Vacation is coming to an end, we are finally home and it's time to blog. We took a long planned (I booked our space and dates in February) bucket list camp at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. There is one road into the campground after a very long but beautiful drive which ends at the campground. The staff are all wonderful and friendly from the camp host to the rangers. The campground sits right on the rim with several premium spots overlooking the canyon, our spot was up one road from the rim. Each spot is a loop pull through so there is no back ins and trailers and cars must stay on the pavement. If you're wanting excitement this is not the camp for you, there is no wifi, no town, and when it gets dark it is very dark.
Aspens, pinon pines and over 30 different wildflowers make for picture perfect surroundings.
There is a herd of over 200 buffalo in the park.
The kaibab squirrel is unique to Kaibab Plateau and the North Rim. This squirrel has not evolved since the Ice Age. During our stay we had a small group (8) of what I call "my soup line friends" that came like clockwork every morning for a handout kaibab squirrels, ground squirrels, and a chipmunk.
Each campsite is a pull through loop facing the campsite.
We enjoyed a week of just relaxing at our campsite while the girls enjoyed the junior ranger program.
Camping during July at the North Rim means one thing. .... monsoon. It is not a matter of if it rains but when. The Yellow Submarine definitely was a great investment since we have yet to rebuild the galley lid and fix the last of the leaks so we set the alarms to alert us when the pressure dropped and when rain was coming. When the alarm went off we secured the tarps over the trailer and took cover under the easy-up and watched the other campers scramble when the downpour started.
This trip we really got to test out what worked and what needs to be changed or added. The weather station definitely worked. Tarping the trailer blocked the roof vent's circulation and left just the windows to keep the air flowing through the trailer. Replacing the windows has now moved up on my to do list on the trailer. Cranking out the windows hurt my hands and the way they are engineered the air has to go under window restricting flow and making the cabin stuffy without a good wind. We are also adding the rain gutters that arrived just before we left to keep the rain off the doors and window and keep us a bit drier climbing in and out of the cabin.
The pull out stovetop worked great, we used our little stove to heat water and make smaller meals. If we were to build a new teardrop or rebuild the galley we would set things up a bit different. One the battery would not be under the sink it would be on the tongue and we do plan to move it soon. We would have a bit more cupboard space to keep our dry goods in the galley. I am making two camp kitchens to keep pots, pans, dry goods, and the extra kitchen items we need to camp.
My last project before we left was installing our solar charger. If you add one upgrade to your trailer I highly recommend this be the one. I researched and chose one with a flow back regulator so our battery wouldn't be drained during the night. I ordered our solar charger from Amazon and chose the [Solar Panel Starter Kit 100W Monocrystalline:100W Solar Panel UL 1703 Listed+2 20' Solar cables+PWM 30A Charge Controller + Uniquely Designed Z Bracket]. Since it rained nonstop our first days in camp we didn't hook up the solar panel until Wednesday. I loved how they have quick connect ends and set up in under 2 minutes. I'm building a padded box to store the panel in with fold out legs to just fold out and plug in. We ran our XM day and night and the lights as soon as the sun went down and charged our phones and the cameras from the galley port. We looked forward to coming home and plugging in to see how well our charger worked. During the week before we left we ran everything we could on the trailer while I worked on it to see what we'd pull from the battery, when we checked we were at 52% charged. This gave us a jumping off point of what our trailer would pull from the battery. We plugged the solar in on Wednesday and didn't have but one good day of sun, when we got home and plugged in to check our use and we were at 87% charged. We decided we need a port and some sort of pigtail for the solar cords from charger to panel so they don't get pinched off.
We cut off the two broken rear jacks Crybaby had installed before we left and took a trip to Camping World and purchased stabilizer jacks that are manufactured for trailers unlike the car jacks Crybaby used. Hey you know what....... these reach the ground! The new jacks are rated for 6,000lbs each and fit like a glove, Bill set them up at camp and boy the trailer was not moving with those babies! The front jacks are still the original car jacks Crybaby installed so we still needed to use blocks to take up the distance to the ground.
We thought of some other items we wanted to add into our camping equipment, these are just little things to make our next long camp more enjoyable. We are going to upgrade our easy-up to a heavy duty one with waterproof sides and an awning. We had to clip a tarp on our current one as a wall during the rain to keep our kitchen area dry. We are also going to invest in some camp loungers so we can really kick back while listening to our XM, camp chairs are fine for short camps but when you want to relax they are a bit more restricting.
We took our youngest and her best friend and they enjoyed glamping in their tent decked out with flamingos outside and a battery powered chandelier inside. They loved every sparkling minute of it and really enjoyed the surprise hammock we brought for the trip. We brought along the glow in the dark games and I found a new one for this trip... glow balls. The girls tossed them, kicked them, and used them with the rings making them like throwing hammers. Another little gadget we brought along was two new roasting forks which collapses down and fit in the drawers. The girls participated in the Jr. Ranger program and were sworn in as Cougars after completing their booklets and attending the classes the rangers put on daily. We also took along the girls scooters and we could hear them running up and down the roads through the campground exploring. We have decided to make that a permanent take-a-long item, it's light, gives them an activity to wear them out, and they even liked taking the trash out riding them.
We took some side trips back to Four Corners and through Monument Valley.
Campout cooking and fire restrictions made meals a challenge. When we arrived we were only allowed to use our camp stoves, no fires or coals were allowed due to dry conditions. These restriction kept us from using our dutch oven or bbq grill. We were camping for a week I decided to make all our meals around beef or salt cured meats since the closest real store was over 150 miles away. Here are a couple of our cheap and easy meals we made this trip.
Chinese Stir-fry Noodles
Ramen noodles (a packet for each person)
1lb ground beef
stir-fry vegetables
Brown the ground beef and vegetables. Cook the noodles and add beef and veggies and serve.
Beef Stroganoff
Beef Stroganoff
1-2 ground beef
egg noodles
beef broth condensed
1 can golden mushroom soup
sour cream
1-2 potatoes
Brown ground beef. Cook egg noodles until firm but soft. Add all ingredients into dutch oven or large pot and simmer until sauce is thick and potatoes soft. We serve ours with buttered bread.
Beef Stew
1lb stir-fry beef
1lb ground beef
carrots
onion
potato
beef broth
Brown the beef and add to pot with veggies, cook until tender.
Next week I start back to our repairs, until then enjoy the summer and stay safe!
