More cold weather camping… and putting compost to the test

In December, before the weather got weird and wacky…meaning normal cold, Arctic cold, then abnormally warm… we camped a few nights in the Paddy Wagon to test the new Espar heater that Pat just installed. 

Note: just the thought of my husband removing the 25 gallon gas tank and drilling a hole on the top of it to install the heater under our queen sized bed still freaks me out, so of course I fled into the house as soon as I took this photo of our gas tank lying on the ground beside the van.

Although my mind wanders to questions like what are the chances that the heater is going to blow us up in a plume of gasoline-fueled flames? I can happily report that neither we nor our van blew up in the middle of the night and we were toasty warm and comfortable to boot.

Our first night, we arrived at the American Winery and American Brewery, our Harvest Host site in Wauseon, Ohio in time to try all of their wines (a flight of 21 – count ‘em). My favorite was the warm and cozy mulled wine, which prompted us to buy 2 bottles of wine and 2 boxes of the mix to bring to Christmas dinner with our family. We managed to take Maya for a quick walk on a section of the North Country Trail that was close by before we parked in front of barren grapevines and hunkered down for the night.

Next morning was chilly, but the three of us hiked around Oak Openings Preserve Metropark before heading into western Michigan toward Battle Creek. I noticed the snow got deeper the further north we travelled. With steady temperatures below freezing, we hiked about 4 miles at the Ott Biological Preserve, after which we drove to our next Harvest Host site, JB’s Whiskey Old Style Grill in Springfield, Michigan. In December, it is way too cold for people to sit outside on the big patio, but the manager told us that on Friday nights during the summer, 500 people would be sitting out there listening to live music. Although JB’s is not a distillery, the shelves on the wall behind the bar held more varieties of whiskey and spirits than I have ever seen in my life. No wonder the liquor menu was massively bigger than the food menu. But we stuck with a pitcher of beer, which seemed right for the pizza and southwestern salad we shared.

We were the only vehicle in the parking lot that night. And although we were close enough to the highway to hear traffic, it didn’t bother me. However, in the middle of the night, Pat awakened and worried about an odd “clicking” noise, which ended up being wind outside blowing ropes against a flagpole.

Okay, I need to briefly interrupt our road tour to explain the “compost test” we experienced that night. Fair warning… if the thought of composting toilets and the smell of what goes in them make you feel queasy, I advise you to skip the following paragraph. Don’t worry, I’m not going to get too graphic, but you won’t hurt my feelings if you skip ahead.

ANYWAY, one person, who shall remain nameless, was experiencing some lower abdomen discomfort while hiking that afternoon, to the point of wishing they had a wad of tissue in their pocket in the event of a gastrointestinal emergency. Fortunately, this situation did not materialize for said hiker. Unfortunately, a gastrointestinal disaster did strike in the middle of the night, which required this person to use the composting toilet in a manner that both van occupants never intended or hoped for it to ever be used. But thanks to an organic substance called PEAT, which miraculously dries and deodorizes the most foul-smelling organic substances under the sun, the van occupants slept in sweet-smelling comfort in a vehicle with all the windows rolled up.

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming…

On to the Woodland Park Nature Preserve for another lovely hike before driving further north, into more serious cold and deeper snow.

We parked at an official trailhead for the North Country Trail just north of Newaygo, Michigan. The only other people around were a few cross-country skiers who left shortly after we arrived. We hiked southbound on the fairly hard-packed, but deeper snowy trail. After returning to the van, we made dinner, played cribbage (here is Pat shedding a tear when I SKUNKED him, in a never-before-heard-of feat) and went to bed.

This was the official temperature in the morning. It was actually too cold for Maya to hike and we knew that a big lake effect storm was coming (within a few days, this area got anywhere from 7 to 12 inches of the white stuff) so we wisely headed east to spend the rest of the Christmas holiday with family.

To all you van builders out there: the Espar heater worked great. We set the thermostat to 50 and heard it cycle on and off during the night, especially on the coldest night when it was in the teens outside, but we were always warm and comfortable. The motor is quiet and it is a great comfort to know that we can boondock just about anywhere in cold weather. HIGHLY RECOMMEND.

And again, our composting toilet worked great, too.

Thanks be to God.

Happy New Year!