Pacific Crest Trailer Hikers-a-go-go

I know I haven't posted in 5ever.  I've been very busy with getting out new fiction.  First the sci-fi romance Aliens Bride, but then also a short gay sci-fi romance (adults only) because I had a big hole to dig myself out of.

Now that sales are high again I have a little breathing room!

We're still at the Thousand Trails Campground in Acton California.  My mom is having a health issue that will require us to stay here for a month or two.  Now, as I've said before, our Thousand Trails membership is 14 days in, 7 days out.  Meaning every two weeks we camp here we need to leave for 7 days.

Instead of leaving I've been using the free ReadyCampGo membership I got with my Thousand Trails membership to buy our 'out days' at $20/day.  I did this for our 7 days out after Palm Springs.  On June 5 I'm going to try to do it again.  I've booked 7 days with ReadyCampGo and I will hopefully just stay here and check-out/check-in at the front like I did before.  This will be the easiest way for us to hang around.

Now, I was not opposed to boondocking on our out days. 

However it doesn't seem as though there's any legal boondocks where we can fit our rig around here.  If we have to tow the RV a two hour drive somewhere and back then we'll be paying in gas what we would spend to buy our out days anyway, with a lot more hassle and a lot less amenities than we'd have if we just stayed put.

Today I was hoping to find a boondock in the nearby BLM areas.  I mean, if there's a place within 30 minutes of here, at a higher elevation (so I don't need A/C to be comfortable) then it's worth the hassle of moving and dry camping to save $140.

My mom and I went down Soledad Canyon Road to investigate.  We passed the KOA to an Angeles Forest entrance type place up a hill.  I drove up said hill hoping there would be a passable road to a higher level area where I could boondock.  My California Adventure Pass was good for this forest, after all.

Okay, so when we drive up this area the dirt road leading up higher is closed off.  :(  Oh well.  I park to go and read the sign and see if we could just boondock in the parking lot there.  :p  Wishful thinking, but I don't know jack about boondocking--so maybe?

Out of the mountain trail comes a young woman walking with hiking sticks with a big pack on her back.  There's dirt crusted on her legs and she's so sunburned that I'm not sure if she's 20 or 40 at first.  I say hi to her as I approach the signage.

"Do you know which way the KOA is?"

Now I realize that this is a young woman who has come from some place far away.  She wasn't a day hiker who was parked somewhere.  There was no other vehicles.  This was a perpetual hiker.  She looked exhausted.

I told her to get in our SUV to drive her to the KOA.  She said she couldn't possibly because she was too dirty.  Meh.  Who cares.  Get in.  We throw her pack in the trunk and drive her down.

She says she's hiking from Mexico to Canada.  @_@ WHAT?!  Apparently there are others doing this since she recognizes a group from the clusters of tents at the campground.  I was so amazed at the adventure this woman was on.  I wanted to spend hours hearing of her journey.  The woman was obviously beat and eager to crash, so I didn't attempt to delay her.  We dropped her at the campground and continued on our way.

We drove around many a road looking for the elusive legal big-rig boondock.  Meh.  Nothing.  So we headed back.

As we're driving back two guys are in front of the KOA kind of blocking the road to flag down a car.

Now, ordinarily I would attempt to ram them while honking my horn and putting the pedal to the metal.  

Ordinarily when you see guys doing this is a car-jacking.  Sorry--I'm from Vegas.  It happens.

But this isn't Vegas.  And though we are 30 minutes from LA, this isn't LA either.  They were in front of the KOA and looked like hikers like that girl.  I decided to stop and hear their plea.  I kept the door locked and only opened the window a crack.  They asked for a ride to the store in town.

We'd come upon two beddraggled hikers who were in their very early 20s.  They looked like realangos, which is Spanish for stray dogs, but a realango tends to be a very skinny scraggly stray dog.  We felt the two realangos harmless and let them in the SUV.

The Caucasian realango was Matt and the miscellaneously Asian realango was Assi.  We eagerly soaked up information about what these crazy hikers were doing.  Apparently the Pacific Crest Trail is a crazy program where hikers hike from Mexico to Canada.  They all go to the same stops and are more or less in a big staggered group.  Neato!

The grapenuts told us of their life philosophies (typical hippy stuff) and gave off incredibly good vibes.  We took them to the nice market in town I covered in the last post.  My mom HAD to feed them.  I mean, I live to feed wild animals and my mom likes to feed the human kind.  So she bought them each a piping hot sausage roll from the deli counter.  We waited for them to get their tortillas, granola, coconut waters, instant Lipton noodle type camp meals, almond butter, poptarts, nuts, peanuts, and shitloads of beer!!  The took advantage of the fact they had a ride back to the campground to load up.

It was a lot of fun helping these tired kids.  I know they're not homeless or necessarily poor, but they were definitely tired and hungry and it was great to get them to and from the store.

Ahh, if I were younger and healthy I would totally...never fucking do anything like that.  But I wish I could be the type who would live life so hardcore and go for ultimate experiences like that.  I can honestly say the dehydration issues with my lack of intestines and my screwed up knee from the bone cancer precludes me from doing such a thing now.

I can, however, do the closest thing possible for me to do to what they're doing:  Full-time RV!

Hooray!  I get the adventure of traveling the country with less snakes and foot blisters.  :D

Holiday Weekend Cometh

I haven't posted in a while, I know.  I've been busy finishing up my novel.  As I've said before, my monthly income has tanked and I really need to build up sales again.  The new novel is in hands of my editor and should be up soon!!

Today we went to the post office and picked up our mail, which we had sent general delivery.  We had a nice envelope full of paperwork from our house sale, and a bunch of checks with refunds and such.  Woohoo!

The Post Office in Acton has no sign and is in an old-timey tourist plaza.  Here's the picture from Postofficefreak.com, except the sign was gone when we went there today.  Made it hard to find.

The store next to it was a really nice market with a full wine selection and deli in back.  It was a very 'upscale small town' sort of market.  Touristy, but not overly expensive. 

Sometimes I think Acton would be a nice place to live, but there really isn't that much to do here.  You have to go to Palmdale for bigger stores and stuff.  Palmdale is kind of slummy.

RVs have been filling the campground all day for the holiday weekend.  We have an empty space beside us where all sorts of birds congregate.  Ravens, crows, and lots of pretty colorful small birds who I don't know the names of, but who drive my cats nuts.  We kept watching the RVs coming in hoping none would park in that spot.  So far so good!

I like campground living, especially in beautiful scenery and weather like we have here.  Before I went full-time I read RV Sue's blog to learn all I could about the lifestyle.  This is a woman who never seems to camp anywhere there are hook-ups.  She mentioned a Thousand Trails campground in a recent post and says it's the type of place she hates. 

Well...I guess it just goes to show we're all different.  I don't mind being around other people.  I don't mind mowed lawns or strategically planted trees.  I'm a city girl and this is nature to me.  I also like the convenience of full hookups.

I thought I'd be a boondocker like her, but that's not really what I want out of this life.  I did isolation before and it just agitated my depression.  I think I'm headed on the right path toward finding the life I want.  I was silly to try to model myself after anyone. We should all be careful to read the blogs of successful people and think, 'I'll just do what she does.'  We all have to find our own paths to happiness.

Thousand Trails Soledad Canyon, Acton California

Hello my lovelies!!  Here is me (right) and The Mom.  We went to the pool opening ceremony party thing at the Soledad Canyon Thousand Trails.  They had a photo booth, so we took some pics.  I am hesitant to post pictures of myself due to weight gain, but I think this one is okay.

Here we are!

 So, like I said in the last post, we've come early to our next Thousand Trails camp due to the failed boondock.  I went online and got reviews of this park.  I'm glad I did because I learned that you can only get Verizon Internet in the N section, which is up a steep hill.  Reviews also stated that there were a lot of spaces with bad electric (they gave us a list of spaces to avoid) and that many of the bathrooms were closed. 

Gorgeous mountains in spitting distance all around

I parked the RV next to a bathroom only to find that it was one of the closed ones.  Boo!  However, I explored today and found an open bathroom a short walk away.  Yay!  We won't have to use our RV shower. 

I mean...our shower's not the worst thing, but we have our litter box in it so it's kind of a pain to dig everything out and clean it before use.  Then it's your typical small RV shower/tub and it's hard not to bump the plug.  If you do it closes and the little tub fills up with water.  I had trouble avoiding this so my mom will have problems too.  Then we only have a 5 gallon hot water tank that has to be heated up with our precious propane before we can shower.  It won't last long so that means Navy showers where you douse yourself wet and then turn off the water while you soap up and put on shampoo.  The you turn on the water again to rinse off.  The showerhead handle has an on/off switch to make this easier.  (You don't have to shut the water fully off and mess with the water temp each time when you turn it back on).

 I love the peaceful atmosphere and scenery of this place.  I'm not as upset over the closed bathrooms or electric issues that some people complained about in the reviews.  I tested this site's electric before setting up and all was good.  We're not hard to please.

This is not really desert.  We have loads of vegetation and wildlife.  Bobcats even!!   The views are stunning in all directions.  There was a trail I forced my mother to hike with her walker yesterday.  There were so many critters!! OMG!

Today they had a party for the new pool opening.  Its a huge pool!  We got free eats and everyone was nice.  It was fun.  RV parties are great because you can just show up and know that people will talk to you even though they don't know you.  There's no such thing as wallflowers or feeling left out.  You don't have to dress fancy.  You don't have to act fancy.  It's just down to earth fun!

Look at the trees!  I haven't seen trees like this in so long.  It was nice and cool too.  It's May here and around 60-70 during the day.  The nights get pretty cold.  Not uncomfortable though.  It's long sleeve weather.  Much nicer than the heat of Palm Springs.

The local animal shelter was there with all the dogs they felt would be good pets for Rvers.  This little guy caught our eye.  If the girl had been pushy we would have caved and adopted her.  OMG...that face!

But we don't know how to dog.  It would be a new thing for us.  Also we were worried our cats would tear her to shreds.  My cat Scrappy is called Scrappy for a reason, and it ain't just cuz she loves food scraps!

There is loads of space here and it's a beautiful park-like setting.  I mean...I LOVE THIS PLACE!!

;o;  There.  I said it.  

This is the sort of place that gets me thinking about buying one of there leased spots and sticking around.  But nay...tis too soon for such decisions.  Still, we're only 40 miles from LA.  This would be a good city to launch my screenplay writing career.  :p 

So this is our home for the next three weeks.  :)  I'm liking it so far, but I'll keep you posted!