Paradise is a vault toilet

Paradise is a vault toilet. 

We are out of the woods and into a horse camp.

So apparently the house batteries did not charge up all the way. This morning they showed depleted. Down to 10.8 volts. The Anker was at 70%. Interesting. 

The morning was spent getting Fatass and the generator mounted securely on the rack. And covered. It was an hours long project. The cover is great, and needed, but there is a problem getting it on properly without covering the tailights and license plate. I might move the whole tailight assembly high on the rear hatch door. It seems the most sensible thing to do to be able to completely encase Fatass and the generator inside of the cover. It's kinda important. Especially out west in the sandy desert areas. The dust just grinds everything down to ruin.  

Made it to Hickory Ridge Horescamp. Luxury! Gravel pads. Vault toilet. Trash can! And sunny spots. I may stay here for a few days to let the house batteries charge up. I'm not sure what to expect at Meriwether. Shade or sun? Crowded with fall sightseeing campers, especially with the next nearest free campground temporarily closed. Not having a site open for me would be a minor catastrophe because there are no funds available for a paid campground until November 3rd. 

Maybe I might hold off until the 3rd and try to stay in Indiana. But it is getting so cold here. 30s at night 50 60s in the day. Brrr. I maybe should have left sooner. In September.  We shall see. 

Lots of sunshine here. And  horses! Pete was whimpering quietly behind me like a little kid getting ready to burst. I looked up from what I was doing and there was a pack of horses walking by. So far... he is doing great and not going crazy like he does watching horses on TV.

 #HoosierNationalForest  #fulltimeliving #minivanlife #HickoryRidgeHorseCamp #dispersedcamping 

Not out of the woods, yet.

 Not out of the woods, yet.

Spent the day breaking down camp. Windy day, made for a few challenges but nothing major. 

It is getting beyond chilly here in the woods. Cold, even Pete is shivering. I put his winter coat on him. Put mine on, too.  

Everything packed in pretty well. Probably, I have too much stuff for the typical minivanner setup. But, that's okay. I'm not minimalistic by any means and am looking forward to some decent ride time on Fatass and getting some quality gamer time in Destiny when I can afford a paid Campsite. 

No need to charge up the batteries. Got that done yesterday. Tomorrow either we make a run for Tennessee or we land at the horse camp if there are sunny spots. Looks like the temperatures go up into the week. Right now, it's too cold for my comfort.

#dispersedcamping #SundanceLake #minivanlife #fulltimeliving #camping

Hoosier National Forest has no mammals? What happened to all the furry critters?

 

Hoosier National Forest has no mammals? 

What happened to all the furry critters?

 
#vanlife  #HoosierNational #SundanceLake #bigfoot #fulltimeliving

Cold, but clear.

 Cold, but clear

Cold but clear. No more rain with the high in the mid 60s. 

The generator ran for five hours on a tank of gas. With an hour more and the two hours from the evening before all of the batteries were topped up with eight hours of generating. Betsy's house bank, Fatass' batteries, and a battery brick for gadget charging cost about a gallon of gas ($3). Not bad. 

In Tenessee, I hope to score a sunnier spot, although even with that the weather forecast looks to be uncooperative. Cloudy, rainy days in the mix. We shall see. 

I have about 10 days to go before funds replenish. Interesting.

#dispersedcamping  #travelingnomad  #minivanlife  #HoosierNationalForest  #FullTimeLiving

Rain. Cold. Gas and screws. A day in the life Full Time Living

The temperatures drop to near freezing as the rain continues for another day in Hoosier National Forest. The supply run to town scored screws to fabricate a mount for the generator, some gas, and some food. #SundanceLake #dispersedcamping #HoosierNationalForest #minivanlife #generator 

Rain was the main event of the day. It eventually waned at 4PM. The other two camps cleared out leaving us completely alone here at Sundance Lake. By 5 I had the generator up and running charging the battery system. 

It was a bit cumbersome at the gas station trying to pump gas into the generator's tank. Spillage. I did get some in, and did get the 1 gallon gas can filled with the rest of the $20 going into Betsy's tank.

Funds are uncomfortably low. Just enough to buy a few needed groceries, screws to fabricate a hitch platform for the generator, and gas to get to Tennessee this week. 

With what was in the generator's tank I got two hours of runtime. Tomorrow I will fill it up and see how long it runs and how much it charges the batteries.

Locked out. Gas run. Tombstone pizza.

 

Full Time Living in a minivan. The adventures of Pete the poodle and Jef continues in Hoosier National Forest. #minivanlife #FullTimeLiving #HoosierNationalForest #dispersedcamping #SundanceLake

Saturday October 18th

I made the shopping trip into town. Desperately need gas so I can charge up the main battery bank so it can charge the solar generator so it can keep the freezer freezing. The banks did great. 5 days till they depleted because of no solar input. Way too shady here for Pizza. Tomorrow will be the maiden run for the generator. Fun stuff.

I pan baked another Tombstone. My second stovetop attempt and last one. Couldn't use the electric pizza oven. No solar. It turned out okay. Better than nothing!

Always carry spare car keys in your pocket. Some fellow campers got locked out of their truck... door key broke off in the lock. Everything was inside it.. including the phone charging cable for their dead phone. I let them use my phone to call for help. Maybe I could have wire hangered the lock, but it was a borrowed truck and the owner lived locally. Sometimes wire hanger attempts go bad. Damage to lock linkage inside the door, torn weatherstripping, scratched interior was weighed against a set of keys showing up in an hour. What's an hour?

Today is Pete's Birthday

Today is Pete's birthday. He got extra bacon and lovin from the other campers at Sundance Lake.

 

Today was also a recovery adventure for neighboring campers. Their 2/wd Ford diesel pickup truck became stuck straddling the narrow gravel road while trying to back their popup trailer into the site. It was stuck real good. 

They walked down to ask if I knew much about camping. I do. But the question should have been, do I know much about vehicle recovery. I do! From watching hundreds of YouTube videos I learned a lot. 

First, the trailer was jacked up off of the hitch and rolled back into the site out of the way. Next, a series of techniques were applied to get the Ford loose from its slippery trap. I tried jacking it up and placing boards under the tires. It just spit them out. We tried digging around the front and rear wheels, but the tires had no grip. I tried wedging a short steel grill I found in the woods at my site as a recovery board. Several times. It was too short to dig in and was repeatedly spit out. 

More digging. More wheels spinning. I noticed the rear end of the Ford was fishtailing left and right quite easily every time a new technique was tried. A risky plan came to mind. I saw it on a recovery video. 

The plan. The lady keeps those tires spinning while the dude and me push on the rear drivers side of the bed. If all goes well, we will be able to push the rear end of that Ford a whole 90 degrees back onto solid pavement. 

It worked. Nobody got run over. Eventually the right rear tire caught some dry gravel and the Ford was able to line up on the road. Glad it worked. I didn't want to have to bring ol Betsy over to pull that heavy ass diesel around.

Sundance Lake, Hoosier National Forest

Sundance Lake in Hoosier National Forest has free 14-day dispersed camping that is what boondocking is all about. Great spot for a little bit of gravel riding, camping, and enjoying Indiana's pieces of America's National Forest. 

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8AqPgrC/

https://youtube.com/shorts/k5KHhqBvBI8?si=nyUPCSQNBv8XCgW-

@FullTimeLiving.life

#cyclenutsusa #SundanceLake #HoosierNational #dispersedcamping  #vanlife

How to bake a Tombstone Pizza on a campstove with a skillet

How to bake Tombstone Pizza on a skillet with a campstove. @FullTimeLiving.life

#tombstonepizza #campstove #fulltimeliving #camping #pizza

Lazy day 4. Made bacon eggs potatoes for brunch. Dragged some scrappy wood from the forest. A broken up pallet and an uprooted tree. Fun stuff to burn while making the sight look nicer. Imagined a way to mount the generator onto the bike rack receiver. 2x4s. Some tape. A couple of ratchet ties should do it. Maybe gonna try to pan bake a tombstone later for dinner. Not getting any solid sunshine here to charge the batteries. Oh well. Generator at some point. Maybe Sunday. Rainy Sunday I will make a trip into town for gas and water and trash dump?

Fattire ebiking in Hoosier National Forest

Pete and me took Fatass out for a ride on day 3 at Sundance in Hoosier National Forest. Gravel roads and trails made for a great ride. 

Day 3 and all is very well. Made spaghetti for dinner and bacon eggs potatoes for brunch. I am guestimating that I will have to make a resupply/trash drop-off maybe by Monday. Rainstorms Saturday rain Sunday.  Crummy forecast. Not sure how the roads will look. But the rainy days may be a smart time to go to store. Not too many people will be looking to camp. Concerned about loosing this site. Weighing if leaving the tent a screenhouse and even Fatass locked to a tree to secure the camp. Hmmm

Dispersed Camping Hoosier National Forest

 Full Time Living - day 2 Hoosier National Forest Indiana dispersed camping Sundance Lake

The camp is built! Probably I will stay here the full 14 day limit. Rain storms coming this weekend. Then sunny and 60s for the week after. It's a great site. A bit too shady. But maybe if I am conservative with power the batteries will maintain enough juice to keep the freezer solid. I can propane just about everything else. Good day. Looking forward to riding with Pete tomorrow on Fatass.

 @FullTimeLiving.life

#FullTimeLivingLife #dispersedcamping #minivanlife #Indiana #SundanceLake