Woooaahh, I really didn’t mean to ignore my site so long (& even let the domain expire briefly). It’s now been months that we’ve been camping on & off, exploring the Angeles National Forest & staying with friends we made along the way.

With an attempt to sugarcoat the last few months, sure we’ve had a few rough times, but overall had an amazing adventure & one of those “life-learning” periods where you find your strengths & weaknesses yada yada… pfft.

We’ve seen a very different side of the US now to say the least, getting to know locals that we would otherwise never have the opportunity of meeting, experiencing their way of life & I never thought I would find myself feeling so foreign in this country.

It’s hard to know where to start. I’m really quite overwhelmed attempting to recollect my thoughts into a readable-sized post, I could write a novel so much has happened in the last few months, so maybe I’ll just get onto the forest…

The Angeles Forest is surprisingly vast. There is desert, there are mountains, it is hot, cold, dry, foggy, snowy… We’ve had the luck of experiencing it all.

Let’s try this chronologically:

We started fairly low in elevation at the base of the mountains, first at a camp called Sycamore Flats then South Fork a little further up. It wasn’t the most beautiful of areas we found on our journey, but it was a good place for us to start with its fresh stream providing good drinking water & ice cold baths, firewood everywhere & tonnes of hikes & climbs.

As usual, you can hover over the images for info

Anyway we were just getting in the swing of living off-grid when Nik had a nasty accident. While chopping wood, a woodchip flew up & hit him in the eye cutting his cornea open, an extremely painful injury blinding him several weeks.

After the hospital & short motel stay we returned to South Fork to continue camping (Nik still mostly blind). It was really difficult for him dealing with the elements & such a fragile injury. As he recovered we met a couple of fellow homeless “campers” Charlie & Daizy (& dog, Chloe) who knew the area pretty well & introduced us to their friends Aaron & Chris, brothers. They took us on a few hikes & we ended up hanging out a fair bit.

This is when we first saw Devil’s Punchbowl, an awesome rock valley with the craziest boulders, caves & structures. We have been back a few times since for climbing. Love it.

Making a convoy with our new friends we went from South Fork up slightly higher to Big Rock, a pretty little site in the forest shade but too cold for some of our group. We only stayed briefly, spending most of our time by the fire drinking hot chocolate, passing blunts & playing cards.

From there we moved onto the other side of the mountain ridge to Cottonwood with Charlie & Daizy. Aptly named, Cottonwood has constant fluffy pollen/flowers like little cotton-wool balls floating through the air. Quite a cool sight. The camp was really fun. There was a little stream to play in (especially fun since Daizy just got a new puppy, Bella), a swing from a big tree & we had the honour of seeing a small deer walk right past us while Nik & I sipped our coffee silently. An amazing thing to see. We liked Cottonwood.

From here we had a few problems as a lot of the camps & roads up the mountain were still closed for the cold season. We were running out of places to explore so we stayed with Aaron & Chris’s family a while who live at the base of the Angeles Forest.

As the weather started heating up we found ourselves needing places to swim. Little Rock Dam was a cute little dam in the middle of the desert with trees growing up through the water. As usual all our dog-friends came too. They’re hilarious in the water.

(From here on I was working with a broken camera without knowing it. I took a bazillion photos but just discovered now they’re all blank. The following are pics from Nik’s cam & my iPhone.)

Once the summer arrived they opened the roads up the mountain allowing us access to sites with higher altitude like Guffy.

Guffy was very high, very cold & spent the pm in beautiful thick fog.

Our tent was right on the edge of a large cliff, looking over the deep valley & clouds below. It was an amazing place, definitely the most remote we’ve gone, but the hike to water was exhausting in the high altitude & just too cold once again.

Nik & I took Chloe for a walk one day…

& decided to take a shortcut through some bushes. Chloe didn’t like that. She rode the Em-bus

Then the worst came… being over 8000ft altitude on the mountain caused Nik’s still-weak eye to eventually split open again & so we came down off the mountain to stay at our friends’ place again while he recovered. Poor Nik.

Fast forward a few weeks…

Strangely, I actually write this from Phoenix Arizona, sitting in an air-conditioned motel room surrounded by all the usual modern conveniences. We drove here a few days ago for some errands, but typically that has proved to be another “adventure”. Driving through the treacherous desert heat our car overheated & cracked the radiator. We spent a night by the roadside in the desert overheating ourselves. Eventually we made it & set up camp at the base of Superstition Mountain (slightly east of Phoenix). While being an incredible place out there, the 45 degree heat eventually got the best of us & we found ourselves quite ill with heatstroke, exhausted, unable to eat & delirious. We had to leave. So now we’re in downtown Phoenix in a motel room trying to replenish our fluids & recover.

This is Goldfield, a real “ghost town” from the gold-rush era. We came across it quite by accident on our way to Superstition Mountain.

We are a lot thinner & tanned than we were a few months ago. The tiring lifestyle & bad diet has left us running on empty & longing to go back to a more normal/ stable life. We are scarred, bruised, malnourished, our clothes are tatters & I can honestly say I have never felt this appreciative of modern comforts like running water, beds, electricity, internet, fridges & light-switches. I feel truly feral.

To add salt to our wounds we were robbed a few weeks ago. Our car was parked at our Aaron & Chris’ place, full of belongings of course since we’ve been living out of it, when thieves got away with Nik’s camera (leaving us totally camera-less now!), laptop, jewelry (including his wedding ring & EN necklace, of great personal value), my ID (!!!) & my bathroom pack. So now I’m driving without a licence & look as feral as ever with no makeup or toiletries (I’m sure you girls know how rough that would feel).

So with all that, you can understand I am looking to go home to Australia quite soon. We’ve had a ball in the US the last year, seen so much more than we ever expected but alas our wallets are empty & I am longing to return to a steady home & job, finishing college & building up funds for the next trip. I’m thinking Asia…

So, while I’m living off-grid for a while I leave you with promises of many photos & good stories to come.

Nik’s video is back here if you missed it.

It was a bit of a tricky ascent in a few places & the rock is incredibly rough & sharp on the hands (we need gloves!). We came home a little scratched up & bloody. My hands are still healing, but man that was fun. We love climbing … well, bouldering technically, since we don’t have ropes etc.

It was a great day out. We’re really going to miss this weather. I imagine in a couple of months it will be far too hot out here to contemplate climbing in the midday sun.

A cute little video courtesy of Nik. This is an awesome place, pretty close to our house, & my new favourite climbing location. I’ll get around to posting some photos soon.

The plan was to go to Silverwood Lake but on arrival we were a little disappointed by its blandness & decided to move on to Lake Arrowhead after our sandwich & find something a little more “spectacular”.

Spectacular. That word seems cheap but I’m having trouble finding better..  Awesome? I use that word too much. Beautiful, too common, Amazing …urg.

Lake Arrowhead was stunning. I’ll try that one.

We drove up the mountains & reached a point above the smog where snow had fallen & the pine trees were old & tall. It was real pretty. We kept going up & up & the snow got deeper as we drove.

Check out the pile a snowplow made! Now that’s deep snow.

It was gorgeous up there. I seriously want to move there & I can’t believe it’s so close to our house. It was really just a quick drive up there & we were in a winter wonderland. All the houses were beautiful & arranged in quaint little towns. We were stuck behind a school bus on one stretch of the road, watching the kids get out & hobble home through the snow & I couldn’t help but be a strong shade of green with envy of them growing up in a setting like this.

The lake itself was picturesque & surrounded by cute little chateaus & families enjoying the day with sleds & making snowmen. So cute I could die.

We found a great lookout along the Rim Of The World Highway heading towards Skyforest (what awesome names!) & it really did feel like we were on the rim of the world. The view just went for miles & miles.

So we wandered around this area for a bit, rolled & slid down the slopes, took lots of photos & laughed non-stop as we struggled to walk in the knee deep snow. One of those moments where you wish time would stop.

The sun was going down before we knew it & it was time to find our way home.

A couple of things today-

The pier..

I used to love sitting on the edge of the pier, especially in the morning sun with my iPod. It was nice living by the ocean there for the first time in my life. …I suppose I’m just noticing how far I am from the ocean again now, living in the desert.

Also, it’s that time of year again & I’m missing out on Auckland’s awesome Lantern Festival for Chinese New Year. It was something I looked forward to each year, possibly more than English-calender New Year. The beautiful lanterns, the food, the crowds, stalls, performances, fireworks. It was a great week. Auckland also celebrated Diwali really hard *remembers the incredible smells & music wafting in the window from Britomart*.

I’m wondering if it’s something quiet unique to that town because of its cultural diversity. I hope I’m able to find more cities that celebrate international festivities so heartily.

I guess I’m surprised there are things I miss from New Zealand..

I think I’m just learning there are things you take with you, even from the “smallest” of places. As the list grows of places we’ve visited & lived in, no matter how brief or the circumstances, I’m finding that I’m becoming romantic about my time spent there & remembering the friends made & experiences collected. I’m becoming homesick, but “home” is spread out now with a brick in every town I’ve been.

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So much room to breathe

& to run.

I can run miles out here, not see a soul. No traffic, no noise, no scary people.

Just me & the red dirt & this big sky.

-iPhone Post

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