Little RV on the Prairie



Needles Highway, Custer State Park
(Adam's at the very bottom)



We finally made it out of Colorado, and have been crossing the great open plains in the last few weeks. Heading in the direction of Minneapolis to visit friends, we took the route through South Dakota. Because we learned that we cannot push ourselves to drive too long each day or else we end up driving in the dark our first stop was a small little town of Lusk, WY just as a stopover for the night. Not much to speak of there. There was a grocery store.

The next day we headed for Custer State Park in the Black Hills of South Dakota. This park was much like Yellowstone with herds of bison roaming, deer, but they also had bighorn sheep. That was cool! They appeared to be a very segregated bunch. The females were down the road grazing while the male rams were found in the hills lying down and resting. Lazy bastards. I found it interesting that they were not intermingled. Maybe there would be fighting. We stopped at the visitor center to gather information on what part of the park to seek. Since hiking is a main attraction (which we cannot do) we took advice on what scenic roads to travel. Needles Highway came highly recommended and was absolutely gorgeous! The road spiraled with hairpin turns and one lane tunnels through the granite. High spires of granite pointed towards the sky like rockets gracing the cliffside. It really was a unique looking park, though it reminded me somewhat of the sandstone spires in Arches National Park in Moab, UT.

We continued the day with lunch in the town of Custer, SD. Since Adam and I have both been to Mt. Rushmore during our childhood years we elected to skip that eye sore. I know it’s a modern marvel, but did we really need our four presidents’ heads carved into the side of a mountain? I’d rather enjoy nature’s natural pictures and look at their faces in a book. After lunch we continued to loop back to our camper by way of Wind Cave National Park. This wasn’t our best planning since the last cave tour was at 3pm and we arrived at 445 we didn’t get to see this great beauty. Apparently there are hundreds of feet of underground caves filled with lots of minerals to see. We did get to see the only natural entrance to the wind cave and felt the wind blowing out of it. Not too exciting if you ask me. Unfortunately, even if we had made it in time for the tour there would have been over 200 stairs that would probably not have worked for Adam anyway. It’s a different type of national park though.

Big Horn Sheep in Custer

After a few days of rest near Custer State park we headed out for the Badlands of South Dakota. I had no idea there was so much ground to cover between Custer and the Badlands. It was straight and brown topped off with wind. Thank goodness we had the Harry Potter book on tape to get us through the prairie. That could have been a very long drive!



Sequoia in the Badlands

Once we arrived at the Badlands we elected to stay at the one open RV park we could find. It was so deserted that I thought we were the only ones there but it turned out it was hunting season and they had cabins rented to hunters. I think I need to get Sequoia one of those orange vests so he’s not mistaken for prey! We then drove through the Badlands and scouted for the photo spots where Adam wanted to take sunset pictures, grabbed a quick dinner in Wall, SD and then headed back. Anyone ever heard of Broasted chicken? I think it must be a South Dakota thing. I asked the waitress whether it was like roasted chicken and she said “yeah, it’s broasted.” It was not like roasted chicken at all! I was hoping it was a combination of roasting and broiling, but it was really flash fried, but not fried as much as fried chicken. It was juicy though, but probably juicy from grease. It burned my mouth.



Sunset at Badlands



The Badlands held our interest for a few days and once Adam was happy with the photographs he shot we were on our way to MN to visit friends. Again we headed out onto the open prairie. This time we stayed in Sioux Falls, SD for our stopover. Now, it has been a little more than a week since we left Denver where our last breakage occurred and nothing has happened to us lately. It was due time. The day we set to head out of Sioux Falls, I checked the tire air pressure in our car and it turned out to be low. So, I thought it smart to stop at the truck stop and fill the tires with air. Apparently, their air connections didn’t like my tires and pulled the plug right out of the front one. I immediately got a flat tire! I had a sinking suspicion that the spare tire was under the fabulously heavy ramp we had just installed in the van. Lucky for me, a nice attendant from the gas station came out to help me change the tire which we discovered was in the middle of the chassis, and I was soon off to get the tire fixed. It could have been much worse. We were only slightly delayed and located in a large city. Now I can check that repair off my list!

Finally, after only a few hours of driving we arrived at a casino RV park near Minneapolis (again because it was one of the only one I could find open this time of year) and we were set to visit our friends. Lucky for us we both have close high school friends in this strange city. We planned to leave at the beginning of the week, but were just hit with hurricane force winds which make it almost impossible to drive a 13 foot high box down the road. So, we are hunkered down for the time being and praying for NO SNOW!

The Fossil Hunter

Along with our recently found hobby of rock hounding, hunting for fossils may be our new favorite activity. It takes a bit more muscle because the rocks are bigger than little crystals but the reward is well worth it. Recently we had the chance to dig around in a shale quarry near Boulder, CO. It’s a working mine that produces rock for asphalt. They dig it up, toss it around and grind it down to various grades and sizes. It’s amazing how people can make money selling dirt! This mine opens on Friday afternoons for school groups and other amateurs interested in digging for fossils because it is known to have them.

We met up with the rock club at the quarry entrance with our hard hats, steel toed boots, rock hammers, buckets and gloves in tow. We took a safety seminar and then caravanned down into the pit. Only about seven people from the club showed with four cars. Once we arrived, everyone unloaded their stuff each with an orange Home Depot bucket. We looked like little clones of one another. The leader of the trip was a geologist. He and his friend/business partner told us they had been searching for fossils for 25 years in this same area. So, they gave us a quick lesson on what to look for and sent us off into the mounds of dirt. A few hammer sledges later, voila! An Ammonite appeared in one of my rocks. They told me I hit a fossil rich vein. Beginner’s luck, I say. Ammonites are 65 million years old and resemble a Nautilus in today’s day and age. They grow in a spiral shape and lived under the sea. We identified where to dig based on looking for white calcite in the darker grey rock. My hot vein was close to a red iron ore line within the grey rock and proved to be littered with sea life. We discovered many clam and mussel shells as well as ammonites of all shapes and sizes. Adam also pulled out a Baculite (a tubular animal related to the Ammonite but looking more like a snake) which added to our jackpot day. Unfortunately that rock weighed about 10 lbs because we had to keep both sides (the fossil and the cast).

This past weekend we had the chance to search for fossils in a sandstone quarry near Florissant, CO and Fossil Bed National Monument. Located on private land (which is a good thing because you cannot dig on nationally protected monuments) the family simply mines section of their sandstone walls for individuals to come out and fossil hunt. They have found many leaves, plant life and even a bird in this location. So, we loaded up our bucket and gear and prepared for a heavy day of rock lifting. We arrived at the gate met by two teenagers who directed us to the site. The girl gave us a razor blade, butter knife and a putty knife and set us off to work. That’s it? What about my hammer and my bucket? I thought I was going to get to dig out my slice of sandstone, but instead there were piles of it lying on the ground from which to pick. She showed us how to scrape off the layers of sandstone very carefully to reveal potential fossils. So we picked up the largest sandstone blocks we could find (as recommended by our friends at the last fossil hunt) and sat down at a table to split them open. First tap, slice, open sesame! I found a leaf in a huge piece of sandstone! Beginner’s luck, again? Maybe not. Maybe I have the skill or possibly a new career?

We tapped and scraped away until we had a nice stack of leaves, one flower, a piece of wood and some weeds fossilized in sandstone. I elected to stick with splitting open a large piece at a time instead picking away at tiny corners of stone. There was a better chance of finding a whole leaf rather than bits and pieces. After two hours of tedious work we cut our losses at not finding a fish or a bird, and piled up our stack of stone to go on our way. I don’t think I have the patience to make fossil hunting a true career, but it sure is a fun activity for the day! For anyone with kids, I highly recommend joining a rock club or even simply picking up a book on rock hounding in your area (it usually includes fossil sites too). It’s a great, mostly free activity for the whole family. And if you have the choice, I recommend digging in sandstone rather than limestone or shale. It is lighter and easier to pick up and carry home.

Things are looking up

Finally, something seemed to go right in our mountain of tasks requiring achievement in order to make our trip possible. All the ramp makers said it could not be done, but somehow, with lots of brainpower, we were able to figure out a way to install our rear-door entry wheelchair ramp over our stow-and-go van seats. And it’s awesome! I never thought I’d get so excited over a ramp.

Our Dilemma: Wheelchair ramps are meant to be bolted to the car frame and not over stow-and-go seats. Previously there was a wheelchair ramp product produced that fit into a trailer hitch and rested on the outside of a van. This allowed for easy installation and disassembly and more space in the vehicle for cargo, but it did not protect the ramp from the elements. The second problem…this ramp is no longer made. After an exhaustive search we were unable to find this product anywhere. We spoke to a welder who told us converting it into a trailer-hitch application would be a simple modification (of course if you are a welder, but not for anyone else!) if we purchased a pre-built ramp first. Therefore we planned to purchase a pre-made, spring-loaded wheelchair ramp and transform it into a trailer hitch compatible unit it once the wheelchair arrived. When that time came, we had the ramp and returned to the welder, but he was too busy to help us in our short timeframe. This pushed us to seek out four more fabricators and the last was finally able to help us.

The Solution: It took some work, but this guy came up with an elegant solution. He manufactured a steel plate for us that would rest on top of our stowed seats securely and allow us to bolt the ramp down onto it and disallowing the base from flying forward or flipping up when lowering and folding up the wheelchair ramp. This was a breath of fresh air. It’s funny, his company actually produces western entertainment shows. I saw him riding in a toy train and working on a stage coach one day too. I’m not sure where the steel manufacturing business came into play. The knowledge must be necessary in the field of western entertainment!

I know most of you never considered installing a ramp inside your cars, but when it’s necessary, it’s a huge deal and a fiasco getting it right. I’m thrilled that this dilemma is solved and is actually usable.

The Real South Park

Many of you only know South Park as an adult cartoon and may not know that it is a real place (kind of like how I didn’t know Coney Island was a real place and not just a hot dog stand in the mountains, but that’s what I get for growing up in Colorado all my life!). This past weekend we had the chance to stay in South Park, CO with our friends. It is literally a vast, flat area, a mountain park sitting between mountain ranges. It’s ideal ranch land. The one similarity it does have to the cartoon is the remoteness from other towns. Fairplay is nearby, but it has maybe one grocery store and a post office. About a 1 ½ hour drive from Denver, we set out to find our friends’ land. Locating land is different from locating a house. And, in South Park there are not a lot of landmarks. With directions to look for things like a canoe sticking out of a windmill, a fake buffalo on the side of the road, and a Twinkie on the hill, we could only hope we would be able to find the correct piece of land before dark.

So, we set out on our treasure hunt determined to reach our destination. The last stretch of the road was the most difficult and rugged. It was 12 miles of dirt, washboard roads. For those of you who have never experiences washboard roads, they are like being a piece of fabric dragged like laundry across a century-old washboard. There is no rest from the evenly spaced ripples and bumps. To this day I still have not figured out how the washboard roads are actually created, but I do know they are a big pain on which to drive. They are an anomaly in the non-paved road world and wreak havoc on your vehicle. The bigger the vehicle the more distinctly you feel the bumps.

We approached the road initially going too fast at 20 mph (the speed limit was 45). After hitting one too many ruts we finally slowed down to 5 mph inching down this terrain at a snail’s pace. Short of stopping this speed was the only way we could feel confident that our rig would not shake apart and break everything in the RV. Just as we reached the last turn to our destination I experienced my heart jump into my throat. I thought we had cleared the left turn when I felt the back right tire sink down into the drainage ditch on the side of the road and the front driver’s side rise up into the air. The RV felt as if it was leaning and the right side heading towards the ground. It happened in slow motion. I was sure we were going to tip over . I slammed on the gas hoping to have enough momentum to pull the rig out of the ditch. Miraculously, the front end descended back to earth and the back rose up from the depths of drainage. Breathe. I was shaking so hard that I had to stop and regain my composure before heading down the road. I didn’t see that one coming. It was as if the earth opened up and sucked my back tire down into it. That was one driving incident I hope never to repeat.

The more I drove on these back roads, the more I discovered that they were as soft as a sandy beach and even a minor slope could make me feel like we were going to topple over. So, in hindsight my spatial judgment was not wrong and I didn’t actually fall into the ditch. The slight incline near the edge made me feel like we were tipping, but in fact, we were still on the road. Live and learn. But, for now, I’ll stick to the middle of the roads on which I travel!

Trash - 10/3/10

It becomes very apparent how much trash we generate from all our purchases of food and other products when you have to collect it in your home and carry it with you until you find a dumpster in which to unload it. We have been pretty good about throwing out our trash daily, but our recent trip to Denver provided us the opportunity to re-provision and thus to shop.


Our first stop was Costco which entailed stocking up on Splenda, granola bars, and medicines. We picked up soda pop from the grocery store and lots of cereal. Each of these items came in cardboard packaging that required collapse before throwing away. The worst offenders of excess packaging are the medicine companies. The packages from Costco were twice as big as the medicine bottles themselves. We elected to remove as much cardboard outer packaging as possible and combine our lot into plastic bags. I’m not sure this is so much better for the environment, but it certainly fit more easily in our storage bins.

I am amazed by how much trash we can collect even in one day. Does anyone have suggestions on how to reduce it? I’m thinking of simply purchasing fresh produce from now on and then I’ll just be stuck with the plastic bags. Then again, that would involve me cooking every day. I don’t think that is realistic.

End of an Era - 9/18/10

Regrouping in Denver for Yom Kippur and my niece’s baby naming was a pleasant surprise but came with unexpected feelings. With the arrival of a few out of town family members, we had the chance to see the family and many friends all in three days. Packed with meals of heavy food and feelings of nostalgia we left with full stomachs and fond memories. It was nice to see everyone again, but I didn’t expect to feel sad on such a joyous occasion.

When we started this journey two months ago I was excited to see the country and was so preoccupied with trying to live in this mobile house that I didn’t allow myself to feel the sense of loss of leaving this place. We planned to travel through Colorado this summer, and I always knew that we would be back to Denver this week. I unconsciously deferred my feelings until now. Now that the time is here I feel conflicted between being happy to continue our adventure and sad to leave the place I have always called home. Though my physical home is on wheels and my sense of home is wherever I am with Adam (and Sequoia), the place I will always call home is here in Denver with close family and friends; the people who have known me since I was a child and know me best.

Somehow it is different moving away this time. Our previous moves were temporary; each one precipitated by educational reasons. I felt like we always had the choice to settle back here if we wanted. And we did make that choice to come back but are now forced to make a different one due to medical needs. Knowing how difficult this move has been on us mentally and physically I can not anticipate doing it again to return. Thus, this choice feels final. The heavy burden and weight of this responsibility fell mainly on my shoulders due to Adam’s physical limitations making it unfathomable to think about moving long distance again given how tired I am this time. It is also virtually impossible for Adam to travel by plane anymore with the oxygen needs. So, unless we choose to drive back (which does not seem likely without our house on wheels which we plan to sell at the end of this journey), he will most likely not have a chance to return to Colorado. This somehow adds to the finality of this move.

We will miss everyone from and everything about Denver and can only hope for a smooth transition to the new place we will eventually call home. I hope you each remember us kindly and come visit us often wherever we may land. We love you all and thank you for supporting us through the years.

Kids Hold the Keys

During my past travels to foreign countries I discovered a community’s secrets are often best revealed by their children. They project naïveté, offer brutal honesty and are a wealth of information. Blissfully unaware of their actions, they return our inquiries with thoughtful questions about our personal reasoning forcing us to reevaluate our culture while concurrently discovering their own.


Bordering the Navajo Indian Reservation, Page, AZ has a population of close to 2000 people. You can drive a loop around the town in five minutes and children of all ages often walk the streets alone, apparently without fear of being taken like kids in a larger city. Their main industry pertains to the energy and water distribution from the Glen Canyon Dam and tourism at Lake Powell. Other than that there was not much going on here. I heard whispers from locals about how hard it was to find jobs in the area. The town supports a Walmart and several fast-food restaurants which employ locals, and the Navajo are given preferential treatment for available jobs at the coal power plant built on their reservation land. But, it still seemed too small to support the number of individuals looking for work.

I sensed an interesting dynamic between the Navajo and the White folks living among them. This was clearly the Navajo’s land and had been for hundreds of years since the US government awarded them their ancestral homelands as their reservation (though they share small pockets of it with other tribes). There was an obvious cultural separation between the Whites and the Navajo, yet they appeared to co-exist respectfully.

While golfing one day I met a couple of ninth grade boys. They were practicing for their school’s golf team and took the time to give me a few pointers on my swing. Something led me to believe that they were not Native Americans. As we chatted I learned more about the Navajos. I asked the boys about the roaming dog populations that I consistently noticed on each reservation. First, according to them, I needed to understand that the Navajo believe that the strength of the dog’s fight reflects upon the family who owns it. In other words, the meaner the dog is, the stronger the family. Of course, I do not know if this interpretation is accurate, but if it is true, then the information connected another piece of the puzzle for me. It explained why, while shopping with Sequoia one day at Walmart, a young boy around the age of four had asked me whether Sequoia was mean. He also questioned whether I just tell him to bite people when I want him to bite. I thought this was a strange view on dogs and felt very sad for this child who obviously had a bad experience with them. It was possible that in his mind a fighting dog was not a negative thing but a reflection of a family’s power and pride. This perspective was definitely opposite from my perception of my fluffy, cuddly, black mop, licker of a dog who could be considered only vicious to a lollypop.

There was no animosity in the boys’ voices, and no racism or degradation expressed, yet they conveyed an outsider’s view of the Navajo culture keeping them worlds apart from one another. Kids are still kids, and if there were tensions between the communities and if their parents held contempt for the Navajo, then I would have heard it in the way they spoke about them. It is reassuring to see that the inhabitants of this small town can each keep their strong cultural ties and cohabitate among one another peacefully. This experience simply reminded me that children are the keys to unlock the untold secrets of a culture.