If you don’t mind a few isolated thunderstorms, late spring is a perfect time to visit the Big Easy. There are boatloads, or River Boatloads that is, of zydeco music, Cajun cuisine, Voo Doo, historical landmarks and nightlife. This particular trip was “grown up” and kid-free, but it was so much fun that this summer a family trip is planned back to the region to tour outside of the French Quarter and into swamp lands as well as the Mississippi and Alabama Gulf Coast…so stay tuned.]]>
Wouldn’t it be nice to be a weather forecaster, be wrong more than 50 percent of the time, and still keep your job?It doesn't work in my case.
As a writer I have to be accurate all the time. On the occasions when I’m not, I can print a correction; when the forecast is not accurate, you and I suffer. This all came to an ugly fruition on a camping trip in the desert between Phoenix and Tucson.
Were were about an hour West of I-10, in the remote reaches of Ironwood Forest National Monument near Ragged Top Peak. “Gusty winds ending by sunset” and a “30 percent chance of rain” became a night-long storm sustaining winds over 20 miles an hour—gusting to 40 miles per hour—and close to 10 hours of continuous slashing rain.
To put it mildly, a pleasant weekend camping trip can be rather uncomfortable in the unprepared tent during such a storm.
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The temperature was plummeting and the sun, an orange ball dropping towards the horizon. We were in the sixth hour of a three hour hike. I could see the car in the parking lot tantalizingly close, maybe a mile and a half away, except for the fact that we are standing on the edge of a five hundred foot tall mesa and at the end of a trail. Despite my orienteering certification, USGS maps, and search and rescue experience, we've taken a wrong turn and are now lost in the desert with one liter of water left to share.We did not have enough water to backtrack to the car.
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There are just some road trips you need to take in a camper. The old school, all-in one travel camper, (complete with a cassette player). Something about the long highways of Alaska and wide rivers full of salmon makes you want to travel in a camper. Who needs the luxury of a hotel when you can drive, park, and camp along some of the most beautiful scenery in the world?
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