relo - Leadville through Frisco to Breckenridge CO

Note: minimal bandwidth (see below) so no pics or links. I’m doing good to get plain text published.

Update: did get 3 pics uploaded. It took over an hour and I had to do it from a linux client; android transfers kept crapping out.

prepping to relocate

I got out of bed a little earlier than usual to get a good start on the move. Made coffee and ate some leftover beans from last night’s dinner.

On my way out of town I stopped at the Leadville water district office where they have a paybox so you can get water for $5 (dump + water is $10). By my estimation I took on 27.5gal, so that’s 19.6 cents/gal. Not a spectular price, but being able to fill with hose potable hose is a Big Deal. Much better than lugging water back and forth in jugs and decanting into the tank.

package pickup and chores in Frisco

I picked up my package from the Amazon locker in the Whole Foods in Frisco. While I was there I picked up a thick breakfast burrito (discounted with Amazon Prime) and cherries ($3/lb with Prime).

From there I headed to the Walmart, which was basically a very small Neighborhood Market installation. No meat counter, no produce, really not much at all. They had maybe 5 brands of beer, all of which were above or well below my pay grade. I passed.

They did have have 1lb chubs of beef and turkey. The turkey was $1.82/lb and frozen solid so I picked up two. One for lasagna, one for meat loaf. I scrounged for what I could, including a 20# bag of kibble for the dogbeest.

I got the world’s slowest checker, but I used that time to update my phone, pull down offline YT videos, and download 18 (!) episodes of Angel season 1.

I tossed everything into the van and headed to the nearest laundromat.

turkey pot pie

Part of the food tossing was me throwing a turkey pot pie into the crockpot. Kaylee (see link in left menu bar) was the pioneer here and I’ve been eager to try it out.

The walmart selection was so thin the only pot pies they had were Marie Callender’s for $2.48. Normally the max I will pay for a pot pie is $1, but at 15oz these were 2.14x bigger than the usual ones. The larger size would also fit my crock better. I didn’t know it at the time, but the MC had top and bottom crust, and sometimes the $1 ones don’t give you bottom crust.

Read on to see how it turned out.

laundry

It was in a downtown area which was closed down for a street fair type event: (Pedestrian Promenade). Because of this parking was a bit of a struggle so I was a bit annoyed; there were a surprising number of people meandering around on a Tuesday morning. Tourists? Locals? Dunno.

This was my first laundry in about a month and I was down to 1 pair of Underoos. Good timing. While the clothes washed Muffin and I walked the length of the drag and enjoyed the sights. Friendly people and nice shops (again, above my pay grade). On the way back to transfer to the dryer I noticed the laundromat had an outdoor dogwashing station. It was $5 and right there so in she goes. I knew she’d just lay back down in the dirt at the next campsite but figured she was due, and the water would cool her off.

Finished the laundry and headed out of town to the SE of Breckenridge.

San Isabel national forest

The “pull-outs” here are extremely narrow and just off the dirt road. Didn’t look promising but I kept driving up until I found

• an identifable pull-out
• with at least 1 bar of Verizon (Tmo is absent, naturally)
• and enough of a break in the trees to get some sun. Sun Surveyor shows the sun will be above the trees from about 9a - 5p. THis is where the nextra panel wattage will earn its keep.

This site is at 11,020ft, so a new record for me. Still 81F up here.

I got the site minimally set up, including the shadecloth “awning” because of the vicious sun at this elevation. There are a lot of flies here. On a whim I bought some flypaper at the wallmart and hung it in the cab area. There are already flies stuck to it, including a horsefly-looking quarter-pounder.

About 1 vehicle/hour passes on the road. There is some dust but because of the way I am parked none is getting into the van yet. I was delighted to see HIGHWAY LEGAL VEHICLES ONLY signs - it means there won’t be brapping dirtbikes or stereo-blasting UTV idjits doing high-speed passes. Traffic levels on the weekend will likely be less pleasant than they are now.

the rest of the story, pot pie edition

I couldn’t remember how long the pot pie had been cooking but it was surprisingly browned and starting to bubble out of the shell a bit. The package said 165F is the minimum temp; I pulled the probe out as it passed 172F

I turned off the crock and removed the lid to let the steam vent. I found the walmart receipt which showed the pie had been baking on HI for just shy of 3 hours.

The central hole is from my temp probing. The bubbling hole on the side is a filling lava eruption.

After it cooled a bit I dug in. It was as good as any I’ve ever had from an oven. This will be a Reprovisioning Day treat/tradition for me going forward.

update

On a walk with muffin I found a spot about 100yds further that isn’t quite so close to the road. Maybe 20mins more sun. Cell data is the same. We repositioned the van to the new spot.

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