The day started bad and got progressively worse.

It started at 2am when I got up to go to the loo. I stepped over Mike in bed, did my thing no problem. But when I stepped back over him, I misplaced my hand and went crashing down on my arm. It was pretty painful and still is.

In the morning we headed to Moab to fill up with water and dump our tank before venturing into the wilderness. It was here I had my first run in with a Trump supporter. We got chatting while we waited for him to fill up with water. It started innocently enough, chatting about our plans etc, where we were from etc. He was from Texas. I said how we wanted to go to Alaska but the weather up north was bad.

He then said the weather was all over the place and proceeded to blame the current government for chemtrails which were causing it. he said once Trump gets back in, things will go back to normal and he’ll head to Alaska next year. He then started going on about crazy eco people and their demonic something or other. It was frikking weird, so I laughed thinking he must be joking, but I don’t think he was. I climbed back in the car and kept my distance. Weirdo.

Today, as we were leaving Moab, up a hill our car lost all power. No power steering, limited brakes, it was pretty scary on a main road. Mike tried to restart the car and it started no problem. Mike thought it would be ok to continue but I said we should go back to Moab and get it seen to, not wanting to head further into the wilderness.

We turned around and it cut out again. We rang a local Mobile mechanic and he said to try driving it back to Moab and he’d take a look at it. So we made it back to Moab no problem, and parked in a carpark. We tried ringing him and left a message with him, but it seemed like he was ghosting us.

We tried a couple of garages. One said bring it in Monday, another said a two week wait

Mike pulled the dog box off and checked the obvious things like air filter but all seemed fine.

We had some lunch at a cafe while we decided what to do. I tried the mobile mechanic again but he’s clearly a prick.

I tried another garage and they said to bring it in at 3.30pm. So we did. It was a Mexican run garage and they didn’t speak good English. A mechanic came out and told us to wait in the office. Mike tried to explain the problem but he repeated to wait in the office.

He then took off out of the driveway and up the road with our home. We got worried when 20 mins later he had not come back. I asked the girl on reception if she knew where he was. She tried calling him but he’d left his phone behind. She then headed out herself to find him.

30 mins later we are fretting and pacing, wondering what had happened to our home. Then finally he arrived back and we both breathed a sigh of relief. Turned out he had broken down and didn’t know about the isolator switch.

Turns out it was an electrical problem. The wiring Mike had done to fix the problem last year had come undone, and the switch was broken.

They fixed some of the wiring leaving Mike to fix the switch. Were were relieved but also a bit pissed off we didn’t diagnosed this simple problem ourselves and were fretting about how much it might cost.

It came to a grand total of $36!

We then went to the car parts shop, Mike bought a new switch and wired it in. By this time it was late so we had to find somewhere to stay. All the camps fill up quickly, but we snagged the last spot in the same camp from the previous night.

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We haven’t done much the last few days while we are waiting for storms to roll over. We left our cowboy camp up in the ridge as high winds were forecast. So we found a stunning spot just outside of Moab, right on the Colorado river with towering rocks either side of us.

We hunkered down for the evening, and had some heavy rain which highlighted another leak in the van through one of the windows. Mike put some sealant on and we’ll hope for the best. We’ve decided to spend two nights at the river camp as it’s so beautiful. Today we went into Moab for internet and supplies.

Tomorrow we will go to Goblin valley state park and I think the plan is to head west to the coast.

We’re back in our favourite cowboy camp, but not in our favourite spot. I casually wandered over to my favourite spot and saw that the guy camping there was leaving today. So as soon as he started to move, we snagged his spot.

It was pretty windy all day, but a lot warmer. We spent the day admiring the wonderful views. I worked on videos and Mike worked on a couple of enhancements to our van. It’s all about limited our usage of pegs (too hard to explain).

We will spend 3 nights here.

I got my days mixed up somewhere along the line, but it is day 29 today.

We woke up to below freezing temps (-4) in our van thankful we’d chosen a powered site and I switched our heater on at 6.30am.

For some reason the data had stopped working on my phone, so I spent the morning talking with straight talk to get it fixed. Two hours later it was fixed and we could finally leave this freezing town in Wyoming.

There is colder weather coming in, and our route north has flood warnings from snow melt, and also fresh snow warnings! We don’t want to risk getting trapped in a snowstorm, so we are retreating.

We searched for somewhere moving forward that would be warmer, but all were expecting sub zero temperatures. So we decided to to backtrack 5 hours to Moab, where we know the weather is nice, and we hoped we might go back to the cowboy camp we loved.

We took the interstate as it was the fastest way and would avoid steep mountain passes. It was still a scenic drive, with snow capped mountains on either side of us.

We stopped at a restaurant stop where there were friendly prairie dogs hanging around. A man at the campground a couple of nights ago said they were pests and carried numerous diseases such as bubonic plague. So I was very wary of them.

As I was filming one on my phone, it came running over to me, clearly used to people feeding them. I’m not sure why he targeted me, maybe he thought i looked like a sucker, maybe he thought I was Alan, who knows.

I tried to shoo him away, but he kept coming at me. The thought of him biting me and having to go for rabies shots didn’t appeal.

He then run under our van and stood up in his signature stance. It looked like he was trying to find a way inside. I yelled at him to get out from under there, knowing I did not want a disease infested rodent in our van. He didn’t listen.

I found a stone and threw it at him, but he thought it was food and came chasing after me again. I abused him, swore at him. But he kept coming.

I threw another rock and he went under the van again, plotting how he could stow away with us. I wanted to get back in the safety of the van but also wanted to keep an eye on the crafty critter in case he managed to find a way inside.

I just wanted to get out of there, but Mike was sitting on the loo doing his business, unaware of the stress I was under.

After running around trying to avoid him, some tourists, whether they saw my distress or not, decided to distract him by feeding it. People are so stupid feeding these pests, but I was very thankful for it at that moment.

Finally Mike finished his business and I was quick, let’s get out of here. Somehow I managed to record the entire incident on my phone.

We arrived back at our cowboy campsite in near Moab and there was one spot free. We’ll stay here 3 nights while we rethink our route. We might have to drive up the west coast and come back down the other route.

Today we touched 149 million year old bones!

The day started with a cold shower. I was annoyed as we had paid $30 to camp. it was a self-register camp so nobody was on site to complain to.

As we were leaving I saw a phone number on the sign so I called them to let them know. They apologised, came straight away to fix, and gave us a full refund!

Then there were the black things. We pulled into a view point and I was busy rabbiting on about how this would have been a nice place to have stopped for the night.

Mike had slowed to stop, then accelerated away, saying ‘I don’t think we’ll stop here.’

That’s when I saw black things crawling all over road. There were hundreds of them! At first I thought they were spiders and I freaked out. Then I thought they were scorpions and double freaked out. Then, on closer inspection they looked like crickets. Still, creepy as. We kept moving.

It was another beautiful drive today. We stopped at a dinosaur fossil quarry, with heaps of bones wedged into the rocks. It was pretty amazing, and we were allowed to touch them. The bones were 149 million years old, and they think the dinosaurs died of natural causes or disease. It wasn’t until 80 million years later they became extinct.

Then we went over the mountains again, up to 8600 feet. We stopped at a stunning overview of red canyon in the flaming gorge. It was absolutely stunning and we were the only ones there! We had planned to camp there, but all the campgrounds were still closed.

We continued on, more amazing views. America is a true road trippers paradise. There is so much beauty without even leaving the car.

We crossed into Wyoming and drove until after 6pm, as all the basic campgrounds were still closed for the season. We had picked a roadside rest stop, but it was so cold, and due to go to minus four overnight, so we backtracked to a camping ground.

They had after hours self-registration and we filled out the envelope with our $43. But first I wanted to make sure the showers were warm before I paid that much.

After running the showers forever, they were still freezing cold, so I decided I would pay in the morning and get a discount. Then a man on a quad bike came over. I told him I was waiting to see if the showers were hot before paying. He said you just have to run them for a while.

So I handed over my 43 dollars. Five minutes later he came back.

‘I don’t think you read my sign properly’ he said.

Oh no, I thought, I haven’t paid enough.

He continued, ‘we aren’t open for the season yet, we’re just letting people stay. It’s only $20.’

And he gave us a refund. So it was well worth it for a hot shower, and electricity so we could run our heater. We were toasty warm even though it was minus four!

It was an incredible drive today. We couldn’t believe our luck at finding the beautiful free camp beside a lake. We had a leisurely morning before continuing.

We drove the scenic byway through a gorge with towering colourful rocks either side. Every corner we took was another beautiful scene. and this lasted two hours.

We were slammed back into reality when we arrived in the busy town of grand junction. A quick stop at Walmart for supplies and some lunch and we were off again.

We are now heading north towards Canada. Just when we thought we were done with high mountains, we found ourselves going up, up, up over the Douglas pass. it was a rutted steep road with scary drop offs. The grade seemed steeper that the million dollar highway and poor Rodger struggled a bit.

We reached an altitude of 8368 feet, 3000 feet lower than the million dollar hwy, but it still felt high, and there was snow.

There were some freedom camping spots along the way but we opted for a campground in the town of Rangely. We need to dump our waste, have showers and top up water.

Today we finally left Durango. We left just before 10am and started the climb to Silverton which was at just over 9000 feet. Then we just kept climbing to 11000 feet. There was snow all around and it felt like a winter wonderland but in Spring!

It was such a pretty drive today. The million dollar highway is renowned as being a dangerous drive with hairpin turns, no guardrails, and sheer drop offs. I was a little nervous us parts, knowing our brakes had failed the other day, and some YouTubers were follow had their brakes fail going over there.

But all was good, and Mike barely used his brakes, opting for low gear instead.

The million dollar highway ended at Ouray which is a charming old gold mining town. If you’ve ever watched The Ranch on Netflix, it’s the town showed on the intro.

After the million dollar highway we followed the upaweep-tabegauche scenic byway. We found an amazing free spot to camp overlooking a river, complete with table chairs and fire ring. We’re not far from the ghost town Uravan where uranium was mined in the 1800s for luminescent on clock dials. Later on the uranium was used for the first atomic bomb (Manhattan project.) should have bought wacky backy in case we start glowing!

We hunkered down in Durango and caught up with cousin Melanie while we waited out a storm over the mountains.

We didn’t do much while we were there as it was cold, and snowing at times. We had a couple of nights out. One at a Mexican restaurant and the other at a Texas bbq place, which was every bit as good as the ones we tried in Texas.

It was a slow start to our day at Mesa Verde campground. I did some editing while Mike organised the van.

It was 11am by the time we left and Mike noticed the brake was squishy. ‘That’s not good,’ he said.

There was no reception on the mountain and I was feeling a bit sick, possibly due to the altitude. We drove for a little bit and the brakes were working a little bit, just very squishy. And we had a steep drive with hairpin turns to get to the visitor centre where we could get them to call for help.

Mike put the van in low gear, put his hazard lights on, and we limped down the mountain. Mike seemed to think it was the power assist that was the problem, and that it would be perfectly safe to drive to Durango. I said, ‘no, let’s stop at the visitor centre, ring a brakes place, and ask their advice before continuing.

I’d contacted Melanie, and she was going to send us her mechanics details.

What happened next took us completely by surprise.

As we pulled into the visitor centre we parked next to a rusty old truck, which looked like it had seen better days. On the side were some words. Can you guess what they were?

Okay, I’ll tell you.

High country auto mobile repairs. What were the odds of that? Mike bailed him up before he could drive off.

The mechanic had a look and noticed the brake fluid was low. Oh goodie, Mike said, we just need to top it up. But no, the mechanic said. We need to find out where it’s leaking.

He quickly established the drivers side rear brake cylinder was leaking. He said he could fix it, so went off to get the spare part from Cortez, 9 miles away.

Two hours later it’s all fixed and Mike reckons the brakes are better than before! It cost $260 to fix. not cheap but saved the hassle of finding a garage and waiting around.

The mechanic said it was just as well we didn’t continue to Durango, because if the fluid ran out we would have lost all the brakes. Scary thought!

It was a 45 minute drive over the mountains to Durango where the hills were dotted with pockets of snow.

We arrived at Melanie’s at 4pm, but she was at work. But she said make yourself at home, the doors unlocked!

So we had a much needed shower for the first shower in over a week!

We had a quiet night sleep in the Walmart carpark. A few other vans had stopped the night too.

We spent the day doing chores. First, the laundromat where we washed the COVID off everything. Clothes, towels, sheets, blankets.

Then to the car spa to give Rodger a good clean, and the bikes too. Neither of them had been cleaned since we bought them and they were covered in dust and bugs.

It was mid afternoon by the time we were done, so we headed for mesa verde national park and found a nice campsite for $10. We stayed at this same campground a few years ago when we were tent camping. Unfortunately it’s not open properly for the season, so no showers.

We drove up the steep drive to mesa verde, stopping at the summit which was 8500 feet overlooking the valleys and stunning views of the snow capped Rockies.

We then continued to the overlooks of cliff dwellings which were really neat. When we were here last time, we were able to walk around the dwellings, but now you need to do a tour.

We had a bacon and egg nap for dinner. Tomorrow we visit Melanie.