City of Rocks

June 12, 2014

Today we adventured out to a curious place called the City of Rocks State Park.  The drive had little to offer!  It felt like an hour of passing by the same stretch of dusty wallpaper, looping over and over.  We proceeded to navigate the sketchy process of managing the kid's expectations, all the while, lamenting the precious gasoline combusting in our engines.  Our fears, however, quickly dissipated as we turned a corner and looked down into a sight that did, indeed, look like a City of Rocks.  Have you ever driven a long stretch of flat and uneventful road and then marveled at a town suddenly appearing out of nowhere?  Little buildings all nestled up against one another for company?    That is what the City of Rocks looks like.  In this large expanse of desolate country, a surprising uprising of rock formations holding court. 

We parked the camper and made our way through the vast trails and climbed over and through the boulders.   After Tom gave each spot a thorough Rattlesnake check, we gave the kids a few pointers on how to avoid plummeting to their deaths and then we mostly let them run free.  It was SO hot, and before we knew it, Ivy was huddled in the fetal position in the shade of a rock declaring that she was dying.  Thankfully, the park offered Day Use for $5 and had electricity and water.  We popped the camper up, turned on the air conditioner and took a nap!  Well...Tom and I took the nap.  The kids just basked in the frosty artificial air and occasionally stepped on our faces.   After our nap, we took sprinkler showers to cool off and the girls finished our laundry.  By that time, the sun was dropping and there was significantly more shade, so we headed back to explore.  
We chased lizards.
We chased rabbits.
We chased shadows.
We had a sweet time.


 

 

 
 

 

As the sun started to set, we hit the road and crossed the Arizona border to the tune of an incredible full moon.  I miss the mountains of home, but the expansive horizon of Arizona is a nice trade.  The  sunset washed us with color in every direction.  We stopped in Duncan Arizona to visit my dad and eat his spaghetti!  A welcome change from our camper cooking!  I drank a cup of coffee with him at 4am before he had to head to the mines to work.  I wish we could stay longer to visit with him, but it just so happens that we have passed through his town at the wrong time.  He has 3 more days of 12 hour shifts ahead of him!  And here lies the downside of this unscripted adventure.  So far...the only one I can count.

Our Trip Summed Up: 

Days Remaining:  29

Miles Driven:  1,732

Currently in:  Duncan, AZ

Total Spending so far:    Gas:       $510.02 out $1,500 goal

                                                Sleep:  $10 out of a $500 goal

                                                Eat:        $146.08 out of a $600 goal

                                                Other:  $33 out of a $400 goal

                                                Grand Total:  $699.10 out of a $3,000 goal

 

Truth or Consequences

 

June 11th, 2014

 

 

Today was a catch up day.   After several days of mostly driving, we decided to sleep in and clean house.  The girls and I did the laundry at our campsite.  We took hot showers and watched little dust tornadoes race across the yard.  The highlight of today was definitely the lizards.   Olive was thrilled to catch one, but was absolutely beside herself when she realized that lizards were in abundance and ripe for the catching.  I lost count of how many she trapped and became friends with.  They went on walks, washed the dishes together, played in the park.  Somehow she always managed to convince them to perch on her finger while she showed them around.  We spend a good deal of the day just catching up with each other at our campground. 

 

 

 

Eventually we head out to put some miles behind us.  We opted to take some roads that were not the interstate, and were very glad we did!  We took the Turquoise Trail to Albuquerque and rambled past a sweet little artist colony, Madrid, tucked into a valley.

Here is a funny story!  Do you know why they call it Truth or Consequences, NM?  Well, originally I assumed it was just a really cool wild west name.  Then, after we nearly ran out of gas trying to get there, we believed maybe it just had something to do with the distance between gas stations!  However, after googling it, Isadly discovered that in the 1950s, a game show called “Truth or Consequences” promised to air its first show from the first town that actually changed their name to that.    Can you imagine?  Generations of people lived in Hot springs, NM and the mayor of the town in the 1950s changed the name after that of a game show.  Weird people. 

 After a long day’s drive, we pulled into another Walmart for an odd night’s rest.   Just a quiet day today.  Tomorrow we plan to visit an enticing place called “City of Rocks” in Faywood, NM.  I will let you know what we find there!

Our Trip Summed Up: 

Miles Driven:  1,732

Currently in:  Lake Conchas State Park, NM

Total Spending so far:    Gas:       $510.02 out $1,500 goal

                                                Sleep:  $10 out of a $500 goal

                                                Eat:        $129.08 out of a $600 goal

                                                Other:  $21 out of a $400 goal

                                                Grand Total:  $649.10 out of a $3,000 goal

Radiator Springs

June 10th

There is a big benefit of maxing our speed at 56mph.  The interstate holds no advantage with us!  We are frequently pulling over to follow Radiator Springs.  This is Ivy’s collective name for all of  historic Route 66.   It has been fun letting the kids see, first-hand, the inspiration behind the Disney movie, Cars.  We stopped for a few pictures, bought some snow cones  from a roadside stand in McClean, TX .  Here, in McClean, we met a local resident’s pet squirrel that delighted in doing back flips in a cage any time we came near!  We took  a chance visiting a roadside Zombie Garage, but they only accepted Brains for payment so we decided to move on.  

As we were driving down the road, we found a field full of windmills and watched as a crop duster “pooted” on the fields.  We had to pull over for that one.

 

 

We also found a small town  auto salvage joint and decided to see if they had a part for our camper sink.  Well…that was our story anyway.  Truly, we just wanted to get some pictures with some really awesome 1930s cars that were sitting out there!  Apparently…junk in New Mexico doesn’t rot like it does in Tennessee.  Something about how dry it is.  

 

 

 

As the sun went down, we made our way to our first paid campsite.  Lake Conchas State Park is a really beautiful and quiet place off the beaten path outside Tucumcari, NM.  The lakeside sites were only $10 and provided a beautiful sunset over the mesas.  Today was mostly a long day of driving, but I think we managed to make it an adventure for all of us. 

Survey Says:

What was your favorite part of today:

Tom:  Getting to see a 1930s Cigar truck.

Sara:  Watching a curious pet squirrel do back flips.

Ivy:  The crop duster

Olive: The squirrel in Texas and the frog she caught at our campsite.

Dizzy:  Watching the sun.

 

Our Trip Summed Up: 

Miles Driven:  1,299

Currently in:                        Lake Conchas State Park, NM

Total Spending so far:        Gas:       $403.52 out $1,500 goal

                                                Sleep:  $10 out of a $500 goal

                                                Eat:        $93.60 out of a $600 goal

                                                Other:  $17 out of a $400 goal

                                                Grand Total:  $524.12 out of a $3,000 goal

 Long story short….Looking forward to parking instead of driving…and we have to reign those food bills in!!! 

 

 

 

California or Bust

And we are off!  It is so awesome to finally be out on our next adventure. 
A family of five living out of this truck for the next 5 weeks. 
No Reservations.
No Absolute Destination.
No Planned Route.
No Planned Agenda.
No Regrets.

You heard that right.  We are on day two of this trip and I still don't know where we are going!  Our loose goal is to dip our toes into the Pacific Ocean.  A few preferences, however, have been voiced.

Tom wants to:  Surf under the Golden Gate Bridge.
Sara wants to:  Chill with my family without having to look at my watch.
Ivy wants to:  Go to Yellowstone
Olive wants to:  Touch a buffalo
Dizzy wants to:  Touch a buffalo like Olive

Looks like we will try to get to California...and we darn sure better stop at Yellowstone, huh?

We have a secondary goal as well.  We have challenged ourselves to make it all the way to the Pacific using only our tax return, $3,000.  Yeah...I know what you are thinking....that should be easy.  But there are a few things that make this quite challenging.  First...we decided to go all the way to California.  We could have picked anywhere...but we chose the furthest possible place in the continental US.  Secondly...we are driving the most inefficient thing possible across this distance; a pickup truck with a slide-in camper weighing it down.  We get 15 mpg and gas prices are $3.45 a gallon. And if that wasn't enough.....we are going for 35 days.  35 days of driving, eating and sleeping!   So who knows what will happen!?!  We might run out of money.  We might run out of gas.  We might break down.  Good news is that we have 5 weeks to figure it all out!   I hope.

Here is our new home!  You want to see inside, right?
.

 

You see....when I take 5 different pictures from 5 different angles....it actually looks pretty roomy!  Truth is that the entire thing fits into the bed of our pickup truck.  The "master bedroom" lives over the cab of the truck.  It is tiny...and exactly the right size!  I had to make a few renovations inside.  It was originally a brown wood grain with some hideous 1980s cushions.  I threw on a little paint, sewed some curtains and cushion covers and tossed in a few pillows.  Now it feels like home.  A super tiny mobile abode.  Like a snazzy snail.  That is what I am calling this rig.  The SNAIL.  Mostly because we poke down the interstate at snail-like pace (50-55 mph) with our house on our back.  This is the first roadtrip I have ever been on where I can be totally unconcerned with whether there is a state trooper lurking around the next bend. 

What does an unplanned trip look like?

Day One ( June 8th)
Pointed the truck West
Stepped on the gas pedal
Stopped when we got ancy....which happened to be in Hurricane Mills, the home of Loretta Lynn's Ranch, where there also happens to be a large shady Buffalo statue.  Do you think we can convince Olive that she can check "Touching a Buffalo" off her list ?

 

 We got hungry somewhere around Natchez State Park, so we stopped in to make lunch. 

 

 When we got tired, we pulled into the parking lot of  the Little Rock, Arkansas Walmart and went to sleep.  Did you know this?  Walmart likes to make money off of RVs, so they let them park there overnight without asking any questions!   It is a pretty sweet deal for a ragtag family that happens to be wearing their house on their back.  Free rent, level ground and 24 hour bathrooms.  The best part is that you wake up to a quirky little community of people who step out of their RVs, yawning and stretching their arms.  In the Walmart Parking Lot.  Yeah.  How have I, as a typical house abiding civilian, missed this?  38 years and I have never once noticed a retired person drinking their morning coffee in the Walmart Parking lot.  It is happening!

We eventually got back on the road and drove along till we spotted this playground from the interstate.  We picked up some more groceries and I made some grilled chicken for dinner in the camper while the family played outside. 

And now...we just keep pointing west.  That is the direction that helps us reach our collective goals.  Tom is driving.  I am typing this up as we soar down I-40 at 56 mph (Tom just informed me that is our magic number....the speed at which the RPMs and gas mileage is most efficient.  He has been watching...taking notes.)  So here is our summary of the day.

Miles Driven so far:  864
Currently in:  Oklahoma
Money Spent:  $359

Yuk!  That $359 is pretty discouraging!  But we have our fingers crossed that it gets better as we build our grocery pantry in the camper and can PARK instead of drive.  Cross your fingers with me?  We are having a sweet time and don't want to come home yet.

HILLTOP TEA PARTY

"Our moments of inspiration are not lost though we have no particular poem to show for them; for those experiences have left an indelible impression, and we are ever and anon reminded of them."

Henry David Thoreau

Sunday, November 24th
Iznik, Turkey

Such great friends!
This is one of the rare photographs from our trip that Kaan did not take!  He made us realize that we are going to have to invest in a real camera if we plan on taking these incredible trips!!!  

This was a gorgeous day in a beautiful historic town.   Iznik has been famous for creating gorgeous ceramic tiles for over 1000 years.  In fact,  we found Iznik tiles gracing the walls of 14^th century mosques and Turkish bath houses in Istanbul a little later in the week.  The leisurely trip to Iznik was a welcome change from our previous nights trip from Istanbul.  The country was charming and almost entirely lined with wispy olive trees.  All along the road we watched mostly women harvest the olives; heads covered, fingers gleaning, scaling ladders, shaking trees to catch the olives on strategically situated nets on the ground.  Later in the day we would watch them all head home, tucked in tight in the backs of trucks, holding their head coverings tight against the wind.

 Iznik still has its original stone and brick city walls around sections of its boundaries.  I was struck by the unfettered access to ramble around the ancient remains of the city.  In the states, we give every rock over 100 years old its own plaque and security guard.  We have immense pride and respect for our relatively little history.  In Turkey, however, the vast majority of its historical structures from the Byzantine and Ottoman empires are left to fend for themselves.  There is more history than they could ever begin to protect.   I love the history of things, so it was a conflicting experience to have that much access.  Even so,  I walked into its tiny rooms and quiet crevices and laid my hands and mind on every stone.   If you want to read more about this fine town, click HERE.  

Classic Iznik Pottery and Tile

The Tomb of Abdülvahap Sancaktari 

Perched high on a hillside,  the mosque and tomb of Abdülvahap Sancaktari overlooks the beauty of Iznik’s ancient walls and olive farms.   Yeliz’s mother had packed us a gorgeous lunch of stuffed grape leaves and Baklava and, as customary in this great place, it wasn’t long before someone emerged from the woodwork and offered us tea.

The tomb of Abdülvahap is a popular place to come for prayer.  It felt like such a gift to share that day with our friends.   Praying to God as we all understand Him.  Sharing a meal made by the most loving of hands.  The crack of the Turkish flag over our heads.  Overlooking centuries of landscape and stories.  I won’t forget that moment.  It is one of those moments you wish you could tuck into your pocket, so that you can pull it out when things don’t make sense.


 Do you have a moment like that?

This little guy crashed our tea party and we couldn't help but let him join us!