September 28, 2025
We arrived at Dead Horse Campground, and will ‘make a stand' here, till we move onto shores further south. We weren't necessarily planning on spending much time in paid parks, but the events leading up to today’s arrival were…momentous.
We knew when we began this adventure, we would have to be a bit frugal, wrt staying paid parks. We do a fair amount of dry camping, sometimes called ‘boondocking,’ to save money, plus it gets us away from crowds of tourons.
Boondocking is defined as where you camp, without benefit of a ‘full hookup,’ or some variation of that. Full is comprised of water, sewer, an d electricity, and of the three, electricity can be the determining factor.
Because of our advanced electrical system, meanin g lot of solar panels, and large lithium ion phosphate (LFP). we can go, with good sunlight, nearly indefinitely, without shore power.
Though our battery ‘tank’ is pretty endless, it still has a limitation: if AC is needed, it’s only able to run one of the two AC units, and then, only for a few hours. Ergo, the reason we ‘chase the 70:’ north through the summer, south during the winter. If it gets a bit warm during the days, we open the windows, and turn on the roof fans, then in the late afternoon into the evenings, keep them open till it cools off, then close them all up. occasionally, we’ve even needed the furnace. If we know we’re going to need the AC, we plan accordingly, and stay at where we can plug in (or run the generator, where allowed).
Now, with our water tanks—fresh, gray, and black—that’s a different kettle of smelly fish! Even on us following a strict water restriction plan, we’re limited to a max of about 10 days. Then, we need to refill the fresh water tank, and dump the gray/black.Thats what we have to plan around, and that’s why we planted at Mormon Lake.
We planned to be at Mormon Lake, Utah, for three days. We spent the time mostly enjoying the amazing volcanic features, Mormon Lake being one. It’s the result of lava flows into a large basin, then because of faulting, a large portion subsided, making Mormon Lake (technically, a ‘graben’).
What happened, and an event which had yet to happen to us was…weather. It’s fall, and this area of Arizona is mid-high alpine, in nature. Flagstaff and surrounding areas actually experience a real winter, and on towards that, a pleasant and long fall. We planned on going to somewhere around the Prescott Valley, find some boondocking, and tour around.
So, about that weather: our three days, turned into 5 days, because these beautiful clouds…
…soon coalesced into massive rain clouds, and it poured. for TWO days!
No worries! We’re not on any real schedule, so we await a dry day, pay for the extra full hookup (good, since the cloudiness wasn't optimal to charge the batteries, anyway), hook up the trailer, and head on down the road.
I’d been told that there was a state campground, called—and I am NOT making this up!—Potato Patch. electric/water, and not terribly dear. So off to Potato Patch we go.
Which, unbeknownst to us, guided us through the town of Jerome, Arizona. Charming little town, much like Central City , in Colorado. With equally small roads.
Maybe I shoulda paid a bit more attention to the signs, saying “NO TRUCKS OVER 50 FEET.”
Surely, that didn't mean campers, right? Doesn't look too bad..at first.
https://youtu.be/_iCHQ-HrUlI?si=qDCsJ90p7Y3zFw5T
Neither of thought to take video, but suffice it to say, may of tourons were giving us strange/puzzled/bemused looks!
Well, after that harrowing trip, we made it to Potato Patch…which the Interwebz had told me was a first come-first serve campground.
A) the Interwebz lied.
B) the term, ‘patch’ may have been a clue….see ‘sixty five feet long.'
So we continue our way down the other side of the pass, towards Prescott Valley, and began looking for some spot to spend the night, till we could find a less-expensive spot. We saw Yavapai County fairgrounds, and fairgrounds hae been a pretty reasonable place for us to stay.
$70, per night.
Now, it’s beginning to get a bit later in the day, and have we told you, setting up AT NIGHT blows? So, we set off to find a boondocking site.
There is a website, Freecampsites.com, which has been quite useful in finding places to boondock. It returned exactly ONE place we could try…and try we did!
Good plan…had there BEEN any appropriate boondocking available, for RVs sixty three feet long...
Many times—and this was one!—these places are reviewed by people who stayed there, and sometimes ofttimes are written by folks who...leave out details. Details like “this site is suitable ONLY for tents and small cars.”
Allow me to remind you: our rig, truck included, is SIXTY THREE feet long. Not a tent. NOT a small car.
Now, it’s nigh on sunset, so we wander around Mayer, AZ, looking for our ol’ reliable fallback: Truck stops.
Except, EVERY truck stop there is:
- Small
- Full.
At the 3rd truck stop, we found one space we could cram ourselves into, BUT…not big enough to out the slides. Fair enough: our trailer is built such that you can still crawl into bed, and sleep, and sleep we did, since we crawled in around 8 pm, making the day about 9 hours long, WAAAY longer than our usual 3-5 hour days.
The Adventure continues!
https://youtu.be/6AIXFoinSnU?si=tIGEGXLI_XxLIX6g
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