mattmtbman
New member
We left on a Tuesday, at three o’clock only two weeks after my planed departure date. The truck isn’t any where close to where I wanted it and I had just recovered it from being stolen and missing for a week but it runs great and I put on new tires so everything else is just semantics. I spent the last week or so trying to get as much done on the truck that I could and thought was necessary to the success of my planned adventure.
For those of you unaware I have been saving money and prepping my truck with some expedition goodies for a 3 month long expedition, but I wouldn’t really call my trip an expedition per se more of a super extended car camping trip but as there is no forum for that here I am.
My plan was to travel the western United States and visit as many national parks along the way as I could. I had originally planed this trip with my friend Cody but he backed out about two months before we were supposed to leave. So with not much time left I started asking everyone I knew if they would be willing to travel for 4 months. I got a lot of interest but no one had either the money or the time. I had told my neighbor Todd that if he could scrounge up enough money he could come and I would pay for the rest of it. Good news was Todd got his money so I won’t be traveling alone.
We spent most of Tuesday packing our stuff and packing the truck we have a lot of stuff so it was a little like Tetris trying to fit everything into the camper and on to the roof racks. We finally got everything all packed up and I realized I had forgotten to get the key to the bike racks from my dad who was at work. I threw one of the bikes on top of all the gear in the camper and had to drive into the heart of San Diego during the beginning of rush hour. As we had left so late I decided we should camp close to San Diego so a quick drive and a stop at a grocery store later we were in a pay campsite in the Laguna Mountains. Since it was our first day we took almost everything out of the truck and set up an awesome campsite, but boy we do have a lot of stuff.
On our second day we drove up to Julian where we picked up a couple of PCT hikers who were trying to get down Banner grade. Their names were Birdman and Nak as in Nak-ed they were older gentlemen from Tennessee who were absolutely hilarious. As we drove down the road Birdman asked in a very thick Tennessee accent, ”Is one of them there Hummers?” I casually told him it was a Toyota but I secretly was busting up laughing to myself. We dropped them off at scissors crossing in the Anza Borrego Desert. Then we were off to Joshua Tree by way of Indio and Coachella. We got to Joshua Tree at about 5:30 in the afternoon so there was no one in the kiosk to take our money so we just drove in. We drove the main road from west to east and checked all of the campgrounds and there were zero open campsites. I decided that since we were heading to Big Bear the next day we should drive west to Johnson Valley to camp there. When we got to Johnson Valley we met a gentleman by the name of Bob, he had recently retired and had decided to buy a travel trailer and live in the desert with his motorcycles. When we first met Bob he seemed like a normal enough guy, but after an hour or so we started to notice some peculiarities about him. It turned out three weeks in the desert alone was too much for Bob and he was just really excited to see other people.
The Following day we broke down our camp and left Bob in the Desert and we drove up the hill to Big Bear Lake, where my aunt and uncle live. We went to the ranger station and I bought my National Park Pass. Then when we got back to the car we were going to go on a bike ride I opened the drivers rear door of the truck and bam my MacBook slipped off the seat and smashed on the ground the screen and track pad both cracked but somehow still functional. Needless to say after that happened I was furious. I cursed and yelled for a couple of minutes then I calmed down, called the repair shop to get a quote it was more than I wanted to pay so I will just deal with it for a while. The next day was opening day of mountain biking at Snow Summit so I took all of my frustrations and tried to beat that mountain up. We rode with my two younger cousins Reed and David, I rode with Reed and Todd rode with David. It rained and hailed a little bit and it cleared out the crowds and it turned into an awesome muddy riding day.
Saturday we finally leave California we made it about 15 miles into Arizona. We camped a little North-East of Lake Havasu in the middle of the Desert again. We stayed there only one night because we were getting tired of the desert. Then we headed east again towards the mountains, we camped in the Prescott National Forrest on Dosie Pit Road, we had found a large slab of concrete that we parked the truck on and set up our whole camp on nice clean concrete. The spot was so nice we stayed there two nights. This morning a truck with a lot of NRA stickers pulled up and two older gentlemen hopped out. There names were Tony and Cousin Lee, they told us that the concrete used to be a train station and it had been there for thirty plus years.
That just about covers our first week on the road, I though posting my first post from a Starbucks in Prescott about 5 miles from the Overland Journal HQ would be a nice tribute to the curators of this awesome website. Now for the part you all really want Photos!!!
For those of you unaware I have been saving money and prepping my truck with some expedition goodies for a 3 month long expedition, but I wouldn’t really call my trip an expedition per se more of a super extended car camping trip but as there is no forum for that here I am.
My plan was to travel the western United States and visit as many national parks along the way as I could. I had originally planed this trip with my friend Cody but he backed out about two months before we were supposed to leave. So with not much time left I started asking everyone I knew if they would be willing to travel for 4 months. I got a lot of interest but no one had either the money or the time. I had told my neighbor Todd that if he could scrounge up enough money he could come and I would pay for the rest of it. Good news was Todd got his money so I won’t be traveling alone.
We spent most of Tuesday packing our stuff and packing the truck we have a lot of stuff so it was a little like Tetris trying to fit everything into the camper and on to the roof racks. We finally got everything all packed up and I realized I had forgotten to get the key to the bike racks from my dad who was at work. I threw one of the bikes on top of all the gear in the camper and had to drive into the heart of San Diego during the beginning of rush hour. As we had left so late I decided we should camp close to San Diego so a quick drive and a stop at a grocery store later we were in a pay campsite in the Laguna Mountains. Since it was our first day we took almost everything out of the truck and set up an awesome campsite, but boy we do have a lot of stuff.
On our second day we drove up to Julian where we picked up a couple of PCT hikers who were trying to get down Banner grade. Their names were Birdman and Nak as in Nak-ed they were older gentlemen from Tennessee who were absolutely hilarious. As we drove down the road Birdman asked in a very thick Tennessee accent, ”Is one of them there Hummers?” I casually told him it was a Toyota but I secretly was busting up laughing to myself. We dropped them off at scissors crossing in the Anza Borrego Desert. Then we were off to Joshua Tree by way of Indio and Coachella. We got to Joshua Tree at about 5:30 in the afternoon so there was no one in the kiosk to take our money so we just drove in. We drove the main road from west to east and checked all of the campgrounds and there were zero open campsites. I decided that since we were heading to Big Bear the next day we should drive west to Johnson Valley to camp there. When we got to Johnson Valley we met a gentleman by the name of Bob, he had recently retired and had decided to buy a travel trailer and live in the desert with his motorcycles. When we first met Bob he seemed like a normal enough guy, but after an hour or so we started to notice some peculiarities about him. It turned out three weeks in the desert alone was too much for Bob and he was just really excited to see other people.
The Following day we broke down our camp and left Bob in the Desert and we drove up the hill to Big Bear Lake, where my aunt and uncle live. We went to the ranger station and I bought my National Park Pass. Then when we got back to the car we were going to go on a bike ride I opened the drivers rear door of the truck and bam my MacBook slipped off the seat and smashed on the ground the screen and track pad both cracked but somehow still functional. Needless to say after that happened I was furious. I cursed and yelled for a couple of minutes then I calmed down, called the repair shop to get a quote it was more than I wanted to pay so I will just deal with it for a while. The next day was opening day of mountain biking at Snow Summit so I took all of my frustrations and tried to beat that mountain up. We rode with my two younger cousins Reed and David, I rode with Reed and Todd rode with David. It rained and hailed a little bit and it cleared out the crowds and it turned into an awesome muddy riding day.
Saturday we finally leave California we made it about 15 miles into Arizona. We camped a little North-East of Lake Havasu in the middle of the Desert again. We stayed there only one night because we were getting tired of the desert. Then we headed east again towards the mountains, we camped in the Prescott National Forrest on Dosie Pit Road, we had found a large slab of concrete that we parked the truck on and set up our whole camp on nice clean concrete. The spot was so nice we stayed there two nights. This morning a truck with a lot of NRA stickers pulled up and two older gentlemen hopped out. There names were Tony and Cousin Lee, they told us that the concrete used to be a train station and it had been there for thirty plus years.
That just about covers our first week on the road, I though posting my first post from a Starbucks in Prescott about 5 miles from the Overland Journal HQ would be a nice tribute to the curators of this awesome website. Now for the part you all really want Photos!!!
