of the full time on the road sort that chase the warmth to avoid extinction in the frigid cold of what once was home.

Yakima Sue for example, spends her nights in a one person tent and days socializing around the camp sights…occasionally taking her red 1993 Ford Explorer into town for supplies…like milk for dying baby wild donkeys. Then there was Kentucky John, and Donna. Kentucky Donna explained that when they started 3 years ago, (failing health drove their decision to see the country…and I suspect out of their home as well), they wanted a teardrop camper…”couldn’t afford it…so John built me one”. Kentucky John added “Yea…see that’s the thing about bein poor…you know how to take junk and make stuff”. And make stuff they did. It was exciting how very proud the both of them were to show me around what they had done with the frame of a small flatbed trailer, some wood scraps, a whole bunch of zip ties and even more imagination. All hitched up behind a little Toyota pickup. Crotchety Idaho Pete, and his nameless companion had taken the bed of a late 70’s Datsun pick-up truck and bungeed some plywood panels onto it which would serve as storage. The rest of his time would be spent in the mid 90’s Ford Explorer that towed it all. Sleeping in the front seat of a Ford Explorer could make anyone crotchety right?? According to Kentucky John…Crotchety Idaho Pete had spent 25 years “out”. A term I learned today…”out”. Kentucky John explained to me that he and the wife had been “out” for three years. He went on to explain that they were the “babies” out here … besides Idaho Pete, the folks in the big fancy Winnebago towing a jeep had been “out” for 30 years. Ashland Joe was only “out” part time. He lives in Ashland Oregon…but winters in “Hippie Hole”….a popular spot, I would later learn, somewhere in Arizona where “River Rats”, as their called go to escape those cold winters of home. It all made much more sense to me now…and sorta took the discomfort out of a complete stranger asking me how long I had been “out”

In another telling exchange with Kentucky Donna she stated “We often say we live where we run out of gas”. And that would be right here till the first of November…when the next disability check comes through.

A whole new and different world had somehow unfolded unexpectedly right before my eyes. This counter culture…or whatever you want to call it…really does exist. In much deeper and richer reality than the Bigfoot tales I had clumped it in with in my head prior to today.

On another morning....Kentucky John would come over to invite me to have a look at the "bathroom" he had just finished up for Kentucky Donna. She'd been on him to craft something that would take the place of treks out into the desert with a shovel when nature calls....As I studied his design and listened to him describe all the features.....how he had figured out how to hang a couple pieces of piping from the roof of the trailer....attached plywood to either side....then attached a door made of what looked like a canvas tarp maybe? With the privacy part handled...the interior would be complete with two pickle buckets...one for clean water....the other...lined with a plastic bag for ...uh...not clean water. It wasn't any of this that struck me in any particular sorta way....what struck me was Kentucky Johns pride....explaining his accomplishment and how he put it all together ..... he was beaming. As I kept restating how clever he had been .....really thought things through...even considered quick tear down and stowage features if sudden winds came on scene....he was walking me through all this as if...well...he could have been showing me around his 2 million dollar waterfront estate ,,,,he couldn't have been any prouder of his accomplishment and how he had just made his wife's life easier....I was happy....for Kentucky John and Donna.

One afternoon I ventured a bit further out into the desert......8 miles south of Beatty on highway 374 is an entrance to Death Valley National Park, as well as the California/Nevada border. From there I starred into what seemed an endless desert. Rhyolite, a once booming gold town is located between Beatty and the border. The ghost town I photo’d today stands in sharp contrast to the excitement that 10,000 gold seekers must have brought to the area in 1905. The Goldwell Open air museum and Tom Kelly’s Bottle House were interesting finds nestled in the foothills just below Rhyolite. Headed up into those foothills I spotted a little house…complete with sheds and vehicles, all long since abandoned. While snapping photos of a past belonging to someone else…I tried to imagine what it all used to look like. Was the rotted out wing-back chair…tattered…with only remnants of the gold and green fabric it once wore proudly all that remained of a life that once belonged to hopeful gold miners? Did they raise a family here…young children playing in and around their new neighborhood? And how these now rusted out vehicles, after rolling off a Detroit assembly line, must have been so shiny and new as they arrived here in the desert to begin their service. Not a soul back then thought, for even a second, about how these things would look in this very place some 60 or 70 years later.

Power lines and junction boxes document that the property was once on the Nevada Power Company grid and even had a telephone…so could it have been inhabited as recently as the 60’s maybe? As I drove away I thought how very different my existence, and time on this planet could have been.

And then there were the random thoughts.....typically over that first cup of coffee watching the sun come up over over the Armagosa Mountain Range.

While I’ve not made much reference to him in posts to date, it is only because of the challenge in finding just the right name. None the less…he has been with us every step…or mile (all 5000 of them)…of the way. There has indeed been a 4th along for the ride on this big adventure of ours. In fact…he is more than along for the ride…he “is” the ride. With the help of friends and family countless potential monikers have been bandied about but nothing ever felt just right. That changed today.

While reading Steinbecks’ “Travels with Charley…In Search of America” I read the following:

” In Spanish there is a word for which I can’t find a counterword in English. It is the verb vacilar, present participle vacilando. It does not mean vacillating at all. If one is vacilando, he is going somewhere, but does not greatly care whether or not he gets there, although he has direction.”

Those words hit me.... I had to put down the coffee cup and say them out loud…and say them out loud again...

“If one is vacilando, he is going somewhere, but does not greatly care whether or not he gets there, although he has direction”

Could it have been more perfect? As we began…we had this far off “destination” of Savannah in our sites…but as this adventure has grown it has become less and less about where we are going…and more about where we are.

So now this closely knit knot of curious adventure seekers will now continue our adventure in a perpetual state of “Vacilando”…quite literally.

From now on.....This 1988 Holiday Rambler Alumilite buddy of ours......is Vacilando.....Dougie, Billie, I.....love Vacilando

Another morning......I would realize that Time passes differently…lately.

The wind blew hard last night. Really hard. I somehow found it fun. Being jostled awake by the whistling of the wind and the gentle swaying of Vacilando as he absorbed the winds’ gentle swipes at us. It was not unlike lounging on a boat in the Puget Sound on a sunny day and having the wake of a passing craft roll up, under, then away from you. Soothing…Relaxing even. You find, when staring at the desert sky at two am…rocking back and forth, you see things. Really see things. Or maybe notice is a better word meaning maybe I just hadn't paid attention to things I see all the time. Last night I saw the moon. I studied the glow. How blinding white it was. At times I could see a light orange glow around the bottom of it as if it were picking up the reflection of tomorrows sun…still hours away. The colors intensify as the night predictably becomes morning. At one point it seemed as if the two would collide…that sun and that moon. Dawn arrives with the rising sun signaling the start of a new day…while that once intensely white moon begins to fade into the newly lit sky getting brighter by the second. Signaling the passage of one more night.

I’m finding I mark time in different ways lately. I look at the sun…or maybe the moon more often…and the clock less. Marking time by the pages turned in a book. Neighbors leaving and new ones arriving. By how long the morning sun takes to remove the chill from the air so I can swap the hoody for a t-shirt and shorts. How much longer till the laptop and phone are charged so I can quiet the hum of the generator and resume listening to the wind, the passing trucks and voices far off in the distance, a dogs bark, and the occasional braying of those wild dog killing donkeys out there somewhere….or sometimes just listen to the quiet. Billie stepping carefully across the keyboard as I type…signaling that he’s been ignored long enough. Or the soft presence of Dougie's’ chin on my knee…his subtle way of pointing out that we have not been for a walk in a while.

Yea.....Time passes differently…lately.