The Blue Daisy

Interpretive Art

2011-12-10T19:19:00.000-08:00

http://youtu.be/kWq60oyrHVQ

Finally, Someone Notices

2011-07-15T09:19:00.001-07:00

This article in USA Today is finally showing the ridiculous power of the press to ingraine an idea in American's heads that is clearly blown out of proportion. We have spent months in the border towns of Mexico and have only once, seen anything unusual (an oddly dressed Mexican man on the beach staring out into the ocean with binoculars, two days later a military checkpoint was set-up in that town). A friend of ours visiting us in San Felipe though thought every single person was trying to sell him coke despite the fact that none of them were. Before he came he was googling "dangers of Mexico". So when he came, he was looking everywhere for evidence of drugs and they simply weren't there. I think he was disappointed but I'm sure he went back across the border and told everyone that it was very obvious something was going on. If you look for something, you more than likely will find something to prove your point - unless you have an open mind. So, for the people of Mexico that have a very struggling economy, don't believe the hype! 99% of it is hype, 1% is as dangerous as Washington D.C.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2011-07-15-border-violence-main_n.htm

2011-05-10T17:45:00.000-07:00

Life is still good but the boy is bigger and now we have a cat.

Mainly showing the coat rack above the driver's seat for winter coats. Really genius idea by my hubby. The shoe rack was also fantastic this winter when we used multiple shoes and they were usually wet and needed some airflow around them. I threw in some photos of the curtains because they are one of the best skoolie ideas ever and I stole them off of skoolie.net. There are two inch magnets in each corner at the same witdth as a window. I used some white sheets I found at a thrift store and have them mostly at 2-3 windows per panel therefore using three-four magnets each panel. They are super easy to fold onto eachother using the magnets when you want to "open" the curtains up for the day. They have worked fantastic and I cannot imagine any other way of making curtains in a vehicle that bounces and jiggles and moves from side to side, all made of metal. I believe any other kind of curtain would make noise when you drive. These do not fall off either. Bought the magnets at Home Depot. My mother-in-law and friend made nine panels total for the bus with the front window using stronger magnets we got at Harbor Freight as the window is longer therefore using more fabric.

Another fun Hollow's Eve

2010-11-01T18:33:00.000-07:00

Another year of amazing costumes made by the hands of "Omy", Steve's Mom. Thanks again Omy for the very original costumes!

Ultimate Scavenger Hunt

2010-10-31T13:53:00.000-07:00

Steve and a friend of his plus two big boys did a Halloween Scavenger Hunt similar to the Amazing Race. The organizers do them monthly in Portland. Check it out if you want to have a good time. Teams of four people required! Pictures coming soon - Tom, pictures?

http://www.pdxhunt.com/

Meredith Sorensen is a Bad Ass

2010-10-25T21:50:00.000-07:00

Cute little pumpkin, eh? Carved from the hands of a woman that has...

Biked to Panama...on the back of a Tandem
Played tennis with the Ecuadorian Ambassador
Hiked the Appalachian Trail
Peace Corped it in Madagascar
Can do Ice Skating Jumps
Wellesley, Jersey, Green Queen

www.meredithsorensen.blogspot.comMy favorite posts are of her trips biking through Europe and Central American back in 2008. Check them out.

September in the Northwest

2010-10-17T09:17:00.000-07:00

Steve’s annual September backpacking trip with the boys happened a few weeks ago on a beautiful autumn weekend. Casey came for the first time this year and carried his backpack filled with clothes, snacks and a sleeping pad. They camped next to Memaloose Lake near the Clackamas River amongst salamander eggs and spent the day catching the slimey creatures.

While the boys were enjoying the great Pacific Northwest, I took a train to Seattle to help my “cuz” pick out a wedding dress. I wish I could show you the dresses but her fiancé reads the blue daisy. I wish I could say she found the one but it's a biggie of a decision that is still in process. So, I'll just have to show you her the morning of wedding dress shopping. Ben + Shannon 7/23/11

Cinema

2010-10-13T00:29:00.000-07:00

I love movies and thought I'd share some of my recent good finds...

Peter and Vandy – I chose this film on the merits of Jason Ritter’s acting chops in Good Dick. It is a funny romantic comedy that has the intriguing twist of being shown in jumbled time frames. You have no idea until towards the end what is the beginning, end or middle part of the relationship you are watching unfold. It kept my attention as it felt like a mystery I wanted solved.
The Social Network – there are a million reviews of this movie online and they are all correct. This was a very good movie showing the beginnings of the monumental Facebook empire. It also explained to me why Facebook always feels like high school all over again.

Seraphine – The true story of the life of artist Seraphine Louis that lived a poor life as a house cleaner during WWI but spent her off hours painting for the angels. This film had beautiful art direction and cinematograpy and reminded me of an Ang Lee film. I love movies where the people behind the lens are just as apparent as the actors in front of it. (French)
Happy Go Lucky – This felt very much like a lot of independent British films I’ve seen in the past. The undercurrent of tension being the most obvious. My distraction with the main character’s nose was ridiculous which happens to me sometimes when I’m not so into the movie (hence my strong dislike for everything Jennifer Jason Leigh and her monotone voice mentioned previously on this blog). It was entertaining though if not just for her costumes.
Amelie – I’ve seen this movie three times now. Me like this movie. It feels like moving art. The production team alone deserves an award for bringing such vivid colors to a screen. I watch so many movies that rarely do they surprise me. Last year’s Wes Anderson directed Fantastic Mr. Fox and this year’s Scott Pilgrim vs. the World are on par with this movie. If you’re into straightforward movies, these are not them. You must use your imagination to understand them. That is why they feel like a sculpture or a Salvador Dali to me. (French)
Toy Story 3 – yes, I cried. It is a very well made movie for both children and adults. I looked around at people in the audience (2 buck Tuesday at the Baghdad) and there were more adults then children. The super hipster next to me that probably arrived on a fixie was laughing when Casey was and crying when I was. It’s really a well done movie.
Bronson – OK, I fell into this movie after watching a four hour miniseries of Wuthering Heights on You Tube. I fell in love with the Heathcliff actor and Googled him. Tom Hardy is his name. He was also the cocky guy in Inception and the gay guy in RocknRolla. He’s a heck of an actor but nowhere is he as good as he is in Bronson. He’s FANTASTIC. This is the story of Britain’s incarcerated and famous Charlie Bronson who has spent 31 or his 34 years behind bars in solitary confinement. He’s crazy or brilliant.

Blue Daisy's New Temp Home

2010-10-06T15:23:00.000-07:00

Our lovely friends we met in Guatemala last year, Gene and Meredith, found this great place to park the bus while living back in Portland. Gene's awesome Mom Nancy has granted us her sideyard for a few months complete with a garden, hook-ups and chickens. It's a quiet and secluded neighborhood I had never seen before in Portland with small farms and barely any moving vehicles. Urban farming within easy biking distance of Mt. Scott, Woodstock Library and Trader Joe's. We're feeling pretty lucky right now. It's good to have connections that think outside the box!

I love this tiny little urban farm we found right down the road. It looks like they have squeezed a ton of food on what looks like maybe an acre and a half. Nicely done!

My future adopted country

2010-10-04T08:48:00.001-07:00

I absolutely love this article about Mexico from someone that knows it.

By Linda Ellerbee

Sometimes I´ve been called a maverick because I don´t always agree with my colleagues, but then, only dead fish swim with the stream all the time. The stream here is Mexico.

You would have to be living on another planet to avoid hearing how dangerous Mexico has become, and, yes, it´s true drug wars have escalated violence in Mexico, causing collateral damage, a phrase I hate. Collateral damage is a cheap way of saying that innocent people, some of them tourists, have been robbed, hurt or killed.

But that´s not the whole story. Neither is this. This is my story.

I´m a journalist who lives in New York City, but has spent considerable time in Mexico, specifically Puerto Vallarta, for the last four years. I´m in Vallarta now. And despite what I´m getting from the U.S. media, the 24-hour news networks in particular, I feel as safe here as I do at home in New York, possibly safer. I walk the streets of my Vallarta neighborhood alone day or night. And I don´t live in a gated community, or any other All-Gringo neighborhood. I live in Mexico. Among Mexicans. I go where I want which does not happen to include bars where prostitution and drugss are the basic products, and take no more precautions than I wouldd at home in New York ; which is to say I don´t wave money around, I don´t act the Ugly American, I do keep my eyes open, I´m aware of my surroundings, and I try not to behave like a fool.

I´ve not always been successful at that last one. One evening a friend left the house I was renting in Vallarta at that time, and, unbeknownst to me, did not slam the automatically-locking door on her way out. Sure enough, less than an hour later a stranger did come into my house. A burglar? Robber? Kidnapper? Killer? Drug lord?

No, it was a local police officer, the beat cop for our neighborhood, who, on seeing my unlatched door, entered to make sure everything (including me) was okay. He insisted on walking with me around the house, opening closets, looking behind doors and, yes, even under beds, to be certain no one else had wandered in, and that nothing was missing. He was polite, smart and kind, but before he left, he lectured me on having not checked to see that my friend had locked the door behind her. In other words, he told me to use my common sense.

Do bad things happen here? Of course they do. Bad things happen everywhere, but the murder rate here is much lower than, say, New Orleans, and if there are bars on many of the ground floor windows of houses here, well, the same is true where I live, in Greenwich

Village, which is considered a swell neighborhood house prices start at about $4 millionn including the bars on the ground floor windows.

There are good reasons thousands of people from the United States are moving to Mexico every month, and it´s not just the lower cost of living, a hefty tax break and less snow to shovel.. Mexico is a beautiful country, a special place. The climate varies, but is plentifully mild, the culture is ancient and revered, the young are loved unconditionally, the old are respected, and I have yet to hear anyone mention Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, or Madonna´s attempt to adopt a second African child, even though, with such a late start, she cannot possibly begin to keep up with Angelina Jolie.

And then there are the people. Generalization is risky, but in general Mexicansans are warm, friendly, generous and welcoming. If you smile at them, they smile back. If you greet a passing stranger on the street, they greet you back. If you try to speak even a little

Spanish, they tend to treat you as though you were fluent. Or at least not an idiot. I have had taxi drivers track me down after leaving my wallet or cell phone in their cab. I have had someone run out of a store to catch me because I have overpaid by twenty cents. I have been introduced to and come to love a people who celebrate a day dedicated to the dead as a recognition of the cycles of birth and death and birth and the 15th birthday of a girl, an importaant rite in becoming a woman with the same joy.

Too much of the noise you´re hearing about how dangerous it is to come to Mexico is just that, noise. But the media love noise, and too many journalists currrently making it, don´t live here. Some have never even been here. They just like to be photographed at night, standing near a spotlighted border crossing, pointing across the line to some imaginary country from hell. It looks good on TV.

Another thing. The U.S. media tend to lump all of Mexico into one big bad bowl. Talking about drug violence in Mexico without naming a state or city where this is taking place is rather like looking at the horror of Katrina and saying, Damn. Did you know the U.S. is under water? or reporting on the shootings at Columbine or the bombing of the Federal building in Oklahoma City by saying that kids all over the U.S. are shooting their classmates and all the grownups are blowing up buildings. The recent rise in violence in Mexico has mostly occurred in a few states, and especially along the border. It is real, but it does not describe an entire country.

It would be nice if we could put what´s going on in Mexico in perspective, geographically and emotionally. It would be nice if we could remember that, as has been noted more than once, these drug wars wouldn´t be going on if people in the United States didn´t want the drugs, or if other people in the United States weren´t selling Mexican drug lords the guns. Most of all, it would be nice if more people in the United States actually came to this part of America, (Mexico is also North America, you will recall) to see for themselves what a fine place Mexico really is, and how good a vacation or a life here can be.

So come on down and get to know your southern neighbors. I think you´ll like it here.

Especially the people.

LINDA ELLERBEE

So, a Chinese Caveman walks in the door

2010-09-28T18:52:00.001-07:00

I have a confession to make. I’m embarrassed of it, as I should be because I know better. I mean hell, I’m an educated sometimes intelligent human being that reads zines and Utne and knows that looks really are what get you through life…but,
I DRINK SODA
Yep, kiss my ass, I do
Which brings me to my current status as an absolutely and absurdly so, strong disliker of most “Foodie” culture. Before you lambast me with your organic heirloom cross bread Armenian sown peasant tomatoes, let me tell you that this has been building for twenty years.
Twenty years ago I went away to college (a bit late, I realize) and my eyes were opened to a big big world out there filled with small college town co-ops that smelled like vitamins and freshly ground peanut butter. I signed up on the dotted line and spent a few hours a week re-stocking shelves of tempeh and celery hearts for my fifteen percent discount. I read John Robbins Diet for a New America and went vegetarian to save the hens from their own long toenails. I even had a “Stop Factory Farming” bumper sticker on my car in 1993. I met people that wouldn’t enslave bees for honey or objectify a heifer to hold up their pants. It was fun and idealistic to say the least. The problem came from the fact I was (and still am) a huge hypocrite. I wanted chicken. No matter how hard I tried, I wanted that fleshy thigh BBQd with a crispy skin slightly charred. I felt satisfied after eating it in a way that rice and bulgur never could do. I lasted on and off for nine years until I finally said to hell with it. Thank god I quit that crap before heading around the world and being subjected to endless days of eggs, cheese and carbs as was the fate of my then still vegetarian husband.
In the process of the vegetarian years, people began to care what happened to their food and what path it took to their dinner plates in new unprecedented scrutiny. No longer was it acceptable to simply eat healthy from the garden with or without meat but now it had to be certified, prepared by ethnic grandmas and follow a code of ethics made for scientific investigators. I knew something was amiss when I heard my friends declare their three year old had a piñata filled with raisins and peanuts. Gone were the days of whole wheat bread and fresh fruit as the healthy lifestyle for children. This new movement was gonna require charts and books and a healthy dose of time shoppin’ and choppin’.
In the process of this movement and even before I felt its hands clasp around my bank account, I had reckoned a problem with my own environmental ethics. Mainly the feeling of an elitist movement filled with overly educated and financed whities (gulp, hi!). You have to remember that in this decade of my twenties, I was also traveling the world and watching naked children eat garbage out of the streets and women living in plastic bags sleeping on the sides of highways. Caring about the direction of my lettuce from inception seemed a bit preposterous to my brain upon re-entry into American culture. “Hey leper, if you had fingers which lettuce would you buy with your money you spent begging for all day while sitting in a gutter?”
It was around this time that I first pulled away from said movement for financial and social reasons. We bought a house and began to have babies. Simply trying to get dinner on the table and pay a mortgage without all the extras needed to be a participant in the new culture, seemed monumental. I had given up the vegetarianism and was simply trying to eat healthy and stay awake at three o’clock in the afternoon. And so I missed the bus. Of course I didn’t want to get on the bus (moo), as usual, but I definitely missed it.
In walks the new foodie culture, club, cult, occult. In walks the glass bottled, soybean GORP, food club naming world of “the new foodie”. It was no longer about eating good food because it tasted good or felt good in your body but instead it was the new club because “they” told us we should eat this way (god, scientists, John Locke?)
Which brings me to a conversation I had today with my dear friend “Butter” (I won’t “out” her for fear of the retribution from animal loving vegans out there). Butter has been playing with different food eating plans for as long as I’ve known her. She used to bake all the family breads and strive for vegetarianism. I know she’s gone vegan and struggled with what fit best in her body. Well, I haven’t seen Butter for awhile and went for a little visit today. It was sitting around the table that she confessed that she had finally found the right elixir. She’s now a PALEO eater meaning a meat, fruit and veggie eater. Picture cavemen in the burbs. It is the way to eat she says. She, of course, knows that I’m a foodie culture strong disliker so she brings this up to get to me (Bitchy Butter is kind of a cute nickname don’t you think?) I tell her that she sounds just like every other food cult out there. She sounds no different than my own in-laws that read a book called the China study and once again, changed their entire lives declaring that everyone will die of prostate cancer if they eat red meat. Of course Paleo Butter declares soy is bad, etc. etc. etc.. Hmmmm, says I.
Now, I’ve been living in a school bus for nine months. We don’t read guide books as a family. We don’t have many cook books on the bus either. We just have to wing it because sometimes in Baja, um, you eat what they have, not what you want. What we do know is that if something doesn’t feel good in our tummies, we all know it. Phelan did say just last week that we should have some sugar free days after receiving some pretty fun candy from visiting cousins. Ryder has told me he sometimes feels hungry for no reason in the middle of the night. Steve and I have noticed how we feel if we eat too much meat or if there isn’t enough salad in our diet. All of it has come from simply listening to our bodies and how they process our food. Not to get too graphic but this is a small space with five people sharing an RV bathroom – there are no secrets. We have found a groove for our family without little voices pulling at our wallets, hearts, souls.
Guide books sadly take away our intuition by flooding our heads with ideas that may or may not be true for each individual or um, true. Eating a vegetable with every meal sounds like a good idea but some of “them” think vegetables should be eaten alone without being mixed with proteins. Eating as much meat as you want might work until you’re a certain age and then maybe your body won’t work so well with high quantities, like cats. I know that soy milk was the one thing that made my boys bleed in their diapers when they were babies so I cannot imagine what would happen if we gave it to them all the time. I don’t like bulgar but I love quinoa and millet. I also know that pasta makes me feel too full as does a steak and ice cream and I are not friends. I know that if I bought the food I’m supposed to according to them and the latest Acai berry manufacturer, I would never be able to sit on a beach in Mexico with my husband and kids for months at a time watching flamingoes fly by while my children look for dolphins and whales soaking up their daily intake of vitamin D. Life is about choices and thank god, we get to make them every day about how we live. So, be good to yourself and make yourself happy because that is the key to life – happiness (“they” told me that, btw). It is the only thing you can control and it is the only thing worth pursuing. If you want to be a caveman or Chinese, do it with love and laughter, and relish it to the fullest… organically though…mango corn relish that is, made by Mayans, on the equinox, while sacrificing a virgin squirrel just as the sun sets....

**Dedicated with love and laughs to Dick & Kay, Trader Joe’s and my friend that needs some new SOX.

Quiet Solitude

2010-09-19T22:46:00.000-07:00

For the first time in days, it is quiet. We have been back in Portland for under two weeks and have been busy to say the least. Connecting with friends and family was our first priority. There were welcome back signs, hugs and kisses, breakfasts and dinners and even a Wild Woman Weekend. But now I sit alone with my family all snuggled together listening to the pitter patter of rain on the roof and I take a big deep breath. This is good. It is good to be loved and have connections. I know this and genuinely am happy for my life in Portland.

But, I miss us. I miss watching the boys climb boulders while a sun sets over the Dakota prairie. I miss reading for an afternoon next to a creek. I even miss the feeling of us against the world while trying to navigate a strange new town looking for a grocery store. I miss the easy sway of life on the road without responsibilities and expectations.

Yellowstone with some BS

2010-09-10T11:29:00.000-07:00

Sixteen years ago, I worked outside of Yellowstone for the summer. I was single and free and drank too much wine, flirted with cowboys, rode horses and spent the summer enjoying the mountains and lakes. To return with children brought a different element to the experience as I learned more about the history and geology of Yellowstone that I didn't think about it when I was younger. To see Old Faithful lodge with the boys and watch them check-out the woodwork and etched glass or tube the Norris river or play homesteader and pioneer made me realize how rich of a life it is to be seen through the eyes of a child. It was fantastic to meet up with Ben and Shannon again and realize that there truly is a comfort in finding your people on the road. They are relaxed and easy going travelers that find the joy in sitting in an ancient lodge for hours on end, drinking cocktails and watching life go by. Sadly it was cold when they visited but the moment they left, the sun returned and we changed into shorts and t-shirts. Now we are off to Portland again for some much needed time off and to re-charge our batteries, literally.

Rest Stop, Somewhere Wyoming

2010-09-06T19:04:00.000-07:00

By pure chance and luck, the only time we have broken down on this trip, was at a rest stop, with a playground, somewhere in rural Wyoming.

Oh crap, I say. This doesn't look good.

Yeah, it's broken. Four gallons of anti-freeze came a pouring out.

Broken right through that pipe, yikes.

Good thing Steve does yoga!

Had to actually take the radiator off to get the new hose on! What a stud

After all that, he deserves a bike ride through Yellowstone Canyon on a beautiful crisp morning.

The Tramping Life

2010-08-28T21:35:00.000-07:00

One of the best parts of a roadtrip life, has to be, the people you meet along the way. We have met people living all different kinds of lives from first time road trippers to fifty year seasoned vets. Some we remember for years to come and some we forget as soon as we hit the open road again. It's a kind of kinship though, a temporary connection among like minded people exchanging information for the benefit of the tramping community. These last few days, we've met some lovely people here and there...

This is Dominic Gill. In 2006 he bought a tandem bike and BOB and road from Alaska to Argentina giving free rides to people along the way. He had over sixty passengers that stayed with him anywhere from three days to three weeks. Now, in 2010, he's taking disabled or ill people on trips for 500 miles at a time, across the country. We ran into him in a campground when he pulled in with his specially built tandem. He gave the boys a ride while his girlfriend and I (sag wagon driver) talked countries and trips. We bonded for only an hour but it was just another one of those moments. Great guy, great idea and here's a link to his current project if you want to know more and please donate!!!! www.domandernie.com

Dakotas

2010-08-26T07:43:00.000-07:00

Finally, after four months in the mid-west, the humidity is gone and the wind has given way to dry lips and a dusty bus. We’ve reached the grasslands or “prairie” as they say in Canada. We’ve had a few adventures along the way such as mining for Indian pipestone, discovering abandoned homesteaded houses, catching crickets and such.

So much of these past few days seem familiar to me as I have read about them through the likes of Willa Cather, Jane Kirkpatrick and Ivan Doig for years now. The sod houses, the wind, the natives, the Badlands and grasshoppers have reminded me how difficult it was for the homesteaders to earn their 160 acres here by surviving and taming their land in five years. Everything is dry and parched in August and yet I know the winters in the Dakotas are the coldest in the country every year. But knowing this land is harsh, you can also see the beauty of the big blue skies reaching right down to the prairie grasses blowing in the wind. The colors are more subtle than the mid-west as the dirt and grasses compliment each other without screaming any particular hue.
Harsh lands often give way to the bountiful gift of wide open spaces. The Dakotas are not a huge tourist destination and so lucky for us, the trails are empty and campgrounds easy to find.

Fruit

2010-08-20T14:35:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I wonder how much my children are absorbing from traveling around. They bring up stuff from places we've been to every now and then but it's usually something like this. "Mom, you know that place where there was that fence and that wall." No Phelan, I need to know a little more. "Ya know, the place with those small horses and it was hot" Well Phelan, what country were we in and who were we with. "We were in Mexico with that cowboy". Oh, yes, when we went burro riding with the caballero that taught you to throw rocks in a cave to scare away the rattlesnakes. "Yes, that's the one. Can we go there again?" It's a constant game of I Spy. The other day though, we were playing NAME HOW MANY FRUITS YOU KNOW...the boys came up with 22. I realized while playing it that they know a lot of fruits, because of traveling. They've eaten lychees, rambutans, dragonfruit and prickly pear BECAUSE we travel. It was a cool observation. Which brings me to this...

I was in a grocery store the other day and there were a bunch of these. They are called osage orange or hedgeballs. I asked the grocer how you eat them wherein he proceeded to chuckle. He said they aren't edible but instead they are used to repel, spiders! You put them on foil in the corners of your house and they repel spiders as they slowly disintegrate. So Cool! I thought I knew probably every fruit in the world (more than 22 btw) but this was a first.

Good-bye Sweet Farm

2010-08-18T00:07:00.000-07:00

The time has come for us to leave the Dopp farm and begin our western migration. We are so very thankful to the Thills and Dopps for sharing their wonderful home and land with us. It has been magical...

Phelan unloading hay bales with Jim into the old back barn

This is how we spent our anniversary - Happy Anniversary baby!

Ryder waiting for the next load to arrive.

On the wall of the barn down below him "John Herman Dopp July 27, 1927"

This might be coming home with us

As well as this little girl - say hello to our newest Blue Daisy passenger "Oreo" caught from the old red barn!

Dopp Farm, Again

2010-08-12T11:48:00.000-07:00

We had so much fun the last time we were at the Family Farm in Wisconsin, we decided to return two months later to help with the hay harvest. This farm is beautiful, albeit hot as hell in August.

What's a barn without some kittens?

Ryder, Casey and cousin Erin with Great Uncle John bringing in the hay!

Corning Venison

2010-08-12T10:59:00.000-07:00

This is an entire leg of a deer - eight pounds of it. Jim is corning it to tenderize it since venison is so lean, it can be difficult to eat at times. Mostly he grounds his venison and/or makes jerky. The backstrap is good for roasts.

Injecting brine for even more tenderizing.

I added this photo only because I found it fantastic. This is Jim's brother's "man" ktichen. He uses it to process meats (such as venison), veggies, fruit, beer, wine, etc. It's actually an outbuilding that used to be a chicken coop and now, it's a place to drink and brew beer and play with meat. He makes sausages, salamis, etc. Very cool and one of a kind.

Dr. Tom Little

2010-08-10T07:13:00.001-07:00

I am extremely sad this morning to learn about the death of a man we met while in upstate New York. Dr. Little was renting a cabin on my friend's island with his wife and three grown daughters, one of them pregnant with their first grandchild due this September. They were a wonderful family working and living in Afghanistan their whole lives to make a better world for all of us. We are very sad to hear of his passing and wish the best for his wife and girls.

Read the story here...

http://www.reuters.com/news/video/story?videoChannel=2602&videoId=133975161

Climbing Mountains

2010-08-06T14:09:00.000-07:00

Dear Ben,

Thank you for walking the walk. Steve and I are so happy that our boys get to be a part of your life with Shannon, living and learning from both of your examples. I cannot wait to hear of the next adventures of Ben and his fellow Party Pickles.

Ben Copstead on top of Mt. Rainier July 27, 2010

A Week in the Michigan Upper Peninsula

2010-08-06T13:39:00.000-07:00

What we mainly did this past week is canoe, everywhere we could find. This is Trout Lake where we spent a whole day attempting to catch a fish with no luck.

Glass Bottom Boat tour of Lake Superior Shipwrecks. Really fantastic as you could see everything, even without the boat as the water was so clear. These boats were 200 year old container ships of salt and iron ore. Can you see the anchor?

This is a pasty which is pie crust wrapped around meat, potatoes, carrots and egg, baked and then covered with gravy. Yummy, oh so yummy!

The Upper Peninsula is a beautiful place filled with wolves, moose and tons of lakes. I would like to return on bike as it's all flat with many places to camp along the way. It was hard to say good-bye to Michigan as I fell in love with the state. It is beautiful, rural, evolved and pristine. I'm not sure about the winters though.

Free Camping Through the UP

2010-08-06T13:33:00.001-07:00

I was planning to take photos of my tea cup every morning as we've been living on the shores of Lakes Michigan and Superior for awhile now. Instead I've decided to take photos of the bus at our free campsites along the way. All of the water you see is Lake Superior and we did sleep at all these places. Fortunately for us, the weather stayed nice and we didn't need our air conditioner which would have required us to get electricity from someplace. It's nice to be fully contained and be able to get by for a week without needing a campground.

Leelanau County, Michigan

2010-08-01T21:42:00.000-07:00

We recently spent a great weekend visiting one of Steve's many cousins on their farm in northern Michigan. Steve hasn't seen them or any of their siblings in over fifteen years but they immediately were gracious and giving and inviting to our crew of crazies. We ate great meals, went boating, hiked, played with real tractors, fed horses and watched the colors change throughout the day. Family is family and Steve's is a fantastic one for putting up with feverish children and giant school buses mucking up their exquisitely beautiful piece of land.

Road Trippin'

2010-08-01T10:58:00.000-07:00

I got this e-mail from a good friend of mine back home and had to share it with anyone interested in "it all".

Hi! We just returned yesterday evening from our 2500 mile road trip. We had a blast. I mean a real, big blast. Being together on the road was amazing and yesterday as we took the tasty last bite of our vacation in the form of a swim in the John Day river just outside of Fossil, I thought of you guys. I totally get your choice on a new level. We felt so free and wherever we were was home. The simple tasks of life that can seem like a burden at home became a joy. Just living was the focus and everything that word encompasses was all we were doing, with pleasure. Life just happened and it was good.

On the same day I read Finding the Open Road , a roadtrip nation book and walked away with this:

"So, what do you want to do with your life?
You should
A. Be a Lawyer, a doctor, an accountant, a consultant"
BLAH BLAH BLAH
Everywhere you turn, people try to tell you who to be and what to do with your life.
We call that the "noise".
Block it. Shed it. Leave it for the CONFORMISTS.
As a generation, we need to get back to focusing on INDIVIDUALITY.
Self Construction rather than mass production.
Define your own road in life instead of traveling down somebody else's.
Listen to Yourself. Your road is the open road. Find it.
FIND THE OPEN ROAD.

www.roadtripnation.com

Skippity Do Canoe

2010-07-28T16:42:00.000-07:00

We bought a canoe in Michigan last week. We actually own a canoe at home and had planned to bring it but once we made a rack, put it upside down on it, well, it was ridiculously high. We left the canoe behind our house in Portland. Now that we are around all these lakes though, we changed our mind, hit Craigslist and $275 later, we own yet another canoe. We decided to do something completely different this time and actually put it on the roof rightside up since it isn't a flat tipped boat. Steve made a rack with 2x4's, bolts and eye bolts. Turned out pretty good and only took a couple of hours to make. If it rains though, we'll be using buckets to get the water out!

Bolt goes all the way through the roof and into the wood frame

She kinda looks like a shark, doesn't she?

Sleeping Bear Dunes, Michigan

2010-07-23T09:21:00.000-07:00

This is Steve's friend Andy from way back when...and Landen

Andy took us to the Dunes to frolick and they were beautiful with a view of Lake Michigan in the background. Ryder is the little black dot - see him?

Traverse City is a very cool and hip little town right on the shores of Lake Michigan. Thanks Laura and Andy for your hospitality!

The Power of Freedom - Unschooling

2010-07-21T19:19:00.000-07:00

11 years old and just getting started...

http://athensblvd.com/?p=295#more-295

Grace, I'm more and more impressed with you as each year passes. You are a credit to the long line of strong women you were born from.

Only for Adult Followers of Weeds

2010-07-20T20:53:00.001-07:00

Season Six Everyone...

**This excerpt is related to our blog due to the five seasons of bootlegged Weeds we copied in Mexico and subsequently watched...in the Blue Daisy!**

KOA with the Hobbit

2010-07-17T21:33:00.000-07:00

This is my friend Deirdre...

She used to live in our basement, for three years. Then she got married, moved to LA and had a baby. Despite all that, we still see her quite a bit. She came to visit us for the second time along our journey and we met up at the KAO in Michigan.

There was a waterslide, putt putt golf, a swimming lake, fishing lake, and three activities a day for kids like bouncy thingies and art projects.

Our kids adore her daughter and tend to spend most of their time trying to make her laugh.

She's made putty out of them.

We thank you Deirdre for your effort getting here and I'll remember our special place under the tree with Steve and his shovel:)

Los Libros

2010-07-15T19:35:00.000-07:00

Our family consumes books by the box load. In order to constantly feed our addiction to books, we must spend a lot of time in thrift stores shopping for them. These limitations mean that I cannot simply find the latest and greatest to read. I’m subjected to the local township folk’s literary choices. This has had me reading books that I never, in my right mind, would have read before. Even Steve has been reading books way out of his genre in a desperate attempt to find something well written hidden amongst the John Grisham, Michael Crichton and Tom Clancy.
Steve and I both have different tastes in books. He’s a science fiction and nautical history buff wherein I’m more of a travel literature and historical fiction girl. When we went around the world for a year and a half, we were stuck with what would fit in our backpack and what we could find on trade shelves at hostels. We made a deal that we would each carry two books, one of which the other had to agree to read as well. I remember sitting on a beach in Ecuador reading Indiana Jones and realizing I had gotten the short end of that deal.
In Toronto, we found a fantastic thrift store that sold kid’s books five for $1 and adult books three for $1. This was awesome for us as the kids alone could spend a few dollars and feel like it was Christmas. Steve and I struggled to find anything worthwhile. And yet with surprise, I found a book called The Outback that I fell in love with and read in two afternoons. The cover looks …almost like a romance novel. It wasn’t. It was actually written in the 1920’s and followed the life of a family over three generations of hard living in the…Outback. Steve started reading a book called The Adventures of Goodnight and Loving that we have both really enjoyed and yet NEVER would have read otherwise. Both of these books have one thing in common – horrible covers. Really horrible covers and yet they are very well written.
For the time being though, I get to be a book snob again. My literary compadre from Georgia sent us a couple of care packages for the road. There were books for all but I scored the most and should be deep in escapism for a few weeks. Thanks Bache!
Books we’ve read as of late…
The Last Tasmanian – Interesting book of fiction about a small fishing village in New Brunswick seen through the eyes of two teenaged boys
The Girls – A horrible ridiculous book that I struggled to read through. The book was written from the perspective of six friends that have all grown apart over the years talking trash about each other in the form of letters. I didn’t like it and yet read the whole like as if I was in a book club.
Blasphemy – I just asked Steve what this book was about and this is what he said “about a scientist that built a particle accelerator that left mysterious messages from god”. This is why we don’t share books.
Streets of Laredo – This book killed me. We both loved Lonesome Dove (before you laugh thinking of Ricky Shroeder in the mini-series years ago, let me tell you that book won a Pulitzer Prize for a reason, it’s great). The sequel was horrible and made me wonder if Larry McMurtry’s agent thought so too but didn’t have the balls to tell him so.
Nemesha’s Ship – A young spaceship designer who takes an experimental ship on a test run and accidentally enters a worm hole (I blush writing that for Steve). Although props to Anne McAffrey for writing a book in a field dominated by geeky science boys and Ursula LeGuin with whom I’ve met and may actually be a geeky science boy.
Mountain of Black Glass – this is the last book in the Overland series. Enough said.
Lamb – About the missing adventures of Jesus and his friend Biff traveling the world. It’s Christopher Moore!

Ryder has read the first book in the Warrior series (it’s about cats), Dragonsdale, The Lightening Thief, The Candy Store Wars, a Little’s book and that is just since this past Sunday (it’s Thursday). So, I cannot list all of his books.

Evolution

2010-07-12T09:09:00.000-07:00

Steve and I come from adventurous parents. My father-in-law thinks our wanderlust is genetic and I must say, I kind of agree. My mother instilled in me the idea that experiences outweigh possessions. Although she's always worked her whole life, she has had a lot of fun doing whatever she puts her mind to. In her late thirties, she got her pilots license and joined the 99er's. She would fly all around California and even Mexico with friends, camping under the wing. In her forties, my parents got into boating, big time. I spent most of my teenaged years, sitting on a boat somewhere, eating crackers and tuna fish, swimming and trying to fish. They followed the boating years with timeshare travel around the country and Mexico and now, in their late 60's early 70's, my parents have become born again cyclists. They take their bikes wherever they go and most mornings can be found at a coffee shop within 20 miles of their house, on their bikes.

Steve's parents traveled to Peru, the Soviet Union and Thailand when they were younger and it was more dangerous. Steve spent his childhood camping with parents between Wisconsin and Oregon and even went to Thailand and the Soviet Union. Steve's father got his pilot's license in his 50's when he retired at the age of 53 to spend more time traveling around and exploring the world and the people in it. Both Richard and Marlene have a zest for learning and trying new things that is quite respectable at a time most people are more "like old dogs that cannot learn new tricks." Like I said, I think it is in the genes.

And so we dream and we think and we dream and we think. And what we think is we like this dream...a biggie but a goodie. Life on a sailboat, perhaps?

Ithaca Boondocking

2010-07-11T11:40:00.001-07:00

After leaving Loon Island, we drove to Ithaca, NY for Ryder and Maretta to attend sailing camp together.

Every afternoon they would head out on the water, usually just the two of them on the boat, and sail around Lake Cayuga while playing tag with other boats or getting purposely tipped over or squirted with water. Although it was excrutiatingly hot, they still liked enough to plan a trip around the world one day...sounds familiar!

We had no plans in Ithaca before arriving except we knew we would have to find a place to hang for the week. We accidentally came across one of the best boondocking sites ever (boondocking=free campsite).

The Ithaca farmers market is famous around New York and even farther! The site itself is a beautiful open air building located right on Lake Cayuga. Arriving during a massive heat wave, we immediately noticed the stalls had electricity (for our air conditioner), as well as water and, get this, wifi! We parked it knowing the farmer's market wasn't until that weekend and hoped no one would kick us out. They didn't but we did get the all too common knock knock from the po po late one night - although we are used to it and they let us stay.

Every morning I sat on this dock eating breakfast while watching boats fill up with gas at the marina across the way

or watched the TDF live stream from one of the booths.

The kids played farmer's market or went swimming or rode their bikes through the market. All this in a tiny town that has Cornell University and Moosewood Kitchen! Nice town.

P.S. Flag Burning 101

2010-07-11T11:13:00.001-07:00

Diana's Mom made us burn a flag on 4th of July!

My friend Diana's amazing Mom, 75 year old Delight (every bit the matriarch you want to be),
has made it a tradition on 4th of July, to burn a flag. The island has had many many flags over the years and unfortunately, mice have eaten them up. So, they burn them. Apparently, you are not supposed to throw them away but instead, give them a proper burning. So, we said the Pledge of Allegiance, sang My Country Tis A Thee and played taps on the bugle before we threw a 48 state flag in the fire (pre 1960's). I felt like Hayduke, for a moment, only a moment though. Hayduke lives!

Fort Loon

2010-07-08T13:17:00.000-07:00

For at least two years now, Ryder and Maretta have talked about building a treehouse together. They would talk on the phone for hours planning how many rooms it would have and how they would get furniture into it. Last Christmas Ryder made one for Maretta out of popsickle sticks to hang in her room and even painted one in the school bus.

Loon island had a decrepit old treehouse that Ryder and Maretta and Steve spent some time solidifying with walls, windows, a bucket on a pulley, mailboxes and a mosquito net.

They named her Fort Loon!

The last night on the island, two best friends slept in their treehouse staying up late telling stories and watching the last of the fireworks together, mission accomplished!

Loon Island, Upstate New York

2010-07-07T13:32:00.000-07:00

This is my friend Diana from Portland...

We met in birth class while prego with our firsts. Every summer, Diana and her family fly to upstate New York to visit an island camp her great grandfather bought and built in the 1930’s. There are several cabins and outbuildings all hand built eighty years ago. It's a beautiful and secluded place with tons of family charm.

This year we were finally able to join her and re-unite best friends that haven’t seen eachother for six months.

We had a great weekend filled with bonfires, rope swings, fish catching, canoing, swimming and watching fireworks go off over the lake.

TDF 2010

2010-07-06T15:44:00.000-07:00

I raise my glass to men that wear tight pants and carry only one Juan Pelota! Show them number eight Lonestar.

The Dead Head Skoolie Team

2010-07-05T13:01:00.000-07:00

Sweet paint job on that bike!

Chico's 24 Hours of Summer Solstice at Albion Hills, Ontario

2010-06-29T05:53:00.000-07:00

The biggest 24 hour mountain bike race in the world happened this last weekend and we were lucky enough to be a part of it. Having spent five weeks at this campground mountain biking and hiking the trails, we've gotten to know quite a few people. Steve was able to hook up with a few of them and get on their teams to participate. For those of you that don't know what a 24 hour bike race is...teams of 1-10 people trade off riding a 10 mile mountain bike lap over a 24 hour period. Yes, that includes all night long!

383 teams came from all over (1800 racers total) to ride through mud, rain, humidity, bugs and ten hours of total darkness. It was extremely well organized with bouncy things for the kids, great food and beer gardens, tons of shwag to win, pro racers to google over and 3,000 people camping together in the woods.

I volunteered at the half way point handing out Gatorade and offering words of encouragement to those losing their minds (like the ones doing it solo - yes, that's right, 24 hours of non-stop racing through the woods).

In the end, Steve even got to ride for the Kijiji team of Canada which might just go down as the highlight of this trip!

Albion Hills Conservation Area, Toronto, Ontario

2010-06-28T04:58:00.000-07:00

Our campground in northern Toronto warrants its own blog entry as it is unique amongst many beautiful campgrounds in Ontario, Canada. The most notable feature at Albion is the 27 km of mountain bike trails in summer that are also used as cross country ski trails in winter. All this and it is only 45 minutes from the heart of Toronto. The chalet at the center of the campground rents skis during snow and hosts meetings and wedding receptions in summer. There is a swimming pool and splash pad as well as a small lake that rents canoes or ice skates depending on the weather. The trails are maintained by both the Conservation Area and the local Racing Organization, Chico Racing. The Ruppel brothers of Chico Racing host two 24 hour rides here a summer as well as the Tuesday night races with 100+ riders.
What we have discovered from staying here for a month is that probably 100 people a day come to ride the trails, thus creating great revenue for the campground that charges a day use fee. Chico’s crew work on drainage and course design in partnership with the employees here to keep the trails in great shape. It is obviously a working symbiotic relationship to maintaining a profitable mountain biking facility in the great outdoors.
When the riding isn’t happening and it is during the week when no one comes to camp, this place has felt like our own place in the woods. Being that we have been here
almost five weeks, we have spent hours watching the forest come alive for summer with wildflowers blooming, bugs arriving and animals searching for food. I have walked the trails that Steve rides everyday and have seen my fair share of orioles, wild turkeys, deer, northern jays and cardinals.

The trails are well marked with three main loops equaling 3.5, 5 or 9 miles with single track side loops to chose from and make your ride as big as you chose. People tend to have their favorites and Steve has been lucky enough to hook up with guys that have showed him around. Along the trails you’ll find ponds and conifer forests and even a sugar shack for making maple syrup (still used in early spring for demonstrations). We leave in a few days but will mark this down as a highlight of our trip that has now reached its six month mark.

Happy Birthday Casey Kirk

2010-06-28T04:47:00.001-07:00

My defiant one, my stubborn independent boy. Your inner strength and compassion are your best qualities Casey and you will soon be up to speed with the big brothers that adore you. We all love you little man and Happy Birthday!

Mama Got a New Camera

2010-06-23T15:10:00.000-07:00

Making Lists

2010-06-20T15:20:00.001-07:00

Steve and I have been lucky enough to travel together for 15 years. We have, at times, needed to entertain eachother. Sometimes those conversations meld into stuff like this...

Our Favorite Places on Earth

Steve's
5)Interlakken, Switzerland, for the hiking
4)Jaiselmar, India because of the fort town you can stay in
3)Oswald West State Park, Oregon because of the memories
2)Marrakesh, Morocco to partake in foods that haven't changed for thousands of years
1)Zanzibar Island, Tanzania see earlier post for this one

Diana's
5)Ireland in a pub on the Dingle for a Shandy
4)The Redwoods for the memories of a lifetime
3)Denali National Park for the Wow value
2)Andean Mountains of Ecuador for the most beautiful culture
1)Rajasthan, India because it is the India

Favorite books is a difficult list to make. Upon a lot of discussion, we realize that our favorite books are ones that inspired us AT THE TIME. They are not the most cerebral, literary or even inspirational to others. They are simply the books we were inspired by at the time and meant something to us.

Steve's
The Boat of a Million Years - Paol Anderson
Siddhartha - Herman Hesse
Cannary Row - Steinbeck
Life, The Universe & Everything Else - Douglas Adams
Aubrey Mauritran series - Patrick O'Brien

Diana's
Cold Sassy Tree - Olive Anne Burns
Beloved - Toni Morrison
My Life on High Adventure - Grant Pearson
The Blue Jay's Dance - Louise Erdrich
Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie

Now for movies. I am seriously not sure I can make this list. I'm a huge movie watcher and love everything from well made Adam Sandler such as Punch Drunk Love to documentaries like Murderball as well as sweeping epic dramas like Holmes and anything with James McAvoy and/or Keira Knightley (OK, British sweeping dramas).

Steve's
Death Race 2000
The Man Who Would be King
The 5th Element
Harold & Maude
Any and every Sean Connery made James Bond

Diana's
Reality Bites
Dances with Wolves
Sid and Nancy
Away we Go
Pride and Prejudice

Have you ever made a list? Try it, it's freakin hard!

What We're Doing in and Around the Blue Daisy

2010-06-20T15:00:00.001-07:00

Alright people, without a camera for another week, I bring you lists of what we're doing. These are the movies I've seen in the last week...

"Outsourced" - a good independent film depicting a very accurate description of incorporating life in India. Although somewhat cheesy at times, so is India. I felt like it really hooked into subtle and obvious cultural structure.

"Youth in Revolt" - entertaining alter ego shows that Michael Cera can now move on from high school sophomoric movies such as this and Juno to meatier movies.

"Eagle vs. Shark" - we are big fans of Flight of the Conchords and so I say, if you enjoy this song Business Time, you'll enjoy this movie.

What I've read in the last week:
Bad Trips Horror stories from the roads less traveled in the 1930's-1940's
Notes from a Big Country - A compilation of Bill Bryson's column for a New Hampshire newspaper depicting life returning to the U.S. after twenty years in the UK.
Spin Cycle - Women and their therapists, summer brain candy, not good for you.
The Painted Drum - I realized, while reading this book, that Louise Erdrich is my favorite author. I have read many of her fiction and non-fiction over the years and I consistently am enthralled with her. This book inspired that epiphany.
Bridget Jones Diary - same as the movie - sip/sip or same/same

Toronto Chinatown & Harbor

2010-06-12T13:10:00.000-07:00

This past Friday, we loaded the kids up from our beautiful campground and headed into the city for a little cultural tour. We chose Chinatown for the obvious reason of food and cheap crappy knick knacks to look at. The kids had giant steaming bowls of pork noodles (a la Kung Fu Panda) and Steve and I shared some dumplings. We finished up our lunch by introducing the boys to rambutans, one of my favorite fruits in the world. We ate these almost everyday in South America but haven't seen them since. The ones we found were perfectly red and very sweet. Ryder and I decided they would make a great sorbet.

We walked along Spadina Avenue, past the furriers and ended up at the harbor. It reminded us a lot of Vancouver, B.C. harbor walk with marinas, townhouses and summer festivals. At the end of the day, exhausted, we took a streetcar back which was almost as exciting as a roller coaster ride.

Toronto Zoo + Fish & Chips

2010-06-06T08:23:00.001-07:00

Phelan's actual birthday, June 3, 2010, six years old. We headed to the Toronto zoo for the day and walked what felt like 50 miles. It's a big zoo. The theme of the day though were baby animals - everywhere. We saw baby baboons, monkeys, tigers, horses - many little ones climbing around. It was perfect for Phelan who is a little obsessed with seasons and seasons changing. He's been asking when summer starts which always makes us laugh because to us we are wondering when has it not been summer? After the zoo we headed to a fish and chip shop where we were invited by some other campers for dinner. They own the shop and live above it with their five kids. Harry has worked at Golden Crisp since he was eight years old (now he's 48). His kids were very welcoming and shared their trampolene, toys and life with our boys for the evening. We had ice cream at the end of the day, per Phelan's request. It was a good day and it took us all the next day to recover.

Travel & Home

2010-05-26T06:53:00.000-07:00

To leave, to travel, is to live for the moment, freely, wildly, to be vital and alive, having ties everywhere but no one place to call home, and, at times, feeling too close to an uncertain edge. To settle is to know security, possess something stable and cared for, built up over years by the warmth of your own fireplace. Unlike travel, a steady home is rarely wild and freeing; yet, it's a dream I often long for when I travel, but fear I may never know.

from "Kite Strings of the Southern Cross" by Laurie Gough, a book that could, at times, be my own life on the road.

Wisconsin Farm Adventures

2010-05-20T18:50:00.001-07:00

Day 1 – We arrive at the Dopp farm (owned by Dopps since 1894) early in the morning and within the hour are hunting wild asparagus in the ditches. Soon thereafter, we jump into Uncle John's truck and head to the backwoods to hunt for wild Morel mushrooms. Steve is very successful. We learn from cousin Jim the best way to cook the mushrooms although he will not give up his secret spice mix (we think it's Lawry's).

Day 2 – Build rope swing in barn. Three kids swinging and falling on bales of hay, ah, priceless. Listen to stories of Opah getting in trouble with his brothers when they were younger – shooting birds, skunks, climbing windmills, catching turtles. Build fort out of hay bales in barn.

Day 3 – Visit Uncle Harlan's farm and play on his soap box derby car. Visit in his 150 year old log cabin home he is currently remodeling with Nelda, his girlfriend. We eat platters of summer sausage and cheese. That evening have a campfire with cousins and friends. Cousin Matthew plays some Dead on his guitar and everyone sings together, three generations living together on this farm.

Day 4 – Visit Uncle Donnie and Boots farm, aka Marlene's family farm. Learn all about a very successful dairy and “embryo” farm. Uncle Donnie takes us for a ride on his manure spreader down to the creek Marlene and siblings used to play in as kids. Visit with family and eat summer sausage and cheese. See Marlene's one room school house across the street and listen while she tells stories of sledding home from school in the wintertime. Beautiful farm.

Day 5 – Everyone sick, everyone. Drive Matthew's go kart – REALLY FAST through farm. Head to cousin Nick's birthday party. Distant cousins play legos and with the newly found pet turtle. We take photos of Wisconsin toe heads. Return to Dopp farm for a dinner of Dopp farm beef on BBQ and morel mushrooms. Uncle John introduces me to honey flavored Wild Turkey – for medicinal purposes only. Once again, three generations hanging together and having fun.

Day 6 – Day off from visiting and summer sausage. Lunch time I serve platter of salami and gouda - when in Rome? Go hiking around farm, work on bus, recover from really bad colds, eat too much, visit local town and cemetaries with family names everywhere! Kids help Jim prepare field for soybeans. Steve and I go on date to LaCrosse for Mexican food, Wild Turkey and birthday shopping.

Day 7 – Hike with Papa to find Indian relics like rusty screwdrivers and feathers on the farm. Have huge corn cob fight in barn. Have family birthday party for Phelan and Casey with homemade ice cream and Phelan's favorite rice and beans. End the day with dinner at friend's farm (no summer sausage :( and go on ride on 4 wheelers around the pond to watch hawks, owls, guinea fowl, cardinals and grosebeaks.

Day 8 – Find Red Ryder BB gun in garage and have to shoot cans before we leave. Cousin Kathy shows us dead raccoon they shot the night before. Tells kids only to shoot the swallows with the BB gun, not the Robins because they are the state bird. I picture my kids with BB gun in Portland, laugh out loud! Time to Go! Everyone cries as we load up and leave.

Check out more photos at www.rmdopp.blogspot.com

EPIC ADVENTURE TO NEVER BE FORGOTTEN. Thanks to all of the Thills, Dopps and Schmidts for their hospitality! We'll be back for that turkey Jim, I guarantee it!

The Henry Ford

2010-05-11T21:21:00.000-07:00

I've never really loved history - as in the history we were taught as kids. King Henry did this and so and so retaliated with this maneuver that caused this uproar! Oh how boring it all was to a kid that really just wanted to go swimming and catch bugs. Now I homeschool my kids and occasionally feel guilty about the lack of history in our curriculum (did I just say I have curriculum????). On those days I usually yell out something to Ryder like "What president is on a penny" and "What was the Boston Tea Party" just to make myself feel better. How he knows the answers is probably thanks to the four hours of reading he does a day.

Another thing that doesn't truly appeal to me is well, history museums. This is something I'm sharing with you while hiding my face in shame. I don't like them. I find it boring to look at arrowheads, old photographs and slippers worn by Mrs. so and so. I know this is what some people love but I do not adore it.

Until now. Somehow I found out about THE history museum to rival any museum in Washington D.C. by pure circumstance. Thank goodness I did. THE HENRY FORD museum located in Detroit Michigan is a Disneyland of American History. There is every piece of anything you ever wanted to know about our country and everyone that had anything to do with its delivery to our current position of power. I have endless photos of all that I saw but I simply think it wouldn't do any good to show it all to you. We spent three days there - yes, I said THREE DAYS, parked in their parking lot and spending all day inside and outside of this amazing museum.

These are only some of the things we saw. Please realize that when I say we saw them, I mean that Henry Ford bought the buildings and had them shipped here and re-built exactly as they were. This is only a sampler of what is there...

The Presidential limos
The chair Lincoln was assassinated in
Rosa Parks bus
Edison's Menlo Park
The first house with electricity - in the world!
Family Home of the Wright Brothers, Firestone, Ford
The bike shop of the Wright Brothers
Ceramic factories, glass workshops, metal shops, old tyme candy shop, jewelry shops,
Courthouse Lincoln practiced law in

Oh, I give up. It's just amazing because it's shown in a very visual style. Henry Ford was a visionary - friends with Edison and Firestone most of his adult life he decided to save history anywhere he could find it. He hired had Oroville Wright oversee the moving of his own family home and bike shop to Greenfield Village and make sure it was set-up properly. He made an entire village filled with all things American history he could find and then hired the best people he could find to present it to people in an interesting way. I highly recommend anyone with a deep dislike of learning history, to find a way to make it to his museum at some point in their life. There is simply too much to explain to you! I loved it though and thought I'd share it with you guys. Just check out the website

www.TheHenryFord.org

Meanwhile, we're in Wisconsin right now visiting family. We won't be posting again for awhile as we don't have internet capabilities with photos. So, enjoy your spring and we'll be back real soon!

Life in the KOA

2010-04-30T01:59:00.000-07:00

Ann Arbor Classic Bicycle Swap Meet, MI

2010-04-29T20:12:00.000-07:00

The biggest bike swap meet in the country happens in Ann Arbor every year and we were lucky enough to find out about it last minute. Fortunately for us, camping was easy enough on the site and we arrived the night before and hung out with about 30 other people waiting in line to be the first in for flashlight diving. We had a great bonfire and sacrificed a bike to the goddess of good deals. It was nice to see Steve with his people and the kids learned some new "language" from the beer drinking dudes and now know the best fishin' holes up in the woods of northern, MI.

Still Life with Daisies

2010-04-25T20:13:00.000-07:00

Sunday evening, sitting around the heater in a parking lot that doesn't matter. My children are asleep, the youngest next to his Dad, warm and cuddly in our traveling home. There are moments like this that feel exactly like being home, in our stick house. I have everything here, with me, that I care about and I know they are tired from a good day out experiencing the world and the people that fill it up. I'm gonna go crawl into my bed with clean sheets and listen to the rain on the rooftop.

For the Skoolies

2010-04-23T16:39:00.000-07:00

Being that I get a lot of e-mails from Skoolies (converted school bus people), I thought I would write a quick list of things that haven't worked for the Blue Daisy. Perhaps it'll help someone along in their conversion.

1) When we bought our bus, some of the conversion had already been done. One difficult to reach part, behind the fridge coming from the stove there was a piece of copper gas pipe put in. Steve wanted to replace it before we left with flexible tubing but we ran out of time. We ended up with a tiny gas leak, only recently. I'm glad we were in the States because it was easy to fix at a propane/BBQ store. So, advice given, only use flexible gas tubing for bus.
2)Every single drawer and cupboard magnet latch we have, has broken. Every single one of them. If we were to do this again, specifically going to Mexico, we would figure out another system. We used heavy duty magnets and they simply broke driving the roads of Mexico. They fell apart or literally broke in half.
3) We lost our hard drive in our laptop from all the jiggling around in the bus. We got lazy along the way and stopped putting our laptop in its comfy padded container and it ruined the computer. We had to replace it but lost nothing because we had just backed it up onto an external hard drive. Still, it was a lesson learned along the way.
4) Steve says he would have a better system for our inverter. The wiring for our bus was a little cooky when we got it and the inverter doesn't have enough supply power to charge much at the same time. You could be charging the computer and use the water pump and it buzzes telling you it's not working. Sometimes we're charging a phone, DVD player and computer all at once.
5) Find a quiet water pump. If you plan to free camp much, you'll use your water pump a lot. The sound of it drives me crazy and it's located right under the boy's bed. I would get a quiet one or put it under the bus.
6) I worried a lot about sunlight. I kept every single window that didn't need to be covered up. I think I would re-think that. Since we've been traveling, we have never actually opened up the back curtains. We have white curtains so light still comes through but honestly, less windows would do more for keeping the bus warm on cold nights. I wouldn't worry so much about it. I would also have made a set of dark curtains for blocking light when you're free camping under a street light or our current campground has a giant light next to my bed.
7)I would have included a washing machine. It really isn't that hard to do this and it would have been greatly loved in Mexico. I washed most of our clothes by hand and it sucked. We could have so easily had a small washer that hooked to our bathroom sink and drained into our shower. We are still planning on doing this sometime soon. Laundrymats suck. No easy way to say it. Their machines are unpredictable, costly and not a fun place to hang around. A washer would pay for itself, in my family of five, in about three months. Dryer is simply not necessarily in our lives of the endless summer.
8) Painted wood floors. Although this isn't really a mistake to fix, the paint (outdoor floor paint)hasn't quite made it. It has rubbed off, chipped ad it looks like hell. I cannot fix it without abandoning the bus for about a week so for now, we live with it. I believe I would replace it with perhaps something synthetic like marmoleum or have stripped the wood floors and varethaned them. I didn't want to do that in the beginning because I feared the used and painted wood flooring we got for free had lead in it. The sand from the beaches, the dropping of toys and the general traffic has simply worn it down, quickly. So, advice - have really great floors.
**Things that I love about the bus:

TV trays instead of a dining room table - we eat outside most of the time anyway
Garage space in back of bus for bikes, toys, boxes of books and cold clothes
Engine cover converted to sitting area

I bow my head in awe...

2010-04-19T19:36:00.000-07:00

The Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland, photographed on April 17. In “dirty thunderstorms," scientists believe that static charges are ignited by ice particles, as well as ash and rock fragments from the volcano.

MI is for Michigan

2010-04-18T11:31:00.000-07:00

Hanging in Michigan this week. It's absolutely gorgeous here. The leaves are just budding on the trees, the birds are making nests and the frogs are laying eggs (as we witnessed just this morning). We have embraced something we've fought our whole adult lives - KOA Kampgrounds. I never thought I would love a place so much that equates camping with putt putt golf and water slides but hell to the yeah! The boys have been endlessly fishing in the (stocked) ponds, golfing, catching frogs, riding bikes, visiting the campground store to buy gag gifts like snapping gum and fart powder and playing on the giant playground. We simply feed them and remind them to change their underwear! We love this stupid place! I am also loving spring in the midwest with the cool weather and no rain!

McLaughlin

2010-04-13T22:17:00.000-07:00

So, my friend Kate has many amazing qualities that belong to her but her family is EVEN cooler...

her cousin is Sarah McLaughlin
her other cousin is a famous dominatrix, nationally famous
and this happened to her brother when she was 16, listen to the story

http://snapjudgment.org/kidnapped-farc

2010-04-13T22:00:00.000-07:00

Our friends, Wilma and Marcel have a new website chronicling their trip in a totally German looking camper truck thingy. They're, quite orederly, detailing their trip all the way to Chile. Check them out and sign their log book (they could use the attention, Holland is a small country;)

www.waggeladventures.com

Rambles and Thoughts

2010-04-12T20:37:00.000-07:00

Things I am consistently happy about:
Matchbox cars are only $1.00
Hotels have free Wifi - that reach their parking lots
Fruit of all sorts
That my children are resourceful and laugh at themselves
Kevin and Kelsi's organizational skills back home
Fresh salsa makes beans and rice seem decadent
Casey is starting to see the cup half full
"My" cousin
The Dopps mighty fortitude
Diesel engines
That Steve showed up
The brain my mother gave me
Earl Grey Tea with cream and sugar
Hot water
Jane Austen movies
Latin culture
Sunlight

Things I am consistenly annoyed with:
The American view of Latin culture
Brussel Sprouts and Broccoli
Heels and pointy toed shoes
S-Mothering
Boxes, chains, locked doors and straight lines
The News, on TV
Bras
Fixies
RV bathrooms
Cheap dish soap
Foodyism
Debt
Movies with Russel Crow or Jennifer Jason Leigh

Austin, Texas

2010-04-08T20:48:00.000-07:00

Time to kick some Tapas Ass. Team Shack 2010.

I saw the seven yellow jerseys and almost lost my cool!

Easter at The Baby Catcher's House

2010-04-08T20:30:00.000-07:00

Thank you to Kate, James and Angus for their southern hospitality. We had a great Easter week eating, egg hunting, swimming, playing, art making, drinking with friends, and Texas sized TV watching!

South Texas Wildflowers

2010-04-08T20:21:00.000-07:00

It's true what they say about Texas, they have a surprising array of wildflowers. Apparently the thanks is owed to Lady Bird Johnson and so I say Thank You!

Insightful Words by John Taylor Gotto, Again.

2010-04-02T06:18:00.001-07:00

Thanks to "Butter Angie" for the passage from his new book...

When, as happens with some frequency, I'm asked by parents for a single suggestion for changing the relationship between them and their kids for the better, I don't hesitate to recommend this:
Don't think of them as kids. Childhood exists, but it's over long before we allow it to be. I'd start to worry if my kid were noticeably childish past the age of seven and if by twelve you aren't dealing with young men and women anxious to take their turn, disgusted with training wheels on anything, able to walkabout London, do hundred mile bike trips, and add enough value to the neighborhood that they have an independent income; if you don't see this, you're doing something seriously wrong.
Even at seven don't edit the truth out of things. If the family has an income kids need to know to the penny what it is and how its spent. Assume they are human beings with the same basic nature and aptitudes that you have; what you have superior in terms of experience and mature understanding should be exchanged for their natural resilience, quick intelligence, imagination, fresh insight, and eagerness to become self-directing.
Don't buy into the calculated illusion of extended childhood...And adolescence is a total fraud, a pure concoction of social engineers barely a century old.
--John Taylor Gatto in Weapons of Mass Instruction p. 137

Saying Good-bye to Mexico

2010-04-01T14:37:00.000-07:00

We spent our last few days in Mexico doing this stuff - boat rides, walking on the beaches, saying good-bye to silly Dutch friends, getting flat tires and riding on burro carts. Just a typical day for us.

Yes, it's true

2010-03-31T16:46:00.000-07:00

Yes, the rumors are true my friends, we are not returning to Portland anytime soon. We have decided to stay on the road for an indefinite amount of time (i.e. until we don't want to do it anymore). We are currently in Texas and heading to San Antonio for Easter weekend. After that, we're off to Austin for some serious biking and poking around. For our Mexico friends, we crossed the border today and are safe and sound in a parking lot abusing free wifi while the kids play soccer in a field across the street. We've already had pizza and bought new clothes for the kids. More photos coming soon.

Our Lazy Days on the Beach, Part II

2010-03-28T11:35:00.000-07:00

We're still doing nothing, yet it takes all day...

A very early morning sunrise walk.

When I was busy doing nothing, Ryder turned into this guy.

We hang out with ultra hip Dutch couples driving to Chile in a silly truck!

Ryder has a somewhat successful business endeavor!

We watch coconut trees get trimmed. Mozzies lay eggs in baby coconuts and the larvae eat the fruit making the tree weak to lose their tops in big wind storms.

A very important ritual!

An outdoor movie, under the stars (Yellow Submarine, thanks Dylan)

Life in the the Hood on the coast of Veracruz

2010-03-16T08:32:00.000-07:00

Pongwe

2010-03-13T07:07:00.000-08:00

It’s morning time in the tropics. The air is damp and heavy with the smell of flowers and mold. It’s muggy with a hint of rain. The birds are ridiculously loud. They are a 4th of July parade and a firetruck passing all rolled in together. They flutter from coconut palm to hibiscus arguing over tree ownership. It is the same worldwide from Hawaii to Africa and everywhere in between. The tropics always feel the same.
We have been lucky enough to travel in the tropics all around the world but one of my favorite memories of all times was a ten day trip we took to Zanzibar Island off the coast of Tanzania (that’s in Africa if you are geographically challenged). It was unplanned as was our entire trip to Africa but we eventually found ourselves on the island dubbed the spice island with no reservations and no knowledge of what to do. This is, by the way, my favorite way to travel. Over planning a trip is a sure way to miss out on accidental discoveries and unplanned invitations.
Going to Africa was never on our around the world adventure schedule. While walking down a street in Geneva, Switzerland, I saw a sandwich board with cheap tickets to Nairobi. Knowing how much a ticket costs from the states ($1800), I randomly decided to check a local bookstore carrying Africa travel books and find out when was the best season to visit Kenya. The answer was the month of October and it was currently September 25th . We arrived five days later with no plans of any sort except to fly to India by the end of the month when our 30 days visa expired.
The ferry dropped us off in the port of Zanzibar city. It was somewhat interesting with a fort wall built around it and twisting streets leading to restaurants serving spicy curried meats and stodgy yet filling casavas. We found a great hotel where we parked it for a couple of days eating tropical fruit and bought time figuring out what to do next. Our friends we had met on safari had plans to party on the north part of the island and they immediately rented a jeep, found some girls and headed off to get tanked on cheap rum and beer. We had declined their invitation to join after spending a couple of weeks traveling with them already. They were German travelers, enough said.
Somehow the idea popped up to rent a dirt bike as their were many around town. We inquired at our hotel and within an hour a guy showed up with a Honda 250 we could rent for $12/day. We went through our backpacks and put everything in one bag, stored the other at the hotel and ventured out on our motorcycle to discover the island.
Zanzibar Island sits on the coast of Tanzania between the triangle of Africa, Saudi Arabia and India. It has historically grown spices, mainly cloves for centuries. The cloves are picked from trees and set out into the roads to dry in the sun. As you drive, you pass giant piles of pepper, cloves and cardomom as they fill the air with their perfume. This on a motorcycle was exquisite.
The two of us ventured off road onto muddy paths leading to small villages with children playing in puddles gathering around us while we checked our maps. Most of the village huts were built with bamboo and thatched roofs. Women carried wood on their heads while nursing babies on their hips. Everyone was friendly and waved and smiled. Life seemed slow and comfortable, as it always does in the tropics.
As the sun began to settle lower in the sky on our first day, we began looking for a hotel. We came across one that looked rundown and perhaps even closed. We were surprised to find a man sitting under a very large palapa style gazebo,

surprised by our arrival. He eagerly ran up to us as we attempted to drive the motorcycle through the knee high sand filling the entrance road. We inquired about a room and he led us to a cabana with a bedroom and bathroom and the most beautiful hand carved four poster bed with mosquito netting covering it.

When the door was open and you were laying in bed, you could stare directly out at a beautiful coconut palmed private beach with crystal clear water. Our cost, $12/day which included meals.

We parked our motorcycle in the front of our cabana and paid a few days in advance. There were tons of papaya and coconut trees around the hotel, ripe for the picking. We could see that only a few cabanas were in working order and the main covered area was obviously a restaurant. It looked like perhaps a hurricane had hit this place awhile back and no one had ever bothered to fix it up. But then it could be just lack of resources that hit it, another common theme in the tropics.
That night for dinner we ate by candlelight in the restaurant as their was no actual electricity at the hotel, even in our cabana. We ate fried fish with spicy black beans and rice cooked in coconut milk. Papaya with lime juice and salt was served at every meal for dessert. The food was fantastic but simple, repeated daily. Our host was drunk from the moment we paid him until we left. He was kind and funny and accomodating. He taught us how to play Bao on an old wood carved board with real Bao tree seeds. In the states you can buy this game at Target but it’s called Mancala. We spent our days swimming and watching the local women collect natural sponges in the shallows and carry them on huge baskets on their heads. They wore skirts and headwraps that matched in colors of bright orange, pinks and reds.
The tropics on Zanzibar island are almost exactly the same as where we are this morning, on the coast of Mexico. Our bus is parked under coconut palms and we eat fish, beans and rice plus tortillas. The mornings are muggy and damp and by noon you are swimming to avoid the humidity. Although our host currently is not drunk, he did hire some builders to work on his palapas once we paid him. He might live hand to mouth, just as many people do around the world. Life is slow but it seems content. I see how time can go by without a care in the world. It feels like a vortex as our kids get tanner and older while we sit and watch.
While writing this historia, as they say in Spanish, I randomly looked up images of Zanzibar Island. I remembed the name of our hotel because it was called Pongwe and how can you forget a name like that. The hotel website popped up and all of these photos are taken from the exact hotel we stayed at ten years ago. It looks like someone cleaned it up, added a swimming pool and now charge $80/night. I bet that price doesn’t include meals though, or a motorcycle, or privacy, or baobao or a drunk manager, or papaya…

www.pongwe.com/gallery/

Busy on the Beach

2010-03-06T09:29:00.000-08:00

We found a little bit of paradise here on the Golf of Mexico. It took us two half days of driving down the mountains to get here but now we've got a couple of weeks of endless lazy days ahead of us. Steve has been biking and I'm practicing my Spanish with Irma, the cook at the weekend restaurant here.

LLF - Family Motto

2010-02-28T17:54:00.000-08:00

Our last day in San Miguel de Allende. It’s been two months since we crossed the border into Mexico and today is a day of cleaning, gathering and reflecting. I have scrubbed the floors, washed the laundry, gathered staples like lentils, oats, rice and vegetables. We have re-packed and organized the toy closet and secured a new stroller for Casey. It feels time to go.
Our last two months have been very surprising for Steve and I but then our whole life has been unexpected in many ways. I never thought twenty years after my first trip out into the world alone, I would still be flying by the seat of my pants living day to day as we choose. Somehow we have managed to buy a house, have a career, birth three kids in between and still live life to the fullest.
Seventeen months ago, Steve left his job in Portland to follow a more adventurous path in his career and life. At the time, the stock market was crashing and people around us were fearing for their futures. I remember very clearly having a conversation with Steve about the fact that somehow there was a way to take full advantage of this scene. He flew off to Louisiana for Hurricane Ike and I rented out our house to a nice couple remodeling their own home down the street. Having no job to return to after Ike, we took off for Mexico and Guatemala knowing the cost of living would be much cheaper.
Here we are now, a year after that trip, living in Mexico, flying by the seat of our pants, still. It’s not always easy as we have a very limited budget. Fortunately for us, we also have three kids that would keep our lives limited in destination and adventure to a minimum anyway. I cook almost all of our food and cheaply. We don’t buy packaged food from big markets and we don’t eat out too often. This requires constant cooking. Most of the time I don’t mind as I enjoy shopping in the markets and learning new foods like cactus with nuts and chiles but on the days that I do, we hit a BBQ chicken stand and drop eight bucks on a huge dinner. Still our food budget per day is twice what a construction worker makes. It’s an interesting thing to think about.
The best thing about our life is our kids, for sure. They are the most resilient, resourceful, easy going and adventurous kids I have ever met. They do not complain unless they’re hungry and they continue to surprise me in their ability to find fun around every corner and learn new cultures and practices as if it is their own. They truly are the reason we can do this – that and the gift of resourcefulness our own parents instilled in us. So when people write me and ask how we can do this, it is not an easy answer. The only thing I can say is you must think outside the box.
This concept is probably the hardest for people. I have heard many a friends over the years say they cannot get by on their middle incomes. They say that it simply isn’t possible. I say it is possible and then some. We all make choices everyday on how to spend our money. We choose how we dress, what car we drive and think entirely too much about how the world perceives us. We worry endlessly about our health, our future and the personalities of our children. We spend accordingly. It isn’t luck that gets my family here, it’s our ability to let go and live with less fear. If you didn’t fear losing your house because of your health, you wouldn’t spend so much on health care. If you didn’t fear the scowls you’d receive for shopping at the wrong store, you could probably save thousands of dollars each year at a different grocery store. These are all choices and you have them daily to make. So for those of you wanting to spend time in Mexico with your family, I say only this… think outside of the box you have put yourself into. It’s not bad to put yourself in a box if you are completely happy and satisified with that box. If you’re not and as we all are approaching middle age, I believe many around me are not as happy in their boxes, then re-invent yourself. Try a new career, live in a smaller house (or school bus), spend no money for a year, go car free, buy a rental house, buy and sell on e-bay, get lost in Mexico for a year, read the book Your Money or Your Life, live a life of trade commerce. It’s possible. It’s all possible.
My mother taught me that experiences are always better than ownership. Everyone of us can remember moments we have loved about our lives. Camping on an island, hunting trips with fathers and uncles, summer days planning tree houses with friends and picnics with fresh strawberry pie. This is what life is. Living Life Free. Free yourselves and your mind and see what happens. We might just pull up next to you in a forty foot school bus!

*Specific shout outs to South Tabor Work Crew and the D-day club for all of their love and support as well as showing us the good, bad and ugly of Living Life Free.

My Lunchtime Walk from School

2010-02-27T06:37:00.000-08:00

I get out of school at 1:00 everyday and spend the next hour eating lunch and shopping for dinner.

This guy is selling ears of corn that you choose to lather with chili, mayo or other condiments. These are not my favorite as I'm used to the Americanized sweet corn and this stuff is stodgy - then cover it with mayo and chili, no thanks!

This woman is selling cactus, peppers and spicy chickpeas served on thick tortillas as a lunch snack for bus riders. I had it once and it was fantastic but a little dry.

This is the entrance to the main indoor market in San Miguel. You can buy six mangos for three dollars, a giant as big as your head jicama for a little over a buck and avocadoes for a nickle. In this picture you can also see honey and flowers for sale.

My favorite restaurant in San Miguel located in the center of the centro mercado. They serve chicken fried steak sandwiches, chicken mole, bistek, soups and every kind of fresh fruit juice you can imagine. My favorite juice is lime with a little sugar water or guava with milk.

Finally, my lunch. This is chicken stew made with zucchini, carrots, herbs and a piece of chicken. You also get rice and tortillas and the very common bowl of condiments - onions, cilantro, jalapeno and limes. This meal with a coke is 35 pesos or $2.75 and it's good! I will miss this particular lunch when we move on next week.

My favorite Blog

2010-02-24T18:46:00.000-08:00

I've been following this family for the past year as they've lived and traveled in a school bus for the last ten years. They recently moved to Hawaii and her pictures are pretty great.

http://fuhkauifamily.blogspot.com/

No time to Write

2010-02-23T17:44:00.001-08:00

Jesus Christo!

2010-02-20T19:24:00.000-08:00

Have you been to Latin America and traveled on a bus? Yep, that's why we got one! And the answer is no Mom, I'm not going to church now! He simply a piece of art.

Little Fay Fay

2010-02-20T05:30:00.000-08:00

My little boy is becoming a little guy. Phelan is changing the most on this trip both physically and emotionally. He's losing teeth all over the place and cries less about every little thing (Casey has now taken over that role in the family). Oh yeah, he's also sporting a fro these days.

A photo journey of my walk to school

2010-02-17T12:06:00.000-08:00

Aguantame or please have patience...

2010-02-11T14:07:00.000-08:00

I apologize for not having time to write here but I'm really busy in school. Here is a story I wrote last month while traveling south.

I have a life list although now I think it is called a Bucket List. A lot on my list has been crossed off over the years such as seeing the Taj Mahal at sunset and the White Mountains in their fall glory. The list changes all the time as I get older too. I no longer care if I learn French but occasionally still work at trying to learn the piano. Some things on my list are small and don’t really deserve to be on anyone’s bucket list like my desire to make a good pot roast once, just once.
I’ve been to a lot of countries. Twenty-seven to be exact. I’ve also been to thirty-eight states including Maine, Florida, Hawaii and Alaska, the four corners which I think is kind of cool. Two more continents and I’ll have all seven before I die. These are all just numbers though, tasks, checkmarks. The important stuff is in the middle.
I saw the Taj Mahal. I touched it, watched the sunset on it. More interesting though and what is stained in my memory is that I watched an old woman sitting on the grass in front of me take a tiny naked baby, hold it up in the air, make a hissing sound and the baby peed right there on the grass in front of me, in front of the Taj Mahal. It was the coolest thing. When I look at my mental snapshot of that day, that old wrinkled woman with her hair covered up is wearing a red sari holding up a baby in the right hand corner of my Taj Mahal memory snapshot.
Although I love photography and tend to flock towards it at museums, it is not something I love about traveling. So many people spend their trips looking through a lens to capture a moment they want to remember forever. On safari in Africa we found a cheetah sitting near a tree stump with five little babies playing around her. My safari mates all grabbed their cameras to help them remember this moment later in their lives, a reminder of their free youths. My memory of that moment was the sound of cameras clicking and the twitch the Mama cheetah’s ear would do when it happened. She stood there for her photos, looking stoic and graceful and I felt uncomfortable being a part of this voyeristic scene. I wanted to leave her alone, take back the photos and apologize. My memory snapshot of seeing a cheetah in Kenya with babies has an audio attachment that sounds a lot like paparazi, and a camera lens sneaking into the bottom corner.
A few nights ago we went to a small festival of sorts in a border town near Yuma. The plaza had a playground, taco stands and families milling about listening to a man singing love songs on the stage. My kids ran around the throngs of children playing on swings and slides of questionable construction. Some of the older girls noticed Ryder but he was too busy hanging upside down on the monkey bars to notice them. It was dark outside so each one of us took a kid to be in charge of. Mine was Ryder. He headed to the slide where a zillion children were going backwards, upside down, in groups, screaming and laughing all the while landing in a dirt pile on top of eachother. All of them were at least a foot smaller than Ryder and all of them cut in front of him. He realized he would have to play with them if he wanted to go down the slide. He used the tickle method to gain entrance into their game. The littlest kids were in awe, surprised, scared and downright hilarious at their response to him. He laughed, chased, hid, tickled up and down the slide while screaming love songs played loudly and the smell of tacos wafted around us.
Then we took a picture. The flash stopped the kids in their tracks. We had ruined the moment trying to capture it. My mental photoshot of that moment is a huge grin on my son surrounded by tiny kids laughing and running from his tickling hand. The photo is of a bunch of kids standing in line behind a slide, in the dark. What was more important was that without knowing the language or rules of a game,
Ryder got these kids to include him. A proud Mama moment better served in my memory snapshot album instead of an actual photo.
About ten years ago we were in Thailand on the tail end of a long around the world journey. We had done work trade on various farms for bits of time while traveling. We found a work trade farm in a rural area of Thailand and decided to spend a few weeks there while we got used to living in Thailand. We took buses, trucks and finally a small boat to get to the farm of Loong Bob.
Bob was a retired school teacher from the States. He had traveled the world, taught school in Indian reservations in the States and abroad and finally at close to eighty years old, he had now lived on this farm for over ten years. He had just enough of a pension to keep his farm running and buy food to get by.
There was no way to get ahold of Loong Bob to ask permission to come to the farm so you merely had to show up and hope it all worked out. In the village upon our arrival some small children walked us to the river we would need to cross to get to Loong Bob’s farm. They guided us across the water on a crazy hole ridden boat and then led us through cane field until we arrived at a kind of odd looking lean to under giant eucalyptus trees.
Bob was a very healthy older man with long white hair he kept in a braid down his back. He never wore shirts or shoes, did Yoga all day and loved his land like a person. He was proud to show us the trees he had planted and called his land an island as he was surrounded by cane fields.
Our accomodations on the farm consisted of a wooden platform with a tin roof. Our showers came from a giant clay urn with a ladle surrounded by bamboo walls on a dirt floor. It was actually kind of nice on hot days. The farm had a few dry fields for rice and several ponds covered in floating rafts for growing vegetables. Loong Bob was a big fan of trying new ways to grow everything.
One of the first projects we did was to pull up the hyacinth floating in the ponds and make large stacks of them. In the sides of the stacks we planted tomato plants. Being that we were in the tropics, those hyacinth decomposed within days and heated up the roots of the tomato plants at the same time. He had a lot of success growing tomatos this way.
One of our favorite projects from Loong Bob’s was to water his vegetable garden. It took two of us to successfully pull it off as he had a bicycled powered water pump. I or Steve would ride the bike and the other person would water the garden. It was an ingenious way to get work done by volunteers wanting to experience an alternative farm in Thailand.
I did a lot of cooking while there as I was fresh off of cooking courses in India and had arrived with spices. Loong Bob taught me how to kill and de-feather a chicken wherein I made chicken masala soon thereafter. We ate well and had many a great conversations into the night at the farm.
Loong Bob said to us at one point that he wasn’t interested in talking to anyone anymore unless they had something to teach him. He was getting too old to waste his time and he only wanted to learn and try new things. We were like every other traveler coming his way and probably didn’t have much to offer. Everyone had either just come from Australia or India probably traveling around the world in the process. He wanted new experiences as his days were numbered. He planned to have his body buried under a jacaranda tree on his land that he was giving to his Laotian girlfriend.
We spent three weeks on Loong Bob’s farm and I can still picture the layout of the land. I can only guess that Loong Bob is now under that jacaranda tree after finally learning his last thing. We have no photos of our time on that farm and I honestly don’t care. I would never forget his face or the ponds or our shower. It’s a mental snapshot that wasn’t touched by the need to preserve.
I think of Loong Bob and his own bucket list, wondering if he ever had one or even cared. My bucket list isn’t that important to me anymore because the experiences I crave now, I cannot conceive of what they are yet. I need to meet the people or have it happen to realize I always wanted to do it or that it is more precious to me than “saying I did it”. Finding a giant squid on the beach last year surely wasn’t on my list but goes down as a memory snapshot to never forget. I’m sure my today is on someone’s bucket list somewhere. I’m sitting on a beach with my family under clear skies, watching birds fly by and listening to the waves of the ocean with nothing needing to be done until dinner.

Ryder at School

2010-02-07T18:44:00.001-08:00

Learning Spanish through art.

It's pretty too!

The Evolution of a Birder

2010-02-03T17:18:00.000-08:00

I used to make fun of bird people, when I was a much more avid outdoors woman. I made fun of them because they carried those giant binoculars and practiced making bird calls. I thought it looked ridiculous and sometimes, I still do.
One summer I got a job in Denali National Park in Alaska. It was kind of my dream job at the time. I was a naturalist guide and I took people out into the wilds of Alaska to look at animals, plants and geologic formations. Most of my clients ended up being birders though. I quite quickly had to learn what a golden plover was and where to find ptarmignans. People were looking for them to add to their lifer lists, or a bucket list of must see birds. I was looking for tips to save for a trip to South America.
The thing about birders though is that they know much more about the natural environment than many naturalists do. They know what kind of trees or bushes their birds live in, what they eat, how they mate, where they make their nests and where they travel to in different seasons. All of this, I found fascinating that summer. I had always spent the majority of my time staring at plants and mammals y la tierra so I ignored most of the general bird population.
Since then I have searched for Quetzals in Guatemala and Toucans in India, to no avail. I have watched bright green parrots fly over a tropical river in the Amazon and listened to the wind blow on the wings of a soaring Andean Condor. I look closer now at the ground when I hike, looking for evidence of both animals and birds.
I’m obviously older now than that girl in Alaska (by about fifteen years). I haven’t slowed down but my kids make life a bit slower. They cannot backpack more than three miles and spending weeks on end with very little resources isn’t so attractive to them therefore, not attractive to me either. Now I spend far more time car camping than trekking through countries. Now we car camp but in Mexico.
The campgrounds we have spent a majority of our time in are basically grassy flat areas with trees, a water spicket and an electrical hook-up. Some of them have bathrooms with hot showers. We are usually surrounded by giant RV’s or 5th wheelers, all of which cost about what we bought our house for ten years ago.
We set up our camp when we arrive which consists of a table and chairs, bicycles, a couple of big plastic tractors, some firewood, our birds and a hummingbird feeder. Thus far, they have arrived within the day. The hummingbirds that is.
From what I can see, currently our feeder is feeding two pairs of hummingbirds. They hover near the feeder making a clicking noise before they circle it a few more times, then take a drink. The males are green feathered and both male and female have bright red beaks. They also hover near the neighbors giant red brake lights, which always makes me laugh. They are single minded these hummingbirds, red being their entire world.
Next I hang up a half an orange. We did this last year in baja and two different kinds of orioles came by for visits. One was a bright red orange fat oriole, like we see in the States and the other was a more slender and yellow one. They can devour a ½ of an orange a day. In this campground, I have seen no orioles but the woodpeckers are interested in the orange. They fly to the top of the tree and very suspiciously and slowly shimmy backwards down the tree towards the orange. They eventually get close enough to reach over and peck away.
Our campground is also filled with doves and palm birds. They aren’t called palm birds but I do not know what they are called. I call them that because last year in Baja they were always picking the palm fruits out of the trees and dropping them to the ground. Here, they are ground feeders. They are large, the size of a small crow but very slender with long tails. The males fluff up their feathers and point their beaks to the sky to impress the ladies at night. They are so black they are almost blue. They pick at things in the grass, working in groups like cattle grazing.
Lastly there is a bright red vermillion fly catcher. They are the size and color of a cardinal but with brown feathers on their chests. They sit in the trees and then occasionally dart into the sky and very quickly return to their branch. They might be the reason we have no flies in our campground. They are a beautiful burst of color in my perephial vision.
I sit with binoculars and watch now. I know the different calls of these birds. The shrill and whistle of the palm bird, the constant cooing of the doves and the click click of the hummingbirds. I watch the woodpecker shimmy and I watch the palm bird puff and I feel myself, aging. I prefer to call it evolving though. I’m not sure I’ll ever have a desire to fly to Alaska to see a bird for my list but if I saw a Toucan in the Yucatan you can bet your ass I will be talking about it on this blog and for years to come. I might need binoculars though.

Get LOST

2010-02-01T06:57:00.001-08:00

Shannon "Chica" Schmidt, aka Fish Head

2010-01-28T06:54:00.000-08:00

She came for five weeks and took over our couch. She washed dishes, made margaritas, laughed with "relish", read five books, helped with maps, stole my new blanket, learned some Spanish, barfed in our sink, didn't change diapers, ate a lot of bread, knit a wash cloth and played with the boys, a lot! We miss you Chica! How will I know when Sally needs feeding? Una besa para tu.

An Invitation

2010-01-27T09:18:00.000-08:00

We are losing the last of our houseguests tomorrow in the magic school bus. If anyone wants to escape the cold and dreary winter of el norte, we've got room and can even do p/u's at airports. Grab your passaporte and hop on a plane. Mexico City until March or fly to Cancun around April. Please come! ...plan on doing dishes.

Ahh, mornings

2010-01-26T18:02:00.000-08:00

We were sitting in a plaza overlooking three different churches during morning rush hour. The light on the stucco walls was orange, yellow, pinks and greys. We sat in the sun as it was cold if you weren’t in it and watched as people came and went, buying drinks and tamales from a stand nearby. I could see the steam coming from the hot drinks they bought. My curiosity finally got the best of me and I had to buy one.
I approached the cart and did what I usually do which is observe what other people are buying and try to figure out what it is. The woman in front of me bought a black drink in a clear plastic cup. I asked her in Spanish if it was sweet. She said yes and walked away without anymore information offered. I told the woman behind the cart I wanted the same. I asked her if it was from frijoles wherein she laughed at me. She tells me it is “near chocolate”. Embarrassed, I then have to explain that in Guatemala they drink the juice from black beans mixed with sugar and milk. She laughed and said, no aqui, not here.
I returned to Shannon with my black steaming hot drink. When I say black, I mean black, not dark brown coffee color, but black like tar. Thick black, like tar. I took a sip and immediately didn’t like it. It was corn, thick corn liquid with probably a little chocolate added and sugar. Mayans are freaks for corn. I tried to cough it down but it was overpowering and I could not make any headway on it. I left it on a nearby garbage can hoping that one of the many local people without resources would find it much to their surprise and hopefully, delight.
I returned to the cart, ready for a new discovery that would hopefully be a little more pleasant to my early morning palette. I asked the woman what each drink is wherein she quite kindly showed me hot chocolate (with corn), hot milk with rice and my favorite, a caramel flavored milk. I ordered the caramel drink which we decided tasted like a pastry in a cup. It was fantastic. I’m sure it had some more of the corn tar in it but the caramel flavor was lovely mixed in it.
During this time in the plaza, there were many people setting up easels to catch the early sun on the churches. They stared through their hands, trying to find the best boundaries for their canvas. There were students rushing off to classes, people catching buses to work and old men and women, warming their bodies with hot drinks and early sunlight. The men were wearing cowboy hats, button down shirts and jeans with belts. The women wore long skirts with black socks and shoes, aprons and large shawls around their heads and shoulders. Their skin was dark brown and leathery with braids down their backs and gold filigree earrings.
One particular woman sitting near us had quite an intericate tamale chocolate drink situation going on. She opened her morning tamale and then proceeded to slowly pick it into pieces and feed it to the pigeons. She carefully peeled every bit of corn from the husk for the gathering group of birds. She took her time drinking her hot chocolate looking as if she quite enjoyed every sip. She noticed nobody around her except the birds and she herself concentrated solely on her own tasks.
When she reached the bottom of her cup, she began to pour small amounts of it into the palm of her hand and drink from it as if it was a spoon. We could only guess that she either wanted to prolong the drink experience or sift through something sitting on the bottom of the cup. I tried to picture myself at a coffee shop in Portland pouring bits of tea into the palm of my hand and then slurping it up slowly, while people watched. It would be fun to do, just to mess with people.
Eventually we left the plaza and went onto another plaza to watch teenagers in courtship, newspaper salespeople yell out the latest headlines and men sell ice cream flavors like mango and lime. We spent the morning like this, wandering the cobblestone streets, sitting in plazas and enjoying the day to day activities as simple as a warm cup of corn tar Joe.

Uphill/Downhill

2010-01-25T08:15:00.000-08:00

Once again, I’m sitting in the sun, in winter. Shannon is learning to knit, Casey is sitting on Steve’s lap eating tortilla chips and the boys are reading comic books in the bus. We could be anywhere right now and yet we’re in Mexico. I can tell by the noise and smells. The birds are louder and have different songs. Tropical sounding songs. The trucks honking down the road are melodic, talking to eachother about which way they’re turning or stopping. The air smells like chicken and tires burning. The temperature is a lovely seventy degree something as we sit soaking in the morning rays.
We left the beaches and headed up into the mountains to get a little closer to Mexican culture and away from the leatherbacks – retired Canadians with “leather backs” from sitting in the sun. They are up and down the Mexican coast, taking over every RV park with their 5th wheelers and diesel trucks. None of them speak Spanish and they sit together for days on end eating frozen lasagnas they bought in the States and spend their evenings watching golf on satellite TV’s. It was hard to leave the beaches as the boys had so much fun in the sand but we were going a little crazy trying to find “Mexico”.
San Miguel is adorable – the Santa Fe of Mexico they call it.

The buildings are painted beautiful shades of tierra and everyone prides themselves on intricately carved doors and metal door knockers in shapes of corn, gargoyles and fireworks. It’s filled with museums, galleries, libraries and craft shops. The plaza Jardin in the main square and overlooks an incredibly beautiful church surrounded by churro and chocolate shops as well as food carts with BBQ corn on the cob, fruit cups and colorful handmade sodas.

The plan is to stay here for over a month while I take Spanish courses and Steve volunteers somewhere with the kids. We’ve come up with a list of projects the kids can do such as map out the central market, take photos of all the doors and hang out at the coolest public library I’ve ever seen. The surrounding area has villages known for things like silver smithing and wall murals that we all can take day trips to. There will be a lot to do in the next month, for sure.
The adventure to get to this village is almost undescribable. We left Teacoupan, a beach just south of Mazatlan around one o’clock in the afternoon and drove until it was dark. We spent the evening in a semi campground behind a gas station. It’s common here for trucks to sleep behind the state run gas stations. It was clean and secure and if we paid the gas station attendant 100 pesos, he would let us stay there. Ugh, I think they’re free I told him. He laughed and said no, I said 100 pesos, not 100 dollars. I told him I would be happy to discuss it with the attendant in the morning and if it was still 100 pesos, I would pay it then. He then asked us to simply fill up with gas and we’d be fine. It’s common that there are hidden charges in our daily life. Knowing ahead of time what you’re willing to pay, stand your ground and you’ll usually get to the bottom of the true price fairly quickly.
Our next day of travel was a day to never ever forget in our life of travel. We entered into a city looking for signs for a small village to the north. We turned when we found it and headed directly into the heart of a tiny cobblestone central area. We realized immediately we were in trouble but we thought there would quickly be a turnoff onto a highway towards this other village we were looking for.
We discovered instead that the road jogged to another side street which required Steve to turn to the left and immediately make another right within about ten feet. There was another bus sitting on the corner in our way. It wouldn’t move. Steve took the turn and the back of the bus swung into the sitting parked bus. The thud was noticeable. Everyone on the street started screaming for Steve to stop.
I jumped out of the bus to help Steve around the corner. The other bus driver came out and told us we would need to pay for hitting his mirror. I ignored him and helped Steve go around the jog. The bus driver stood in the way of our bus and started yelling for the police. A man walking down the street came over and asked us if we needed help. Obviously we did. He worked for the bus company and told the other bus driver to see if he could fix the mirror himself. The police showed up and asked us if we wanted an escort out of town. At this point we didn’t know how many more streets we would need to turn and figured they wanted us out of there, they would help us get out. The helpful man jumped on our bus to help guide us out of town as well. All was well with the bus we hit and off we went. By this time, I was a little shaky about our chances of getting out of this maze. The roads was getting thinner and the balconies were at about the top of our bus level.
Finally, we could see the end of the street. We would just need to pass a full size pick-up truck. Steve slowly squeeked by while I hid my head in my hands. Then another clunk and scrape sound. Oh god, we just hit the truck. I panicked and tried to figure out where we had put our Mexican insurance and my hands began to shake. Then Steve said he didn’t hit the car, only the truck’s tire and it broke off the lid to our black tank, holding our shit from the bathroom. He said there is piss and crap flowing out of the tube, onto the little cobblestone street we were traveling on. With people watching. The smell was um, kind of bad.
Steve wanted me to go outside and pick-up the pieces of tubing that had broken off. Now picture this. There’s a tiny street maybe 10 feet wide with a four foot wide patch of pee and poop flowing down it. In the middle of it, is a lid cap that needs to be retrieved by me, while people walking down the street are watching. Yes, I grabbed it and asked for a plastic bag from inside the bus. Shannon hands me a tiny ziploc bag and I yell for a bigger one. My hands are shaking so bad at this point that I couldn’t open the bag she hands me to get the parts in it. The entire moment was so ridiculous. I hop back on the bus crying from stress and fear of hitting another car or building. We had one more major turn to do that somehow Steve made look easy and we were now out of the maze.
Once out of town, we pulled over and assessed our mental and physical damage. Only the pooper cap broke off and Steve was able to instantly fix it.
What we didn’t expect to find though is the massive dent and scrape on the side of the bus. The bus we initially hit probably had a lot more damage than either we or that bus driver had seen. Steve thought he had hit it harder than just pushing a mirror but we weren’t going to argue with the bus driver anymore than we had to. We eventually took off after Shannon made me a margarita and managed to get to our destination about five hours later, a little bruised but now with a good story.
Now we rest. It’s pleasant here sitting in the sun with my family. We are more than happy to not drive anymore for awhile. We’ll take some day trips around the area on chicken buses and head back to the beach next month for more boogie boarding and sunsets with leatherbacks. For now though, it’s good to be in Mexico in January listening to birds and eating chips and salsa in the sun.

Mazatlan

2010-01-20T06:09:00.000-08:00

1/16/10

I’m sitting on an old cement rooftop overlooking the ocean and two miles of Mazatlan coastline. We parked here in the wee hours of the morning, knowing there would be few cars parked on the beach. All day we expected La Policia to tell us we had to move since we were in some prime real estate.
Our bus windows look out over water, resort buildings, islands and the Promenade. Actually, our door opens up onto the promenade which is a three mile walkway with art, restaurants and exercise stations. It’s very similar to the Venice Beach/Santa Monica promenade.
Yesterday we convinced some carpenters working on a house next to us to let us fill up our water tanks. We have two fifty gallon tanks with water we use for washing and two five gallon water bottles of agua pura for drinking. I thankfully bought, at the 24th hour, a pump that attaches to the top of the drinking bottles to fill our water glasses from.

Since we have been doing so much free camping on this trip, finding water to fill up the big tanks with, has been difficult. We have done it at campgrounds for a nominal fee and have most definately scouted for water spickets. We carry a hundred foot hose just for these situations. It took the whole hose to get from the house to the bus without losing our golden position on the beach. We tipped the construction crew three bucks for the hassle and enjoyed some much needed showers.
Mazatlan is surprisingly cute for a big bustling Mexican city. There is the common resort feeling on the north side of town with t-shirt shops and taxis yelling at sunburnt tourists clutching tightly to their purses and wearing hats that say Minnesotans Do It With Relish?

Farther south along the promenade is the historical district that has recently gotten a facelift and is enjoying a bit of a rennaisance. Old colonial buildings line cobblestone carriage roads. As you wander around them you come across tiny plazas with musicians and bouganvilla covered restaurants.

Near the historical district is a beautiful indoor market. Shannon and I went there yesterday and bought giant shrimp, guavas, mangos and finger bananas. I introduced Shannon to horchata and Casey and I gulped down fresh guava juice. The woman that sold me shrimp also had crab meat,octopus and scallops, all caught within eight hours.
The only casualty of our Mazatlan adventure is that we had our stroller stolen. It was a big loss as we speciically brought an all terrain one to handle sand, cobblestones and broken concrete. Last night as we were eating dinner, I chatted with a local street vendor about our missing stroller. I told him if he saw the people with it, be sure to tell them I’ll give a reward for its safe return. Maybe it’ll help, maybe not. If we don’t get it back though, our long walks through villages will become impossible with Casey.
Right now I’m watching Ryder watching the ocean. He watches as the waves run into the building we sit on. He’s watching for the tide to go out so he can boogie board again. Now that we are in the land of warm water, their Christmas presents from Aunt Connie are coming in handy.

Phelan lost his voice last night after a day spent screaming in delight riding the warm waves. Ryder learned from the local teenagers to duck under waves and wait for the good ones. I have a feeling, in a couple of weeks, he’ll be spinning cirlces on his board and thinking about dreadlocks.
Mazatlan finally feels like Mexico. Up until now Mexico felt more like a latin flavored retirement villge. When we drive now we see men on horses pulling wooden carts, giant fields of corn and clay bricks being made by hand, drying in the sun. Gone are the endless taco stands, dune buggies for rent and shrimp sellers.
We are heading inland soon, towards Mexico City. We hope to find a small village in the mountains to spend a month or more so that we can find kids for the boys to play with and I can work on my Spanish. The bus is working great and the kids are happy to have their “things”. Thanks to all, again, for all of your support and generosity in getting us here, 2600 miles from Portland.

A Beach, Mexico

2010-01-11T13:00:00.001-08:00

We'll get back to you soon, we're kinda busy

The Journey of Discovery

2010-01-03T21:40:00.001-08:00

The tide is going out. I can hear it only as it is dark outside and I’m sitting on a picnic bench awaiting the moonrise. It will be almost a full one tonight. Everytime I see the moon reflected on the Sea of Cortez, I cannot help but sing that “it’s a fabulous night for a moondance”.
Nine days ago we were in Portland opening Christmas gifts with our family. It seems like a year ago honestly. We are now in a warm climate with outside living. We BBQ daily, ride our bikes and eat mangos and avocados. It took us three days of driving and a lot of tolerance, but we all made it, happy and really glad to now be here.
Our first day of driving involved a previous night’s sleep in a mall parking lot. It was 25 degrees outside and we all slept in sleeping bags under wool blankets despite the fact we also had a propane heater going all night. As we awoke in the dark the next morning, we could not wait to get on the freeway despite the fact we would be driving all day long. The sun came up somewhere around Eugene which was covered with frost and a low fog. The kids got excited near Ashland when they saw snow remembering last Christmas when Portland was covered in a thick blanket of powder. In Redding we could really feel the temperature change in the bus and the windows no longer fogged up as we drove. We arrived at my parents house in Sacramento tired but ready to embrace our second Christmas dinner and gift giving.
My mother made her potato salad knowing it is my favorite. There was also ham, rolls, bean salad and sherry wine cake. It was the Christmas of my childhood. I was relieved after days at Steve’s parents house eating traditional German food such as Oyster stew and bag pudding with sausage and plums.
We went to bed very early as we had another long day ahead of us. We crammed in quick showers in the morning and were guided out of the “suburbs for seniors” by my parents in their golf cart. My Mom brought out all the neighbors for photos and rides in the school bus. It took awhile but everyone was in good spirits. Finally, two hours later, we found our comfortable position in the slow lane on I5 heading south again.
The evenings camping had not been planned out in advance. I simply thought we would find an easy place to bunk down for the night around San Diego. We did. About an hour north, we found a scenic overlook. Despite the close proximity to I5, none of us cared so we put up the curtains and fell quickly asleep.
During these two days of travels, we ate very well. I practiced cooking while driving. I baked sourdough bread, popped kettle corn, cooked beans in a pressure cooker and made hummus in my mini food processor. No fast food or sandwiches for our group. Although the pressure cooker was the most difficult to do, the split pea soup was fantastic with the fresh bread.
Sometime during these two days, we realized we were beginning to have a few battery issues. We seemed to be losing battery power in the bus and driving wasn’t refilling them. Somewhere along the road, we also realized it was actually our fridge draining it while we drove. Our fridge was supposed to be working off of propane but for some reason, it wasn’t. We would now need to find a repair shop before we could cross the border. An unexpected detour on what we were now calling the Journey of Discovery.
Our third day of travel had been planned a month before. Our group of nine would head to Sea World for the day.

We decided the fridge and batteries would have to wait as the kids deserved a day of frolicking. We saw the shows, aquariums and went on rides. At lunchtime we all headed to the bus and BBQ’d chicken. Late that evening, despite being tired, we drove to a nearby Home Depot and parked in the parking lot for the night. The adults stayed up late in the bus drinking beers and rum surrounded by oil lanterns. In the morning, we would get the last of our needed items before leaving.
After doing a little early morning shopping, we were off to an RV repair shop where our little group played in the parking lot across the street while our fridge got fixed.
We unloaded balls and bikes and had a picnic at lunchtime. We were trying to decide if we should rush the border before it got dark. The fridge was done in the early afternoon and we probably could make it. We decided to go for it since we had driven this stretch to San Felipe two times before and we knew exactly where we were going once we got to town. That and my birthday was the next day.
Of course we didn’t expect to get denied entrance to Mexico. Calexico is about 100 miles east of San Diego on the California side of Baja. We stood in a long line of cars waiting to cross through evening traffic. It probably took us 45 minutes to get four blocks. When it was finally our turn, we were waved into a separate lane for larger vehicles. The agent asked where we were going and then began to move the barriers. To cross into Mexico, you usually do not need to show your paperwork. It is only upon leaving Mexico that you need a passport.
While the officer began to move the barrier, a man yelled across the lanes to stop. He was obviously a superior. He approached our bus and I opened the door. He asked for our papers. I asked him if he wanted our insurance papers and he said no. I got our title and registration. He then asked for our commercial papers. I told him we didn’t have any. He said we needed them since we were driving a commercial vehicle. I invited him inside to see it wasn’t a commercial vehicle and he didn’t. He seemed quite angry at us. He told us to go back to the U.S. and ask them for the papers. At this point, we had no other options. Especially because he was kind of a jerk to begin with and obviously in charge.
Then he ordered the craziest thing. They stopped every person from driving through the border and had Steve turn the bus around right there. He turned across five lanes. He barely made it. There were multiple people involved getting cars out of the way, low hanging wires and one-way traffic. We ended up on a side street with a U.S. border agent.
The American agent asked for our passports and put the dogs on the bus for inspection. He told us to try another border nine miles down the road. He said that sometimes they just won’t let buses go through but there doesn’t seem to be any particular reason why. We headed down the road to the other border where we were searched and sent on through quite quickly. We all looked at eachother in awe and cheered that we had finally gotten the Blue Daisy all the way to Mexico in one piece.
Now I sit here, five days later feeling like Christmas was a lifetime ago. We’ve done nothing but read, eat and play on the beach since we’ve arrived. There are quite a few empty tequilla and beer bottles sitting around the bus, some sunburnt faces and sandcastle skeletons. The stresses are gone, the cold is gone and we are beginning to fall into a familiar rhythm.

Tomorrow we leave San Felipe and head down to new territory. Our six months in Mexico has now officially begun.

Cooking in the Bus

2010-01-02T18:49:00.000-08:00

We have been eating VERY WELL...

For my birthday we had
Fresh BBQ'd giant prawns
Rice & beans
BBQ'd peppers

New Year's Eve
Grilled chicken tacos
Fresh coleslaw

Ben's last night dinner
Ceviche with avocado slices on crackers
Fried chayote

We just finished off a bowl of freshly chopped salsa plus guacamole and chicharrones!

Benjamin Copstead

2010-01-01T20:00:00.000-08:00

He traveled with us for 8 days
He never once lost his cool
He smiled through border police, crying babies, freezing buses and questionable chicken. He supervised the death of 15 flies, became Steve's underboss, never changed a diaper, played the opposite game with Ryder and took the garbage out. You will be missed.

Cuarenta Anos

2009-12-30T14:38:00.000-08:00

I AM

40
12/30/2009
Moonrise over Sea of Cortez, San Felipe Mexico.

We've made it, safe and sound.
Stay tuned for a photo update of our Journey of Discovery.

Blue Daisy Complete

2009-12-21T22:41:00.000-08:00

She's done and almost all packed up. Thank you to all for your help in our conversion - you know who you are...artists, painters, cleaners, donaters, supporters, drinkers and other free lifers. Thank you and Happy Holidays from Steve, Diana, Ryder, Phelan and Casey (asleep in the bed on video).

Check out how much it has changed by clicking on the link to the right - bus conversion beginning!

Jack Black and I are members, are you?

2009-12-18T10:36:00.000-08:00

www.stillerstrong.org
Follow along for a chuckle, but then give this holiday season!

7 to 71 in 18

2009-12-11T21:52:00.000-08:00

Two weeks from today I will load my family onto a forty foot school bus packed with bikes, clothes, school books, Legos, a BBQ, kitchen, bathroom, beds, a living room and a 17 foot canoe on top. For eight months we have worked, scraped, saved and converted this school bus into a house bus that we plan to drive to somewhere near Guatemala. As of today, everything is breaking because it is freezing outside and seven degrees. The propane is frozen, the batteries are kaput and our hands are chapped from working in the cold. The good news is that it is seventy one degrees in San Felipe, Mexico and we’ll be there in just 18 days.
Last year when we spent two months in Baja, we had plenty of time to watch all of the American and Canadian snow birds drive their big RVs into our campgrounds and maneuver them around palm trees and mangy mutts. The RVs ranged from tiny converted vans to half a million dollar big rigs with matching trucks being pulled behind. Steve and I were camping in our twenty year old VW van with our three kids. It was working for us but more space would definitely have been welcomed. We knew we wanted an RV to return to Mexico in but what it looked like, we couldn’t figure out.
My in-laws were in the desert in Arizona during the same time and drove down to San Felipe for a quick weekend visit. They left their big rig on the other side of the border and drove their jeep down from Calexico. After a summer of chemotherapy for my mother-in-law, it was great to see her eating fish tacos and flying kites with my kids on the beach. They’re easy to hang with and always have interesting things to talk about.
It was during this time that my father-in-law had mentioned he had recently met a cute little family camping out in the desert in a converted school bus. The story went something along the lines of garlic transporters, home-schooling, Mexico half the year and Canada the other half. He said their school bus had beds made of 2x4's and bikes and lots of space to stretch out in. He mentioned this story to us and I filed it away in the oh my god I’m not a freaking hippy file I always keep in the back of my head. There are other things in that file like “I don’t shave because I’m actually just lazy” or “Volkswagons are just easier because we’ve always had them”. My favorite file I keep is “but I don’t even like brown rice”. Really, we aren’t hippies. If we are, we fight the title with Pepsi, deodorant and occasional road rage.
After our adventures in Mexico and Guatemala, we returned to Portland in the spring and immediately began to look at RVs. We also looked at school buses but there were not a lot to chose from. The first one we looked at was forty feet long. We didn’t need anything forty feet long! For the same price we could buy a very small RV from the eighties with mold and a rusty fridge. The RV’s were also looking kind of cramped to me. I pictured constantly moving out of each others way to make the beds or even dinner. The kicker with every RV though was that we would not be able to store our bikes inside. Kind of important when free camping your way through Mexico with fancy bikes. The super long school bus looked better and better. We called the owner and struck up a deal. It all happened faster than was probably necessary but I think we would have never done it otherwise. When Steve drove the bus into our driveway, I think the panic and giggles began. Six months later we’re still giggling and panicking but either way, years from now, we’ll never forget the year we bought a school bus.

Ryder's Birthday

2009-12-06T17:15:00.000-08:00

I'm nine now!

Nickel Arcade with friends

Caleb trying to figure out French desserts.

Isabelle really enjoying french desserts.

Friendship Necklaces that make into a HEART ;) Friends forever, Maretta + Ryder

Ryder and the Girls

All the Usual Suspects - Maretta, Isabelle, Ryder, Caleb & Pierre
The "Every Week" Bunch

Three Angels

2009-12-05T07:26:00.000-08:00

Our newest edition! Our friend Angie makes these awesome angels on reclaimed lumber and sells them around town. She, very kindly, painted these angels to bring along with us to Mexico. Thank you so much Angie. The second photo is to show the frost in the window reflecting our need to get out of town very soon, as in 21 days!

Ampage/Wattage/Crapage/Trapage

2009-11-28T08:55:00.000-08:00

Saturday morning conversation over coffee in the Kirkndopp house:

"It looks like a 45 Watt solar panel gives us 12 amp hours a day."

"I think the black tank needs a trap. I definately think that is the problem."

"What is the opposite of a trickle charger, a non-trickle charger or a fast charger?"

December 26th!

2009-11-23T10:37:00.000-08:00

We are leaving in about a month. The trip is kinda sorta planned. We'll take two days to drive to San Diego and then take the family to Sea World courtesy of the grandparents in Roseville (thanks ;) We'll practice city boondocking nearby. On the 29th of December, we'll cross the border in Tijuana and head to San Felipe for my big 40 celebration! I like champagne, blended margaritas and gin & tonics everybody!

I'm spending my days thinking through our needs before we go. We're going for a long time so there is a lot to think about. I have to buy things like a lifejacket for Ryder, containers to keep the bus organized, a case of pesto and pasta, enough journals for all to last months, tape, scissors, find the best gas prices, solar panels, sunhats, bike tubes ...

Bought this week...
Portable DVD player with speakers
Mini Weber BBQ with 12 foot gas line
Shower Head with on/off switch
More Books on Driving through Latin America
Lots of TJ's Enchilada Sauce/Angel Hair Pasta/Pesto Jars
Solar Panels for roof

Looking for...
kids' wetsuits
inflatable kayaks
collapsible jogging stroller
trickle charger

Shannon & Ben's Engagement Party in Seattle

2009-11-17T12:38:00.000-08:00

We had a great weekend up in Seattle with Shannon and Ben as well as all of Steve's family. The party was fantastic, breakfast the next morning at Connie's was delicious and then another overnight on Whidby Island where the wedding will take place summer 2011. It's always fun to hang out with Bannon and we thank them for all of their efforts!

How cute is this!

The elves came again!

2009-10-29T11:19:00.001-07:00

More art, more fun, more thank yous!

How we Converted

2009-10-14T23:12:00.000-07:00

It took four months of collecting, gathering and working to bring this house bus to fruition. She's now complete. We still have some kinks to workout but we could leave for Mexico tomorrow and live like kings. We still want to order screens for the windows which will cost a bit but all total - it looks like $4500 from beginning to end. This was a really fun family project and we hope in a year from now we'll still be Living Life Free because Life is Good!

ITEMS WE FOUND FREEEEEE
wood flooring (freecycle)
egg crate foam (freecycle)
insulation/cabinets/paint (Pierce family)
awesome carpet squares (Tom Byrne)
Metal cabinet aka sheet metal (free on craigslist)
2 Futon Frames (freecycle)
Orange,yellow,red,blue,green paint (everywhere)
Wood Burning Stove (thank you Craigslist guy)
Bricks (Pierce Family)
Grey Water Tank (Craigslist Free)
Wood Flooring & Cabinets (Kevin O'Connor)
Thai Fabric (Marlene)
Wood door for Headboard (Byrne family)
Futon Mattress (Carol Dopp)
Sink and Faucet (Free Craigslist)
Tiles (Meredith)
Coreboard (Richard & big Tom)
Generator (R&M for Anniversary:)
2x2 pieces (John & Angie)
Cabinet doors (Katie & Matt)
Masonite (Nathan, Jane's Daddy)

COST BREAKDOWN
$1800 School Bus
$1 Foam from Garage Sale
$17 Fabric for dining room cushions (sun vinyl)
$17 bolts for seat belts/nail gun nails
$4 Rust remover for stove
$406 New registration (holy moly!)
$19 Floor supplies paint/brushes
$8 Wallboard from Rebuilding Center
$25 Metal Cutter Blades /lead test kit
$150 Propane Stove
$4 Spray Paint for Door/Windows
$32 Plywood for Bed
$50 lights/water tank/pump/belts
$7 Fabric from thrift store
$27 Fabric for Couch (sun worthy)
$650 RV Fridge/Toilet/Air Conditioner
$10 Fridge propane adapter
$350 Plumbing Supplies
$50 Super Bad extension cord
$24 Window tinting & battery stuff
$108 Super Special Rv Batteries
$10 Metal putty
$64 Spray Paint for Ceiling Color
$20 Propane Heater
$20 Screws/Drill bits/Plumbing
$30 Wood Putty and spray paint
$65 Toggles and Magnets
$45 Scrap Metal
$360 Screens/Window Tinting
Total $4346 thus far (10/09)