And so I spent much of the week anxiously trying to organize the details of Alumafandango.  We want everyone to be completely mesmerized by the experience, to the point that (like our other events) there’s never any desire to leave the grounds to find something else to do.  That’s a tall order.  I expect Brett & I will be busy programming the event for the next few months, even while we are finalizing details for Alumapalooza 2012 in Ohio.

Meanwhile we are nearly done recruiting for the Modernism Week “Vintage Trailer Show” in Palm Springs.  We have 20 trailers signed up and they are all really cool.  The leader of the show will likely be Randy Grubb’s “Decoliner,” which is technically neither trailer nor motorhome, but so exceptional that we felt it should be in the show anyway.  We’ve also got a rare 1965 Dethleffs Bedouin, 1954 Hille Ranger Pop-Up, 1946 Curtis Wright, 1964 Traveleze, 1954 Silver Streak Clipper, and the following Airstreams:

• 1972 Airstream Ambassador
• 1957 Airstream Safari
• 1973 Airstream Safari
• 1965 Airstream Safari
• 1960 Airstream Caravel
• 1959 Airstream Globetrotter
• 1959 Airstream Traveler
• 1968 Airstream Ambassador
• 2008 Airstream Custom by Timeless Travel Trailers
• 1969 Airstream Caravel
• 2012 Airstream Sterling Concept
• 1967 Airstream Overlander
• 1963 Airstream Bambi

At this point we have just one space left in the show, which will probably get snapped up in the next week or so.   We’re expecting some special guests to join us, including vintage trailer restoration specialists Mike Keenan of M.E.L. Trailers, David Winick, and Uwe Salwender of Area 63 Productions.

We really do like organizing these shows, but we’ve got to stick to the core business of running Airstream Life and our own events (AFD/APZ), so this will be the last year Brett & I are involved in curating the Modernism Week show.  We’ll hand the reins over to someone else once this show is done, and hopefully it will continue growing as a special event. I’ll probably still come out to Palm Springs in future years just to attend and see what’s on display, as it is a unique chance to see some of the best vintage trailers in the west.

But Friday night, after some intense negotiations and late-night conference calls, Brett and I finally resolved the last remaining issues for a major project.  And that makes it possible to announce “Alumafandango,” our new event to be held in Denver CO this coming August, 2012.

We’ve been working on this for about a year.  For a long time we’ve been hearing from people out west that they’d like something like Alumapalooza.  We looked at potential sites in Palm Springs, northern Arizona, Texas, and Colorado, but we kept running into barriers that made it impossible to hold the kind of event we wanted.  Finally, we found Lakeside Amusement Park in Denver, and started actively working on a deal with the park ownership so that we could camp right in the park next to the lake and the old-school rides.

This wasn’t easy at all.  The area we wanted to camp in was overrun with bushes, littered with decades of debris, and overshadowed by an abandoned race stadium and a half dozen decrepit mobile homes.  The park owners agreed to clean up the area, install water and power stands, and level & seed the ground so that it would be transformed into a nice place to camp for a few days.  This work started last fall and has been ongoing through the winter.  It probably won’t be done for a few months, but when it is, it will be a unique opportunity to camp where no one has camped before—and that’s one of the keys we were seeking.

Timeless Travel Trailers (Wheat Ridge, CO) has been instrumental in helping us put this deal together.  They will be the key sponsor, and as part of the event they are planning to provide on-site service and tours of their workshop.  They’re also supplying the fencing, water, and electrical infrastructure.  Our plan is to make this an annual event if it turns out to be popular, so we are all looking to the long term.  Obviously all of this investment in the site wouldn’t make sense for just one year.

Brad Cornelius designed the new logo, which you can see above.  A version of this will appear on the t-shirts, too.

Our goal is to have something just as fun as Alumapalooza, but not the same.  So we are looking for all new seminars and presenters, new entertainment, and different games.  That way you can go to both “APZ” and “AFD” and have a great time at both without feeling deja vu.

We selected the headline entertainment with the intent of carrying over the “carnival” theme, and we’re very excited to have the Lucky Daredevil Thrillshow featuring Tyler Fyre and Thrill Kill Jill for two nights of performances. They’re Airstreamers, of course.

We’ve also secured a night of free unlimited rides for all participants.  The classic rides at Lakeside are really fun.  You’ll remember most of them, and want to ride them all.  My favorite is the old-school wooden roller coaster.  It’s just fantastic excitement packed in a 1-minute ride.

Registration for Alumafandango opened on Sunday and already the first three trailers are signed up, which is encouraging.  We think we can accommodate 150 trailers on site, maybe more, but it won’t be clear until the site work is complete.

Of course, now that we’ve pulled the trigger I’m wondering nervously if we’ll be able to get 100+ trailers signed up in six months.  Right now the website doesn’t have much detail about what we are planning, but hopefully the reputation of Alumapalooza will carry over, and people will know that we guarantee a great time.  (We’ll get more detail up on the Alumafandango website as the plans begin to firm up.)  We’re working on a “vintage showcase,” some interesting tours, lots of seminars, and a pretty radical trailer makeover demonstration that happens in five days while you watch, among many other things.

Those of you who followed the saga of our aborted trip to California know that our third Actibrake disc brake actuator quit without notice recently.  I’ve had a long and painful history with that product, which you can read about in the Tour of America archives and the Man In The Maze archives.  Suffice to say that this time we chose to switch brands, and after some research into the various products I chose to go with Dexter’s brake actuator, model K71-651-00.  It’s a 1600 psi unit designed specifically for disc brakes.

When the new actuator arrived I was immediately impressed with its design.  It’s a bit smaller than the one it replaced, and has a less-complicated 4-wire installation process (12v+, ground, brake controller, breakaway switch).  The previous one required five wires and I’ve seen some competitors that need six or more.

The mounting feet are integrated into the cast aluminum case, so I was able to toss the funky hold-down straps that we’d used before.  The whole thing seems tougher and neater, and from what I’ve read this Dexter unit has a good reputation for reliability, which is of course the highest priority in your braking system.

Removing the old dead unit was simple. The first step is to disconnect the trailer’s power, which means unplugging the trailer from shore power and removing the negative terminal on the battery.  Then I unscrewed the straps that held the brake actuator down, snipped the wires, and unscrewed the flexible hydraulic line.  It was out in five minutes, and it would have been quicker if I wasn’t working the confines of a closet.  I haven’t decided what to do with the old one yet.  My friend Rob suggested I send it to the Smithsonian.  I suppose it could be refurbished with a new circuit board but I don’t feel very good about passing on a proven unreliable product to someone else, given that I’ve had three of them fail.

Most of the job would have been fairly easy if it weren’t for that closet.  Having the actuator inside the trailer eliminates possible future problems from weather exposure, but it also means it ends up in some really awkward spot.  To get into the closet I had to lie on my side and wedge myself in, which was uncomfortable to say the least.  Fortunately, Rob came by and shared the joy by taking turns with me crimping wires in that tiny space (and he’s bigger than me).

The only other attachments needed were the hydraulic line, which just screws on with low torque (22 ft-lbs), and four wood screws to attach the Dexter to the floor. I pre-drilled the floor holes with a 1/16″ bit, screwed the actuator down, and we were basically done inside.

The next step is to fill the reservoir up with brake fluid, which required about a quart.  We reconnected the power, pulled the breakaway switch, and heard the reassuring hum of the actuator’s pump in full operation.

Once we knew it was working, we needed to bleed the air out of the brake lines.  This is the part I hate, because I have never managed to find a way to get a hose tightly on the bleeder valves so that it doesn’t leak.  I always end up with an armful of brake fluid, and this time was no exception.  But the bleeding went fairly quickly (there wasn’t a lot of air to be removed).  It definitely is crucial to have a buddy standing by at the breakaway switch to activate and deactivate the unit while you’re underneath getting doused with brake fluid.  We kept an eye on the fluid level but didn’t need to top it up until the bleeding job was done.  All told, we used about 1.5 quarts of DOT3 brake fluid to fill the reservoir and bleed the lines.

After that, the next task was to clean up the wires, which are a bit haphazard with different colors and multiple butt splices left from prior re-installations. The photo shows it before I wrapped things up.  I may also install a shelf so I have a flat surface above to store things, later.

At this point I lost my assistant, but the hard work was done.  All I need to do now is hitch up and go for a test tow.  When I do that, I’ll be checking that my previous brake controller settings still feel right for this controller (they probably will) and that I’ve gotten all the air out of the lines.  I’ll know if there’s air because it will take longer for the actuator to build up pressure and hence cause a delay in braking action.  Hopefully I got that part right.

If you are contemplating this job yourself, you’ll need these tools:

• 2-3 qts of brake fluid
• open-end wrenches to remove and re-attach the hydraulic line
• brake bleeder wrench (5/16″ or 1/4″ —check your brake calipers for correct size)
• yellow and blue butt splices
• wire cutter/stripper/crimper
• drill & small bits (to put new mounting holes in the floor)
• clear tubing & bottle for draining brake fluid
• rags or paper towels
• headlamp (very useful in small spaces)
• an assistant for the bleeding process
• mounting screws
• screwdrivers
• a test light or multi-meter
• wire loom and/or electrical tape

What a great feeling it is to have this done.  Not only are we ready to get back on the road, but I no longer have to worry about a random failure of the brakes. Dexter is a major company with a lot of experience, and they have a good product, so my confidence level in my disc brakes is high—for the first time in years.

Oh, I know, some of you are saying, “Yuck—he can’t be serious.”  But I am.  For example, when Emma was born my brother visited us in the hospital and handed me a can of Spam and a spray can of Cheez-Whiz.  He said, “Get used to it—this is all you’ll be eating for a while.”  Eleanor decided to make him eat his words, literally, and kept those two cans on the shelf for a year.  One day she mixed them up with some polenta and made a well-disguised appetizer that she called, “Polenta and cheese with ‘domestic pancetta‘.”  My brother and my father ate ‘em up (the little wedges she’d made were actually darned good on crackers), and only after the entire plate was gone did she tell them what they had actually eaten.

So Spam can be a tasty treat once in a while, and I don’t hate it.  I still don’t eat it much, but I do have more of an appreciation for the stuff, and for its role in our society.  Likewise, I’m gaining a small appreciation for the other type of (lower case “s”) spam, namely spam email.

In the early part of the First Decade, spam was pervasive, annoying, and even intimidating.  There was fear that the unchecked volume of spam email would eventually overwhelm us all, clogging the Internet and billions of email Inboxes like an invasive species.  New takes on confidence tricks like “phishing” for passwords and “advanced fee fraud” (AKA Nigerian 419 scam) were sucking in many people, who lost hundreds of millions of dollars.  Like any red-blooded Internet user, I hated spam just on principle. It had to be stamped out.

Eventually, the geeks came to our rescue.  Math geniuses hired by companies like Google and Microsoft worked up clever algorithms to quickly identify and divert spam to places where it can do no harm, in effect, toxic waste dumps for email.  Like everyone else’s, my Google email has a Spam box where about 99% of all the spam email I receive is automatically filed.  I never have to see it or sort through it.  Like the prospect of global nuclear annihilation during the Cold War, spam email has faded from being a source of constant anxiety to just another one of life’s realities.

Even though I don’t have to pay attention to it anymore, I do go look once in a while.  It’s a good practice, just in case a legitimate email accidentally gets mis-filed, which happens once in a long while.  But mostly I look at the Spam box because it’s a great source of entertainment.  When things are dull around the office, I look for interesting new variations on the advanced-fee scam, or funny announcements of various European lotteries that I have won.  (I win a lot of lotteries these days.)  I like the constant barrage of people who “just happened to be looking over your website and noticed you aren’t listed at the top of Google”.  (So many wonderful people are looking out for me.) I’m flattered by the beautiful women in the Ukraine who are looking for husbands just like me.  Just about the only thing I don’t appreciate are the many offers to “increase your manhood.”  Hey, I’ll take a winning lotto ticket but just what are you implying about my love life?

In fact, it has gotten to the point that I’m now disappointed when my Spam box contains a bunch of garden-variety re-runs.  Note to scammers: I’m looking for creativity.  When you send me a plaintive cry from the cancerous wife of a deposed Africa dictator, I want an engaging and heartbreaking story or I’m not going to bother reading all of it it.  Next time I win the “Pan-European” lottery, give me a good spiel to explain how the heck I got entered in the first place.  If you want me to visit your porn site, have “Rudmilla” write me a better come-on than “I’m hot for a man like you!”  And if you’re going to buy my car off Craigslist, at least have the decency to know the car’s year and model before you send me a bogus check for $2,000 more than the purchase price.

This is the next frontier for the scammer and spammers, as I see it.  Like any marketer, they’ve got to try harder to get my attention, and I don’t mean by being more obnoxious.  They’ve had a free ride all these years with dumb email blasts that favored quantity over quality.  Now technology has given us the upper hand, and that means it is time to demand better things from our spam.  Otherwise, I’m not eating it.

The Airstream is slowly getting unpacked, as we pull out things that we would have used during our 10-day trip.  Every day we go “shopping” in the Airstream for whatever we need:  clothes, frozen food, a movie, some tools, etc.  Mostly we’ve been taking out food since Eleanor had a program of meals planned for the entire trip.

The Dutch Oven has been fun for both of us, even though our second attempt at cooking was disastrous.  We tried apple crisp, a favorite of mine (traditional up in Vermont, where I grew up), but naively followed the recipe in the “Dutch Oven Cooking 101″ booklet.  We should have followed our instincts instead.  The recipe called for way too much nutmeg and not enough brown sugar.  It smelled fantastic as it was cooking out in the back yard, and we were drooling with anticipation, but when we sampled it after dinner the taste was repulsive.  Nobody could even finish their serving.

It was a complete loss, and things got worse the next morning.  Disappointed with the outcome, I left that terrible apple crisp in the Dutch oven overnight rather than transferring it immediately to the compost bin.  When I scooped it out in the morning the bottom of the crisp had an absolutely incredible skunk smell that nearly drove us out of the kitchen.  Some sort of chemical reaction occurred, a final insult in the apple debacle.  Fortunately, after cleaning the oven didn’t retain the smell.

Cooking-wise, the oven has done a good job.  I stacked up some leftover flagstone to make a temporary windscreen, with an aluminum turkey pan for the coals, and it worked so well at retaining the heat from the oven that it may become a semi-permanent feature of our back yard.  (Someday I’d like to build a permanent brick & stone oven that we can also use for pizzas, but that’s way down the home improvement plan.)

Even though the potato recipe we tried earlier did work fairly well, it was a bit on the greasy side and there was more bacon in it than we would have preferred.  So based on that and the apple crisp we’ve learned that the booklet recipes are really just starting points.  From now on, we are going to modify the recipes as we go, using Eleanor’s culinary experience and training as our guide.  Tomorrow the plan is to make “Chisolm Trail Blueberry French Toast Cobbler” from a different recipe book as a special Saturday morning breakfast.

We’re also going to break out one of Eleanor’s Christmas gifts, a deep fryer.  Now, some of you are probably thinking, “You got your wife a deep fryer as a gift?  What’s next, a vacuum cleaner and a scrub mop?”  But don’t worry, Eleanor loves cooking tools.  I once bought her a second refrigerator as a Christmas gift and it was probably the best received thing I’ve ever given her.  She’d rather have a new oven than a diamond ring (and the oven she wants costs about the same as a 1-carat diamond).

All of this cooking is a way of maximizing the value of our staycation.  We would have used the Dutch oven once, maybe twice, and the deep fryer not at all if we were in the Airstream.  The fryer is just too big for our style of travel, especially with the gallons of oil it requires.  Dear old Vince Saltaformaggio would have brought it all—and more—but we don’t have a separate trailer just for the cooking gear, as he did.  So we’re taking full advantage of being at home by spreading out and getting into messy projects.

Until Tuesday, things were nice and quiet.  With the New Year everyone has come out of the woodwork.  Suddenly I’m getting calls about Modernism Week and Alumapalooza again, I’m getting article pitches from PR agencies and freelance writers, advertisers with shiny new budgets are looking to spend money (yahoo!) and people I call are actually answering their phones again.  This has impacted the vacation aspect of this week but I can’t complain because stuff is getting done.

Even Carlos called, wanting to shoot some neon this week.  In the past two years we’ve documented just about every historic sign in Tucson, and certainly all of the “live” ones (those that are still operable).  These days we are just picking up the remaining “dead” signs, like this one.  The upholstery shop is moving and the long-dead neon sign will likely be torn down, so this photo shoot was slightly urgent.  This particular sign doesn’t look like much because the neon is broken and the background was repainted.  In its original form it looked like a ribbon and was undoubtedly considerably more attractive. We’re trying to locate a historic shot that shows the original design, for inclusion in the book.

The brake actuator problem is on its way to resolution.  I have decided to get a Dexter replacement, which is currently on order and should arrive fairly soon.  The replacement unit has a good reputation, takes up about the same space, and requires only four wires.  I’m hoping to install it later this month with Eleanor’s assistance.  As Jim & Debbie pointed out in a comment earlier, installing it ourselves means we’ll know that much more about our Airstream, which is very useful when you are on the road and something goes wrong.

@Alicia Miller:  We hope to be more skilled with our Dutch Oven by Alumapalooza time, but in any case both Eleanor and I hope to attend the DO cooking class this year.  I’m pleased to say that Lodge is going to be a sponsor and so we’ll have a few pieces of their cookware as door prizes too!

It’s hard to explain fully why the option of taking the Caravel to California didn’t work for us.  Mostly it was because our trip was very ambitious.  We were going to meet friends in three locations, sharing some fairly elaborate meals each time, and traverse from desert to ocean climate.  This meant a huge amount of carefully packed food (some prepared in advance, others in the form of ingredients), clothing and gear.  We planned to hike, picnic, grill, cook in the Dutch oven, photograph, swim, courtesy park, write/blog, and entertain.  It just didn’t all fit into the Caravel, and culling down the gear meant culling down the plan, to the point that big chunks of our itinerary didn’t make sense.

Plus, Emma’s cold seemed to be draining the spark out of her, and Eleanor was showing symptoms of having caught it too.  They weren’t going to be ready to do the hikes I had in mind in Borrego Springs.  And then there was the curse of reservations—we were fairly locked into an itinerary by the reservations, and changing it to fit our new circumstances meant a slew of fees and lost deposits.  We couldn’t extend the trip to make up for the lost day because of appointments back at home, so we’d have to rush something, and that wasn’t going to be fun given the number of miles we had planned (1,200 roundtrip).

We finally recognized the situation.  By losing 36 hours and having to downsize, the trip we had planned no longer made sense.  We needed to invent something entirely new rather than try to save an unsalvageable plan.  It was a tough call to give up a vacation I’d been anticipating for weeks, but I think it was the right one.

A key to happiness is to be satisfied with what you’ve got.  So, what did we have?  Well, beautiful weather in Tucson (upper 70s by day, sunny), plenty of time, and lots of good food to be eaten.  I broke out the Dutch oven and made my first-ever dish over charcoal in the back yard: “cowboy” potatoes with onions and bacon.  I also grilled up some of Eleanor’s spiced chicken on the Weber, and some huge portobello mushrooms with olive oil and Kosher salt.

Eleanor started cooking up the perishable food that she was planning to serve during the trip, including a really fantastic Indian chicken with rogan josh and cream (which we will eat tomorrow—it’s always better after sitting a day to let the flavors meld).  We opened up the windows and the sliding glass door and let the unusually balmy air flow through the house, tantalizing the neighbors with the smell of good things cooking.  And we talked about future plans.  I think we will go to Anza-Borrego in April to make up for this lost trip.

The rest of the time we spent unwinding all of the things we’d set in motion.  The Caravel was unpacked and sent back to storage.  “I think it’s disappointed,” Eleanor said. “It was all psyched to go out.”  We left as much packed in the Safari as we could, hoping that we’ll be able to use it in a week or two for a shorter trip, but all of the stuff we’ll need this week has been removed.  In the process we found some things in both trailers that needed attention, like flashlights with dead batteries, compartments carrying stuff we wouldn’t need, expired food, outdated paperwork, etc., so it was good to get all of that stuff addressed.

I cancelled the reservations, losing a total of about $180 in reservation fees and non-refundable charges.  We still have one valid & non-refundable reservation in California for next weekend, but I doubt we’ll use it.  We’ve offered it to a few friends.

The biggest hassle is that I had previously directed some mail to California, where I was going to pick it up during the week.  That mail includes some checks.  Now I’ve got to get it re-directed again, back to my usual address, and I can’t do that until the Post Offices open on Tuesday.

Today our “staycation” continues.  I’m going to bake apple crisp in the Dutch oven, and Eleanor is going to cook up more of the goodies from the Airstream.  I expect to get a quote from a local dealer on a replacement brake actuator, but until I hear what he wants to charge, it’s not decided whether I’ll buy locally or mail-order it.  So it may be a while before I get on the job of replacing it.  I’ll document that process when it happens.

We spent the last two days packing for an 11-day trip to southern California.  Eleanor hustled mightily to get all her stuff ready for the Airstream; she’s got big culinary plans in addition to the usual challenges of packing up a household and child.  I was busy too, packing, testing, filling, tweaking … Around 2 p.m., while Eleanor was making her finishing touches, I pulled the trailer forward a few feet and found that we had no brakes.  The disc brake actuator (a hydraulic pump) had failed.

I knew at that moment we were probably screwed, because we’ve had a long history of problems with brake actuators.  The unit was made by Actibrake, a company that has since disappeared, and whose legacy is hundreds of brake actuators that are known to suffer sudden failure.  This is our third Actibrake, and we have it only because when the prior two failed they were replaced under warranty.  For the past three years I have considered preemptively replacing this one to avoid a possible inconvenience, but since a replacement unit would cost $600-700 and this one was functioning properly, I let it go.  And so, it died in our carport without even a whimper to warn us.

But to be sure, I ran through the usual checks.  I added a little brake fluid, since it seemed low.  I cleaned the main ground for the trailer with a Scotchbrite pad.  I checked the 30 amp fuse that protects the unit, and all of the other fuses too.  With Super Terry on the phone, I verified power was going to the unit and that the ground was good.  I power-cycled it by disconnecting the battery. I even banged on it a little.  Nothing.  Dead dead deadsky.

So I told Eleanor, “We’re not going today,” which was no surprise to her by then, and I got on the phone to see if anyone in Tucson had a replacement unit.  At 3:30 pm on a Saturday, New Year’s Eve to boot, I didn’t expect much but I did get one RV parts store that was willing to order in a Dexter or Carlisle replacement actuator on Monday.  So the very best I can hope for it is to get one on Tuesday.  If I install it myself and all goes well, we could be on the road Tuesday night or Wednesday.

I think the fact that I made reservations for this trip is karmically jinxing us.  We don’t usually make reservations, and often when we do, we come to regret it and pay lots of cancellation fees.  That’s going to be the case for this trip.

Super Terry pointed out that we have a “backup” trailer, our 1968 Caravel.  So I picked up the Caravel from its parking spot and delivered it alongside the disabled Safari, and we started figuring out how to fit at least some of 30 feet worth of stuff into 17 feet.  It’s not easy.  The Caravel is a weekender.  The refrigerator is 1/3 the size of the Safari’s.  Storage is extremely limited.  It’s so small that when one person stands up to do anything (cook, make a bed, get something out of storage) everyone else has to sit down.

In 2004 we took the Caravel to the WBCCI International Rally in Lansing, MI.  That trip was 17 days, our record for length of time in that little trailer.  But Emma was a tyke then, taking up hardly any room, and it was summer so we were outside most of the time.  (In the photo, that’s Emma at age 4 pretending to be asleep.  Don’t be fooled—she never slept.)

Things are quite different now.  Emma is over five feet tall, she travels with an immense collection of books and stuffed animals, and we have the added complication that she has a nasty cold at the moment.

Plus, I just blogged about how cold it gets in the desert in the winter, and how sunset comes crashing down early.  I’m envisioning ten long nights in a tiny trailer with a sick kid …

But what can we do?  If we wait until the new brake actuator arrives, we might be on the road Wednesday.  That would cause a huge ripple that would eliminate much of the plan we’ve carefully laid out over the past few weeks.  And still something might go wrong that could cause a further delay.  Taking the Caravel is the best option we have to salvage at least some of the plan.

So we’re re-engineering everything.  About a quarter of the stuff we were bringing along is now staying home (but the Dutch oven is still coming!)  The Mercedes will now serve as our outside storage, loaded up with all the things that won’t fit in the Caravel.  (I don’t normally like to carry a lot of stuff in the car when towing the Safari because of weight limits, but the Caravel puts very little weight on the car so we are free to pack it full.)  Some plans that required big refrigeration are getting scotched, other plans are being modified.  We worked on this until about 7 p.m., but we need a lot more time to get it all figured out.

If we can figure it all out by tomorrow afternoon, we’ll get on the road and just miss our first night in the campground.  If we need more time to pack or if Emma needs more time to get over the worst of her cold, we might leave Monday instead.  All we can do is be flexible.

So tonight Eleanor broke out the cheese fondue that she had planned for our New Year’s celebration on the road, and I’m making popcorn for the movie we’ll watch.  It’s an enforced “staycation” tonight.  Not the New Year’s Eve we had planned, but a memorable one nonetheless.

But the desert offers some intangibles that make it worth a little chilliness.  The winter days can be startlingly clear, with fantastic views through clear blue sky for a hundred miles.  Daytime hiking is superb, and there’s always lots of room to find your own campsite.

The past few years we have spent New Year’s Eve in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, about 70 miles south of Palm Springs.  We like it for the peacefulness (we don’t go to have a blowout party). Every New Year’s Eve the primary sound we hear is coyotes howling, and occasionally a breeze blowing through the long fronds of the palm trees.

The early sunset means that dinner is always in the dark.  Typically it’s in the 40s as I’m outside grilling something on the Weber, wearing a ski hat and gloves.  It reminds me of days in Vermont when we’d grill in the winter, except in the desert I don’t have to spend the first 30 minutes shoveling snow out of the way. (Although last year we had a brief moment of sleet.)

Last year we were joined by Alex & Charon, who travel with a substantial collection of cast iron cookware.  Alex gave me my first instruction on Dutch Oven cooking, a subject I’ve been interested in since we ran an article on the subject in the Fall 2010 issue of Airstream Life.  Alex piled some hot charcoal atop and beneath his Dutch Oven and baked us a nice dessert.

The combination of glowing charcoal, and a nearby campfire with a roast on an iron spike, reminded me of reading about the exploration by Lewis & Clark.  They cooked in much the same way, over a century ago as they walked and canoed across the new American wilderness.  It transformed the cold dark night into a great camping experience, full of delicious scents and great karmic rewards.

So it was with pleasure that I received a late Christmas gift: a #10, Lodge four-quart Dutch Oven, a gift from my mother.  It comes with a booklet entitled, “Dutch Oven Cooking 101,” to get you started.  I’ve been studying it and planning out a few basic recipes.  Today I am going to get some charcoal and some welder’s gloves, and piece together a complete set of tools and ingredients so that I can try some Dutch Oven cooking of my own next week.  What better time and place to learn this new skill, than out in the desert at night, with no distractions and plenty of time?

Of course, there’s a small fear of committing some heinous Dutch Oven error and producing a charred or inedible dish.  I’m not generally known as a cook, although I do a lot of grilling.  For this reason the Weber Baby Q will also come with us.  It’s my safety net.  I’ll just stick to “optional” items with the DO, so if my experiments turn into charcoal briquettes themselves, nobody will starve.

Tomorrow we are going to seriously start prepping for the trip.  Already we’ve been buying groceries and making lists of things to bring.  The Airstream itself is kept mechanically ready to go at all times (empty holding tanks, cold refrigerator, cleaned, fresh bedding, etc.), so our efforts will be focused on packing our personal stuff. Since we only anticipate being out for 10 days or so, it should be a straightforward job compared to the usual challenge of packing for several months.

We’re not just staying in the desert this time.  Our route will take us all the way west to the Pacific Ocean.  Depending on circumstances, we may make a second stop in Anza-Borrego on the way home, or make a longer trip out of it up the Pacific Coast Highway in which case we’ll be out a little longer.  Friends have popped up all along our route, which is always superb.  We’ll see Bert & Janie, Leigh & Brian, John & Helena, David & Ariadna — Airstreamers all — and perhaps a few other people.  So it’s shaping up to be a great trip.  We’ll hit the road on Saturday and I’ll blog regularly as we travel.

OK, that’s all the musing. One random note: We still have a few spots available at Modernism Week 2012 (Vintage Trailer Show), Feb 25-26.  The Mod Week people have sweetened the deal for trailer owners.  Now for your $95 entry fee you get one free night of hotel (a $100 value right there), two receptions, a chance to win one of three Airstream Life awards, an electrical hookup if you want to stay in your trailer, and a pump-out at the end of the event.  It’s a great way to meet a lot of really cool people, and we always have a wonderful time. All you need to participate is a very nice vintage trailer of any make.  It’s a great reason to visit Palm Springs and check out some of Modernism Week.  If that sounds like fun to you (and it really is), ping info@alumapalooza.com for an application form & details.

But the big highlight of this time of year has lately been our annual trip around New Year’s Eve.  Typically we pack up the Airstream and get lost in the southern California desert for a week or so.  This year we’ll do that, and a bit more. The trip plan has been stretched to include a jaunt up to Santa Barbara (CA). I am not sure how long we will stay out, but it will be at least ten days … and you know how susceptible we have been in the past to ad-hoc trip extensions.  Once we’re on the California coast, it may be hard to convince ourselves to head back home.

The holidays are great times to be Airstreaming.  We’ve spent many Thanksgivings, Christmases, and New Years Eves in our Airstream—every one memorable for the great places it has taken us.  All of the holidays we have spent at home have melded into one blob in my memory, but I remember clearly the Christmas in San Diego, the Thanksgiving turkey Eleanor cooked in the redwoods, picking out seven fishes for a Christmas eve meal at St George Island (FL), and all of the great New Years we have spent in Borrego Springs.

Holidays seem special when we spend them in the Airstream.  The small space encourages us to get outside and absorb whatever holiday vibe the local area has to offer.  The Airstream is always peaceful in a campground on a holiday.  It feels like the world has gone away for a day, and left us alone to enjoy each other’s company.  And it never feels like the sort of horrible travel experience people normally associate with holidays.  We move at our pace, free from airport crowds and TSA body searches, not rushing on a snowy highway to get to a relative’s house, not pressed to be anywhere, far from home and yet still at home.

We spent so many holidays in the Airstream that when we finally bought a house it was a huge novelty to spend Christmas eve in it.  The house was uninhabitable because of all the renovation going on, but we cleared a space in the living room, made a fire, and slept on the floor in sleeping bags just so we could wake up by the tree.  I like having the choice of home or Airstream every year, although we typically select the house for Christmas and the Airstream for New Year’s Eve.

Of course, in most of the country it’s hard to get out this time of year.  Most people have winterized their Airstreams for the season, and would be facing drives of 1,000 miles or longer just to get somewhere that the weather is reliably above freezing during the day.  But even if you can’t tow, you can play.  Does your Airstream live in the driveway?  If so, can you get a power cord to it?  That’s all you need to “camp out” for a few days.  Seems silly, but I know lots of people who do it all the time.  It’s just the change of scene that makes it fun.  It’s an adult version of sleeping out in the backyard in a tent.

Decorating the Airstream is easy, too.  It doesn’t take much to make it festive inside: a string of lights or two, a little rosemary bush trimmed to look like a miniature pine tree, a few small presents, and maybe a pie or some cookies.  Perhaps a little Christmas music on the iPod?  Add in your favorite beverages and some fuzzy slippers, and you’re in business.  Curl up on the bed or couch and watch a Christmas movie with someone you love.

And while you’re doing it, think about places you want to go.  Call up the Ghost of Christmas Future and ask him to show you where you’ll be spending the holiday some other year.  The world is wide open, and if you already own the Airstream, all you need is a little time.  Don’t wait for “someday.”  Happy holidays—this year and next!

Time and again I’ve said I wanted to encapsulate that epic into something portable and readable, but every time I looked at the task it was so intimidating that I found something else to do instead.  Once I actually wrote about 80 pages, and then abandoned it as a terrible effort.  At another point I published a series of three essays on the blog in the hopes that going “public” would embarrass me into completing the job.

But nothing has worked.  It has been three years since we stopped full-timing, and probably five or six abortive attempts at re-writing the story, and it continues to be a sort of literary Don Quixote-windmill that thwarts me.

I am taking another run at it now.  This time I’ve approached it by downloading the entire contents of the blog to use as notes.

This has already turned out to be tricky.  See, I was rather prolific in writing about our travels, to put it mildly.  This is normally a good practice for a writer, because the blog entries and 10,000+ photos comprise all the information I need to augment my memory.  But I wrote six days a week, averaging about 900 words per blog entry.  Multiply that by three years and the result is smothering:  over 800,000 words in total.  That’s the rough equivalent of a 1,600 page book.  It’s almost double the length of The Count of Monte Cristo.  At least Dumas had the excuse that his story spanned decades.

Don’t get me wrong—I think our story was mostly interesting, but the sheer size of it is impractical.  Not only is it too much information to sort through, to keep it unabridged I’d have to publish it as a three or four volume set —at least— and that’s without any pictures.  The cost of publishing would be prohibitive.  And it would be boring.  So it has to be trimmed down, and therein lies my first challenge.

Just getting the data down from the web was a hassle.  WordPress doesn’t have a handy plug-in (that I could find, anyway) to export blog posts to a Word processing format.  I finally used a web service that converted the entire blog into a PDF, including the photos.  The resulting PDF took about half an hour to generate and massed 155 megabytes.  I converted that to text and imported it to my word processor, and now I’m cleaning up the result (removing extraneous detail and spam comments, etc.)  So far I’m 600 pages into the document. It will take a couple of weeks to complete the first pass, if all goes well.

This is just the beginning.  Then I have to start writing, with a copy of the cleaned-up blog at my side.  It doesn’t work to merely publish the blog entries chronologically as a book.  In that context it just seems strange and disconnected.  So the actual book will have to be mostly new material—a re-telling of the blog story, in past tense.

Still, I think that I would like to retain it as a moderately long travel story.  There’s no plot to our travel story, no climax at the end, no whodunnit.  It’s just a series of lessons and experiences, the way life is.  So instead of trying to trim to 200 pages, which would be a comfortable length for publishing, I will probably let it run quite a lot longer.  I want to include lots of color photos, too.

For these reasons, the book will probably never be printed on paper.  I expect it to be something you can only read on a Kindle, iPad, or similar device, where there’s no financial repercussions from being long-winded. But I hope—if I ever get this beastie under control—lots of people will read it and be inspired to do things that change their lives for the better, too.