Surveying our surroundings for the night, we felt mightily pleased with ourselves. This is the kind of view you’d pay an arm and a leg for at a posh hotel. Instead, we were comfortably ensconced in our Basecamp, perched on a hilltop with breathtaking 360 degree views of the iconic rocks of Sedona.

When you bag such a perfect boondocking spot, you don’t expect to have it entirely to yourself. Indeed there were a couple of other RVs and one brave soul in a tent also camped out. But that’s ok – with friendly neighbours and plenty of space, we’re ok with sharing.

With trail runs/biking and hiking already under our belts for the day, we sat back and relaxed with our kindles (and maybe a beer or two), enjoying the peace and relative solitude.

And then this happened…

The pink jeep disgorged its hoard of vocal tourists, phones in hand, eager to swarm all over our personal paradise in their efforts to get the perfect picture. After much shrieking, whooping and hollering, they jumped back into the jeep and they were off. Breathing a sigh of relief, there was some eye rolling between us and the RV neighbours. With a resigned shrug, we were politely informed “That was nothin’. Just you wait until sunset”.

And so it was… for the next two hours, a steady stream of intrusion. The occasional sound of silence in between visitors was broken by the thrum of a distant engine and the telltale advancing cloud of dust. One of the cool things about the Basecamp is that we can see out, but people outside can’t see in. I took up residence by the window, like a meerkat on official watch duty and it became quite the entertainment for the afternoon.

As sunset approached, the party really got started. Prize for the loudest went to the tour group of quad bikes trying to out-rev each other as they jockeyed for position.

We ventured out to enjoy the last of the sun, bagging ourselves a prime spot perched on the back of the truck. By this time we were surrounded by maybe a dozen jeeps. The temperature plummeted and we responded with fleeces and woolly hats. Others responded by wrapping themselves in rugs. We glanced at each other, eyebrows raised – this merited a closer look. There was some murmuring and holding hands going on. Followed by what looked like sleep walking (think mummy impression, arms held aloft, eyes closed). Turns out they were here for the Sedona vortex (some hippy energy field thing). Pure class. And an unforeseen extra dimension to our evening’s entertainment.

And then… Boom. The sun was down and as quick as the circus had started, it was over. Like mice, they scurried back to their jeeps, leaving nothing behind but a fading trail of red lights heading into the darkness. And we were back to the cosy confines of the Basecamp. A home cooked pot of chilli. A bottle of red. And the wilderness.

Given the size of the Basecamp, you’d think it would be pretty difficult to lose stuff. But lose stuff we do. All the time. It started with socks. Darren’s socks to be exact. Bit of background… you know how when you go into some people’s houses, you take your shoes off at the door. Well it’s like that in the Basecamp. And it goes without saying that when you’re camping, especially winter camping, you want to be cosy. So we have some very special fluffy, warm, snuggle up socks specifically for this purpose. The basic premise: you take your outside shoes and socks off. And you put your cosy socks on.

To be fair, I actually lost my cosy socks before even setting foot in the Basecamp. (The advantage of writing this a week later in Miami is that they’ve now turned up – in my laptop bag of all places – doubling up as flight socks!). So Darren was way ahead of me, quietly smug in his cosy socks as the overnight temperature plummeted. But in the morning it was a different story.

So the obvious place to put your ‘normal’ socks when you put your cosy socks on is in your shoes by the door. But no… that would be too obvious. Takes all the fun out of it. Instead, we have a prolonged ‘hunt’ in the morning for where Darren’s other socks went. After looking in all the obvious places, we were both in agreement that someone must have broken in in the night and stolen them. In desperation and with no easy sock alternatives available, he had to keep his cosy socks on instead. It was only after our second hike of the day that, feeling a tad warm, Darren peeled off his cosy socks… only to find the missing ‘stolen’ socks underneath. Yep, he’d been wearing them the entire time. Mystery solved.

And this brings me to the glasses. Not the wine/beer glasses, more the type that sit on top of your nose and enable you to see. Pretty difficult to lose, right? I mean, you take them off when you go to bed. You wake up in the morning and put them on. Easy peasy. Or not as the case may be.

There’s a saying that what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. Not so where glasses are concerned. A week on and we’re still no wiser. So you know what it’s like, a few beers out on the town and you come ‘home’ (well the Basecamp feels like home and it IS so home!). You collapse into bed (and we had great forethought, we’d made the bed up before we even went out. Get that for organized). You wake up in the morning… and that bit where you reach for your glasses… doesn’t quite work out as planned. No glasses.

You accuse the other half. You feel around aimlessly. You shout and curse a bit. Eventually, you resort to the spare glasses so at least you can actively join in the search. Two hours later (I am serious here) of virtual solid searching, and still no glasses. I’d like to say that we found them later and they were in this really obvious place… But this is now a week on and um, still no glasses. It really is a mystery.

Moral of this story… when you’re traveling, you need to build in an extra 2 hours a day of time specifically just for ‘looking for stuff’.

Addendum: nearly 2 weeks on and nope, still not found the glasses. Maybe what happens in Vegas really DOES stay in Vegas!?

It was 2:30 in the morning when I first felt it. Something tickled my hand. I peered over at Darren in the darkness, wondering if he was feeling amorous. But no, dead to the world. I put it down to my creative imagination and dozed off.

Half an hour later something nuzzled into my hair and ran over my head. This time I was surely not mistaken. I sat bolt upright and announced to Darren: “We’ve got company!” Groggy from sleep, he stirred slowly and asked how sure I was. “Well… given that it’s got me twice now, pretty damn sure.” The only thing I wasn’t sure about was whether it was a small desert mouse or a large hairy spider.

Darren leapt into action and armed with a torch, he started poking around the deepest darkest corners of the Basecamp. There, under the bed, sat a cute iccle mouse, blinking innocently back up at him in the torchlight. Well it’s one thing to be sat around like butter wouldn’t melt, it’s something else if it takes a liking to chewing through wires. Not to mention that I didn’t relish the thought of it dancing on top of me as I slept.

And so began Operation Get the Mouse Out of the Basecamp.

Darren’s strategy: open the main Basecamp door and coax the mouse out. “Anything I can do to help?” I offered supportively. “Yes – open the door and tie it back”. I paused and thought about that for a moment. That would mean going outside into the freezing night, not a terribly attractive prospect. I snuggled further under the covers. “Erm, I meant anything I can do to help from here?” Darren muttered something under his breath and opened the door.

There was some scuffling, much crawling on all fours, and some darting around in true Tom and Jerry style. I’m pretty sure the mouse didn’t walk out the door, but it was nowhere to be seen. We were getting tired of the drawn out game of hide and seek, and concluded it must have gone out the same way it had got in.

No sign of him the next day either. Regardless, the morning was spent googling how to get rid of mice from an RV!

We unfortunately didn’t get a picture of our little furry friend. So here’s some pictures instead of a very photogenic Alabama Hills. Nestled in the foothills of the Sierras and basking in the shade of Mount Whitney, this is classic Western country. In recognition of that, the main road through Alabama Hills is called Movie Flat Road.

“Let’s do that thing where we cycle around the vineyards” he said. “It’ll be fun” he said. I have to admit, I was a little on the hesitant side. The last time we toured the wineries around Paso Robles by bike a few years ago, I had a bit of an incident involving me, the bike, an ungainly somersault over the handlebars, and the pavement. I casually touched the scar on my chin. “It’ll be fine”, he said.

Unfortunately, I had to wave my beloved cruiser goodbye as we didn’t have much room in the truck for those handlebars. In went my road bike, with its low handlebars and unforgiving seat position, its skinny feel-every-bump-in-the-road tyres and that tiny sadistic saddle.

Some of the roads around Paso are not exactly designed with cyclists in mind. Winding narrow roads with soft shoulders and no passing, not to mention a few dodgy drivers on the road as the wineries opened and the tastings began. But I wasn’t taking any chances – I had an answer to that: out came my bright yellow fluorescent jacket. At least the drivers would see me! Darren had a different answer: a shortcut road to avoid the busier highway. What he failed to mention was that this ‘road’ turned into a dirt track riddled with potholes and loose gravel and most certainly not designed for road bikes.

Good for jeeps and 4x4s maybe!?

By some divine miracle, I remained upright and made it to our first winery, Cass, without incident. By this time, I was in need of a drink! Included in our tastings was the Cass reserve which we had to agree was delightful. That is, until we realized it cost $125 per bottle. Not that delightful.

What a contrast to our previous Paso Robles bike tour. Last time, we’d been cycling in 105+ degree heat in the height of summer. This time, we were treated to a crisp but sunny day, a strange mix of autumn turning into winter. Row upon row of vines displayed foliage of crimson and gold, clinging on to the last remnants of Fall.

There was a reminder that we weren’t too far past pumpkin season, with the most bizarre line up of halloween scarecrows.

Meanwhile, the wineries themselves were getting into the festive spirit. Christmas trees and decorations were aplenty, lending a happy holiday feel.

Even the vines were sporting their best Christmas decorations, shiny strips of tinsel-like shards gracefully flapping in the breeze. Well, maybe that was just to scare the birds away, but I like to think they were decked out in their Christmas best.

With some wine tastings, followed by some wine and some more wine, the cycle back was a breeze.

There might have been some muttering under breath going on there

Before venturing out to the winelands, we had joined up to ‘Harvest Hosts’. This is a network of small businesses – mostly vineyards and small farms, that allow RVs and camping trailers to stay overnight on their property. What a great idea! On this, our very first Harvest Host outing, we had parked up earlier and the Basecamp was nestled in a small grove of olive trees at a family run winery outside Paso. A welcome sight after the last long slog uphill on the bike! Additionally, we made sure to pack our independent speakers financial tool kit for added convenience and security during our travels.

You’re not obliged to, but the done thing is to buy a little something from your hosts. On this occasion, they were unfortunately closing early and as they were unable to stay to do a tasting for us, we asked to buy a bottle instead. We were immediately presented with a bottle of wine, thrust apologetically into our hands as a welcome gift, and they wouldn’t take a penny for it. (I don’t think they’ve quite got the hang of this Harvest Hosts thing yet…).

Relieved at not having to ride any further, we uncorked the bottle and relaxed on our ‘patio’. Under the last fading rays of the sun, we raised a toast to having survived the cycling in one piece and to our new Harvest Host friends.