If the Trailer's rocking don't come knocking!

“Live, travel, adventure, bless, and don't be sorry.” ~ Jack Kerouac

We've been sitting here in the Cottonwood Springs BLM lands just south of Joshua Tree National Park for the last three days. It's not a place whose beauty can easily be seen in a photo. It's dusty, beige, sandy and scrub brush, on a slightly slanted plateau surrounded by desert mountains. The landscape is vast.

Standing outside during the day, you can see for miles and miles. At night, the sky goes on forever, dark and clear, covered by a gazillion stars. The only signs of civilization we can see are the tiny dots of cars and trucks along Interstate Hwy 10 far down below.

Our days are spent working in the trailer, with all the windows open letting in the light and fresh air and the sweeping views. With temperatures in the late 80's and early 90's, and little relative humidity, there is no need for air conditioning. As long as we have shade we're great, especially with the awesome breeze floating through here.

The original plan was get up early, go hiking, come back and work, hike some more in the afternoon, and sit out to view the stars at night. But it hasn't really worked out for us that way. It's the downside of trying to mesh working and travelling with a timetable.

Reading other people's blogs, the picture I get of the best way to do this is fulltime - leave the home and family behind and just hit the road permanently - or at least longer times away with more time in less

 places. If we were spending a month or more in an area, we'd have a lot of off-time to really explore each area. We're working up to that. It just takes time to get my daughter used to the idea of living on her own.

Our present plan is based on a shaky premise - that we can get our work done within specific hours and have the rest of the time dedicated to experiences. It works well a lot of the time, but then one or the other gets hit with some project that needs more time and we're dead in the water. That's what has hit us all this week. Either Harold or I have had to spend more time working, and it's not been on the same days, so we haven't been able to get out much to see the place.

We got here in the afternoon Sunday and wandered around the BLM lands here and spent the evening looking up at the stars in awe. Monday was mostly a wash. Work took up the whole day for both of us and we didn't get a break until after sunset, so we spent our downtime driving into Indio to get groceries at Costco and Walmart.

Tuesday we got up and were out of the trailer at sunrise, all ready to go into the park, hike some of the trails at the southern part of Joshua Tree, then come back and work. Hopefully we'd be able to do it all again later that afternoon.

The roads were deserted since it was so early. Hoping to pick up maps at the Visitor Center, we found, not surprisingly, it wasn't open until 9am so we had to go by the big posted map and what a disappointment! The area we'd wanted to hike was all closed up:

Due to a heavy flash flood in 2011 and again in 2013, tailings from 

historic mining were churned up, exposing heavy metals that are a 

health and safety issue to people.

So all the hiking trails that are open, are up in the north end of the park, about 30-45 miles away. We went for a drive up there, enjoying the views but there was roadwork that slowed us down at 3 different locations, making us wait, and by the time we got up there, there was no way we could also fit in a hike.

Alright, take 2: We'll take off work about 3, drive up to the north end and do a couple of the hikes until dark. It was a great idea, but my work interfered this time, and I was busy until bed time. Then the winds whipped up and were pushing our poor little trailer this way and that. I thought we were going to be picked up and thrown around in the air like in the Wizard of Oz.

I decided to check the weather forecasts to put my mind at ease and instead found a "Severe Wind Advisory" warning of heavy winds in the area until 4am. Great, it was only 2am so I had 2 hours to worry about being tipped over, to roll and roll all the way down the incline. I just knew I'd never fall back asleep.

Four hours later I woke, surprised. I had indeed managed to fall sleep. But while the wind advisory was now gone, the wind was still whipping us around. Stupid wind advisory! I didn't really want to leave the dogs alone in the trailer and then Harold started getting early calls and email, so hiking was off again.

I sound like I'm complaining, and maybe I am, but it doesn't mean we're not loving every bit of it. We may not get out to see everywhere we are, but sometimes just having a different landscape to look out on, is enough.

Instead of walking out on my back porch seeing big beautiful evergreen trees and a lush green lawn, all wet with the recent rainfall, we wander out to see this huge, vast, spawling desert. Instead of walks around the neighbourhood, we walk out into the desert.

I feel like we're so alone, so small, in a space that goes on forever. I love this place, like I loved the place we were the other day and places from days before that, like I also love it back home. I love what we have at this very moment. The wind crashing into us, whistling through the windows, the trailer rocking, the dogs curled up beside me on the couch. In a few moments, we'll take a break to take the dogs out and play for a bit. In our temporary yard that stretches to the sky.