Why I Drove 650 Miles in One Day to Taos, New Mexico, and Back

I've been looking for a camper trailer since before the pandemic hit. This virus has only fueled my desire to obtain a camper trailer. They're self contained, thereby reducing viral exposure to/from others. I have looked at a dozen different trailers in person since March. And I've perused hundreds of ads. I've messaged 30-40 trailer owners selling theirs, asking questions such as, "Do you have a clear title?" "When is the last time the bearings were packed?" I'm not entirely sure what the second question means, but I was advised to ask it, so I do. If nothing else, it makes me sound just a little bit more informed.

Perception is everything.

Most everything I saw in my price range was in need of some work, and I'm not a DIY fixer-upper sort by any stretch of the imagination. Then, I rented a thirty year old Scamp trailer to drive around on a recent family reunion in the mountains. I never towed a trailer before so I was a little apprehensive, but it all worked out. My vehicle was able to tow the trailer and I was able to manage towing a trailer on the road. After this experience, I became laser-focused on wanting a small Scamp-like trailer.

I realized I was going to have to increase my budget to get such trailer, and that I was probably going to have to travel out of state to find one. I saw used Scamps for sale in Texas and Utah, and a few in California, but none in Colorado. Then! One such beauty popped up on Scamp Finder site in Tres Piedras, New Mexico.  I looked up Tres Piedras on the map and saw it was thirty miles northwest of Taos. Taos is a five hour drive from Denver, so this meant I could, conceivably, drive to see the trailer, buy it and drive back with it, all in the same day. I don't drive after dark, so I always have to plan my road trips around sunrise and sunset times.

I messaged the owner LOTS before making the trip. She sounded like a lovely young woman. She and her two goats just moved to Tres Piedras from Spokane. She wanted to sell her Scamp to raise money for projects on new little New Mexican ranchette she purchased. She had a clear title. The bearings were just packed last summer. She said she had maintenance records for all the professional maintenance and repairs she had done to her Scamp. The trailer sounded PERFECT. The woman sounded honest. She revealed, after plans to come see the trailer were already made, that the cover to sunroof and cover to battery had both blown off. She offered a $500 price reduction if I'd receive as is, as getting the part in her remote part of the world was not easy.  I called around. The cover, and labor to replace, would run me approx $175. Her $500 price reduction seemed more than generous. She assured me it had been stored water tight since loosing the sunroof cover and that she'd be sure to make the opening in the roof road-worthy before I arrived.

On Wednesday, I got a cashier's check for our agreed upon price and fully serviced my own vehicle in preparation of hauling my new Scamp trailer home with me the next day.

On Thursday, Zoey and I left the house at sunrise and drove from 5:30 - 11:30 all the way to Tres Piedras, with two brief potty breaks along the way. About an hour and half from our destination, I texted the owner our status. She texted back that her dad was there making sure the sunroof was all sealed and she was busy gathering all of her maintenance records and other paper work.

Excellent, I thought.

Shortly after sending that text, we entered an extended No Service Zone for cell reception. I was glad I texted her when I did. I followed her directions, continuing south on the two lane highway about five minutes beyond Tres Piedras, to FSR 222. Then I drove along a poorly maintained rocky/dirt road about a quarter mile until I saw the sign directing me to her site number. Over a rock and down a steep short hill later, I spotted the Scamp in front of a rustic wood house (?) and knew I was in the right place.

The road leading to her ranchette.

An older man met me as I drove towards the house structure. Her father, I assumed. Nice man, but he had lost quite a bit of his hearing and all conversations with him were a struggle, always culminating in screaming the key words of whatever was being said.  Dad showed me around the trailer for the first five or ten minutes, with the young woman not making an appearance. After asking more questions than he could answer, he went into the house to retrieve the young woman. She was as friendly in person as she had been on the phone. She had a ladder positioned next to the trailer so I could see how they had sealed the sun roof.   

This was my first serious disappointment. The 16 X 23 inch hole in roof was covered with only a couple sheets of saran wrap and secured with masking tape. I immediately expressed concern. I brought duct tape with me. I mean, who doesn't bring duct tape with them on road trips, right? I got up on the roof to try and secure the plastic wrap. I was on the very top step of ladder and extended half a body length across the roof. Eventually, the young woman offered to help.

Then she showed me how the hot water heater worked. She said she didn't want to demonstrate turning it off, as it was busy making hot water in that moment. I didn't understand but decided to let it go, for now. I asked how to drain the hot water tank if I didn't want to haul the extra water weight. She confessed she had no idea. Inside the trailer, she showed me how water comes out of the sink. I asked how to drain that tank so I didn't carry that water weight. Again, she didn't know. I was disappointed to see that the shower dominated the floor plan. It was the first thing seen when entering the trailer. It also took up critical space if two people wanted to sit at dinette. The shower rendered the 2nd dinette seat inaccessible. I was less and less impressed with this hot shower feature. Also, of the four interior lights, three didn't turn on. This led to a screaming conversation with Dad about what he had done with the battery to make the lights not come on. After much yelling of repeated words it was determined that he didn't know what he had done with the battery to make the lights not work. Maybe the fuse was blown again? (All I heard was, "again".) The young woman screamed back at her dad that she didn't know where the fuse box was.

As she and her dad tried to troubleshoot the lighting situation, I sat at the cramped dinette to examine her maintenance records. Of the large pile of paperwork she left for me, it only contained two maintenance records from the previous July. That was all. No other records. When asked about prior records,  she said that she spent nearly $1,000 to make the trailer road-worthy as she had never taken it anywhere in the two years she owned it. I was under the impression she owned this trailer for many years. Her short-term ownership brought to rise a whole bunch of other unknowns. I looked under the trailer and saw worn our wood, exposed screws and rust. I was starting to get worried.

It was decided that, maybe, if we hook the trailer up to my van, it might cause the battery to turn on the lights. That didn't make any sense, but it didn't matter as it was then we discovered my electrical hook up in my van was not the same electrical hookup she had for the trailer. There was NO WAY I was going to try hauling this trailer 325 miles back to Denver with no brake lights. It was suggested I might get a converter at the U Haul in Taos. The young woman called the U haul place and, despite the poor phone connection, was able to discern that they did have such a converter. Zoey and I drove the thirty-two miles on into Taos to get the converter.

This thirty-two mile drive was thru a lot of desolate nowhere. But we did pass by an interesting "Earth ship" colony of half-buried berm homes. It seemed like a hold-over either from old bomb shelter days or the hippie era. As one looked across the stubble and sage brush covered range, houses like these popped up much like prairie dogs.  Here are some pics:

Earth ship (top) and berm home (bottom)

We also drove across a bridge that spans what is called The Rio Grande Gorge. This was the only time in our thirty mile road trip that we saw signs of humanity. Otherwise, this land is barren and almost other-worldly.

It took a bit of time to locate the Uhaul place. I was becoming cognizant of how much daylight I was burning trying to get this converter. Once back at the ranchette with the converter, it was quickly evident that this was the WRONG converter. The dad wanted to know why I bought the wrong one. I felt defensive. It was suggested that the dad go back to Taos and get the right converter from WalMart and that me and Zoey could "camp" there at the ranchette and wait for morning.  By now, clouds formed overhead. An afternoon rain shower was in the making. I went back inside the trailer to examine the sunroof one more time. I remained concerned how I was going to keep this trailer dry should the clouds open up.

It was all too much. I no longer felt excited. Instead, I felt only concern for this purchase. It was going to cost me every dollar I had managed to save to buy this. I wasn't willing to let go of all my savings for a trailer that only gave me concern.  I told them my decision to not buy the trailer, put Zoey back in the van and headed home. I decided to try and drive the entire distance before sunset as I didn't want this profoundly disappointing road trip to last a minute longer than necessary.

On the drive back home, I went thru the five stages of grief before coming to some clarity. I decided I really did want to own a camper trailer and that I really did want this camper trailer to be small and manageable with minimal frills. More important, I didn't want the stress and worry about what might break or fall off while using this camper trailer. I realized that feeling confident about my trailer is more important to me than saving a few dollars.

On Friday morning, I called Scamp Trailers in Backus, Minnesota and ordered me a brand new, thirteen foot Scamp that will be built per my specifications. Scamp only builds to order. There is no show-room or dealers. My trailer should be ready for pick-up in late March. Ayla likened this timeline to me being pregnant.

Long story short: I am expecting a new trailer in eight months... and I am so excited!

My First Baseline Dementia Test

Both of my parents died from dementia. More specifically, they died from complications brought about by the dementia.  This insidious disease doesn't kill the body, but it shuts down signals to other vital organs, which then kills the body. I think both died from some version of kidney/renal failure. By the time each passed, the disease had progressed to a point where it didn't really matter which vital organ function failed. I'm not sure who was relieved more when they died: Each of my parents, or those of us left to witness their decline.

I was rather clueless about the disease when Dad was diagnosed. Unfortunately, he was diagnosed after the disease had significantly progressed. We were made to feel that, "if only" he had been diagnosed sooner, maybe there would be more that could be done to intervene. So when Mom began to display different yet similar cognitive decline, I was quick to get her into her primary care physician. Nobody wanted the diagnosis, but I didn't want to be told I waited too long with her, as I had with Dad.

Dementia is a slippery slope. Cognitive decline is inherent with aging, so it is difficult to discern between what is "normal" and when the decline should be of concern. Mom was given "The Dementia Test" - - for lack of a better reference.  She was asked the day of the week, what city she lived in, who the President is and to count backward from 100 by 7's. Once you make it to 58, you are allowed to stop. Midway thru this test, the examiner lists five random objects and tells the patient they will be asked to recall these five objects later in the test.  The first time Mom was given the test, she struggled with the counting backward and recalling all five objects. Yet she scored high enough on this first test for us to be told there were no red flags. That her occasional forgetfulness and confusion were right on track for her age (80).

A couple of years, and more instances of forgetting later, she was administered her second Dementia Test.  It was the exact same questions asked before. But, this time she scored higher than she did two years previous. "How is this possible?" I asked her doctor. She clearly was starting to slip in my mind's eye, yet this rudimentary test did not support my observations. "Highly educated people such as your mother," the doctor explained, "are frequently able to pass this test. They are able to disguise their dementia for longer periods of time." At my insistence that SOMETHING be done, Mom was subjected to an MRI. Mom hated the MRI process: The confined space; The loud banging and clanging. And I felt awful for insisting she have one, but I was desperate to find help for her. I did not want the regret and guilt I had for my father's un-monitored decline to be duplicated with my mother's decline.

The scan was summarized as having normal amount of plaque build up for a woman of her age. Normal? Really?  We all KNEW, KNEW, KNEW something was up with Mom, but we were given no tools to address. Two years later, and another try at the Dementia Test indicated that now at 84 that the disease was probably present. We tried to keep her in her own apartment for as long as possible before moving her and her cat to assisted living. A year after moving into assisted living, her decline was so great that she lost the ability to keep her beloved cat with her. We basically sat back and watched over the next seven years this disease consume my mothers wit, intelligence and insight. She was reduced to a confused woman with only three or four stories about her life that she shared over and over (and over) again to anyone who might listen. When she finally died at the age of 92, most of her grandchildren and all of her great grandchildren had no idea what an extraordinary and vibrant woman she once was. Such is the true pain of this disease.

This is a legacy haunts me and my sisters. When one of us can't recall something or gets confused, we quietly confess to one another, or try to joke about how "it's" probably starting to happen to us now. I decided to take the proverbial bull by its horns, and get a handle on my own cognitive status. I wanted to have a game plan for how to address should the disease be present in me. I wanted to know what all they had learned about this disease in the twenty some years since initially navigating its' waters with Dad and then later, with Mom. I made an appointment with a neurologist. As I had no real symptoms or pressing brain concerns, I was given an appointment four months into the future. I'd like to say I almost forgot about this appointment by the time the date finally came along, but my truth is, I thought about this appointment nearly every single day since making it.

Ironically, the day of my appointment, I drove to the wrong office location. I

arrived early enough at the wrong location to still be able to drive to the correct office location, with enough time to still be seen by the neurologist.  After hearing my perceived justifications for making the appointment, the neurologist offered to get some baseline data on me. I was eager for this. Yes! Some data!  And then out came the same worn out and tired Dementia Test.  Seriously? Nothing else?

The five objects I was asked to remember were: Face-Velvet-Church-Daisy-Red. I am pretty sure these are the same five objects Mom was asked to recall back in 2002.  And, between you and me, I have been practicing counting backward by 7's from 100 for many years now. When the test was done, the neurologist said I scored a perfect 30 out of 30 score. "Good baseline data," she said. The neurologist commended me for already doing all the anecdotal things we are told to do to keep our brains pliable. I practice yoga, I (try to) learn new skills. I socialize and stay active.

And nothing else. The appointment was over.

In the nearly twenty years since first having Mom take this test, absolutely nothing has advanced in how we diagnose, or stave off the effects of dementia. NOTHING.

Face-Velvet-Church-Daisy-Red is my new mantra.
My plan is to fake them out for a few years, just like Mom did.