clair034

So a bunch of us are planning a trip for next week that means four nights of camping, and it also involves hauling a lot of heavy gear on top of two small cars. It occurred to us that everything we need to take, including two inflatable rafts, probably won’t fit inside the cars, so we started to discuss loading the gear on top of the cars. (istock) It seems to me that the things we’re loading have a strong potential to scratch the vehicles’ roofs – neither car has a roof rack or side rails – and in Utah, our destination, it’s possible it’s illegal for us to simply strap the gear onto the roof the way we’re proposing. So I found  a site that sells inflatable racks that use the roof to stabilize the load .  But that triggered a heated conversation about spending money versus making do with what we have. Which is something that comes up a lot lately, in the face of downsizing and layoffs and a rough economy. I was raised to take care of the things I already own, which is why I wa...

My favorite foods on the road are the ones that can be cooked in the RV, keep well, feed a lot of people and make most of them happy. If they’re incredibly delicious, that’s a bonus. This kalua pork recipe definitely qualifies on all counts. You can find recipes all over the Internet for this Hawaiian-style meat, but most of them put the pork butt in the oven, and oddly, even when they cook it in a crockpot, they call for way too long of a time, which dries out the meat.  The pineapple salsa moistens the pork or rice.  We have become addicted to the little slider buns you can now find in most grocery stores, which are made by Sara Lee and Pepperidge Farms. They cut down on the number of sandwiches every eats, which makes for natural portion control, and they’re tasty (count on at least two per person). We’ve also served the pork in tortillas with all the fixings – onions, cilantro, tomatoes, etc. Barbecue sauce is great with the pork, but the pineapple salsa recipe that follows is ex...