Wendy is wandering and enjoying every minute of it. I love being a vegetable farmer in Vermont! Our growing season is nice and short leaving part of the winter free for traveling to warmer places. I am writing this while at Ortona Lock and Dam on the Okeechobee Waterway, not too far from Fort Myers, FL.
On one side of me is a cattle pasture dotted with cabbage palms and spreading oak trees. On the other side is the lock. All day we watch every sort of watercraft, from immense yachts and barges to canoes and kayaks cue up and go through the lock. My daughter, Heather, has been out there in her 17 foot sea kayak that she built this summer. Floating with her are manatees, otters, and an alligator.
A couple weeks ago I was huddling by the woodstove as below zero temperatures froze the garden solid and I was afraid I was next! Now that my leg is held together with metal plates and screws, it does NOT like cold weather!
What's a homesteader to do? Ummm when that homesteader is me, that means it's time for a road trip! I left home with $121 in my pocket, confident that all will be possible and ok. Am I nuts? Yes! Have I done this before? You bet! One year all I had was $10 and a credit card.
How do we do it? Several ways. I have to admit that some years I charge gas on my credit card, then pay it off over the next growing season.
We have a 1989 Chevy Cheyenne ½ ton pick-up truck with a beat-up camper on the back. I bought the camper for $300 years ago. On our first trip in it to Arizona, we had to re-build the overhang, which almost broke off enroute. A couple years later we faced reality and cut off most of the overhang, leaving only about a foot. Now we have two twin beds in staggered bunk fashion. There is storage under the top bunk's overhang in Rubbermaid totes and again under the lower bed. There are two large food cupboards and a two-door pot/pan/plate/bowl cupboard. I have two totes of clothes, and Heather has one larger one. Then there's the tote of toiletries, medicines, candles and other miscellaneous items. Under the bed is a HUGE food storage container, two ice chests, and a pressure clothes washer and a footlocker of books. Up front, between us on the seat is a storage organizer containing maps, snacks, wet-naps and other stuff we need/want while driving.
The camper is eight feet long, just fitting in the truck bed with the tailgate closing up behind it. In the wheel wells are a screen house and dog supplies. The tailgate folds down to become our back porch. The camper has a built-in stove/over and propane furnace. There's a porta-potty that I keep a leather seat cushion on, so it doubles as a seat. We sit on that and the lower bed and use a wooden tray table between us for eating and playing cards. Our beds have sleeping bags, Mexican blankets, and colorful crazy quilts.
Alongside the food cupboard are two shelves for toothpaste, shampoo, lotion, etc. Next to the stove is a counter with the dishpan. A 5-gallon jug of water sits on the floor. Heather's kayak goes on the roof and her backpacking tent at the foot of the bed.
We have enough food . I carefully clip coupons all year and stockpile appropriate traveling food like dried beef, tuna, rice and pasta mixes, canned goods, dried fruit and candy. At home I make fruit leathers, dry homegrown fruits and veggies, and save up garlic, onions, shallots, potatoes, carrots and squash from the garden. We try to eat the fresh and heavy stuff first, supplementing our food stash with local fresh food and the occasional Krispy Kreme donut. We also glean just-picked fields and get food from campgrounds and folks we visit. At this campground it's all the grapefruits, oranges and kumquats you can pick. Heather has polished off two gallons of kumquats in three days!
Don't overlook dumpster diving. We get a lot of perfectly good food that way. If you find a place where the military practices, check out the dumpsters. Our favorite national park hosts marines who practice there. We get over 500 pounds of MRE's (meals-ready-to-eat) from those dumpsters in 2 weeks. Also, check out campgrounds/campsites after weekends. We have snagged still-frozen cases of food and un-opened cans from the Boy Scouts. Lord only knows WHY they don't take the food home!!! Senseless waste is everywhere you look. Houses can be furnished and bellies filled on other people's discards. You can also shop and the "scratch and dent" grocery stores, look for the soon to expire food on sale at the regular grocery stores and read the fliers for loss-leader specials at stores.
Camping - the most obvious choices are national forests. National forests have started charging for the sites that used to be free $4/night or a seasons pass for $40. If you have a Golden Age (seniors) pass, it's only half that price. Out west there are lots of free BLM and forest service sites. The season's pass is getting popular, Though. The camping might not be free but it will be darn close.
When traveling through, Wal-Marts, Kmarts and truck stops are good places for free camping in their parking lots. We have also discovered that long-term airport parking lots are a good place to boondock.
From Vermont to Florida is about $150 in gas for our pick-up with camper. I bought the Ocala/Oceola/Appalachicola National forest hangtag at half-price for $20. That is good for a year's worth of camping at designated campground in Florida's three national forests. We also splurge, staying at Corps. Of Engineers, National Park and other national forests at half price. Ortona lock and dam is about as expensive as they get at $16/night . $8 with a pass and that includes water and electricity at each site. We also stayed at free campgrounds at Big Cypress Preserve and two different campgrounds at Everglades National Park. ($7)
Once we get to an area, we get the free weekly paper, a daily paper and all the tourist info that seems interesting at the chamber of commerce. By reading over these things, you can find out about local events and there are often really good discount coupons for restaurants and attractions. Since we are born yakkers, we get into conversations with folks and learn even more that way sometimes being invited to homes and churches or told about off-the-beaten-path opportunities. Other snowbirds or full-time RV'ers are also an excellent source of info. I belong to the Escapees (SKP's) RV club. These folks publish a bi-monthly magazine; have get-togethers all over the US, Canada, and Mexico and have a network of campgrounds and co-ops to stay at. Members help each other in all sorts of ways.
Friends and relatives homes make good stopping places. I put out the word to my cyber friends and was inundated with invitations to go all over the country! To me, this is fantastic. Meeting new people and having a way to get to know an area is more intimately the essence of traveling. What fun!
How about "what do you do all day?" We are rarely bored. Heather has her kayak and rollerblades. We swim in pools, keys and the ocean. We have snorkeling equipment with us that is great for down in the keys or in the many natural springs such as Salt, Alexander and Juniper Spring in Ocala National Forest.
We spend time writing in our journals and working on articles. We read things brought from home and trade constantly while on the road. We stop at libraries, sometimes scoring a temporary card, sometimes borrowing one and other times we just sit in the library and read. Most libraries have computers with internet access. AOL (America Online) now offers access to e-mail on the web, so we can catch up on correspondence. When you're in the library and short on cash, stick your hand in between the cushions of the comfortable chairs and couches we almost always find something.
Soooo traveling on the cheap utilizes our creativity and powers of adaptation. If you can be a homestead, you can also be an adventurous traveler!
Write to me at
Wendy Martin
PO Box 69, Calais, VT 05648
If you'd like to camp at our farm this summer, give me a shout
