freedom and arby's.

i have good days and i have bad days on the road. i have small moments of utter transcendent joy and others of self-loathing depression. i find it hard to balance the two as of yet. i still haven't found the rhythm of the road yet and set my pace of life. it will happen for sure, it may take a few weeks, though. i can be patient.

that, having been said, for partly budgetary reasons and partly because of the authenticity of the experience i'm camping 99.9% of the time. and of that it's pretty much all freedom camping. for those that aren't familiar with that term, i learned it from a friend of mine after he spent a few months touring in new zealand freedom camping the whole way. it's where you set up camp wherever it suits your needs, often in unauthorized locations. here it's more commonly referred to as "bandit camping". i'm not a big fan of that term because it perhaps implies ill-intent. freedom camping, on the other hand, implies just that, a life of freedom... and that is what i'm after.

this type of camping is not for everyone, however. it takes a certain amount of bravado to risk being caught in order to get some sleep. to be more specific, the locations you find yourself spending the night literally cover the entire spectrum. no location is verboten. but with risks come great rewards.

sometimes you find a location out of sheer necessity. for example, 2 nights ago i rolled into a town after a long, hard day of riding and i was just absolutely beat. i had just got to a grocery store and gotten some food for that night and the next day when it had just started to drizzle. the weather radar showed a lot more rain heading my way over the next several hours with a bright band of orange/red in the middle. i was too exhausted to do any more riding and further more, i had run out of time, the rain was happening now. i had spied an out-of-business arby's right down the road on my way in. it had a doorway with plenty of coverage and it was not terribly visible from the street. welp, that's the spot for tonight. not glamorous but i stayed dry. and man, did it pour that night.

other times you have the luxury of stumbling upon a location that just pops. you just know that this is it for the night, even if you have plenty of time and energy to ride further. a few nights ago i had taken a rest day and spent my time at the local library and made a very leisurely lunch in the grass out back. with plenty of daylight left i decided to go find home for the night and started on down the road. i had spied a few potential locations using google satellite views [an absolute necessity for freedom camping] and decided to check them out. i never even got to the first one. i had rolled up on a section of the delaware river that was so scenic and so abandoned. the water was crystal clear. the weather was perfect. the vibe was totally right. i knew this was it for the night. i made some coffee and some dinner. i went for a night swim. i woke up and went for a morning swim because i can. it was a magical night.

when you spend the night in a location that you get you into some trouble you have to get up extra early so as to not get pinched. that has it's own side benefits. as a photographer i want to shoot in interesting light and weather conditions and those things often happen before the sun rises. after clearing out my yard sale from arby's and after a night of heavy rain the fog was thick...  very thick. long before the sun comes up it just makes for interesting and gloomy ambiance. but near sunrise everything changes; the fog remains but the sunlight makes everything look magical. i've gotten quick with my travel rig so i had it up and shooting in no time. if my day was over right now i'd be okay because i just scored, big time.

with any camping, but especially the camping of this type, the "leave no trace" mantra is of utmost importance. you absolutely need to respect the location and take away everything with you. nobody should ever know you were there... unless they look at the GPS data of your photos... in which case, whatever, chill out.