My Journey

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

JD.....the vet recommended up to 10 days. She's on antibiotics for 10 days and pain medication for 5 days. Next month she gets spayed.....apparently another cone is coming.....thanks.....

Riversdad.....thank you.....

tgil.....the reason for a gasoline engine is that I don't want the hassle of trying to find DEF & ULSD if I go south.....I hear good things about the Ford 7.3 gasoline engine so no concerns with that.....that chew toy is great ! Nice find ! Thank you.....

Alan.....we shall see.....I have the desire to upgrade but the wait times and uncertainty are a real challenge.....bids are finally coming in & that's a start.....the Ford dealer informed me that Ford has quit accepting contracts for 2021 F550 trucks. I had heard it first elsewhere but this is the first time I heard it directly from Ford. The Bozeman, Montana Ford salesman had previously been telling me that March 10th was the cutoff date and he actually argued with me yesterday & said that my information was incorrect & that he would get me a 2021 F550 truck. Thirty minutes later he called back confirming the bad news. Thanks.....

Greg.....yep, not just the fishermen. Yesterday while walking here I observed a man bent over with his pants down to his knees doing his personal business.....it was 9:00 a.m. in broad daylight.....not more than 100 feet away.....enough to make a grown man vomit on the spot. He wasn't a fisherman.....he's camping here. I think I've reached my limit of people for 2021.....


The $501 treble hook.....




Hard to believe sometimes how quickly time goes by.....while the pain of losing a best friend drags on forever.....it was one year ago today that the world lost an amazing adventurer & wanderer.....

 

[GregSplett]

"Remember fisherpersons are not the only group of people that litter."
Definitely not, unfortunately, where I live (and fish) they are pretty high on the list of offenders though! Like Jerry, I try to pick up after the slobs as I go.
We went to check water temp yesterday eve, at a spot I hadn't been before. The sunset was worth the drive, and Scout came home with a new chew toy!

Been cleaning up after others for decades. Geting really tiresome actually. This year was the worst I have ever seen it with everything here shut down. The woods got hit hard and I mean hard. There is nothing else for people to do and law enforcement has been told to keep interaction to a minimum so its a nasty free for all. I fish Salmon and Steelhead in remote parts of the Olympics so I do not see too much of what the power bait crowd is doing.

 

[chet6.7]

I have the desire to upgrade but the wait times and uncertainty are a real challenge.....bids are finally coming in & that's a start.....the Ford dealer informed me that Ford has quit accepting contracts for 2021 F550 trucks. I had heard it first elsewhere but this is the first time I heard it directly from Ford. The Bozeman, Montana Ford salesman had previously been telling me that March 10th was the cutoff date and he actually argued with me yesterday & said that my information was incorrect & that he would get me a 2021 F550 truck. Thirty minutes later he called back confirming the bad news. Thanks.....

It looks like supply problems may exist for some time.
"Shortage of computer chips causes problems for auto industry"

 

[GregSplett]

I have spent a lifetime drinking water unfiltered or treated for giardia in the Olympic mountains. a few years ago I came apon a young lady pooping in the Duckabush river upstream from where I had just spent my Birthday. I actually let her have it not so nicely explaining why you do not do that and how you do that up here. I left feeling like it went in one ear found nothing that mattered and out the other. I pack a Sawyer water filter now.

 

[GregSplett]

It looks like supply problems may exist for some time.
"Shortage of computer chips causes problems for auto industry"

I guess this problem is big with everybody staying home and working from home the demand for semi conductors for home schooling, work and entertainment has gone through the roof. I do not believe anybody really understands how this covid crap is changing the world. Today's chore is to diag my ford trucks bank 1 retarded timing issue. YAY. Bring on the shiny new Phasers.

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Greg.....here's something interesting (somewhat aligned with your experience) about Lake Las Vegas and Lake Mead that I just recently learned (at least this is what a local told me). The water in Lake Las Vegas is actually treated sewer water from the City of Las Vegas and he said that there's a huge pipe running from the city to the lake. From Lake Las Vegas the water then flows through Las Vegas Wash, combines with water from the Virgin River and the Colorado River and they together fill Lake Mead. So that explains that God awful smell of the water in Las Vegas Wash. And that water in Lake Mead is drank by millions of people.....

Chet6.7.....yep I was aware of that. Apparently there are a multitude of issues and it sure does suck. I really wanted to do something but as each day passes it looks more & more unlikely.....



So not much new going on at the lake these days. Trapper gets spayed in 3 weeks, truck tags are in the mail, Jeep parts finally shipped, and I am hoping that I can get a Covid-19 vaccine while staying here. I've been trying for days but no luck yet. I wonder how it is that anyone ever gets the shot.....hopefully, hopefully my groin muscle pull will be fully healed in 3 weeks, Trapper will be spayed, the truck tags will finally have arrived, I'll at least be partially vaccinated, and then we can get back to doing what we love doing the most..... wandering.....

With nothing new to post from the lake I thought I might share just a few pictures from my Peace Corps days.....all of these are from the 70's.....just like the Alaska photographs that I posted previously, I once again took pictures with my cell phone of photographs that were in my storage unit.....obviously these are fairly random.....just whatever I happened to see in a box on that particular day.....

I'll start in the Andes Mountains.....these were taken in either Ecuador or Peru.....I don't recall which.....these mountains & the people that live there are without a doubt some of my favorite in the world.....sure hope to return one more time.....

If I had to take a guess I would say that some of these were taken at the famed market in Otavalo, Ecuador.....Cuenca, Ecuador and Quito, Ecuador are strong candidates as well....or any combination of the above.....those are just guesses.....it's been a long time.....





We had three modes of travel in the mountain back in those days.....I had two friends that were foresters with the Peace Corps and they had a Defender 110 assigned to them. I certainly loved this mode of travel.....we would travel the back roads and went wherever we pleased. Often locals would take us in and those experiences were worth every penny that we didn't make.....







I could often be found on a commercial bus when in the mountains. I took buses from the end of the road at the jungles' edge & I took buses all over the mountains & whenever in a city (taxis were for the rich). Several times I took a bus to Guayaquil, Ecuador to hang out at the beach. I remember declining an opportunity to visit the Galapogos Islands and I turned it down due to insufficient funds.....







And the last mode of travel in the mountains that comes to my mind was by boot. Yea.....even way back then I loved my boots. No matter where I go or what I do, it's my boots that take me to the places most infrequently visited. It's always been that way.....



Those were the days my friends.....

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

It was in the Andes Mountains or along the Pacific Oceans' coast that I went to have fun & relax.....to escape from the never ending high humidity of the Amazon jungle and from the hard work that I had enlisted to do. Work to adventure was and has always been my way of life. I swear to this day that I still can feel the relief that I felt when I returned to the Andes Mountains and the constant flow of perspiration finally left my body.....



Typically the descent from the mountains into the jungle began in Cuenca, Ecuador where I would purchase my bus ticket and then would head east. Those bus trips seemed to last an eternity.....one today can't even possibly envision the dismal conditions of the roads that we traveled in those days.....roads that eventually ended at the western edge of the Amazon Jungle. Most often the bus rides were shared with farm animals.....goats, chickens, pigs, dogs.....whatever & whoever needed a ride was always welcomed onto the bus.....

(Not sure what year or which of my trips to the jungle that this picture was taken.....this would have been taken descending into the northwestern portion of the Amazon Jungle).....



I rented a wooden shack at the edge of the jungle.....it was nothing more than one small room where I could store my belongings. It had a door yet no windows.....theft was never an issue here. I remember so clearly how one could easily see between the boards that made up the siding as nothing here was sealed tight.....sleep was under a mosquito net.....always. Of course there was no toilet or running water. I had a parrot for a pet.....a blue & yellow Macaw. I trimmed his wings with a pocket knife so that he couldn't fly away and he'd spend his days exploring the massive orange tree in the backyard. I see the world differently today.....I wish I had released that poor bird.....



Life was difficult here and all the people worked together for the common goal. Everyone pitched in when help was needed.....in the next photograph someone decided to move their hut & I no longer know why.....I believe this photograph was taken in a remote part of the jungle (I am not certain of that fact) and not in the village where I resided when not working in the remote areas of the jungle.....



Once arriving at the end of the road which I would also describe as the jungles edge, travel was limited to small airplanes, wooden canoes, and of course my favorite.....boots. There were no more roads beyond my village.....only foot trails that meandered throughout the jungle floor.....the jungle rivers helped to limit the expansion of the roads.....and that was a good thing for sure.....



A small plane would fly me in to narrow grass landing strips and typically natives would be waiting in wooden canoes to take me further into the jungle. The next 2 pictures were not a part of my collection.....I borrowed these from the internet just to give one an idea of what we traveled in.....again, most of my pictures are in the form of slides so I had nothing of my own to show.....





I worked with a tribe called the Shuar.....they were well known for being a part of a small number of Amazon Jungle tribes that shrunk heads. In the next picture (which I posted previously) is a typical resident of the Amazon jungle. I was gifted a shrunken head, a blow gun, and most of the other items that you see in this next photograph, as well as many other items. They currently reside in a storage unit with the remainder of my junk.....



I spent weeks working in the jungle with the natives.....camping along riverbanks at night or wherever we finished our days work. It was here that I first drank Chicha (a fermented drink made from the Yuca plant.....if interested Google it to see how it's made), also where I first ate boiled totally entact fish (still had their eyes in tact !), and where our meat source came from animals such as monkeys or maybe even jungle parrots.....whatever happened to be hunted on that particular day.....



It was just a few posts ago that I mentioned being in the bank lobby as a young boy looking at National Geographic magazines while my mother was busy with the bank teller.....those were my moments of dreaming that I thought could never come true to me.....but as the years passed those very magazines that I marveled at a young age became my own reality.....life has been good to me.....I was given far more than I ever deserved.....

"Dare to live the life you have dreamed for yourself. Go forward and make your dreams come true."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

[tgil]

Absolutely love hearing these stories of what seem like ancient times. There is so much outside our borders, yet I've seen so little of what is inside of them.
Truly, truly appreciate the way you share your experiences with us!

 

[longhorn1]

I remember my grandfather had a subscription to National Geographic. Whenever I stayed over on a weekend, my grandfather had several issues waiting for me on the table. I emersed myself in those magazine. How I wished I could have visited some of those places. Your pictures brought back so many memories. We will be thinking of Trapper. Hope you get your vaccine. We had our second a week ago, so another week we will feel safer as we venture south to Texas.

 

[Ace Brown]

Those old NGS Magazines inspired a lot of future explorers. Also awakened interest in the opposite sex for a lot of young boys.

Well today is March 1 and very “lamb like” here in Western Colorado. Looks like we may see 60s next weekend. I’m more than ready for it.


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[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

Epilogue.....

In February, 2008 I found myself sitting at a friends kitchen table in a small adobe hut in the Andes Mountains of Central Peru.....





.....we had spent the past few months in Peru, Chile, & Bolivia bumming around in his Mitsubishi 4 wheel drive van climbing mountains and exploring whatever may have come our way. I would spend my nights alone in my tent with a smile on my face dreaming about the next days adventure.....my friend shared his van with his Peruvian father-in-law.....and those nights alone in that small one man tent were simply amazing.....



I like to think we were climbing bums back then.....certainly not overlanders.....as a matter of fact, I'm not even sure that I knew of the word.....

He was a mountain guide in Peru and was at the end of that career, and he had a desire to return to the states and with his lean budget I suggested he try truck camper life. Eventually he moved north to the states and built his own rig and here on XP he posted his own truck camper build, and one day I just happened to stumble across it.....



After that the dogs (Yukon & Montana) and I took a trip to northeast Canada.....as far north as the roads would go.....and that was my first trip report posted here.....more than a decade ago.....



And I continued to post here but honestly my heart has never been in overlanding.....I just love adventure and exploring and wandering.....I'd rather be found diving in ice cold mountain waters.....



Or deep down in the dark, cold oceans where the shipwrecks lie.....with the sharks and their scraggly teeth.....and the multitude of colorful fish.....(yes, that is me just finishing a dive on a shipwreck in the Atlantic Ocean).....



I long to once again fill my mountaineering pack and head up into the mountains where few men will go......I'm always so happy in those happy places.....



For me the thrill of exploration comes not in a vehicle.....as a matter of fact.....the thrill begins when the ride is over.....



I want to break trail in a pair of leather boots.....

 

[YukonMontanaTannerTrapper]

I want to hike to those remote places that are filled with such beauty that it's almost hard to comprehend or believe.....and that I can only hope that vehicles will never find.....I am not an overlander.....



To camp on mountain peaks and ridges that are barely accessible by man.....





And to stand on those mountain summits.....



To hang out with the Buddhist monks one more time.....





And to climb in their mountains.....





Happiness for me is a pair of boots and a pair of dogs....



And the mountains.....

 

[Ace Brown]

Ok you have convinced us you’re not a overlander. Lots of people don’t like that label. But how can a dog lover go back to climbing big mountains and do international travel with two dogs that you love so much?


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[tgil]

That is the greatest pic of T-n-T in the Jeep! A seasoned soul and his eager understudy, smiling in anticipation of the next lesson learned!

 

[longhorn1]

The dogs win every time?