We spent a couple of days in Las Cruces before moving on to El Paso.  Home cooking at Shawna and Steve’s, and a coffee stop at The Bean in Mesilla after catching Claudissa and Jonathan at her Valentine’s Day bake sale, where we indulged in a fabulous cheesecake and red velvet cookies.  But, the dread of every traveler plagued us.  First Judy, then Larye, came down with upper respiratory distress.  We kept it at bay a bit with nasal irrigation, cough drops, and over-the-counter remedies, but got worse over the days.  We still managed to get in dinner in El Paso with son Jason and Melissa, and breakfast with grandson Cage and Melly.

We ended up spending an extra day in El Paso, mostly sleeping, finally getting collected and on the road again mid-day on Monday, February 17.  We arrived well after dark in Sonora, Texas, and took the first likely parking spot at the fuel stop, which was sloped quite a bit.  We had a fitful but largely restful night back in the van again after several days of guest room stays.

Back on the road after breakfast in the truck, we ran into mist and light rain, though a warm day.  This part of Texas is characterized by sheer limestone cliffs formed by the freeway cuts through the rolling hills.  Not far down the road, we decided that it was best if Judy sought some medical advice and a bit stronger attack on the coughing and hacking.  This took us into Kerrville and a strip-mall urgent care center, which didn’t accept our out-of-state Medicare Advantage.  So, a couple of hundred dollars later,we left with a new stash of medication and a few groceries from H-E-B, where the pharmacy was located.

The GPS led us into a maze of freeways through San Antonio and out the other side into farmland and small towns, and eventually to the Goliad State Park by mid-afternoon, for a rest and electrical hookup in anticipation of the cold front moving in mid-week.  At least, the fuel prices have been lower than anticipated and much lower than at home, but the freeway speeds have eaten into our good mileage a bit.  The next few days promise to be on back roads.

And, the cold front did move in, freezing overnight and not promising to rise much over that through the day.  So, we registered for an additional day, took our laundry to the laundromat in town, and spent the day catching up on computing things.  Near the end of the day, we were entertained by a flock of buzzards swirling in the wind above the campground, disturbed by another camper hiking on the river trail. The next night was even colder.  The water spigot in our campsite froze, so we left without refilling our drinking water supply.  We did stop and tour the restored mission complex.  We had seen it two years ago when we stopped through, but it was always good for a second look, and we enjoyed the weaving, spinning, and natural dye exhibit.

We took the back roads from Goliad to Galveston, refueling on the way.  Through Galveston, we took the ferry to Port Bolivar and continued up to I-10, stopping for the night as darkness overtook us as we crossed into Louisiana.  With the cold snap still with us, we quickly bedded down for the night before the van temperature fell.  In the morning, we dressed and drove up the road to the next gas stop to get the van warmed up before breakfast and coffee.  Then, up US 165 to Alexandria, and east to Natchez, where we made lunch at the closed Mississippi Welcome Center before refueling at a local gas station.  Coming out of Texas, we noted the live oak giving way to cypress and southern white pine as we crossed Louisiana and into Mississippi.

We spent the next two days cruising up the Natchez Trace, enjoying the lack of traffic between cities, arriving in Tupelo after dark and finding our way north to the Love’s Travel Center, where we repeated our cold-weather drill to stay warm through the night in our cozy 15-degree Big Agnes sleeping bag, as the temperature inside dropped to 5 C/41 F and freezing outside.  We stopped at a supermarket for breakfast bars and a gallon of drinking water, stopping later up the Trace to make coffee.  The 80 kph National Park speed limit brought our gas mileage back up quickly, and there was little traffic on the parkway except near the cities, where the locals use it as a bypass.  As we moved North, the foilage changed again, to more cedar and hardwood forests, and rocky outcroppings of the Nashville Dome karsts and limestone as we entered Tennessee.

We arrived in Nashville mid-afternoon, to cruise down Broadway past honky-tonk after honky-tonk and the crowds gathering for Saturday night festivities, then out the other side to Matt and Darice’s house, where we enjoyed a warm guest room and a promise of warmer weather in the next week, but a frozen weekend.

One of the advantages of our continent-spanning travel is we generally know which grocery chains carry the food brands we get at home.  We shop at H.E.B. in Texas, which doesn’t, but it’s ubiquitous.  In Nashville, we found Kroger’s, which owns the Fred Meyer chain at home, but they were out of Judy’s lactose-free yogurt.  However, we know from previous trips that Publix does carry both lactose-free products, and we found both there.  Dinner out at a local brew pub was excellent, with a good selection for vegetarian for me and bacon-laced dishes for Judy, who still enjoys bacon and shrimp when available.

Once again,we enjoyed guest quarters, in a future rental apartment at Matt and Darise’s house, which the temperature plummeted below freezing outside at night.

In preparation for warmer weather, we cleaned, lubricated, and adjusted the tandem bicycle in anticipation of exploring the Music City bike trail that winds around the city from nearby.  We took a walk on the trail as the temperature moderated.

The weather cleared, and we drove to a nearby trailhead.  We zoomed down the hill and over the pedestrian/bike bridge to ride on the Music City Bikeway through Shelby Bottom along the river, exploring the many side paths and circling a small lake in a park at the west end of the trail.  Naturally, for us, we had to push up the spiral path to the bridge and again up the hill to our van.

On Thursday, we formed a two-vehicle caravan headed from Nashville to Maggie Valley, North Carolina, to open the kids’ Glamping tent for the season.  The trip took us on I-40 to Newport, Tennessee, where we detoured up US 25 to bypass the closed section of I-40, destroyed by hurricane Helene last fall.  The French Broad River along US 25 was also the site of much devastation wrought by the hurricane, with much of the lowlands along the river scoured of trees and structures.  The route twisted and turned, becoming tortuous as we departed the river, winding through a maze of country roads over the foothills of the Smoky Mountains.  One climbing set of tight curves knocked over our drinking water supply, which Judy hastily righted, but several liters spilled on the van floor, spreading in rivulets as the van shifted from side to side on the mountain road.  The spout broke, but the pump still works.

We finally arrived up the mountain, leaving our van at the tent site and walking the rest of the way up the mountain to the cabin, where we discovered the water pump had burst a seal, due to failure of the pressure shutoff.  Freezing weather is expected at this altitude nights this week.  Lots of repairs in addition to the usual pre-season prep, and the water system is a priority.

After draining the water system to keep essentials running, carrying water up the hill from the truck and the water lines, and Matt making several trips to town for parts, the water was back in operation.   Over the next few days, we helped out at the tent site with sanding and varnishing the picnic table, and a bit with installing the new sink counter on the outside sink.

Numerous trips hiking up and down the 30-meter elevation difference between the glamping site and the cabin is getting us in shape, if nothing else.  The weather is holding for now, with cool days and cold nights. The mountain proved to be a good place to observe the string of planets overhead as darkness fell on the last day of February.  At this latitude, the ecliptic is 13 degrees higher than at home, putting Jupiter and Mars almost vertically overhead.

As our visit drew to a close, we took a trip to Asheville, ostensibly to look for a bike trail while the weather held.  But, the trail along the French Broad River was still mostly closed and unsuitable for biking.  We did hike the trail along the river, observing the devastation to the Arts District across the river and the incredible height of the flood debris around us and above us, while the trail stayed well above the normal river level.

As the clouds and wind moved in from the early March storms, we decided to head southeast to the coast instead of following our 2023 path north into the worst part of the storm path.

In early February 2025, we headed south on a 10,000-mile trip around the U.S. to visit relatives and hopefully ride our bicycle along the way. Our planning was, of course, made in the balmy mild winter of the Pacific Northwest, thinking it would be warmer farther south and spring-like when we got near the East Coast. We were wrong.

Expedition 2025 began on the eve of more snow in the Pacific Northwest.  We got an early start, down I-5, through Portland, and up the Willamette Valley against a stiff headwind and heavy rain squalls.

Because of snow and chain-up requirements on the passes, we turned right at Eugene and headed for the coast, arriving in Brookings, OR after dark.  The welcome center at which we thought we would park for the night was closed, reclassified for day-use only.  Another rest stop north of town was, in a word, sketchy, and posted for 4-hour stays.

So, we ended up parking overnight at the Fred Meyer store, off to the side of the garden center.

In the morning, we made a quick shopping stop for supplies, topped off the tank, and headed south into California, stopping for breakfast “on the beach” at at turnout on Point St. George, where we had bicycled a few years ago on another trip down the coast.

The rain came again as we passed through Eureka, and continued off and on through the day as we drove down US 101.  We turned off on CA 20, well beyond the snow zone, making our way back to I-5 as the sun set, for another cold, rainy night at a truck stop.

Day 3, we headed down to hwy 99, then turned on Hwy 58 at Bakersfield, ending for the night at Boron, where we had stayed the last time, on Expedition 2023.  Another cold night, and we were off toward Arizona, taking the back roads through 29 Palms before crossing the border on I-10.  Joshua trees gave way to saguaro as we moved eastward into Arizona.  Deja vu found us at Buckeye for the night, where we had stayed in 2023.

In the morning, we met our granddaughter Zylania and Martin at their house, not far from our overnight stay, then off to lunch somewhere in the Glendale maze, where huge shopping centers had sprung up since our last visit.  In late afternoon, we said our goodbyes and headed down the 202 loop and I-10 to Eloy for the night.

As planned, in the morning, we turned off on Kolb Road to ride our tandem on the Julian Wash Trail, part of the 200-km Tucson Loop bike trail system, officially the Chuck Huckleberry Trail.  The trail climbed 70 meters over the  8 km route, so we turned around to call it a day for a 16-km first ride of the season, the downhill return trip taking 20 minutes, offsetting the 1-hour climb uphill.

Since we didn’t ride as far as we intended, we had time to kill, so, after post-ride ice cream stop at Benson, we detoured, following old U.S. 80 to Tombstone, Bisbee, and Douglas before heading north to arrive at Lordsburg at sunset.  The day’s drive took us from the saguaro forests to fields of yucca.

By sticking to the back roads for the most part, and following at truck speed on the freeways, we recovered the gas mileage we lost to the rainy headwinds in Oregon and short-trip winter driving at home, making daily runs of 19 mpg or more (12.33 l/100km or less)with the wind behind us.  We didn’t expect that to hold as we climbed over the  Rockies, since we lost a bit with the detour into the high country south of I-10 in southeastern Arizona and keeping up with traffic in the Phoenix/Tucson metro areas.

From Lordsburg, we headed north, the plains of yucca rising into the pinon forests of the Gila, bypassing Silver City on the truck route.  We stopped for a photo op at Leopold Vista, named after naturalist Aldo Leopold, where we were delighted by the mosaics on each picnic table, depicting area scenes.

We turned off on NM 12 to Datil, where we spent the day with our daughter Sheri, companion Tom, and her dogs, a friendly bunch that includes two giant mastiffs and a couple of rescue dogs.

After a cold night, at nearly 8000 foot elevation, we awoke to ice on the inside of the windshield, though the heaters kept the inside comfortable.  After coffee and breakfast, we headed down the mountain to head toward our next stop, Albuquerque.  But, first, we stopped at the Very Large Array, the radio telescope installation in the Plains of San Augustin, with huge parabolic dishes arrayed on the three spokes of a 26-mile diameter telescope lens that peers deep into the universe.  The below-freezing wind roared across the plain, putting our layering system to the test, as I ventured out for photo ops while Judy, beginning to suffer from a winter cold, stayed in the van.

At Albuquerque, we had dinner with another granddaughter, new new husband, and the two of her five children still at home.  We hadn’t seen them since before COVID. At the end of the evening, we drove 60 km south to the truck stop we had showered at earlier, for another cold night without electric heat.  The morning dawned at minus 5 outside the van and 9 inside (Celsius), which quickly dropped to 5 (41F) once we opened the curtain to the cab, removed the window covers, and made a dash to the store.

The wind had subsided overnight, so we had a pleasant drive south to Las Cruces.  We set the GPS on “Fuel Saver” mode, so it routed us on side roads and through towns along the freeway.   We have taken our own slowtroute in the past, but this was slightly different, taking us on a few roads we hadn’t driven before.  Like other relatives who have guest rooms, our daughter Shawna insisted we use her guest casita instead of sleeping in the van, a welcome change, since we didn’t have to make up the sofa/bed in the van.

So ended our eighth day on the road.  We have a lot of relatives in Las Cruces, so spent a couple of days in hopes of seeing some of them before headed to El Paso, where more family awaits.

2024 started out in a normal way: we had our Senior Off-Season Pass from Washington State Parks, and had spent the holidays skipping from one nearby state park to another, getting $30 partial hookup sites for $10 when we needed a little supplemental heat and cooking inside on an electric hot plate instead of filling the van with butane fumes when we couldn’t cook outside. All was well. We even snagged the one and only electric site at Penrose Point State Park because there wasn’t a camp host in residence.

But, a little more than two weeks into the new year, we pulled out into the glare of the low January sun and were smacked by a car that came out of the glare impossibly close. We were clipped on the rear wheel, spun around crossway in the road, and stopped. The driveshaft lay in the street, the rear axle pushed up against the spare tire. Almost no other damage, except the camper furnishings were tossed around, the bed and shelving ripped loose from the wall. No one was hurt, and the other car was drivable, but our insurance declared the van dead. A total loss.

So it was that we salvaged what we could out of the van and went shopping for another, and started building again. The off-season came and went, no camping, and only one bicycle outing. This time, we had a new floor plan, one we had envisioned to adapt to the old van, and it took a lot of work, using both new and recycled materials and fixtures. As before, most of the cutting and shaping was done with hand tools and a drill, with very little power tool work.

Meanwhile, Judy had taken over the hosting role with Hypatia-In-The-Woods, a non-profit for which we are on the board, that runs a solo residency for women in the arts, at a cottage near Shelton, named Holly House. This turned out to be a near-full-time job, contacting the artists as soon as they were awarded a one to three-week residency, connecting them with the volunteer who would greet them, and arranging for them to give a presentation of their work or a workshop as part of our non-profit community outreach. And, as it turned out, also handling the publicity, scheduling the venue, and making the introductions, and scheduling volunteers for the turnover support at the cottage. I helped, with the web site updates, drafting and formatting the publicity flyers, etc., while working on the van build.

We had a deadline for the van: meeting our granddaughter and her boyfriend in eastern Washington when they came up from Phoenix over the 4th of July for a concert at The Gorge at George. And we did meet it, with most of the build completed except for the kitchen plumbing and cabinet doors. By then we had installed a trailer hitch and bike rack for our tandem, as the new van floor plan didn’t have room for the bike inside, and we inaugurated the new rig with a side trip to ride across the Columbia River at the newly-restored Beverley Bridge, which connected the two halves of the 237-mile Palouse-to-Cascades State Park rail trail that crosses the state. We had made a couple of overnight runs with the van partially completed in early June, sans bike. We met Zylania and Martin in Wenatchee, watching water bombers scoop up water from the river and dump it on a brush fire on the hills above the city.

After a few more overnight van/bike camping trips over the summer, we planned an “Expedition” to Montana and Idaho to visit friends and relatives, and, of course, ride our bike. In between visits with friends in the Bitterroot Valley, and Judy’s brother in Idaho, we spent a couple of days completing the final segments of the Trail of the Coeur d’Alenes, the 72-mile-long bike trail in Idaho we had started riding 20 years ago, with two rides, of 15 and 20 miles, to finish the last 7.5 and 10 mile missing pieces.

Returning to Washington, we intended to ride parts of the Centennial Trail through Spokane, but were put off by the homeless camps around the trailheads and didn’t, though we camped at the spectacular Bowl & Pitcher area in Riverside State Park and hiked. On the way home, we ventured north to Republic and Curlew Lake, where we rode the recently-upgraded lakeside section of the Ferry County Rail Trail.

Early fall colds sent us home early, with an overnight in Wenatchee and no bike riding. That, and the fall social activities and rain brought an end to a disappointingly short bicycling season. But, we continued to sneak away to camp whenever we could through the fall.

Besides losing our beloved van Bella, we also had to replace our failing furnace at home, and came home this fall after a camping trip to a root-blocked sewer line. We had to spend a night in our van in the driveway and a night at our son’s house in Olympia while spending the children’s inheritance on home repairs, at weekend rates, no less. But, we love our new van, Bianca, which is truly a home away from home instead of the bike-hauler with bed that Bella was.

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It’s been a tough year, and we hope not to have another like it. We’re planning a major van/bike expedition starting in late winter in 2025, visiting relatives across the country again, and taking in adventures we missed in our 2023 grand tour. Keep your kids and dogs off the street: the old folks are coming, possibly to a town near you.

So it goes: Here’s hoping for a better 2025 for you and yours. Seize the day,you never know what’s next.

Larye & Judy

The last two years, we’ve been slackers in the bicycling department, failing to just get out and ride on nearby bike trails. But, we have traveled far and wide in our camper van to seek out new trails and revisit trails we’ve ridden parts of. Here, then, is a short list of rides in 2024 across Washington, Idaho, and Montana, most since we finished outfitting our new van, Bianca. The demise of our previous van, Bella, in January put a damper on our travels and bicycling until we completed the new van, a build covered elsewhere.

As soon as we acquired Bianca, we did take the bike out, ignominiously laid on the bare floor of the van, for our usual winter bike escape at the local airport industrial park.

After we installed the hitch rack for the bicycle, we started taking the bike with us when we went on the Tuesday morning hikes with the Senior Center walking group, then either camping overnight near the hiking destination or going to a bike trail or scenic route after the hike. In June, we revisited the Raymond trailhead of the Willapa Hills Trail State Park. We had ridden from there several years ago, but the trail had not been improved past the short paved section, and we had turned off into Willapa Valley, where we found a delightful winery and eventually found our way back to Raymond. But, this time, we continued on on the trail, which had been improved since, until we reached the part that wasn’t.

The first week in July, we had the opportunity to go to eastern Washington, to meet our granddaughter, who was traveling from Arizona to attend a July 4 concert at the Gorge at George. On the way, we arranged to spend a couple of nights at a state park on the Columbia River near the Palouse to Cascades State Park Trail. This gave us a chance to ride the rough gravel/railroad ballast trail to cross the Beverly Bridge across the river. The railroad bridge had been brought up to trail standards and opened in 2021, to join the two halves of the trail, which runs 237 miles from North Bend, east of Seattle, to the Idaho border, mostly following the old Milwaukee Road right-of-way, with a number of detours around collapsed bridges, collapsed tunnels, and private land.

Later in the month, we chose to head north after a Tuesday hike, seeking a place to camp and ride. In the height of the Olympic Peninsula tourist season, we managed to get the next-to-last campsite at Fort Flagler State Historic Park. We got in two rides, but only published video from the second one, where we pedaled in early morning through the upper campground and to the decommissioned artillery batteries facing the entrance to Admiralty Inlet.

After another Tuesday hike, farther west, we continued on to Lake Quinault, where we had made reservations at the popular national forest campgrounds near the Lodge. We rode from there along the south shore road, partly paved, and partly gravel, to the Olympic National Park boundary, repeating most of a ride we had done in 2013. The morning fog burned off for the trip back. The destination, Bunch Falls, was a disappointment, obscured by a screen of fallen trees, and we chose not to ride the additional mile to the bridge across the Quinault River this time, as the gravel part of the road was thicker and looser than last time.

When we first acquired our new van, we took it to a van outfitters to have the roof fan installed, since it was winter and not feasible to do it ourselves. When we dropped off the van near Washougal, we were on foot, walking to town on the levee trail along the Columbia River. We decided to come back when we could to ride the trail. By late summer, we did return, riding out through the Steigerwald National Wildlife Refuge.

In mid-September, we ventured out for an extended tour to visit friends and relatives in Montana and Idaho, and, of course, ride our bike when we could, on and off the beaten track. Over the next few weeks, we found time to ride in the Bitterroot Valley in a place we hadn’t when we lived there. We finished sections of the Trail of the Coeur d’Alenes in Idaho we hadn’t in our 20-year quest to ride the entire 72-mile trail in both directions, which took us to the east end and middle of the trail. We also meandered up near the Canadian border, to ride a relatively new trail, the Ferry County Rail Trail, on a groomed section completed in 2016, along Curlew Lake in Washington.

This is part 5 to start reading at the beginning, click here.

Phase IV: Eastern Washington

At Coeur d’ Alene, we stopped again to refuel at Costco, then to a nearby laundromat to do our weekly wash. We made our way through Spokane traffic to Riverside State Park, where we had reservations at the last available utility site, anticipating cool evenings. Using our Senior Off-Season Pass, we only paid for the utilities, so justified the splurge, and planned to spend two nights, to have time to ride our bike and explore the hiking trails.

The campground, officially called the Bowl and Pitcher for distinctive rock formations in the Spokane River, is a gem: we hiked across the swinging suspension bridge for views of the gorge from a different perspective. Taking advantage of electric power, we reheated leftovers packed for us by Judy’s sister-in-law for supper, a rare hot meal on the road. And, we appreciated our new sink for making dish washing a breeze. We talked to a bicyclist we met on the trail about routes into the city, but decided we would drive to a trail head in the morning for a ride on the Centennial Trail up the river toward Idaho, as the only practical way out of camp was on the busy Riverside Road, which has a few steeper climbs and no shoulders.

The planned morning bike ride turned to disappointment, as we found every trail head we visited infested with homeless folk, one promising turnout was closed for freeway construction, and more homeless on the trail ahead. So, we returned to camp, intending to explore the hiking trails across the river after lunch. As we crossed the famous swing bridge, the first raindrops began. We walked down the river until the rain began an earnest drizzle, and returned to camp before it became a downpour.

The cold and rain was starting to wear us down. We have electric hookup and the small heater kept the van at least in the high 50s at night, versus the high 40s we experienced a previous night when it got down to freezing outside, with no electric service.

In the morning, we headed north, then west on the remote WA Hwy 20, then Hwy 21 to Curlew Lake State Park. We checked in, then drove to the trail head at the north end of the lake. We rode to the other end of the lake and back on the Ferry County Rail Trail, a total of 11 miles (18 km). During the ride, we were paced by deer through a cut and by a chipmunk on the trestle across the north end of the lake. Another bucket list checked. There is one more “improved” section of this trail, north of Curlew, which we planned to check out the next day. “Improved” means they swept the railway ballast to the side and laid down fine crushed gravel. Most of the 40-km trail from Republic to the Canadian border is not improved, except for those two sections, reserved for non-motorized traffic.

By Sunday morning, Judy’s cold had set in with an agenda. We drove to the trail head at Curlew, but neither of us was game to get out and ride, so we turned about and headed for Wenatchee, where we got a no-utility site at Wenatchee Confluence State Park. It was good to arrive early, as the campground filled almost completely by dark. Another fitful night ensued, and in the morning it was obvious the best course was to head for home, just four hours away. We arrived home just before noon, and in time to get settled and prepare for a Zoom board meeting. We had been several days with minimal to non-existent network access, with no WiFi along the way and the usual “No Service” showing on the cell phones, so finding reliable WiFi and privacy to run a Zoom session would have been problematic.

So, our fall expedition came to an end, after 25 days wandering the Pacific Northwest across 2500 miles of driving and 93 km of bicycling. We look at it as a shake-down tour to prepare us for our planned late winter 2025 excursion.

Epilogue

After being home for a few weeks, recovering from colds and catching up on chores we couldn’t do with minimal internet access, we took a couple of days to escape to the beach. We returned home after a blustery night of wind and rain, and loaded the washing machine. At the spin cycle, the sewer system backed up. A late Saturday call to the sewer service got a quick response, but the blockage was obviously downstream from the laundry, the last point in the line, and the technician was unable to clear it. So, we spent a third night in the van, in our driveway.

Sunday brought another look-see, with a camera, which merely verified the general location: a crew would arrive on Monday to open the line to make it easier to deal with. We were preparing to retreat to a nearby state park when our son called us and offered a guest room and shower, so we took them up on it. Two more days of digging, blasting roots out of the system, putting in an external clean-out, and installing a high-tech liner to seal the joints in the old concrete pipe sections and extend the life of the sewer system finally ended the ordeal. But, we’re now left scrambling to arrange to liquidate a substantial percentage of our dwindling retirement funds. Full-time van life might be closer than we planned: our biggest asset is now our house. We probably can’t sustain any more maintenance expense. But at least the sewer will hopefully pass inspection when we go to sell, along with the new furnace we replaced earlier in the year.