Carpe Dory (Too!)

While this was mostly a work weekend for me, it was still a pleasant getaway to a beautiful location, happily not too damaged by fire. It is crunch time in special education land. What is normally a busy time with IEP goal progress updates, has been amplified by having 5th grade transition meetings happen the same week those are due. And then someone thought, ‘Wow, how could we make this more stressful? What if we also opened in hybrid in-person at the very same time?’ Well it worked, and I am officially underwater with color coded spreadsheets, and data tracking sheets, and information summaries, and a lovely stye in my left eye that I only get when I’m stressed. But Saturday was set aside for some serious catch up doggie paddling and it couldn’t have been in a nicer place. I may be blowing water out my snorkel, as a favorite colleague liked to say, but I’m still swimming.

Napa Valley is looking a little better as the Spring brings in green and yellow ground cover bandaids to start healing the fire scars from last year. Yes, there is damage apparent, but also the return of life. Vineyards remain, in their orderly rows, standing in solidarity with the promise of future wine. Fields of yellow mustard look so bright and cheerful, it is hard not to imagine that all will be well.

We took a backroads route out of town and I think that may be how we roll from now on. Skipping the 680/242/4 triangle altogether has no downsides besides time. And it felt absolutely worth it, both on the departure as well as the return. All told, it probably adds a half hour to the trip, but likely adds years to my lifespan just in merging stress reduction.

Bothe Napa was closed for a while after the fires last fall, and I knew there was some damage in the park. It turned out to be not too bad looking, although you can tell how close it came. Across from our site, just past a little river, there was evidence of an active burn, leaving blackened bark on the lower ten feet of the big trees that survived. Lots of small charred brush is still there and I imagine it will take a long time to clear the area. Nothing inside the campground seems to have burned though, nor did the historic Bale Grist Mill, so that’s nice.

Richard enjoyed a bike ride up Howell Mountain road and notes that there is a section that is totally closed off to cars. Sometimes it is hard to work out timing on bike rides vs whatever it is that I’m doing. There’s a fine line there as to how long I can entertain myself before I get bored if I’m not out doing something fun. And it’s a moving target, so Richard routinely has to gauge the precarious balance of how long he can stay out. This weekend I was fully occupied all day long, so he had full freedom to take as long as he wanted. In fact, I did not leave the campsite at all and barely left Lola. I will admit, it was a nice view out the BFW to keep me happy while updating goals.

Sunday we discovered that the fairgrounds, where we normally go to dump, is completely closed. So that left us with few options. The idea of not dumping until next weekend was discussed and dismissed, so we chose to make a stop at ABBA RV storage in Concord on our way home. It is $25 to use their facilities, so not cheap, but it was clean and on the way, so there you go.

We remain extremely grateful for the opportunity to get out. Even in the midst of business and weekend work, it soothes the soul to be in nature and away from home.

Total miles: 68.2 (taking Pleasant Hill to Alhambra to Shell), 15.5 mpg, 2 hours 24 min. Site 7 still a favorite, but no solar. LTE for Verizon enough to work in SEIS (special ed database). 1 bar of 5g for ATT- enough for email and slow texts, but not fb or SEIS. New bathroom is still standing, though we’re still self contained. No dump and fairground closed.

River plus rain, with a little reconnaissance thrown in, makes for a really romantic respite. The four day Presidents’ weekend timed nicely with Valentine’s Day this year. It also meant we were able to take our time Friday for the drive up. We had a whole plan that involved searching out backroads to see how feasible it is to avoid highway driving. All systems were go and the route was entered into Apple Car Play as we hit the road. Then my phone blew up with texts from teachers just discovering that educators can now schedule appointments for the COVID vaccine, and that everyone should log on like RIGHT NOW before they’re all taken. So it’s really hard to pay attention to driving with all that going on and somehow the navigation had gotten into a mode where it wasn’t actually giving me directions. So I pulled off and drove into some random residential neighborhood so we could sort through all the texts and restart the navigation. We sat there a few minutes until the guy with the leaf blower across the street started shooting debris our way. I’m still learning the user interface in the car, but I kind of figured out what I’d done and we did a Take Two.

With all the excitement, we figured we’d earned a lunch stop at Brannan Island. Also, we wanted to know if they (and their dump station) were open. They are, it is, and we had a nice lunch under blue skies. It was a long drive, but a relaxing one, taking back roads up to the Marshall Gold Discovery site. This is the 5th time we’ve been to this RV park and it was one of the best sites. We pulled in just in time to do a Caravan Mover View Maneuver for optimal window positioning, get our patio area and awning set up, and sit back to listen as the gentle drizzle began hitting the roof. It’s one of my favorite things to listen to the sounds of a water feature and rain feature from under shelter. Even nicer once it got chilly, was to move inside where there is also a heater.

Richard got in a bike ride on the only blue sky day and I got in some work while watching the river and admiring a cute Retro in the site next to us. Blue Apron was on the menu for the evening and all was delicious and cozy. Our second full day included a fact finding mission to a state park I’ve never booked: Folsom Lake Peninsula. The single reason for this omission of a state park close by: the look of the eight mile zigzaggy road that takes you out there. On a map, it looks intimidating for a trailer, but for an unencumbered Passport, no problem. We drove Richard and his bike out to the start of it and played leap frog for maybe six miles. It turns out I was right to be suspicious, but not for the reasons I thought. It is a well maintained road which is mostly wide enough for two cars to pass if they are careful. There are sections where it is single car width, but I think you’d have enough visible forewarning to be able to pull over before the tight spots. But for biking, it is not ideal. The grade is pretty steep, with long climbs and long descents. Richard is a badass when it comes to climbing, but he is not fond of clutching at the brakes around endless turns for an extended time. So that gives us a hmm. Oh also, there are cows that just wander into the road. And turkeys. So be careful.

We checked out the sites in the loops that are open, and surveyed the general set up of the campground. We weren’t so impressed that we’d be looking forward to that drive on a Friday after work. It’s doable for sure, even with a trailer, but that would be a long eight miles. If the reservoir levels were high, there were four or five sites that seemed like they might be nice and conceivably close enough to the boat launch to get in a paddle. But in drought, the water is waaaaaaay over yonder and not much more than a distant backdrop. So… maybe? I mean, it could be fun so I’ll put that in my back pocket now that I know what’s involved in getting there.

From the afternoon on, through Sunday night and all Monday morning, we got rain for real. It was an extremely pleasant way to spend a long Valentine’s weekend. I won’t even bother reporting out travel data though. Both there and back, we took a side trip to Brannan Island and kept to back roads a lot. So what could have been a three hour trip, took more like four. Richard wants to note that he really hates the dump at Coloma but equally loves the dump at Brannan Island. It’s the little things in life, yanno? Meanwhile, I have learned several new buttons in both Google and Apple Maps, and have discovered that english muffins, with ham and cheese, for one minute in the microwave, are the best things ever.

Back in the swing of things. Second weekend out, post lock down, and it’s feeling more normal now. I’m even less nervous about crashing to some extent. Richard has moved from phrases like: “Drive safe,” or, “Drive like you do,” to: “If we crash, we crash.” Or like, if he takes his shoes off in the car, he says, “I’ll put them back on when we crash.” Check. We’re ready for it. Oddly, that puts less pressure out there and helps me to relax.

This KOA is the nicest private place I’ve ever been to, but it costs a lot. And there are only some sites that are spaced far enough apart from each other that it feels worth it. I hadn’t previously realized you can reserve those premium sites for an extra (!) fee, but if you do, it’s a very pleasant stay. There are all kinds of amenities, like an on site restaurant that has to go during the pandemic, and live outdoor music. Oh and there is even a roaming cocktail cart that makes the rounds in the afternoons! None of that is cheap either, but I figure, with all the reservations that got cancelled due to shut down, we are coming out way ahead. And given all that has happened this past year, I will never regret splurging on a campsite, especially one with an ocean view.

We pulled over on the way down to catch the sunset and I noted that when I went inside to get my puffy, the view out the BFW was very nice. This is to prove that we are not fully anti BFW people and do notice when it is nice. Still, no regrets on our Dory2 ordering decisions and we can’t wait to get overhead cabinets and dining area lighting back.

I can report on our latest Lola mod: the sliding dining room table! We have really pondered whether we would re-do the Lagun table mount in Dory2. The upsides include having the ability to move the table out of the way enough for me to get in and sit down, plus the ability to lose the pedestal stand and track on the floor, thus opening up the under table space. The downside is that eventually, the table top will tip. It’s just a really big piece of wood for that mount. Even if the material were lighter, it would list at the two pivot points and result in the far side being lower. And even if my Type A “noticing eye” could overlook the unevenness, I was also hesitant to put heavy things on that side. Our solution to that involved putting a support leg at the far corner. But that ended up making me feel trapped just as much as it had felt before the mod. And it was kind of a small pain to lock it all into place securely for travel. So, I wanted to re-think some other solution. Really, all I’m after is making it easier to get in and out of that corner by the fridge. I don’t need 360º rotation, nor do I need the ability to adjust up or down; I just want to shove the top out of the way and the track on the floor doesn’t cut it – especially with two batteries sitting on the base.

Enter a lengthy discussion and investigation into drawer slides. There are many kinds of slides, as it turns out. But with a little thought, a tiny cardboard model, and a couple of phone calls to some online drawer slide guy, we reached a prototype solution. Basically, you take the pedestal receiver mount off the bottom of the table and put it onto a rectangle of something; in this case, a made to order polypropylene cutting board. You mount the inner slide brackets onto that. Then you mount two 90º angle brackets onto the bottom of the table to hang the slide assembly. Et voila! You have a tabletop that can slide away from the middle point by however long the slides are. We decided 16″ was plenty because you will almost run into the far wall in that amount of travel. We also got super heavy duty locking ones so it will stay locked in place in its center position.

Verdict? Love it! It’s a game changer for me and exactly what I will want in Dory2. It is easy to unlock and roll the table top out of the way and easy to pull back once I’ve sat down. When Richard is sitting on the other side, I need to rotate it a bit in order to not cut him in half. We waxed the pedestal in the bottom mount so that it rotates a little easier and that way, I can get up from the table even when he’s sitting there. In fact, I made a point of just getting up and down on any whim I had. Need something from the fridge? I’ll get it! Feel like maybe getting fuzzy socks from the back. Oh no, don’t you move, I got this! Up and down all weekend. Heaven.

Saturday was a glorious day out. The weather was wonderful and Richard got out to do a loop over to Pescadero and back. I got to sag him in Bruce2 and I am enjoying driving that car a lot. I feel that I was unfairly deprived a full month of new car smell, so it was really great to crank the tunes and hit the back roads. We went past Butano State Park on our route and it was very closed. But though I could see some evidence of fire damage, it did not look too bad from the road. I am hopeful that the park can recover. Along the route, we stopped to admire the lighthouse at Pigeon Point and reflect on all the “lighthouses” in my life that have shone so brightly these past four years. It’s a good feeling. We finished the day off with a walk to the beach to watch the sunset, and a Blue Apron for dinner. And for dinner, I made sure I needed to get up and down a lot.

Heading home Sunday, we enjoyed a sandwich at the BFW, against a background of mustard in full bloom, with the lighthouse in the background. Fabulous weekend, happy campers.

Total miles: 75.6, 15.1 mpg, 2 hours 39 min. Site S11 full hookups, premium (expensive) reservable site. Not great cell service for either one of us, but ok LTE down by the ocean. Campground wifi strongest at the restaurant but not useful from site. You have to bring a sewer fitting (like a funnel shaped thingy) in order to dump – like don’t just run the dump hose to the opening.

Hooray!! The Stay at Home order has finally been lifted! This is not to say any state in the country has this COVID thing licked, by any means, but it does mean campgrounds are open with restrictions in place, so yeah, we’re gonna head out and it doesn’t matter where. The state park reservation system didn’t seem to have updated to allow for reservations quite yet, so I just started going through our favorite private places. Boom! The KOA at Moss Landing had space, so this was really the first “normal” weekend we’ve had with Lola. Like not in someone’s driveway or in our garage.

As long as things don’t shut down again, we are hoping to keep all our weekend reservations going forward. And that’s a really good thing for towing nerves. Given it had been about a month since the last outing, I was uneasy again just getting back into it. All was going well on the trafficky drive south until the car right next to us had a very near miss. It was like exactly the same situation as Dory’s crash: off ramp backup, someone going too fast to stop in time. The difference was that I was in the lane to the left, and a little behind. So we watched the car slam on the brakes, like squealing, smoking rubber. Then they swerved right in front of us at the last second to avoid slamming into the stopped car. They did a full swing all the way through our lane and then spun back to the right. They were damn lucky that lane had cleared enough by then or it would have been a really bad collision. So here’s me, just slowing, not braking hard cause I didn’t want the person behind me to do a rear end repeat, and I put on the hazards. I watched it all unfold in front of us and we were never in danger of actually being hit. But Damn, Universe. Could you maybe not do that??! Both of us started quasi hyperventilating after we’d passed it by, and my hand started immediately trembling. Like full PTSD there. I mean, all was ok and we just carried on our merry way, but I wasn’t at ease until we came to a full backed in stop in our site. #margaritatime

Overall, it was just a normal weekend out, but boy oh boy did it feel great. There were a lot of empty sites in the KOA and everyone was masking and distanced, so it felt fully safe. Richard did a bike ride, I got in a paddle on the Elkhorn Slough and cooked a Blue Apron on Saturday. It just feels extra specially wonderful following so much anticipation and prep.

And speaking of anticipation. WOW!! We got a big, beautiful, made me choke up, surprise on Friday. Dory2 is complete, y’all!!! And not only that, but our wonderful sales rep, my new Canadian boyfriend (this might be news to him), Francois, got the build team to pose for a picture, complete with a little Dory stuffy right in the middle. How cool is that, seriously?! It is taking a lot of self control to not start driving east. But, two things: 1) the borders are still closed and me crazily trying to explain why my attempt to enter the country really counts as ‘essential’ might get me arrested, and 2) I remind myself that it is winter in Quebec and I definitely do not want to drive in that. So, patience it is, until we can get her shipped to Durango, CO, hopefully this summer. I’m SUPER glad we have Lola in the meantime.

Here I was, telling myself I would maintain a safe, emotional detachment from Dory2. Well, there goes that idea. I’m looking at her picture waving “Hi baby!! Mama will see you real soon!” Oh well, looks like the new puppy will be well loved too.

Total miles: 106.3, 17.6 mpg, 2 hours 36 min. KOA – full hookups. All communal facilities closed for COVID. Safe checkin with no indoors/contact. Management recommends locking bikes or keeping them inside vehicles. We’re happy Bruce2 fits a bike so easily.

This was a great outing. Even though we didn’t get to keep our winter plans down south (we’re on 3 year streak for cancelled reservations at Joshua Tree), we were able to safely get in a test run with Lola, due to the supreme kindness of a couple of local Altoistes. Back in March, at the very beginning of the shelter in place, we hunkered down at Putah Canyon Campground on Lake Berryessa. Gaye Quinn graciously reached out to us to offer her property as a refuge in case we got kicked out. We declined at the time, but asked if we could cash in a rain check now that everything is closed down again, and they were more than wonderful to say yes. Their property is in the Napa Valley area and they escaped catastrophic fire damage only by the skin of their teeth – and the ingenuity of their neighbors with massive land moving equipment. That’s a whole story right there! But they are close enough, and plenty isolated, that we felt comfortable getting in a test drive with Bruce2 and Lola so the holiday wouldn’t be a total bust.

We hit the break-in period for Bruce2 right on the nose and began the journey with exactly 500 miles of gentle driving on the odometer. Richard got in one last project before we left, which was to replace the solar controller in Lola with an Epever Duo Racer, which means he can pull off some of the solar input and direct it toward the coffee battery. We had six nights of dinners on board and 24 washcloths to try our hand at sponge bathing so we could perhaps extend our time before needing to dump waste tanks. All systems go!

I knew I’d be nervous towing again after the accident, and I was. It wasn’t perhaps as bad as the first hundred miles at pickup in Quebec, but every stop caused my heart to race, wondering whether the person behind me was paying attention. I took some backroads rather than the freeway to get started, but ultimately, you have to get on a freeway at some point to cross the delta. It was all expected and I made it without freaking out; I was just really alert the whole time. Thankfully, most of the drive was through lonely, winding country roads.

Gaye and Mark greeted us as we pulled in and they get a five star rating for being wonderful hosts. Their property is gorgeous, and you can see from the singed hilltops all around them how close they came to losing everything. All along the drive, you can see the devastation. There are pockets where structures were clearly protected by firefighters, but then there are many that didn’t make it. And there are just miles and miles of scorched trees and barren earth. But their little valley remains, with all the vineyards intact. They’ve even got a pond on their land, though it is really low right now. For this outing, we mostly just wanted to test out the systems and driveway camping was the perfect spot.

Little did we know, this campground even comes with fresh homemade sourdough bread, a plate of delicious olive oil and 25 year-old balsamic vinegar, and cheesecake! Our offering to them was far a less impressive: Omnia baked Trader Joe’s croissants. However, it was presented on the Altoistes “Pass Along Platter,” so now they are part of that fun tradition. The platter began its journey at the 2016 rally in Oregon and has travelled through Canada and the East Coast. The Mazzas were the last recipients, so now we get to send it forward to the Quinns. Once we can all come out of our Covid cloisters, some lucky Altoiste will be the recipient of something delicious.

Everything in Lola works perfectly, and we even got to christen the pristine looking stove with some very messy Blue Apron dinners. At the forefront of our minds were a couple of key questions, the first of which being: what do we really think of that BFW and do we want to change our Dory2 order to include one? To those who have one, we get it. The light that comes in first thing in the morning is lovely. It makes the front table very cheery and bright. And though we didn’t have a show stopping view, I can imagine that it would be nice to look out that window if you’re pointed the right direction. As for the cons, we found that, even though I figured out where to relocate all the things displaced by the missing overhead storage bins, that is a pretty big loss. It was our most used storage area, so we definitely noticed the absence. Second, it is entirely possible we are descended from vampires (as our son’s holiday sleep patterns would seem to confirm). Yes, the early morning light is nice, but as soon as the sun shone through directly onto our faces, we would hiss, “Hhhhssssss! It burnnnssss ussssssss!” and close the shade. To be fair, we do not have a Magneshade, which is an outside covering that is supposed to solve the glare/heat problem. But boy, you can feel the heat coming through the window, and this was December.

Next, there is the fishbowl feeling. Yes, you can pull up the shade half way to get privacy, but when it’s open, (unlike the tinted glass windows) you are just right there on display. The newer models have the shade pulling down from the top, which is good for the vampire factor, but less good for fishbowl. Even with all this said, the prettiness of the first morning light was enough for me to ponder how I could make something that would be fairly easy to pull up about half way to get the same effect. And I could make it attractive and opaque, and then I could pull the shade down for glare, or put the Magneshade on outside, and that could all work. But at the end of the day, no. For us, the downsides outweigh the upsides, but more than that, it’s a feeling. The Alto is my private little cozy safety pod. I think if we didn’t have the wall of windows that come with the R series, I’d feel differently. The openness at the front is nice for sure, but there are little things, like I still want to put up maps and dry erase boards and tissue boxes that I can knock off with my head every time I sit down. And I want to feel cozy and not on display when I’m sitting at the front. So no, our holiday gift to Francois, our sales rep, is that we will not be changing our order.

The next system we got to try was the water heater. This comes with a sponge bath story as well as a frantic call to Linda with dogs. When we first thought we might be using a 1713, the model without the shower, another awesome Altoiste was there to talk us down and teach us the ways of sponge bathing. Like she wrote out detailed directions and made a video. We watched that more than once, I can tell you. So now we don’t have to go that route, but we wanted to try it anyway, just to see if we could extend stays and not need to dump the grey water tank as frequently. We packed 24 color coded washcloths into a brand new collapsible tub and dove right in. Richard ended up really liking it, especially because his towel didn’t get as wet. Me, not so much. I felt icky by day two and was ready for a real shower by day three. Since this was a test of choice, rather than necessity, I caved. Lola arrived at Randy’s fully winterized, and we have no clue what unwinterizing entails. We blithely disregard every Altoistes discussion when they come up in the fall and spring in order to preserve our California climate willful ignorance. So we turned on the Truma water heater, and once it had been given sufficient time, I got in the shower and ran the cold water into the toilet bowl, waiting for hot water goodness to start coming through. After filling one bowlful of frigid water, I questioned whether I knew the hot from cold knobs. So I switched it and filled another icy bowl’s worth. Ok, so abort and Richard then looked at the Truma panel to see an actual error code. Did we bring the manuals? No. Did we have enough service to download any of the dozens of Truma files on the Altoistes site? Nope. So we called the only person we thought would not laugh at us for too long, since we knew she also had never winterized her Alto. With Linda’s help, we identified the correct orientation of all the little plumbing valves, but only after we had, through trial and error, aggressively dumped all of our fresh water onto the Quinns’ driveway. It’s like we are brand new campers, you guys, except twice as stupid. Finally we got it sorted (it was the fault of the yellow valve, by the way) and eventually got actual hot water to flow. But now we had a practically full black tank and practically empty fresh tank, so we moved our departure date up a couple days. Oops.

The time spent not dumping water onto the ground was taken up by touring around the area. Richard rode and I drove, so that we could check out how some of our favorite spots at Lake Berryessa had fared. The news was not good. It is really beyond description how bad the fire damage is, and how extensive. Guard rails all along the roads were mostly lying on the ground because the support posts had been incinerated. Countless charred trees stood bare against a once green landscape. It just makes you cry. All through Pope Valley and down into Napa Valley, the fire scars just slap you in the face. Horrible. The couple of notes of relief included the fact that Putah Canyon Campground looks mostly unscathed and seems to be getting ready to reopen in a month or two. That makes me glad, as it represented such an important little refuge for us. Everything around it is burned though. The Visitor Center at Spanish Flat also made it, as did the little ceramic tile mosaics. Steele Canyon Campground looked ok, though obviously closed due to Covid at the moment. Also the day use area and canyon around Lake Hennessy looked good. Turtle Rock Bar made it, the odd place with all the dollar bills hanging from the ceiling. But generally, the hills around the east side of Napa Valley are a hellscape of burned forest and I don’t know how something like that comes back, or if it ever does.

We got to see the ruins of the abandoned Aetna Springs Resort, a historic go to destination from the 1890s to 1970s. That area has an interesting history and the buildings that are standing give a window into California’s past, complete with the location where Ronald Regan announced his run for governor in 1966, as well as the subsequent occupancy by the Moonies. But perhaps the highlight of the bike/car side trips was the fact that the Passport has plenty of room to stow Richard’s bike atop all the other stuff. That’s a big win there.

We thank our hosts profoundly for the opportunity. It was important for me to get out on that horse again before too much time had passed. The drive home was noticeably less tense than the drive up and the entry back into the garage went far more smoothly than the exit (also, it really helped to let air out of the Caravan Mover jockey wheel tires). We went home via Putah Canyon to dump waste tanks and I took backroads as much as possible. Really this made things far more enjoyable and maybe I’ll just keep doing that. The stretch of 680 from 24 to 4 is the least pleasant driving of almost any trip. So even if it takes more time to go the back way, perhaps that’s the wiser thing to do.

Happy new year to all! 2020 was … well, that was something. With luck, 2021 might bring some less socially distanced camping. It would be lovely to share stories and laughs with camping friends.

Total miles via Putah Canyon and taking back roads: 82.7 miles, 15.4 mpg. The Passport does not have a trip time feature anymore. I wrote down that we left at 12:40 but then forgot to write down when we arrived at home. Time data might stop happening. Dumped at Putah Canyon $15.

Hi there. We are alive. We’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and regrouping, and we were lucky to have had a week over Thanksgiving Break to focus on only that. After the accident, we needed to clear everything out of Dory and kiss her goodbye for a while. That stung, but we vowed to keep going. By the way, in case you have not yet heard the “Keep Going Song” by the Bengsons, here it is. I have it on repeat. You’re welcome.

The first step on our road to recovery was to get back on the horse, which in this case, took the form of a Class B “Coachmen Beyond” motor home, rented though Outdoorsy.com. We had some super sweet reservations made six months in advance for this week and we had been very excited about them. So, rather than wander around the house, rattling chains and moaning, we plowed forward and clicked “yes” on a whole slew of very expensive therapy items without thinking them through too much.

What this looked like in action for Richard was a really full Friday. He picked Bruce up from the body shop at 9am, looking shiny and good as new (Bruce, that is). The mechanics even said they did some kind of tests on the frame and gave him a clean bill of health to tow again. Not so sure what I think about that, but it sounded like good news anyway. From there, Richard drove about an hour and a half up to Woodland to pick up the van. He got a super thorough training from Spence, the van owner, and then drove it all the way back home. Some of you may not realize that Richard can drive. In fact he can, but it is not his favorite thing. Desperate times though, so he not only drove this thing home, but all the way back up to Hendy Woods, which we didn’t get to until after dark. When I got home in the afternoon, I saw this enormous vehicle parked in front of our house and I was like “No way am I driving that.” In pictures it looked “cute.”

Everything was on the table to consider. We walked it all the way back to the foundational questions of what we were trying to get out of camping and what were the non-negotiables that would take us across the line into “not worth it.” We considered everything; tents, really fancy tents, pop ups, T@Bs, Basecamps, really big trailers, vans, all of it. And we then made a list of bottom line needs and started crossing things off. Know where we landed? Alto 1723. That’s it. That’s the thing that works for us and that is IT. If we were infinitely wealthy, I suppose we could buy the house next to us and turn it into RV storage, but barring that, we need something that goes in our garage so that it can be packed and ready to go, without too much work, every Friday afternoon. Additionally, and in order of priority, we need: 1) indoor toilet, 2) indoor shower, 3) indoor gas stove, 4) bed large enough for bed roll, 5) heater, 6) bike rack, 7) tow car (ie not a van). If you cross reference that list against something that can be stored inside a garage, you land on: Alto 1723. So given the fact that this is such an integral part of our family’s collective mental health, and given the expectation we now have that we will definitely crash again, we need something that does not ground us for 2 years while waiting for a new one from Quebec. I’ll cut to the chase: we decided it would not be all that crazy to have a spare Alto.

So we will not have to wait two years for a new one, and we love them to pieces for that. But we are scared now and wouldn’t expect them to do this for us again. We had joked/not joked before about needing a “backup Dory.” This experience has shaken us badly, and the only way we can move past the fear is to basically plan for the next crash now. Even as I was pondering what we might name a new Alto, there is a part of me that views everything as temporary. So if I were to go with some other name, like “Marlin” for example, there are only so many names in the Nemoverse that I’d be willing to use for a trailer. We’d run out. So we will serialize. We will soon have “Dory2” and I’m sure we will learn to love her – until she crashes. Kidding/not kidding.

In the meantime, it will still be several months before she arrives and we are bad enough at staying home single weekends, that we figured we needed an in between solution. Randy worked out an amazing deal with an Altoistes couple to use their 1713 for the interim. We kind of feel like we’ve been living the ending scene from “It’s a Wonderful Life” with all of the kindness that has come our way these past weeks. We are seriously overwhelmed, and very grateful for all the love. One thing that became immediately apparent in the van though, was that when you are in someone else’s vehicle, it is nerve wracking. Besides really wanting to not crash the thing, you also don’t want to get it dirty, scratched, etc. We took good care of Dory, but if we messed her up, that was on us. I would feel horrible messing up someone else’s RV. So we vowed to be ready to jump on any used 1723 that came on the market. The only problem is that they hardly ever do, and when they occasionally show up, they sell in minutes.

Well, what do you suppose happened? 🙂 We had several people alert us to an announcement on facebook, and the owner, having seen our sad story, made the commitment to sell to us, despite all the offers they got. I will do a whole post later about “Lola Too,” who is beautiful and currently in North Carolina, waiting to hitch a ride back here. We have our “heir and a spare,” as our Alto BFF put it so perfectly.

As for the trip and the campgrounds, there’s not nearly as much to say. We’ve been to each of these places at least once before and they were everything we needed them to be. From the towering redwoods in the middle of Mendocino County, to Highway 1 down the coast, this is California at its best (and mostly not on fire). I will note that one of the things we were most excited about was the apple pie from Gowan’s Oak Tree, just outside Hendy Woods. This is the best pie I’ve ever had and a big part of the reason we did not want to abandon the reservations. We may or may not get reimbursed by insurance for the price of the rental, but even if it turns out to be a $3,000 pie, it was worth it.

The Coachmen Beyond van was pretty swanky and we learned immediately that we love the Truma Combi heater. Way back when we ordered Dory1, my Canadian boyfriend, Denis, tried to talk us into being the first Alto to get the Truma installed. Richard was concerned about it being a new technology in the US and worried about getting it repaired. We passed. I reached out to Denis last week to tell him he was so right and we were so wrong. He reacted like, “I know.” with a facial expression of “duh.” It is extremely quiet and maintains the temperature steadily. The Suburban, in contrast, comes on periodically and noisily. One tradeoff is that you can dry your towels over the vent from the Suburban, whereas the Truma spreads the heat across multiple outlets for more even heating. Plus, since vans are insulated vehicles, it was warm and cozy the whole time. I was also really excited about the larger 12v fridge because it fit a lot more. I was thinking this would be the increased size we would be getting in Lola and Dory2, but it turns out this one was 6 cu ft, as opposed to 4.3. Our current fridge is 3.5 cu ft, so we’ll get an increase, just not as big. In general, it was easy to use and had all the amenities, including an indoor bathroom and shower. The touchscreen control panel was super fancy and fun to use. So many gauges, and different lighting zones to turn on and off! It comes with a 12v television and though that is a smaller picture than Dory’s hanging rear screen projector system, I will say, it is a lot easier to use. If we were looking at something like this to buy, we’d get one with the bedroom area in the back so we could leave the bed made and still get to the bathroom without climbing over the bed. If you sleep with two single beds, this model would work nicely. We didn’t use the induction burner stove much. Our pans and milk frother do not work on it, so we pulled out our propane camping stove to do most of the cooking. The van drove well, getting on average 13 mpg, and yes, I learned to drive it the rest of the trip. In fact, I was not nervous about handling, even on the “roller coaster” section of Highway 1. I’d say it was nice enough that it seriously got us thinking about vans. The only thing is, when I want to follow Richard on some crazy bike ride, or if we want to go three miles off road to get to a trail head, I do not want to pack everything up, and this is not the vehicle I want to take on rough roads. For those reasons, we still want a trailer that stays put, paired with a tow vehicle that is fun to drive and can take some back country.

So, onward. I hope to have news soon about Lola Too’s arrival and subsequent adventures. Dory is sheltered in place at Randy’s until we can get things in place for her to come home. Dory2 will enter production way sooner than we’d even dared to hope. And there will even be a post for Bruce2 coming soon! So much has happened the past two weeks. Richard has adulted like he’s never adulted before. Between arguing with insurance adjusters that Altos are NOT the same as T@Bs, to getting finances made available (like a LOT, really FAST), to arguing with Honda salesmen that hitches really seem like they should be included in a trailer hitch package, to getting certified checks speed delivered across the country, all in a pandemic, he’s been a badass.

The details – like do I keep the pin map with all the places we’ve been in Dory1 or do I start over, do trips taken in a van count toward the campground visits numbering scheme, do I need to rename the blog – all those things will get figured out. Meanwhile California heads into another shut down and I will focus on all the kindness I’ve witnessed. As Clarence says: “Remember George, no man is a failure who has friends.” This experience is showing me that we have some really good friends out there.

Hendy Woods SP

MacKerricher SP

Manchester KOA

Salt Point SP

This will be the most difficult post I’ve ever written. And it will be long, because this is part of how I hope to process it all. A big huge thank you to every single person who has reached out to offer support, a nice note or text, a sad face reaction or comment. I’ve taken strength from all of it. Let me cut to the chase before I tell the story, so that you will not be in suspense. Dory has suffered irreparable damage following a rear end collision. She is “perte totale,” or a total loss. We have been in shock and grieving, and know that this will hurt for a long, long time. But here is the story. Pictures at the end because they are too horrible to casually scroll through.

Last Friday, the 13th, in 2020, during a global pandemic, on the first real rainy day of the season, and in the fading light of dusk, we set out like we do, in the late afternoon, heading for Samuel P. Taylor. And in an instant, we lost our Dory. About 20 minutes from home, we were traveling on Highway 680 North, like we often do, and about to pass the offramp to Highway 4. I saw the sudden backup in the lane ahead and started braking pretty hard. But I drive slow and we were fine with the unexpected stop on a slick and busy highway. It was a dicey enough situation, that I thought to put on the hazard lights to warn the people behind us. They were also able to stop, from what I understand. So we were stationary for a bit before it happened.

I probably will hear this sound in my mind forever. And see the image of Dory in the mirror, flying off to the side, knowing she was disconnected. The jolt was not as disturbing as the sound. And in my mind, even in that split second, I knew. I said, “Dory got hit,” Richard said, “Fuck!” but I knew Dory was gone. It was that bad a sound.

Altos are not your typical trailers. They are made like aircraft, using super lightweight materials and an aerodynamic design to keep them light and easy to tow. Their body is made from aluminum sheets, sandwiching a stiff honeycomb core. This allows them to be rigid and sturdy and take a lot of movement on the road. But the engineering depends on the integrity of the whole. We’ve seen how these things are put together and every step requires specialized expertise to assemble the parts into one brilliant puzzle. And it begins with the floor being fitted precisely into the aluminum frame. You cannot come back from frame or floor damage without a complete rebuild.

I turned off the engine and slowly walked back to see my worst fears confirmed. Richard called Randy. The hitch, along with the entire weight distribution system, was twisted and contorted and hanging off the back of Bruce with no Dory attached. She was nose down, maybe ten feet behind. Both safety chains were ripped off, dangling from Bruce, and the emergency brake cable had also been torn off. But it had done its job, and stopped her from rolling into other traffic. For a moment I thought she might be ok because the front didn’t look too bad.

Then, as I walked around the back, I saw. The bumper was torn mostly off and hanging by a thread, The bottom back section was crushed. And though the roof looked bad, I had the fleeting thought that maybe it could be replaced (which would be no easy feat). Looking underneath though, it was unmistakable that the floor had suffered serious damage at the back end as well. I texted Randy: “Dory is dead Randy. Accident on 680.”

Richard had called 911 and walked toward me. I simply stated, “Dory is dead, baby. She’s dead.” I never call him “baby,” Shock is a funny thing. I don’t think he processed that or heard me, and someone came up asking for a fire extinguisher. As I looked around the highway, I saw that at least 4 other cars had been totaled. Someone was walking through, asking if anyone was hurt. The wrecked car nearest to us was smoking.

From there, it’s a blur. Fire engines arrived, and CHP. People started asking questions and papers had to be retrieved. I went inside Dory first to get the fire extinguisher and I could see things had been tossed around. After I got the insurance and registration, I just started putting things back. I saw no broken glass from the crescent windows, and in fact nothing looked broken inside. I even checked on the coffee cups and there was literally not a scratch on them. We pack well.

Tow trucks and clean up crews began arriving. One woman was taken by ambulance on a stretcher but I heard that she was ok, just shaken up. She had been inside the totaled car that was smoking. Richard was on the phone with insurance and was getting instructions. Meanwhile, he started trembling violently and tried to sit on a guard rail post. Did I mention it was raining this whole time? At some point, someone put a jacket on him and that struck me as too Covidy, so I wanted to get him into Bruce. So he pulled the twisted weight distribution bars off the back we drove Bruce to the side of the road, where we were both able to sit inside for a while.

A tow truck positioned itself in front of Dory, getting ready to put her on their wrecker. Richard, still on the phone with the insurance company tow driver, told them to stop and wait because the other guy with a flatbed was on his way. The CHP officer stepped in and informed us that we were not allowed to wait and that it was his job to clear the highway as fast as possible. Things got tense. We asked if they could simply tow her to the side of the road so we could wait for our tow truck there and at first the officer seemed to agree with that. The tow guys kept reiterating that we would have to pay the full price whether they towed her to the side or all the way to Randy’s. That wasn’t the point, we tried to explain, what we needed was a flatbed. When it appeared there was no choice in the matter, they hitched her up. Safety chains were gone, the hitch lock was unusable, and then they informed us they had to tow her to the next exit to get her safely off the road. So we followed as they took her away from us.

If what had already happened wasn’t bad enough, we then got to watch as they pulled about twenty yards onto the offramp and Dory jumped the hitch. She was rolling with no chains or emergency brake until she came to a stop by hitting and wedging herself against the guard rail. I think only the state of shock we were in prevented violence. I simply took pictures to document the fiasco and told them not to touch her. And then our tow guy finally showed up. We made the wrecker guys leave, which they were happy to do quickly. At this point Richard had Randy on the phone, which he handed to the driver. After a brief conversation, Richard got the phone back and Randy said to thank the man for his time, to make him leave, and to sit tight until his guy could get to us. We trust Randy with our lives, so we did exactly that. We waited, now in full darkness, on the side of an offramp, Bruce’s hazard lights flashing and headlights fixed on Dory to warn approaching traffic. That seemed an eternity, but it was worth the wait.

This guy, I think Carl? basically put his life on the line to get Dory off the guard rail without causing further damage. He was wielding chains with giant hooks like a towing ninja. He pulled just a little on one side, then got back out into fast moving traffic to reposition his truck. Then he moved chains, got back in the truck, just a little more repositioning, until finally he had her on a course where he could pull her up without having her just scrape all along the side. It was masterful. And death defying. And we are grateful. We followed them all the way to Randy, who had been clearing out his shop for her in the meantime. We both could see the extent of the damage as we followed behind and it was then that Richard started processing the possibility that Dory’s road days might be over. He began sobbing.

Carl got her off the truck and Randy pulled her into his shop using a forklift. I was not really taking anything in and just continued the process of putting things away inside, trembling uncontrollably. Like if everything could just go back in its proper place, all would be ok. Getting a better look, I was amazed by how much things seemed fine. The kitchen shelves fell, but I put them back up. Things flew out of organizer pockets, and shampoo fell onto the shower floor, but really nothing broken, no damage. Randy told me that if there was any way in the world to do it, he would fix Dory. Then I started sobbing and gave him a full Covidy hug with no regrets.

That was Friday. Through the weekend, we mostly cried, and have gone through all the symptoms of shock and grief. And actually, though I have mostly felt no physical symptoms as of Monday, as I started to write this, the trembling started back up, double time. We now know that really, she is not repairable for the road. We have wonderful friends who were quick to contact Safari Condo on our behalf and we shall see what is possible in terms of getting another Alto. She is well insured and Altos certainly hold their value, since you can’t easily get one. The downside is that you can’t easily get one.

We’ve started the process going with insurance and we’ve taken Bruce in for repairs and a diagnostic. He may be retiring, but on the upside, we had already begun thinking about that. Just not this soon. We’ve emptied both Bruce and Dory and realize: a) that doing so is really really sad, and b) damn we carry a lot of shit when we go camping. The list of mods we’ve done to Dory goes on for miles and each one hurts to think about. Like the latches, the Lagun table, the Mr. Moose key holder, or the etched 633 in the window, done by a friend at a rally. Ouch.

So Carpe Dory is no more, at least no longer in its original form. We have some hopes and dreams for what might be done with Dory I, and perhaps there will be a Dory II. And I know she is just a trailer, but she has been like our child. Each of our actual children has had a terrifying health scare, and I can tell you that this feels no less traumatic. If we do get another Alto, I can’t help but feel we will never love it as much as we have loved her. But I guess that’s what you say about the new puppy after you’ve lost your beloved dog, right?

And now I need to write several love letters. The first I’ll address to Safari Condo and to the Altoistes group. The fact that the Nadeaus have created an inanimate object that elicits this level of bonding from its users is extraordinary. As I said, Altos are not ordinary trailers, but it goes beyond the engineering and design. This is a company that treats their customers like family (or their “California girlfriend” in our case) and treats their product as though each one off the assembly line is one-of-a-kind. They create trailers, but they do so for the joy and happiness of the people who use them. And that culture has carried forward into the Altoistes group I started. Some of my dearest friends are members of that group. The moment I expressed what had happened, I had people jumping in to help us. So many offered us their support and well wishes and this is not something that happens in every facebook group. There were even Alto owners offering us the opportunity to use theirs for the interim time. There is just something about Altos that attracts really good people and that is pretty special. And if this experience has shown us anything, it is that there is literally nothing else out there we would buy instead of an Alto. And also, we cannot live without one, so the near future will be rather tough.

The next is to Randy Wilferd. I know I have sung his praises before but this guy, on a Friday night, at the drop of a hat, turned everything upside down for us. He coerced his guy with the flatbed to come save us because he knew we would need the best. And he cleared out his indoor garage because he knew it would be better to have her in there since she can’t be sealed up properly. He was there for us, again, in a big way and we can never thank him enough. If you use his services, don’t you dare be a pain in the ass customer to him. Overpay him if you can, thank him profusely, and know that you are lucky to be getting the best and most honest RV mechanic out there. He is also a little crazy and that is also why we love him. Thank you Randy. Again.

And of course, thank you Dory. You picked me up after a year of tragedy and you brought Richard and me back to life. You carried us when we were scared, and elated, and always gave us shelter from the storms. You got us through some terribly dark years, but only just. And remember when we played ‘where am I?’ with Jimmy Gunn? You’ve been our escape hatch and our weekly therapy retreat. You’ve been a weekend office, and a full time Learning Center. You’ve been across the country and back, twice, and so many other places in between. We loved you at first sight my dear, and our love only grew with time. We are so so sorry this has happened and that your road days have come to an end. But what a trip, eh? We would never ever have seen all of these places and met all these people were it not for you. You made adventure doable, Doryable, with hot showers and espresso in the morning. And you got to be a TV star too! We love you and will never forget the times we had with you.

As for the future, we shall see. We watched “Finding Nemo” to cry to on Friday night and “Finding Dory” to cry to on Saturday. We will ‘just keep swimming’ and we have some ideas for how Dory might be able to be repurposed in a spectacular way. If we get a Dory II, I’m sure we’ll learn to love again, though maybe not quite like this. And perhaps the blog can be renamed to ‘Carpe Dory Duo.’ Not sure. Just taking this one day at a time, cause that’s what Dory would do.