Pandemic prompts local & driveway camping

   POINT RICHMOND, Calif. - The long-planned grand adventure of traveling to Oregon & Washington, then east across the northern U.S. and eventually to the Maritime Provinces of Canada has been downsized.

Camp set up at Olema

     Maybe a better description would be miniaturized.
     Thanks a lot, coronavirus!
     Instead of thousands of highway miles, The Red Writer for the balance of this summer will likely do mostly local travel, going to places like Olema, Calif., adjacent to the Point Reyes National Seashore.
    We did one foray there to shake down the rig last week. Another four-day expedition begins Sunday.
     How local is Olema to Point Richmond and SF Bay?
    Thirty miles.
     But last week's trip proved that 30 or 3,000 miles doesn't make any difference in enjoyment.

Biscuit searching for gophers, moles and voles

     We camped among the trees at a private campground. Our Yorkie pup Biscuit was able to run free. And Admiral Fox and an amiga made it to nearby Limantour Beach for a hike while I stayed at camp and practiced the ukulele with Biscuit as canine critic.
     I think Biscuit would have preferred to go to the beach with the ladies, but he was a good sport.
     The only real excitement came a 2 a.m. the first night when we were visited by a hungry raccoon. He got in the tent and absconded with a ripe avocado, passing up a tray of apples and bananas.
     Because the campground is in Marin County, his choice of foods is not that surprising.
     The state parks in California are slowly re-opening, filling up campsite reservations as soon as gates open.
     Once Labor Day is past however, campgrounds will be mostly empty and The Red Writer can expand our travel radius with plenty of places to stay.
     One arguably big trip is being mulled.
     A few days ago a newspaper story about Modoc County in California caught my eye.
     It's a last-frontier kind of place. Kind of wild west. Undeveloped wooded property there is pentiful and relatively cheap. Maybe buying a few acres might be worth considering.
     Might have to break out my cowboy hat to wear on that trip.
     Oh! And Modoc County has not had a single case of COVID-19.

Downtown Alturas in Modoc County, Calif.

The tent has a footprint as big as the inside of the trailer

Test campsite - at our condo in Point Richmond

The Red Writer visits Olema for Biscuit's birthday

   OLEMA, Calif. - We dusted off The Red Writer last weekend for a three-day sojourn to Olema to camp and celebrate The Biscuit's birthday.
     He was one-year-old Saturday and celebrated at a party at the Olema Campground in the company of maybe 100 people.
     OK, they didn't all come just for his birthday. It was a Northern California T@B Rally, a gathering of folks with T@B trailers like The Red Writer.

     Admiral Fox, The Biscuit and I toured a dozen other trailers and found all kinds of neat RV hacks to make things more comfortable.
     Perhaps the biggest single thing was finally getting courageous enough to put up the tent that affixes to the outside of the trailer. Since buying The Red Writer, a dozen tales of mishaps from T@B owners had made me hesitant to try it. But with about 30+ T@B trailers there - a half-dozen of which sported similar tents - we knew we had plenty of backup to make it work.
    As it was, it took just the two of 20 minutes at the most. And it was easy-peasy.
     That might have been because: A. Admiral Fox and I have decades of sailing experience doing similar things and B. The Admiral read the instructions.
     The tent has more square footage than the inside of the trailer. And it is a game changer. Of course, we need accessories now for inside the tent. (I'm pushing for a wine rack.)
     The Biscuit proved that he loves the outdoors a lot more than our Point Richmond condo. He scampered hither and yon the whole time. And as part of our weekend, we took him out to Limantour Beach on Point Reyes where he chased birds and ran like the wind for an hour.
     We hope to get The Red Writer out for another foray in a week or two before the rains set in. But if they do, well, we have tent in addition to a trailer now.

Biscuit was subdued early in his birthday party

Although a good camper, The Biscuit proved not to be a morning dog

A Sunday selfie at Point Reyes

Biscuit thought this was his birthday party...

The Red Writer rolls out for a spring shakedown

   OLEMA, Calif. - After a long rainy winter, The Red Writer rolled out last weekend for a three-day shakedown cruise.
     In a little over two weeks, Adm. Fox and I will be pulling out of Point Richmond to head into the Southwest: Cottonwood, Sedona and Flagstaff, Arizona, followed by Santa Fe, New Mexico.

The Red Writer at rest at Olema Campground

     Five months in storage didn't seem to phase any of the systems on The Red Writer. All still operated fine, though my skills at packing need tuneup.
     When I got to the Olema campground what had been a neatly arranged trailer interior looked like a room from Animal House. I suppose I took a few turns too quickly and/or hit the brakes a little to enthusiastically.
     Olema is close to Point Reyes, a fabulous national seashore. One afternoon we headed out with

Sylvia, Deb and elk friends at Pt. Reyes, CA

Brickyard Landing amigos John and Deb Connolly in search of a herd of elk that wanders near the ocean. We found them, not 100 yards off the country road leading to the beach trails.
     Jaysus, those animals are huge.
     Now the serious packing begins for my long-looping cross-country trip this summer that gets underway after Adm. Fox flies home from Santa Fe.
     My plans (written in Jello) call for a trip across the Deep South, then up into Tennessee, North Carolina and eventually the Finger Lakes and the Northeast.
     More later on all that.

Might not look like elk country, but it is