Gadget’s Airstream Chronicles

Friday night before going to sleep I took my ZipDee awning down.  The winds here can really kick up, and they were starting in.  Best advice on a windy day?  Take your multi-thousand dollar awning in.

It’s a good plan, and I strongly suggest it in windy spots.

Unfortunately, something occurred.  One of the hooks that holds the awning together shattered when I closed the awning.  I’ve always known the arm was too tight against another arm when closing, and the pressure of 4 years of being over tight finally won out over the piece of metal.

Looks like I’ll be calling ZipDee next week to see how to permanently repair it.

I was a little concnerned about the return trip home.  The arm won’t stay in position, so I devised several ways to deal with it.  None were to my satisfaction, so I sat out in the sand for a little while looking for the other piece of the arm.  After 10 minutes of searching I finally found the hook piece more than 30 ft away.  I broke out some super glue and duct tape and went to work.

The temporary patch worked so well that I could actually put the awning up!  Hooray for duct tape!!!!

While doing my work, Bill sat outside his trailer and connected up to my wireless network to do his first posting from the field.  See, Bill & Larry are new to Mac, so we’ve been doing a little tutoring here and there.

After all the morning fun was done (Zip Dee repairs and IPhoto instruction) we looked into cancellations in the park.  And guess what?  There were cancellations!  So we decided not to head out into the desert to find a random spot.  It’s so nice here at Anza-Borrego, why move?  Plus staying allows for another easier try at finding Big Horn Sheep.

Once we knew we weren’t moving I stopped packing and reorganizing.  Instead we headed out to Font’s Point to get a view of the Badlands from above.  It was a fun ride out, off road, with super light sand.  4 wheel drive was necessary, and if you took a regular car out I think you’d have trouble.

The ride out was fun.  Several Jeeps were playing “off road” adventure in front of me, driving in the super soft sand, going really slow and back and forth.  So I passed them (we all know how speedy I am).  I didn’t feel like playing “off road”, I wanted to see a cool view.

Unfortunately, the smog from LA rolled in late morning.  I’m not kidding, the air became thick, and I didn’t feel super.  You could see the stuff rolling over the mountains, spilling into the valley below.  And that smog really took away from our views of the Badlands.

We wrapped up early, and headed back to the Airstream.  A light lunch, and then a trip to Ghost Mountain was next on schedule!

Hitting the Airstream I felt super lazy about cooking.  So I broke out the Tofu Patties and Tater Tots.  Anime was put on, and the winds were picking up ever so slightly.  Hmmmmm……wind in the desert, who would have thought?

Sadira was interested in heading by the local outfitter.  It’s been super sunny, and super hot during the day, and she was determined to find a hat and one of the UV proof shirts like the one I’m always wearing.  So we popped over after lunch, and she found a few good deals.  Glad she did, as our hike up Ghost Mountain was much longer, and would have us exposed to the sun for quite a while.

After the little shopping spree we rolled back to the Airstream to pick up Bill.  He was very interested in a return trip to Ghost Mountain, and revisiting the Marshall South home.  He’s read up on the history of the family that lived atop Ghost Mountain for 16 years (before the Mrs. of the household had enough and walked out with her kids in tow).

I too became familiar with the family’s story last year, but that wasn’t why I was heading over there.  For me it was a fun hike with an interesting destination.  More walking time, neat views, etc.  The family’s story has never been my primary draw to the site.  As a matter of fact, if I were picking a remote spot to build my home, I’d pick a site with fewer rocks where I could grow food, a ready water source, etc.  A desert mountain top just doesn’t sound like the right place to try and go it alone……at least not for me.  I have the feeling that might be part of why Mrs. South finally left!

The drive out takes about 45 minutes from A-B.  The hike in well under an hour.  Super fun getting atop the mountain.  And it wasn’t hot.  The winds were kicking up!

By the time we reached the summit the winds were really cranking up!  We got to the former South home site and I hid behind some rocks and ate beef jerky.  Bill wandered off to take pictures, and Sadira wandered around talking about the people who lived up top.  “If my husband made me live on top of this mountain and lug supplies up over a mile, I’d leave him too!”

Well put!  They didn’t even have a driveway!!!  No thanks.  Pretty spot to visit, poorly chosen home site.  There’s my 2 cents. 

I finally rose from my munching and started looking around for interesting photos.  The water cistern?  The remains of the adobe walls?  A few used up cans here and there around the edge of the site?  Yup, got them all.

Oh, and of course the spring bed that had been lugged up the mountain, but never removed……

If you want to know more about the experiment of desert living, check out Bert’s Blog and Bill’s Blog.  They’ll fill in the big details, and give you links to other places that talk about the Souths.

Once we finally determined to head back down we realized how windy it truly was.  The winds blasted us as we hiked down the mountain side.  I kept one hand on my hat at all times.  It was bad.  The plus though was that we kept cool the entire walk.  I can only imagine what hiking the PCT must be like, as it passes through the same range (and we drove across it).  I bet it would be an interesting hike to say the least.

We reached the truck safely, and returned to Borrego Springs before dinner time.  As we approached our campsites I was thrilled that we decided to put the Zip Dee away before leaving.  Winds were easily 60 mph gusts.  I had a tough time controlling the truck when the winds came at it from the side.  Quite the wind storm, and it lasted into the night.  Wind howling outside an Airstream……doesn’t quite soothe you to sleep, but ah well

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 2nd, 2008 at 8:34 am and is filed under Notes from Gadget, On the road, airstream.You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.