July 10 – 21, 2014

We finally get our XP and we wouldn’t even get to spend the first night in it!

Our original plan was to have the XP for a few weeks to get comfortable with the rig and flush out any issues with either the truck or the camper before going to Alaska. Because of some of the delays we would have just two weeks to get to our ferry in Washington. We still had a lot to do in this short window giving us very little time to get to know our new home. After Marc handed us the keys we went to dinner in Nevada City and took inventory of what needed to be done before boarding the ferry. Our first order of business was to get the F350’s 100k mile service completed ASAP. In our experience it’s never just taking a vehicle in for service since they always find something else to fix. We didn’t have time to waste so we decided to find a Ford service department who could begin work the next day. The Ford Store in Gilroy had a 7 am appointment available the next morning. This meant driving our FJ and XP the three hours to the Bay Area once we finished dinner. We stayed in a hotel just minutes away from the dealer. Our first night in the XP would have to wait.

We dropped off the vehicle and were told that it would take a couple of days to do the service and finish work on the additional items that we knew about it. Later that day we heard from the service department. They suggested that we take care of a few more issues which added another day. We spent these days visiting friends and buying some gear for the trip that we couldn’t fit into the FJ. There was even some time for my favorite run in the Bay Area at Wilder Ranch in Santa Cruz.

Now with our XP ready for the trip we were ready to move into our new home. After living in the FJ for four months, the XP feels like a palace! We now have a small kitchen with plenty of counter space to prepare meals. Everything runs on diesel so no more searches for propane canisters for the Coleman stove.

Our first guests were Cesar and his wife Brenda, longtime friends of Darryl’s. We gave them the ten cent tour of our XP which took just a few minutes. A quick spin around while standing in place is about all it takes to see everything! 🙂 There’s not enough room in the XP for a dinner party so we headed across the parking lot for dinner. Over dinner caught each other up the happenings in our lives. There was also plenty of talk about where to cross into Mexico and safe places to stay as well as places to avoid. As Mexican natives, Cesar and Brenda have been a wonderful source for us as we plan our trip into Mexico. We don’t expect to cross the border into Mexico until October but it’s never to early to start planning parts of the route!

As soon as we picked up our truck from Ford we went over to our storage locker to transfer everything from our FJ into the XP and to pick up our cold weather clothes which we’ll need at some point in the upcoming months. Our next stop is to say good-bye to the FJ and leave it in storage until after the trip. The FJ was an awesome vehicle for us during the last four months. We had absolutely no mechanical issues with it and it handled all of our off-road adventures with ease. Although our XP will beat the FJ + roof top tent in the comfort category it won’t hold a candle to the FJ in the off-road capability category.

Now with our FJ tucked away in storage and us settled into our new home we had one last stop to make before saying good-bye to California. Back in June I met Gypsy Vanner breeder Lynn Strauss of the Gypsy Rose Ranch at the Western States Horse Expo. After talking with her about the breed I asked if we could stop by her ranch in Lodi, CA to spend a little more time with her horses and take a riding lesson with her on a Gypsy Vanner. We would be driving by Lodi so I called her up and scheduled a time to meet the next day. We spent most of the following day at the ranch learning about the operations and meeting the horse. I fell in love with all of them!

We had to make one more stop at XP in Grass Valley to have our rear window replaced and then we’re off to catch our ferry in a week out of Bellingham. We spent the night in the Tahoe National Forest after fixing the window. I really felt the elevation during our morning run the following day!

We’re super excited about starting our adventure in Alaska. Just one more week in the lower 48 and we’ll be catching our ferry!