Crawlin through Rawlins

Well, kids, yrs trly is crawlin' with altitude sickness. Turns out we're at about 7000 feet, and so both of us are kind of dragging about, me especially.

I feel like Pip in the mud (Great Expectations) except here it's all wind, all the time. Open the trailer door? WHAM! Throw the ball for the dog? Wheeee! Roaring trucks, sagging houses, the inevitable white "R" on the hills above. The KOA lady hides; you have to call her on the phone. She avoids her office. I would too.

Last night, Dave said he'd park us by a tree at least. Oh, it's a sad little blighter. 

However, they do have awesome hot showers and we took 'em. And cleaned up the trailer. We had been awakened by a phone call at 7:45 a.m. (!!!) from the eager car salesman that Dave had tipped off. We put him off for a while so that we could feverishly check things out on our 'puters, trying to decide what our options were.

Turns out they're pretty slim. You really don't want to be in Wyoming without a car. Not in Rawlins, anyway.

We can either buy another used van or we can U Haul it back with Scampi. Both options have problems and cost money. We've been bouncing it off people. Most go for the U Haul idea (except for our sister-in-law Victoria who says we should start walking).

We schlepped over with Kevin to see printouts of the vans they have: two Town and Countries and one Caravan, and I was armed with about a zillion car notes on what I'd found on www.cars.com, none of which were in the state of WY. Poor Kevin.



He told us that wind power isn't looked upon well here because it's all coal and fracking and jobs and mosquitoes. Yup, mosquitoes. The wind turbines mash up the bats who eat the mosquitoes. Well, OK, maybe. Solar didn't even get a nod. He drove us through Magwitch land, dry mud, dusty tears, rusted out indescribables, and always the tearing wind.

We got back and hid in the trailer. Scott actually kind of washed the outside of the trailer. (I wiped some green slime off a while back, but just the worst little part.) But I hid, feeling pretty listless and funky. Trying to do some school work. Made the mistake of peeking out the door:

I love this picture, but the video!

Tomorrow we dicker with Kevin. Or figure out how to get to Caspar to get a U Haul. Or lie around in listless disbelief. I get the sense I should probably end this misnamed blog about now.

(By the way, I am taking all these pictures and videos with my WONDERFUL l'il iPod that my WONDERFUL Phoebe child gave us! Thank you, Phoebe!)