I wanted to put this out early so you could pencil them in and start planning.

Northern California Sportsmobile Meet and Greet
May 8 or 15*
The Lost Coast (about 4.5 hours N. of SF)
For us usually a 3 day event.
Class 2.

OurExcellentAdventures
May 26-31
Grand Canyon North Rim*
Class 2.

Weekend Adventures for Weekend Warriors
(SMB and Sprinter owners)
June 12 and 13
Crandal Peak Trail – between Vallejo and Strawberry
2 hours to the trail, and 2.5 hour home the next day from the end of the trail.
Class 3.

OurExcellentAdventures
August 28 – September 5
Glacier National Park*
Class 2.

* Awaiting confirmation.
Class 2 – High clearance vehicles preferred but not necessary.
Class 3 – High clearance 4WD preferred but any high clearance vehicle is acceptable.

The US Forest Service (FS) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) (and other state and local agencies) allow dispersed camping on most of their land – which is a lot!

Dispersed camping means you can drive along a FS or BLM road and basically pull off, drive a few feet and set up camp. As long as the area is not posted “no camping,” and 20′ from the forest road, you are good to go with just a few rules to follow:

• Camping at any one site is limited to 14 days per visit.
• Pack out what you pack in.
• Avoid camping within 200 ft. of any water source.
• Do not leave campfires unattended.
• Whenever camping outside designated camp sites please practice the following minimum impact style camping:
  • Camp at previously used sites, if possible.
  • Fire pans or stoves are recommended.
    Avoid building new fire rings.
  • Use only dead and down wood for campfires.
  • Do not put cans, bottles, or aluminum foil into a fire ring.
  • Burn campfire logs to ashes, then douse with water. CAMPFIRES OF ANY KIND MAY BE BANNED DURING HIGH FIRE DANGER PERIODS.
  • Dispose of human waste properly. The use of portable toilets is highly recommended. If no portable toilet is available, solid body waste and urine should be buried in a hole six to twelve inches deep. The disposal site should be located well away from streams, campsite, and other use areas. Toilet paper should be placed in a small plastic bag and put into your camp trash bag.
  • Pack out your trash (and a little extra).

Check the website of the particular national forest or BLM area you are going to be in or (better) stop at the local NFS or BLM office. Each national forest will have “localized” rules and suggestions.

One other note. If you are going to have a campfire in a FS dispersed area camp you will need a campfire permit (good for one year) and available at any National Forest Office.

For us, this is easiest and best way to camp. And don’t forget, Tread Lightly!

In the middle of all the rain yesterday I got out the hard copy(yes, that is good to have) Rand McNally Road Atlas. Then using that to find the names of towns and Bing Maps, I was able to come up with quite a few checkpoints within a 2-3 hour driving radius of home. The idea being I would be up to driving a couple of hours, 3 at the most, to get to a good camp site, hiking point or adventure.

Then I got out the Backcountry Adventures: Northern California, and looked for trails near my checkpoints. The idea being, leave home in the morning, hit the trail about noon, travel to about half-way and camp. Sunday, finish the trail and head for home. Some of the trails are short, which means more time camping and hiking and some are longer. Actually some of the short ones can easily be done in one day. Some of the trails are more challenging and call for high clearance. None of the one I chose required 4-wheel drive.

Most, if not all, will be within the Stanislaus National Forest where camping is not usually a problem. Most will not have amenities, so we pack out the trash and carry water. The main advantage is scenery, away from the big crowds and using your RV for the reason you bought it!

You can use this same approach to State Parks and find some great ones near .

I think this is a good idea wherever you are. Guests coming for the weekend and they cancel . . . no problem, jump into the Sprinter and head out. You already know where you are heading.

Nothing is more fun than pulling into a campground, setting up camp in time for martinis, sitting back and watching the big-boys (class C’s or A’s) come in and, at dusk, turning on the awning lights!

Yep, pumpkin lanterns for Halloween, American Flag lites for July 4th and, just acquired, a set of Bass lights!

Hee, hee – camping is too much fun! I can hardly wait to put these up for the pleasure of my fellow campers. I know they will love them.

One reason we got a Sprinter is that we believe there is no need to rough it just because you are camping. And in fact, although you want to get away from it all, there are parts of civilization that are ok. Crab cakes and a martini are two of them.

I do this because I hate the store bought or restaurant served crab cakes that are made of of bread crumbs and crab crumbs. My crab cakes may not be pretty but you definitely get your crab.

You can do this at home or camping in about an hour.

Get 2 good sized crabs from your crab man and have him clean and break them. Boil a pot of water with some sea salt added. Add the crab pieces to the boiling water and when it comes back to a boil, give it about 10-12 minutes.

While the crab is boiling, using some French or Italian bread, tear bread into small, less than dime size pieces – you need three cups of these.
Put the bread into a mixing bowl along with all the ingredients below.

2-3 chopped scallions, about 1/4 cup
2 tbl good, hot salsa (You should see actual pieces in the salsa. If it is smooth like V8 juice it is not the right kind.)
1 tbl Dejon mustard
2 tbl mayonnaise
1 tbl A1 sauce
1/2 tsp Red pepper flakes
1/4 tsp Horse radish
1/4 tsp Pepper
2 eggs

Fold the ingredients so all the bread is moist.

By now the crab is done. The crab claws and legs will most likely be red. Run cold water over the crab, still in the original pot, to stop the boil and cool the crab enough to handle. Removing crab meat in the largest pieces possible. You should have close to 1 pound. (You can do this part before leaving for camping if you want as you may be short on water at the campsite. Just refrigerate the crab until you need it.)

Fold the crab into the ingredients until it is mixed in well.

Now you are ready to cook. Use a medium hot skillet with just enough olive oil to cover the bottom. Add a tbl of butter for flavor. When hot, form the crab mix into hamburger size or smaller patties. The thickness should be about hamburger size also – not too thick. The patties will want to fall apart in your hand due to the large crab pieces so carefully put them into a skillet. Once cooking, they will stay together. Cook about 4 minutes on each side or until they turn golden brown.

You should end up with 8-10 crab cakes.

Now is the time to break out the Martini shaker. The taste of a cold martini will enhance the flavor of the crab cakes. Add 3 shots of gin – most likely Bombay Sapphire (medium martini) to ice and a tiny drop of Vermouth. Shake well. You need to shake a metal shaker 64 times minimum to reach the optimal temperature. Pour into cocktail glasses. Yes, glass, not plastic. You may be camping but you still have a reputation to uphold. If the right temperature, there should be tiny ice crystals in the glass. Add an olive or two.

Enjoy.

“Man-O-Manischewitz. Makes me want to slap my momma down!”

Thursday we left for the Sample Meadow campground in the Sierra National Forest. It was about a 5 hour drive with the last 1-1/2 hours in the mountains. It seems we live too far from the mountains!

The occasion was a meet/great for Sportsmobile owners and we had a great turn out. Two Sprinters, six 4-wd Sportsmobiles and 1 rental Class C (Driven by a potential SMB buyer, Andrew, from Switzerland and his business partner from France.)

We camped in a couple of groups and had a great time. It got down to 26° F. but during the day was quite warm. At night in the Sprinter it was cold – we opted to use the heater in the mornings to take the chill off. Presley had a great time hiking, eating snow and trying to take in all the smells and sights. He was afraid of the poping wood in the campfire so during that time he slept in the bus.

I don’t think I could have run the heater all night as we were parked in semi-shade and never got a full charge. I may start looking at 6volt AGM batteries to replace the 12volt I have.

The 4wd’ers took off for some real challenging runs while several of us opted for hiking. I had hoped to see some wildlife but we just saw signs of their presence. The other Sprinter (08) took off to see some scenery but had a turbo boost failure and had to limp out of the mountains. I think it may have been one of the inter-cooler hoses but I will make a note here when I find out.

There were too many foo-foo California hunters in the area. I say that because all they do is drive up and down the roads slowly, peering from their vehicles which are often bristling with the guns of too many occupants. (Yes, I hunted for many years in Colorado, always successful and NEVER from a vehicle, ATV, etc.) OBTW, hunting from a vehicle is illegal as were the 2 shots we heard long after sundown on Thursday night. Give me a break!

Around the campfire at night, every one sitting close because of the temperatures, a lot of information and ideas about Sportsmobiles, 4-wheel driving and more was exchanged. I think everyone there learned something.

We had a great bunch of participants and I look forward to next year’s event.

The day before we left, Big Dog, as I called him, (His real name was Cracker Jack) followed a couple of our hikers and their dogs into camp. He had a collar on with name, number and address (of course, we had no connectivity) and a tracking device. Seems he was a “bear dog” used apparently to for hunting bears. I know nothing about that and prefer not too.

He was still there on Sunday morning so Debbie and I decided to take him to his home. We had no way of knowing if his owner was on the mountain or not (turned out he was but lower and a long way from us). He was a blue tick hound dog, very well behaved, and slept all the way to his house.

We got great mileage going and coming and the Sprinter, turning over 30k miles on the way home, continues to be a delight!

And PS, you need to haul your own trash out. Don’t leave it in the outside toilet buildings like some ignorant, stupid, deserve to drive off a cliff at night, idiots.