Category: On the Road

3 min read

Day 23: Jerome and Tuzigoot

Jenn

3 min read

4187 views

3 min read

Please bear with me as I catch up on our blog by posting a few posts a day. I want to share our journey with you and I want to…

Please bear with me as I catch up on our blog by posting a few posts a day. I want to share our journey with you and I want to have a day by day account to give to the boys so they can remember this adventure. We just spent 10 days in Austin with my best friend. I typically write at night or in the morning but since I rarely get to be with her I spent every free moment I could hanging out and creating memories.

__________________________________________________________________

Jerome, an old mining town, is nestled high atop Cleopatra Hill in Arizona’s Verde Valley. In 1900s, Jerome was a boom town. Copper had been discovered and thousands flooded to Jerome their hearts filled with ambition. Some even referred to Jerome as the “wickedest town in the west”. If only those crumbling walls could talk. Jerome’s population reached it’s peak of 15,000 during the 1920’s but every good party comes to an end and in 1953 the mines closed. Not long after, Jerome was declared a ghost town with a population of around 50 people. Leave it to the artists to rediscover the beauty of Jerome during the 1960s and 1970s. Today Jerome is a communtiy of about 500 people. Artists, artisans, writers, and families seek out Jerome for another kind of wealth. The streets are no longer filled with miners in search of an improved life but tourists walk up and down the hilly streets reflecting on a different era.

We wandered around the worn streets and down a slope to the front face of an old building that sat precariously on the mountain. The walls had long ago crumbled but the facade arched proudly to the sky. We noticed a sign for glass blowing demonstrations. “Glass blowing demonstrations from 12-ish to 5-ish” We headed in and much to the boy’s delight a man with long grey hair tucked under a red bandana was giving a glass blowing demonstrtation. He spun, shaped, and colored the molten mass until he had a tear drop shaped stem that shimmered in the light that poured through the large windows.

The Jerome Historical Society’s Mine Museum was well worth the $2 admission (children are free). The museum boasts many relics and exhibits that help bring the town’s history to life. Just down the hill is the Jerome State Historic Park. Unfortunately, it was closed. Thing 1 was really ticked because he wanted to see the Douglas Mansion. However, the Audrey Headframe Park was open right next door and the boys got to stand on glass above a 1,900′ shaft.

After Jerome we took a short drive to the Tuzigoot National Monument.

Tuzigoot is the remnant of an ancient pueblo built by the Singua around 1000 AD. The views are amazing and I imagine haven’t changed much since the Singua gazed across the valley. There is also a museum where you can look at artifacts and learn about the site’s excavation.

On our way home we passed a Goodwill. Brent stayed in the car while the boys and I puttered around the store. As I was going through a rack of jackets (I’m on a mission to find a myself a vintage peacoat.) a strange man approached me. After asking if I had found any treasures, he asked if I had dinner plans. Yes, with my husband but thank you. I guess. As I was telling Brent about the brief exchange (that he had watched through the window) Thing 1 piped up, “Why didn’t you say yes? You could have brought us back something.” That’s one way to look at it.

Love and Laughter,
Jenn

Share this:

7 Comments

1 min read

On the Road

Day 22: The Warmth of Freshly Laundered Towels

Jenn

1 min read

2901 views

3 Comments

1 min read

Today, we had plans but somehow the details of life devoured the time. At 3:30 pm, I still had laundry in the dryer and the sun was getting low. These…

Today, we had plans but somehow the details of life devoured the time. At 3:30 pm, I still had laundry in the dryer and the sun was getting low.

These sort of days frustrate me. Especially now that we are living on the road and there are towns to be explored and national monuments around the corner.

Yet, I’m learning these days are necessary. After all there is laundry to be done, a house to clean, and minds that need to rest.

While I shuffled through through domestic duties, the boys played with the kids they met yesterday.

Brent worked.

We lived.

Life almost felt normal. I was glad to have the company of an ex-drug addict while I did laundry. Her honesty and hope was as warm and inviting as the the scent of the freshly laundered towels.

Love and Laughter,
Jenn

Share this:

3 Comments

2 min read

On the Road Uncategorized

Day 21: Porcupines and Passion

Jenn

2 min read

4590 views

6 Comments

2 min read

‎”When I got into hunting porcupines, I knew everything there was to know about porcupines. I was passionate.” – Tom from the campground chapel service We set up camp at…

‎”When I got into hunting porcupines, I knew everything there was to know about porcupines. I was passionate.” – Tom from the campground chapel service

We set up camp at Thousand Trails Verde Valley last night. Will we ever get in before dark? While we were driving around blindly looking for a space, I spotted a group of javelinas. Meow Cow must have spotted them too because he got all funky on us, hissing and growling. That ferocious feline.

It was a cloudy wet morning. After a lingering breakfast, went to the campground chapel service which was really more of a “Bible study”. Travelers of all ages and walks, sharing their opinion on God and the Bible. The topic was “passion vs. duty”. Tom was my favorite. He told of of his passion for porcupine hunting and searching for gold. How he threw himself into researching and pursuing his hobbies with commitment and passion. His wish was to pursue God with the same passion. While clearly simplistic and odd, there was something sweet and touching about his honesty.

Personally, I don’t see passion and duty as mutually exclusive nor do I see one as better than the other. (Although passion is most certainly more fun.) They work together. Duty picks up when passion falters. I experience this again and again. Take fitness, for example. Sometimes I workout because I crave the feeling of strength found through the cold iron of kettlebells, sweat, and time alone for my mind to wander. Other times, I do it because it’s what I do, like flossing my teeth. The same goes for marriage, parenting, writing, and my faith. I try to cultivate and feed passion but try not to shun duty. Mostly though, I try not to over think it too much because that makes me crazy and I have enough of that for 5 people already.

Anyway, I sat quietly the entire chapel taking it in and stumbling over the hymns. I didn’t grow up singing hymns.

After two days of driving, we decided to rest the remainder of the day. The boys met another fulltime RVing family and played with those kids the rest of the day.

I sat at the window and watched the desert landscape. I’m a little sad and worried. After the broken refrigerator and new tires, I’m starting to wonder if we should have saved up like we intended before we left. Certainly, that would have been the dutiful thing to do. However, passion took over and we took off, trusting that God will provide. Clearly, I’m as simplistic as Tom. Maybe, I should take up porcupine hunting.

Love and Laughter,
Jenn

Share this:

6 Comments

2 min read

On the Road

So Much for Kicks on Route 66

Jenn

2 min read

5271 views

6 Comments

2 min read

I like this quiet little campground nestled out here in the middle of nowhere Fort Mohave. It’s not much more than a parking lot in a desert but you can…

I like this quiet little campground nestled out here in the middle of ~~nowhere~~ Fort Mohave. It’s not much more than a parking lot in a desert but you can see the mountains in the distance, it’s clean, and there is a little random cactus garden between the office and the parking lot. This morning, I saw a roadrunner dart through the garden.

After a breakfast, we took the RV back to the tire shop. As it turns out there is nothing wrong with the mechanics of the axel and suspension the tires are just delaminating. Unfortunately duck tape won’t fix this problem. The numbers are running through my head. Once again as “luck” would have it, I had the exact amount in my paypal account from selling stuff on ebay before we left. I guess I won’t be getting that new camera lens afterall. Something about this trip is makes me feel like a college student scraping together money to buy a pizza.

We while we were getting the tires put on we drove over to Nevada and filmed a workout for Girl Heroes in the rain. Shortly, after lunch we were back on the road shortly after lunch. Not without a stop at the Goodwill in Laughlin where I found an adorable Marc Jacobs dress for $5 and a peacoat for Brent.

Back on the road.

Hours later we stopped at, Seligman, a town on Route 66. We had heard there were cars painted like the cars in the movie Cars. (What a sentence.) We exited the freeway and drove down the nearly deserted street to Delgadillo’s. It was closed. In fact, almost the entire town was closed despite it being 4:30 pm on a Saturday. We got out and walked a bit and I had this eeery feeling come over me. It was similiar to the feeling I got when I “met” Miss Havisham in Great Expectations. The town seemed to be suspended in time, waiting for something that was never going to come. Everything looked fun but frozen like a painted smile on a clown. Bright colored signs advertising “Route 66” were on every delapitated building. A group of mannequins posed happily on a roof overlooking the empty street was about as much as I could take so we headed back to the car.

So much for getting our kicks on Route 66.

Love and Laugher,
Jenn

Share this:

6 Comments

2 min read

On the Road

Day 19 : Pit Stop

Jenn

2 min read

5232 views

1 Comment

2 min read

Driving days are my favorite. The endless black snake of pavement makes me feel like each cell of my body has a breath of it’s own. While on the…

Driving days are my favorite. The endless black snake of pavement makes me feel like each cell of my body has a breath of it’s own.

While on the road my mind wonders. Sometimes I wonder if I’m running from something. I search every nook and cranny of my mind and heart looking for the thing that draws me to the open road. If there is something, I’ve yet to find anything except the love of adventure that is around every corner or behind each mountain.

Today we didn’t get far in our exploration when we noticed at a rest stop that our two back tires on the right side of our rv were rubbing together. A few days ago I mentioned to Brent I smelled burning rubber but he didn’t hear me and when the smell dissapated I passed it off as “the brakes”. Have I mentioned we are newbies?

The rest stop was still a good two hours from the nearest town. Brent contemplated fixing the tires himself but we decided for the safety of our family to take it to a shop. Only problem was the nearest shop was a hundred miles away and the afternoon was slipping away behind the mountains. I began making phone calls and found the closest tire shop in Fort Mojave. I told the woman we should be there by 4:30 just before the shop closed at 5 pm.

Wrong.

Arizona doesn’t observe daylight savings time. When I called her to let her know we were just around the corner she said they had closed. Awesome.

I must have sounded ~~pathetic~~ desperate because she said one of the guys could take a quick look at it. Unfortunately, it looked as if a bolt had been “sheared” and a leaf spring needed to be replaced. They said they could take a better look at it in the morning.

As luck would have it, a campground in our RPI network was just two blocks away. Literally. Full hookups for $11. Living in luxury in Fort Mohave.

We set up camp and I set to “work” worrying about how much tomorrow morning’s repair was going to cost.

Love and Laughter,
Jenn

Share this:

1 Comment

2 min read

On the Road

Day 18: Goodbye Yosemite

Jenn

2 min read

2047 views

No Comments

2 min read

I could see my breath as I lay in bed this morning. It was even cold for Meow Cow. He regularly sleeps on our feet but last night I pulled…

I could see my breath as I lay in bed this morning.

It was even cold for Meow Cow. He regularly sleeps on our feet but last night I pulled him under the covers. At first he stiffened, “I think not, human.” but the warmth outweighed his ego and he cuddled beside me resting his little head on the pillow next to mine. I love that cat.

We are getting better at packing up to leave. Last week when we left Morgan Hill we didn’t pull out until after check out. Today, we made check out time by a few minutes. 😉

Slowly, we wound down the mountain roads leaving Yosemite behind. We drove through a small town called Chinese Camp. This was literally a “blink and you’ll miss it” sized town. I saw a solitary white church on top of a hill next to a cemetery filled with above the ground tombs. I wondered who was burried there and how their lives led them to be buried in the small town of Chinese Camp.

We turned left down a old bumpy road called “Red Hills Road”. I may or may not have failed as navigator again. Good thing I’m not getting paid for this. However, sometimes mistakes are really blessings in disguise. I don’t know if I have ever been on a road as lovely as Red Hills Road.

Oak trees, horses, hills, boulders all placed like art on the hillsides. The sort of road that you think of in storybooks. It was only 4 miles long but I could have driven it for four days.

We scarcely saw a car except for a lone UPS truck. Modern day cowboy.

In the evening, we stopped to visit Brent’s aunt for dinner.

We enjoyed our visit very much and the boys especially enjoyed relaxing with the dogs. Have you ever seen a dog sleep like that???

Finally, we stopped for the night at Walmart in Bakersfield.

I’m a little sad. It’s hard being so close yet so far from home.

Love and Laughter,
Jenn

Share this:

No Comments

1 min read

National Parks On the Road

Day 17: Snow!!!

Jenn

1 min read

3135 views

4 Comments

1 min read

Some days are simple. I really like the simple days. Days when we get up, have breakfast, and I do school with the boys while Brent “goes” to work. Then…

Some days are simple. I really like the simple days.

Days when we get up, have breakfast, and I do school with the boys while Brent “goes” to work. Then when afternoon comes, we go for a bike ride, a walk, or some other simple adventure.

Today was one of those days. After our morning routine we loaded up in the truck and headed back to Yosemite to say goodbye to Half Dome and film my first workout. I’m trying to film a workout in every state for my health blog, Girl Heroes. While in Yosemite, the boys decided to play in the snow since we had just bought them ~~overpriced~~ new gloves from the camp store. I’lll never understand, how we took off forgetting gloves when it was nearly winter. For goodness sakes, I packed a pair of fishnet stockings.

Then it was war!

After playing in the snow, we ran out of propane which meant no heat or stove. Go figure.

Luckily for us, I had bought some convenience food and we had a cozy meal of micorwaved lukewarm Indian fare before hitting the cooooold sheets.

Love and Laughter,
Jenn

Share this:

4 Comments

1 min read

National Parks On the Road outdoors

Day 16: Yosemite National Park

Jenn

1 min read

3192 views

2 Comments

1 min read

Majestic. Breathtaking. Awe inspring. Is there a way to describe the beauty of Yosemite National Park without sounding cliché? El Capitan reaching violently towards the sky. Half Dome ,austere, keeping…

Majestic. Breathtaking. Awe inspring.

Is there a way to describe the beauty of Yosemite National Park without sounding cliché? El Capitan reaching violently towards the sky. Half Dome ,austere, keeping watch over the valley. Bridal Veil Falls unapologetically crashing through the forest.

Today, we enjoyed Yosemite National Park. We stopped at vistas, hiked up to Bridal Veil Falls, explored bridges, went on a ranger walk, observed mule deer, and watched Half Dome glow bright orange at sunset as the moon rose behind his stoic face. Magical.

Of course, for every moment of magic there is the pinch of reality. When we told the boys we were going on a ranger walk they protested. Thing 1 saying he “could learn all this on the internet.” Sigh. They ended up enjoying themselves (for the most part), learned a few things, and earned their Jr. Ranger badges.

So far the hardest part of our trip is accepting that we can’t see it all. I could spend a month exploring the wonders of Yosemite but the road calls, new adventures await, and there is work to be done. 🙂

Love and Laugher,
jenn

Share this:

2 Comments

1 min read

Family on the Road On the Road

Catch Up Day (Yosemite)

Jenn

1 min read

3933 views

6 Comments

1 min read

Today was a “catch up day”. Brent spend the entire day working at the lodge where there is internet. We lost our cell phone service yesterday coming up the mountain…

Today was a “catch up day”.

Brent spend the entire day working at the lodge where there is internet. We lost our cell phone service yesterday coming up the mountain right after we got a call from our tenants that the fridge broke. Oh lovely.

While Brent worked, the boys and I did school and laundry.

Thankfully, we have a security guard.

Gotta be “serious” when you are sitting on your “thrones”.

While the laundry was drying I “made” the boys walk 1/2 mile up a hill to the country store because I’m a “terrible” mother for wanting them to get exercise. Unfortunately, the store had closed 15 minutes earlier. Oooops. The 10 minutes that followed weren’t pretty. Good thing, no one was around or I might have just decided to hitch a ride. It’s also a good thing that I had my walkie-talking and could call ~~911~~ Brent.

Love and Laugher,
Jenn

Share this:

6 Comments

2 min read

Family on the Road On the Road

Great Noni

Jenn

2 min read

4065 views

5 Comments

2 min read

There is nothing like getting ready for church in the Wal-mart parking lot when it’s so cold you can see your breath. We are in Turlock, CA, to see Brent’s…

There is nothing like getting ready for church in the Wal-mart parking lot when it’s so cold you can see your breath.

We are in Turlock, CA, to see Brent’s “Noni”. We’ve been meaning to see her for years and had decided that this was one of the first things we would do.

We got ready and headed over to her retirment community where we took the shuttle bus to Turlock Covenant Church.

Today was one of those mornings where I felt God’s presence as sure as I felt my own pulse. Church isn’t always that way for me. Faith has always been somewhat difficult for me to embrace as I’m a bit of skeptic by nature but today I fought back tears as a deep peace settled into the crevices of my soul.

After church we spent the afternoon visiting with Noni.

The boys swept her porch.

Thing 1 played the piano for her.

I sat in her small apartment, not much bigger than our RV, looking at her things. Everything had a history, a story. I noticed picture upon picture of family and I thought about how grateful I am for mine. Dear family, I hope you know how much I love you.

Later, while Brent and the boys went move the RV closer to Great Noni’s apartment so she could see it, she and I spent a few minutes alone. She told me about her wedding and how her and sister had a double wedding. She told me about how she missed her husband. Being missionaries to Africa in the 1950s, they had their own set of adventures. I was reminded of the real reason behind our year on the road. Love. To say Brent still gives me butterflies is an understatement and going on this adventure with him…for lack of better words…is a dream come true.

Sappy, I know.