Almost Departure Time

Its been a couple of weeks and the vegging is in full swing.

I've been busy honing in on my climbing knowledge and learning some of the essentials for the road trip while Joe has been away in Virginia working for a couple more weeks. But now he has returned and needless to say we are taking full advantage of the amenities provided by the McKinstry household.

While Joe was gone I was able to do a couple of things for the car that didn't require any carpentry skills. So I put my creative thinking cap on and figured out how to make the curtains. I ended up measuring the windows and cutting a square piece for each window then deciding that the best way to attach them would be by using Velcro. Though its not ideal if I ever want to take the Velcro off, but it

Rocket Box has been added

honestly made the most sense for the windows themselves. So the Velcro is on the outer edge of each window and makes it so you can still open and close the door while the curtains are up. The other side of the Velcro is on the fabric itself and sewed on. I ended up hand stitching one curtain and after 4 hours and much frustration I came to the conclusion that letting a professional use their magic on them might be the better way to go. After the Velcro was sewn on I ended up cutting the fabric to fit the window shape. But in the end the curtains are awesome, they're subtle and do their job.

Now that Joe is back we were able to finally finish the car. Not that there was much to do on it but we still ended up having to pull out the jigsaw and cut the last piece of wood for when the car is in sleep mode on the drivers side. We ran out of plywood in Washington so we finished the last piece using chip board. Though it doesn't match, it works. Especially because while Joe was gone working I found some 3in camping foam that is now our car mattress and it covers up that mismatch chip board wonderfully! After we had finished the last piece of wood we threw in the foam and used a bread knife to cut along the edges to have it fit perfectly into the car.

With that the car is officially finished. Now the packing is in full swing. Both Joe and I have created our own personal packing list for the car and have a shared packing list for cooking and other car garb that we will be sharing throughout the trip. The packing is turning into being a multiple day project but when your going to be traveling across the country and going into winter its important to make sure you have everything you need! As of right now the lists are coming along quite nicely and having the car with the extra rocket box storage is making our lives much easier.

Calorie counting and food packing for the Sawtooths

Official departure date is definitely looming but until then we have decided to semi start the road trip in the Sawtooths. I say semi start because we will be returning to my parents house on Wednesday the 12th to finish packing. As of right now Joe and I plan to head out the morning on Monday the 10th to go climb Thompson Peak. The highest peak in the Sawtooths at 10,751ft. I love the Sawtooths but haven't gotten the chance to spend anytime at all in them. Plus what better way for Joe to see a super great piece of Idaho?! We plan to hike in Monday and camp that night, hopefully summit on Tuesday and then hike out. Maybe stop at a hot springs on the way home and camp at one of those. We will get home on Wednesday, pack all the rest of the garb for the road trip and head out to City of Rocks that weekend to meet up with a couple of our friends to climb some great stuff out there. After that we aren't exactly sure where were headed but that is the great part about this trip, the possibilities are endless!