Painted rocks at campsites

Can someone explain to me what is the deal with finding painted rocks at campsites or other places ? We found these two at our last campsite. What is the reason people leave them behind ?

We also found this one at the RV dump gate in the area, and I did leave it behind for others to enjoy but I am sure someone will take it.

Squirrel watching

We watched this squirrel eat 2 almonds and a green pine cone in short order on our last trip out. I like squirrels.

Don't be a camping ass hat

This is one of those cases where if you read my web page you have to occasionally deal with my opinion.

First what is a camping ass hat ? It is the person who comes up the road you are camping on pulls into your spot and see the road goes nowhere else and instead of backing up and turning around they drive into your site behind your camper and then out between some trees, that is a camping ass hat.

Or it could be the other camper that pulls up to your camp site while you are gone and squeezes into what is clearly your spot and runs a extension cord for their generator over behind your site so you have to listen to it.

It is also the camper with a atv or utv or even their vehicle that doesn't even bother to slow down when the come by your site, they just dust you out I would bet they wouldn't appreciate it if it happened to them.

A lot of us have to deal with assholes all the time when we are at work, we go camping to re-leave our stress
and to get away from rude people, no we can't totally get away from them but please be courteous to your fellow campers, don't crowed into their camp site, slow down if you see there site don't dust them out and don't drive right up into their site.

USFS & BLM roads and trails

A lot of USFS & BLM roads and trails don't see a lot or in some cases any up keep, we need to help them by filling in washed out areas ourselves if there is loose rock near by because if we quit using them they will be over grown and we will lose them. So use'm or lose'm

Temporary solar panel stand

Two times when we were out we just laid our solar panels in our flat bed trailer and used them from there but on this last trip we had to keep moving them around so I made a makeshift panel stand out of what was available on site.

It was a pain to move around it took two people, but it worked and was free.

Youtube & instagram

We are now on youtube and on Instagram
 Our youtube channel

Our instagram

Camper Maintance while camping.

Sticker removal:
I got tired of all the stickers put on the trailer from the dealer so I set about removing some of them on our last trip. First is just tape residue on the front of the trailer from stuff they taped on.

The wife mentioned using Goo-gone to remove tape residue and I had used something quicker at work, starting fluid and I also used steel wool.

Disclaimer here do this at your own risk, try the starting fluid on a place on your RV where it wont show. 

I then moved onto a decal by the door that I had fought with before.

I then moved to the back and started on a large one with a razor knife blade which left a heavy residue and I then used the starting fluid.

Why was removing the decals important ? I got tired of being a rolling billboard for a RV dealer who when I bought my trailer had a big sale going on and had to clear out trailers, but would not deal with me even when I was paying cash and would not take anytime at all to show me how things worked on my first self -contained RV.

11 days of fun and cooler weather in the Big Horn Mtns of Wyoming

We just got back from a 10 night trip to the Big Horn Mtns and a new favorite site on the water.
We rate this camp site 4 1/2 stars

It was a little different for us to park in a shady area since we try to use solar panels to recharge our battery's as much as possible. As usual it was 20 deg cooler at 8500+ feet so that was nice. This was a much busier area but this site was more secluded.Here are some more pics and some of the local wildlife.

We did have two mama deer with three fawns the first two evenings but we never seemed to get the camera fast enough, the fawns were to skittish.

And as always I like to include a sunset pic whenever possible.

Waste drian valve replacement

On our last trip out the 3" black water valve started to drip from the seals so I thought I would by replacement seals and be done with a cheap fix. I soon found out that the Bristol valves on my Keystone were less common to find for sale in my area but the Valterras were easy to get, also I could not find seals for the Bristols only complete valves. So out with the Bristols and in with the Valterra valves not a much harder job I thought, what I didn't count on was the old plastic pipe especially the flanges for the valves being brittle and breaking.

So I picked up the two valves and a replacement "Y" for above and went home after work and started removing the 1 1/2" valve and the flange on that side broke also and the other flange on the 3" side I heard it cracking when tightening up the valve so back to the rv dealer. This time I bought a 3" elbow, flange & sleeve and a 1 1/2" sleeve and flange, I just cut all the old plumbing off at the valves and installed new pieces. Now if the seals start to leak I have replacement seals and the valves are easy to get.

At this point I am into it for about $106, anyone with basic household plumbing knowledge could do this repair and I did find out that 3" house drain pipe fits the 3" elbow that I bought so other parts may be interchangeable.

Mac Custom Wheel Net ATV/UTV tie downs

After having my side by side come loose on my trailer when using wheel straps and 1000 lb ratchet straps and pinning my generator to the gate I decided it was time for a change in how I secure my UTV and that was wheel nets from Macs Custom Tie-Downs, they are very heavy duty and very quick to use when tying down my Rhino when used with D rings mounted to the trailer bed. They are not cheap at $300 but it is so much easier to tie it down now and I have peace of mind knowing it is going to stay there.

http://www.macscustomtiedowns.com/product/utv-wheel-net-pack/WheelNets

Battery's and something to charge them with while camping.

You may have a single marine/rv battery or you may have 2 connected together in your rv, for these to recharge while camping you either need solar panels or a generator and a automotive type battery charger and you will probably recharge them every day or every other day and slowly kill them off because you are draining them to far down before recharging them. If you are using a battery bank of golf cart battery's like me then you will want solar and a charger that is 4 stage and will put out the higher voltage that these batteries require for my US Battery's it is 14.7 volts and for Trojan Battery's 15.0 volts so you cannot use a automotive type charger on the whole bank and expect to get extended life from them. My charger the Boondocker BD-1275-C is a four stage charger that gets the high voltage that I need out and will even equalize the batteries  when I am not using the trailer as long as I keep the charger plugged in. So no matter what type of battery's that you are using make sure and check into what type of charger you need for them and get what they need and you will prolong their life.

Camp site research

How do I find camp sites. First I start with Google Earth and I search areas I may be interested in and I look for spots that people are in or for fire rings, next I will check web sites like Campendium, The Dyrt, Free camp sites.net, public lands.org and I will see what they have, also you-tube videos. I am also always exploring for new sites when out camping or just running around I check fishing access sites and lakes everything I can think of. I make little google earth maps and down load them to a cell phone or tablet to keep track of the sites and I GPS sites while running around and mark them on my GPS.

I never stop looking, I am always in search of that ultimate camp site and sorry no I won't share it's location with you if I find it just pics of me in it.

Toaster

We added a cheap toaster from Walmart to our gear, I like toast with my eggs and bacon. We boondock so we have to run it off our 1000 watt inverter,  it pulls 700 watts so we are good there, the first time we used it we were setting at about 86% on our batteries and the solar panels were putting out 7-8 amps, the toaster pulled 54+ amps for 1 1/2 min the solar panels quit charging with the cheap Harbor Freight charger we were using then but we stayed at 86% on our batteries. So we are good to go with yet another appliance running off our batteries and the 1000 watt inverter.

Powdered milk

A word here on powdered milk, we quit carrying regular milk with us camping to save room in the refrigerator so we picked 3 powdered milks that we like and we make it by the quart. My favorite is Milk Man followed closely by Peak and then Nido.

Trailer damage from the last trip.

We had some damage to the stabilizer behind the rear door when we bought the trailer but I fixed it good, so time for a new one. How I didn't get step damage also I don't know must have been lucky.

Electric heater cover

If you have looked close at some of our interior pics the you may have caught a glimpse of our electric radiant heater setting in its factory box next to the couch, we kept the box over it to keep the dust off but it was unsightly. So the wife made a canvas cover for it and I had her tie dye it.

Dayton Gulch WY depression era gold mine camp,

These pictures are of a depression era gold mine and the camp around it. Off Dayton Gulch road in the Bighorn Mountains in Wyoming.