This is an entry from my Journal from last Fall. I'll post the "why" later, as I try to get caught up.   Ciao Ya'll.

JOURNAL 41

Wet Night

It's a drizzly night. Throughfall from the rain sounds like irregular bullets on the camper roof. There is a Barred Owl calling, back in the wet forest. I'm laying on my stomach, staring out into the forest. There's just enough light to make out the silver fallen trees and dark boulders. I keep half an eye on the boulders, just in case one moves, and turns to a bear. The air is chill and smells of cold, wet, dead leaves.

It all drags me back 60 years to east Texas and bedding down in a lean-to on a December night. It's been a long circuitous route through many countries and years. Strange to consider I've gone so far to have come to the same place. Strange I'm so much older and still 19.

Right now I'm glorying in the restful night woods and trying to turn different options over and over to reach some reasonable decisions. I love sleeping out like this; in my little cave. Unfortunately, this is still just regular camping. It's not full time living. The pieces just won't fit right, so I need to get a few possible options and try to fit them in.

I need more space for storage, or a small cheap home base, or a full size van or small camper. Now the Element won't pull (effectively) over 1500 pounds. If I get a camper of any size, I've got to get higher power, 4WD vehicle. So, I'd have to finance both the camper and vehicle. Even 10 years old, that's at least $10, 000. So, annually, with insurance and taxes, that about $3,600., and there goes 2/3 my monthly budget.

A cheap home base, even just a Studio apartment, costs about $500. in NY, or $300. down in WV, and I'd still have to come back after each trip, losing time and gas. It would provide a place where I could get mail and packages and people could visit. And a lot more comfortable. Just for storage, a small unit would do – but I couldn't shower or cook there. I might as well get a small cargo trailer and pull it around with me. New this would cost about $2,500. to $3,000., but used a lot less. Unfortunately most exceed the 1.500 lb. tow limit. Craig's List has a few for $800. - $1.000. but no telling the weight or real condition. I'd have to check out each possibility.

When the weather lets up I'll have a go at Lake Onteora again, or up at Sundown. That's a lot more remote, but right by the main road.

Later in the month I'll go down to Sleepy Hollow and visit the Headless Horseman, Raven Rock, and Spook Rock (Witch Hulda) sites. Since it's on the same site (Kykuit, Rockefeller Estate) stop and check out the stained glass windows by Matisse and Chagall Then cover Laurel Grove Cemetery, and Miss Fanny's Victorian Party House. On the way back try to stop at Bannerman Island Castle, if I am holding up OK.

This camping in the cold and rain is seen by different people in different ways. I like it,but someone ask me if it wasn't miserable. In good shelter and a warm sleeping bag? Miserable is sleeping under a piece of plastic at 12,000 feet in the Andes in a cloud forest. Two weeks of dripping rain and 50 degrees. Hike wet, then eat wet, then sleep wet, then … and so on. That's miserable!

Some years ago I got into a discussion with the kids about what was “luxury”. I said it was all relative, and recounted that years ago, when I was 18 I was hitchhiking through East Texas in November. A “Norther” blew through and it began to blow and rain. By the end of the first day I was soaked and there were no rides. I huddled under a bridge all night and tried to keep a little fire going. Lord! I thought I'd die!

In the morning I stayed down and hoped for relief. About noon the creek was rising and I heard at muted thud. Somebody had thrown, or lost, an empty refrigerator box and it rolled down by the bridge abutment. I dragged it under the bridge and wedged it in front of the abutment. By getting in the box and putting my fire in front of the wall, it was both shelter and protected the fire. This night I slept in the box.

Luxury!

Now, as much as I love looking out, the rain is getting harder. Time to shut the hatch and the moon roof. Hate to do it because then the interior sweats. I've got to rig a protected vent. But one that can be closed when it's colder. It can get pretty cold but with a Memory-foam pad and wool blanket under me, in a good sleeping bag, and under a Mylar “survival” sheet, I'm warm as toast.” I just have to figure out how to manage the trip to the pissoir.

My battery is running down and the owl is moving closer, time to switch to the Kindle, read a bit, and get to sleep.