(April 10, 2019)
Video Transcript:
So allow ME to tell YOU…
laughs
What Annie learned about car camping on some BLM land today.
(pans camera around)
So as you can see, I’m in a hotel.
And what I’d like to say foremost is hotels…
I’m gonna stop talking shit about them because they’re good when you need to recover from an incredibly traumatizing experience.
So let me just show you my shoes…
(shows shoes with dirt and bits of outdoorsy material)
This is what my shoes look like today after my experience.
(kicks shoes off; sockless feet also dirty)
This is how I dress…
(shows outfit in mirror)
I don’t think you can tell, I’m like, dirty.
Let me just unequivocally say, I had a legit near death experience.
laughs
I’m not kiddin’ y’all, it was fuckin’ BAD.
It was bad in a lot of not good ways.
And I gotta be completely real with you…
sighs and plops down on bed
There’s a way to attempt to camp on BLM and it’s NOT the way that I initially went about it.
sighs again
Birtha. My car. That’s her name. Birtha Love.
She got that name on our 2016 solo roadtrip out west where I saw Devils Tower for the first time and it was fucking amazing. That experience is just in my heart as one of the most amazing things that I’ve ever done. Driving out there by myself and seeing that.
So Birtha and I, we done been through some shit today.
Some shit that I don’t ever want to repeat, and I know how not to repeat.
God bless Subaru. God bless, okay, because…
Had I not been in a Subaru, I would be stuck in the middle of some fucking treacherous as fuck, boulder-ridden BLM shit right now. And I just about did not make it out. I just about didn’t. Understand that.
Was only by the grace of God that I found my way out of that shit.
We had a harm time.
Birtha was lowkey angry with me. And we have an amazing relationship. She’s ride or die. She’s a tough bitch and she’s on my side, but today?
I pissed her off worse than I ever have or ever will again.
Out of ignorance, out of just not knowing what I was doing because I had never done it before.
Now that I have, I know better. But Birtha was angry. And she powered through and did the best that she possibly could.
It was a terrible situation, you guys…
And I know you’re looking at me right now like, “No shit.”
But you gotta understand, if I hadn’t chosen the path that I did, it would have been totally fine.
If I had just stayed on the beaten path, it would have been fine. That’s the truth.
But as I said in the other video, when I got there, there was that guy there and I recognized that guy and I know what he was about. And I’m not saying that he would have done anything… but I recognized him as an archetype, as a situational marker. And I should have known right then and there that this was not what I needed to do, this was not where I needed to go.
And I kinda did know that, but I didn’t know the severity of the situation.
It was a learning experience, as fucked up as it was. And it was about to be so much worse. But as fucked up as it was, it was a learning experience that was necessary for me.
To be honest, the camping stuff, the driving stuff, and just life in general…
Has these learning experiences that, at the time, are just fucking heinous.
Things that you have to understand are necessary for your development and your knowledge base.
And that was one of those situations. In the future I’ll recognize these situational markers, and I’ll know that I’m on the wrong path.
I feel like that host guy kinda knew this could be bad. He was also thinking about that guy, talking to him while I was leaving, but that guy was super old. What’s he gonna do? What will be will be. But I think he kinda knew inside some shit was gonna south here. And it fuckin’ did.
But I survived and nothing horrible happened. But it just about did.
Like, wow y’all. Fuckin’ wow, like…
laughs
God bless Birtha. Dust was flying. Birtha got scratched by some shit. Birtha drove over some shit that she NEVER, EVER would have chosen to drive over.
I’m so fucking sorry Birtha.
I feel like my car is like, an entity.
And you don’t wanna fuck up with her cuz if you piss her off and get on her bad side and give her bad experiences, she’ll be hurt over it.
I don’t think we reached that point today, I made it right with her.
When we finally navigated out of that fucking heinous atrocity, I went STRAIGHT to an auto shop, covered in dust. My hair is covered in dust and dirt and all kinds of shit.
I walk into this auto shop and there’s a guy standing there waiting at the counter.
I was like, “Is anybody here?” and he’s like, “I don’t know, I haven’t talked to anybody.”
So this poor dude…
I just told him some shit. He was standing there like, “Oh my God.”
I had to tell somebody cuz I mean, that’s kinda the nature of trauma, when you’re ready to talk about it, whoever is there is gonna hear it. And it’s something you never forget.
That guy was super nice, but he was like, “Oh my God, this bitch is WHACKADOODLE.”
Then the auto shop guy comes out and he’s like fucking amazing, I told him the story. I was like, “Dude I just about got into a really bad situation on some BLM land, and I need you to look at the undercarriage and the tires. Because that shit was not good.”
So there were like a ton of people there, these people were swamped dude. And he was like okay, I’m gonna go get it and pull it around and I’ll call you back. So he called me back, and he took me under it and we looked at everything.
He was like, “I don’t see anything wrong with it, the tires look fine. There are some little scrapes from where you ran over some rocks but there’s nothing wrong it.”
And I said, “Wow, I’ve never seen her from this angle before.” He kind of laughed and he said, “I’ve seen way worse and it’s fine.”
And that guy was wearing some blue contacts. I said, “What color are your eyes?” and he was like, “They’re brown.” And I was like, “Brown eyes are beautiful,” and he was like, “Meh.”
laughs
I tried to encourage him cuz I felt like he felt some type of way about himself.
So he pulled it off the rack and I took off.
One of my subscribers dear to my heart said, “Look, you should just get a hotel and get your bearing straight.” And I was like, you have no idea right now. I said yeah, that’s what I’m gonna do cuz I need to charge some things while I’m here and I need to take a shower now. I was planning on not taking a shower, like ever, but it’s necessary.
If you have to get a hotel room every now and then just to do some shit, there’s nothing wrong with that.
The essence of the matter for me is…
We need an abundance of designated places that we can park up and that we can stay 24 hours or pay for longer.
And BLM land is great, don’t get me wrong, most of it is developed. You don’t get in the shit if you don’t do what I did.
Not all BLM land is created equal. There is an abundance of BLM camping areas where I am right now, and the one where I was yesterday is much better quality.
As far as the quality and the vibe it attracts, it’s totally excellent. Easy to access, easy to navigate. Nothing treacherous.
BLM land is fine, just don’t be a fucking idiot like I was and will NEVER, EVER be again.
National Forests, tsk…
They’re not AS good in my opinion because in a lot of them you have to stay in a designated, numbered camping spot. Which I will probably do throughout the course of this journey…
But it’s not my preference. My preference is BLM land. My preference is interstate rest areas. They don’t freak me out at all. If you’re not near a city or any fucked up areas. If you’re anywhere in the eastern United States, like no, don’t.
You CAN, don’t get me wrong, but a lot of them over there are 4 hour limit stays and they don’t allow overnighting. It’s just not welcoming.
The western states are where the rest areas are the fucking shit.
Paved rest areas with amenities…
Are my favorite thing, and I would stay at them all the time except that you’ve gotta move along to the next one.
Doing that requires traveling vast distances and it’s not efficient or economical to move that way or travel that way.
You can believe that if I were to do it in the way that makes me feel the best and really fucking gets me going, I would stay at NOTHING but interstate rest areas.
That’s the truth.
And so that’s the goal, we’re aiming for paved areas, designated areas made for sleeping overnight in your vehicle with the option of paying to stay longer.
That’s the type of infrastructure that is going to be required for mobile living.
Not everybody wants to be out west where there’s an abundance of BLM land.
Not everybody wants to stay out in the wilderness and forests and shit.
Some people would really prefer to stay near civilization and they should be able to do that.
There should be places where they can do that.
Big areas. Why can’t we get shopping mall sized areas to do this?
It’s my belief that we will.
But that doesn’t exist right now, and it needs to.
Until it exists, we have to stay in the areas that are already being used to accomodate this lifestyle.
As I learned today, you’ve gotta be smart about it. You gotta stay in the developed areas.
More progress needs to be made on this, and I hope the right people in the right places with the power to do it will make this dream a reality for us.
Because I’m one of so many people who truly want this.
But for now, I am in a hotel room and you had better believe I am gonna be making the most of this.
