Robbed

Emily had graciously let us crash with them for a night but unfortunately Mother-in-law was coming that weekend and we got the boot.  Cant have those unsavory bikers hanging around.

Went to get a camp site and this is what they gave us. We couldnt figure out how exactly you’re supposed to lock this bear box, it was the only one like this that we saw, and ontop of that theres a big fresh bear print right on the side that hadnt been washed away by all the rain.  Uhh no thanks!   We went back and complained and they kindly gave us another spot.

Our new site next door was much nicer, with a bear box that actually works!  I was a bit concerned that we were supposed to leave all our stuff in here and it didnt actually lock to keep other people out.  More on this later.

Like most other campgrounds almost everyone was friendly. Our neighbor for two days was a retired technology consultant for the pharmaceutical industry now living just outside the park in Idaho and here for some photography for a book he was working on. We’d talk and laugh and chat for hours of each others travels around our lantern, in fact it was hard to politely tell him we needed to get some sleep. Thats the great thing about these national park campgrounds, you never know who you’ll meet.

We talked to everyone in our loop of the campground, everyone was curious about the motorcycle with the strange yellow plate and how we ever fit so much stuff on it when it takes an SUV to carry the same for them.  Everywhere we’ve been so far people have come right up to talk to us, I suppose with a little girl in pink we arent as threatening as a bunch of pirates on loud Harlies 😉 Everyone except the campers on the other side of us that is who didn’t talk to a soul and never looked at anyone and only rarely seen outside their tent.

By now we’d been on the road for more than a week with no laundry 😉 our clothes by now had had hot chocolate, pasta, hamburger juice, cheese, oat meal etc spilled on them.  I’m not normally a messy eater but cooking and eating outside on rocks, shit happens.   Just to camp in a tent out here they make you sit through a 5 min spiel on all the bear dangers and precautions,  absolutely anything that smells like food or touched food even empty water bottles and toiletries has to go in the bear box and stay secured when you’re not using it.

Getting eaten by a bear is a bummer way to end a killer road trip, so in go our bags of dirty clothes too especially with a fresh bear print nearby.

We’d been using cash for everything, I only used credit cards for the gas.  This makes it real easy to budget, every morning put $50 in your wallet and thats it you have to spend, if you dont use it all then you have more the next day.  Cece kept her stash well hidden in the bottom of her compression sack with the clothes, in the bear box overnight.

Well the next morning getting ready she was way upset, very pissed and on the verge of tears.  Someone overnight while we slept had gone through the bear box and rifled through all our clothes,  found her money and taken it.  And the unfriendly neighbors next to us that didnt talk to anyone were already gone, f’n bastards!  I wish I had come out of the tent when I heard the box close in the morning..

So now we’re down $500 but still have the majority of mine left hidden in the bike (I had mentioned that she should split it up like I did a week ago).  Going on a long trip like life’s long journey you can pretty much guarantee something not going right, you just have to deal with it as best you can with a positive attitude and not let it bring you down.  Its only money, we can get more.

Her mom wanted us to file a report. We did that so its on record and wasted 2 hrs giving statements to different sets of rangers while they told us theres not much they could do but assured us this kind of thing never happens. The last theft from a bear box was like a decade ago.  How did we get so lucky?

Bored waiting on the cops.

With that over, we went back to Jackson Hole to check out the town and do some shopping.  And hit an ATM before we spend the rest of the week without banks or credit card access.  The ATM’s here would only let me withdraw $100 but it took a bit of trial and error to figure that out,  $300: denied, you account balance is $2700. Have a nice day.   $300 again denied,  $250 denied,  $200 denied  etc.

On the fifth or sixth try it finally worked, and about 5 mins later my phone rang with a recording from the bank fraud division informing me that my account was locked down due to unusual activity.   $#*%!!  It was the weekend already, banks were closed, and we’d be without cell service till who knows, and no way to call them to fix this so my autopay bills will go through next week…   Oh well fuckit, lets check out Jackson, WY.