20250501 Thursday, May 1, 2025. End of Our Clamming Season

20250501 Thursday, May 1, 2025. End of Our Clamming Season

The weather could not be more perfect for camping.  We woke to blue skies and calm winds.  We decided to hit the beach early to try to get home before the worst of the traffic.  The low tide was at 9:52am at -1.6'.  We were on the beach at 8am, and had our limits by 8:45.  Getting to the beach before the bottom of the low tide may have been advantageous because the clams may be making shows that disappear over time as the tide drops.  We were able to spot more shows today, although many looked like holes rather than the classic donuts in the sand.  It was such a beautiful morning, there could be no more drastic contrast to some of our earliest razor clamming days when it was raining sideways.  

We got back to the RV and shucked the clams, putting them on ice in the refrigerator and then breaking camp.  We were on the road at 10am.  We did stop at Dairy Queen in Aberdeen for lunch at 11am.  We dumped our holding tanks in Montesano.  There are 4 lanes of trailer dump sites, but only one is open, so we had to wait in line. Fortunately, there was only one rig in front of us.  

Then we made a  brief refueling stop at the Lacey Costco, and a final refueling stop at the River Rock at the Angel of the Winds Casino exit.  We pulled up behind a huge class A RV that to our surprise was being filled up with gasoline and not diesel.  The owner says it takes 80 gallons to fill it up.  We're glad we have a more economical diesel that only takes 24 gallons to fill up.  

There was a bit of traffic heading into Seattle, but fortunately, the express lanes were open so we were able to bypass much of the building traffic.  There was also traffic in Everett, with much of it heading to Snohomish and Marysville.  

Ben took a brief detour to stop at a closed state patrol weight station to see what weight we are actually driving around with.  The RV had a full load of water, LP and diesel, as well as Janet on board.  The total weight of the RV was 11,300 pounds, which is slightly over the 11,030 rating.  The Bronco  with a full tank of gas and some gear surprisingly weighed in at 5200 pounds, which was significantly heavier than what Ben thought it might weigh.  So we were probably 8% over the rated weight.  But we were well under the rated axle weight ratings, and closely monitor tire pressures, engine and transmission temperatures, and don't drive that aggressively.  Still, we need to be more conscious about unloading unnecessary gear from the RV and Bronco.  

We arrived home at 4pm.  It was a bit different doing our clam processing in our kitchen instead of the RV.  Janet did some fresh fried razor clams with panko and seasoned bread crumbs that were tasty and tender.  It is quite a bit of work and mess to bread and fry them, but they are a treat.  

While there are additional razor clam openers days during the Spring, our Senior Off Season WA State Parks pass is now expired, and May 1 marked the opening of ling cod fishing season, so Ben and Price will be getting out on the Pacific Skiff to see about catching some fresh ling cod.  Halibut season is also under way, although halibut is a much less productive pursuit in Puget Sound.  Spot prawns will also open later in May, so we will be quite busy working our local waters .  We did get our money's worth out of the Senior Off Season WA State Parks Pass, and will likely buy next year's version.  We have become pretty adept at camping with the RV in all weather conditions and are getting some good use out of the RV. 

20250430 Wednesday, April 30, 2025. Another Honest Dig. Campground News

20250430 Wednesday, April 30, 2025. Another Honest Dig. Campground News

Since we have been camping in a site adjacent to the bathroom and shower facility, we have noticed quite a few “unhoused” people making use of the State Park campground facilities here. There is no gate house or on-site rangers. A crew shows up in the morning to do maintenance and check for campsite registrations and payment, but for the most part, the campground is unsupervised. 

Over the last 2 days, a minivan with a couple inside had spent most of both days parked in front of the bathroom, and yesterday, for hours, the man had unloaded the contents of the van in an enormous pile of plastic sacs, totes, and random piles all around the van while he cleaned it out. He also disappears into one of the toilets for more than 40 minutes at a time. His female partner sat in the passenger seat glued to her cellphone nearly the entire 2 days. He finally got it all repacked into the van as the sun set. They also had a yappy rat Terrier tied up in front of the bathroom barking for hours and hours while this was going on. 

In the past, others would pull up in various cars, disappear into the toilet or shower for more than an hour before reemerging and leaving. Fortunately, we haven’t encountered any syringes, needles, or other unsavory items being left behind. While it sure is nice to have the free hot showers at these State Parks, there should be some effort to restrict access to park guests. 

The rangers have been busy preparing the west half of the campground loop for opening. The flooding has largely receded, and they are moving picnic tables around with a tractor. We imagine it will open tomorrow. 

We were on the beach at 8:15am and it didn’t rain overnight, so we were hopeful for an easier time finding the clams, but it was pretty much like yesterday. We got our limits but did have to work at it for a little over an hour. 

Our doppelgänger neighbors had left the campground before we had even gotten up. We got our clams processed and then headed into Westport to hit the Shop’n Kart, which is their local independent grocery and goods store. Ben was looking for some solvent to get pine sap off the Bronco’s windshield, and Janet wanted to pick up some hot dogs for lunch and dinner.  It’s interesting to wander through these stores that have a bit of everything. Ben did find some Goof-off, and Janet found a selection of tube steaks. 

After indulging in some cheese and jalapeño  brats for lunch, we hit the trails around Twin Harbors State Park again. The last time we did that, we encountered flooded-out trails that went nowhere. But the water table has dropped a lot, drying out all the trails and the back half of the campground loop. We were able to walk all the way from our campground loop to both the Bonge Street parking lot area and the one northwest of the campground loop where we have been hitching the Bronco and RV together because it is a big, level parking lot. We clocked 2.75 miles in about an hour. 

April 30, 2025

April 12, 2025

Burned out abandoned RV at Bonge Rd Access. 

The sun has been out most of the afternoon. We had run the generator while processing the clams, and that had charged up the batteries from 52% to 75%. With clear sky and full sun, the batteries were charging at 3-4A. By evening, they were up to over 85%.

Dinner tonight will be hot dogs with canned chili. Tomorrow will be the end of our razor clamming and free senior off-season pass camping season. 

20250429 Tuesday, April 29, 2025. Honest Work for Clam Limits, Doppleganger RV

20250429 Tuesday, April 29, 2025. Honest Work for Clam Limits, Doppleganger RV

It was raining through the night and into the morning, although it had largely stopped by the time we hit the beach at 7:45am. The rain seems to drive the clams deeper and washes away classic clam shows, leaving only subtle dimples. This made it harder to find the clams, but we did find out limits of 15 each. It’s nice that it was a -2.0’ tide and daylight. It took us nearly 90 minutes to get those limits. 

After we got back, as we were cleaning up our equipment, another camper came up to chat about our RV. He was looking to trade in his class A for something smaller now that their grandchildren were all adults now. He was also hoping to pull a Jeep Wrangler, which is comparable to the Bronco. 

After he finished and headed back to his campsite, a lady walking her dog exclaimed “You have the same RV as us!”, and sure enough, a Winnebago Navion of the same year and color was being driven into the campground. He had stopped to pick up the registration paperwork while his wife walked the dog. 

They ended up parking right next to our site. It looks like a Winnebago jamboree. Actually, their rig has a different layout with a fixed bed in the back and different storage layout.   It turns out they are traveling musicians. He does Elvis impressions and she does Ann Margaret, as well as others. Their layout has more storage for all their show equipment and costumes.   They had also clammed in the morning, and were going to head off to the docks at Westport to crab from the pier with crab snares. 

It was fun and interesting to share experiences and modifications with these RV’s. 

After getting our clams put up in the freezer, we headed into Westport to get our auxiliary LP bottle refilled, lunch and exercise. 

We got our last punch on our Merino’s fish and chips card so the next time we come, we can get $10 off. They really have the best food in Westport. We’ll have leftover fries with whatever we can come up with in the RV for dinner tonight. Most likely, this will involve more Costco rotisserie chicken, noodles and cream of mushroom soup. 

We walked the trail from the Westport tsunami sanctuary tower to the Jetty. It was nice that it is paved and the jetty blocks the winds. It connects to the lighthouse trail so we walked just shy of 3 miles.  

Then we stopped by the library to use their WiFi to do our Duolingo lessons and post this blog. 

Tomorrow we may try a different beach. Our new Winnebago neighbors dug at the Cranberry road access, which is the next one south of the Bonge Rd access we have been using. They said the digging was quite easy there. 

20250428 Monday, April 28, 2025. Morning Clamming and Emergency Med Hunt

20250428 Monday, April 28, 2025. Morning Clamming and Emergency Medication Hunt

We got up at 6 a.m. but could hear other campers heading out to dig for clams and the cawing of crows in the campground as we got dressed. 

There was heavy overcast overhead, but plenty of daylight and light wind when we got to the beach at 6:40 a.m. With a -2.0’ tide, there was a lot of beach exposed. The sand at the end of the beach approach had gotten very loose, so a lot of people were parking on the shoulders of the approach. An abandoned RV has been on that shoulder for weeks, but since the last time we were here, someone had set it ablaze, so now it’s a burned-out hulk on the shoulder. Some of the nearby trees were also burned. 

Although the tide had gone way out, there was a surprising lack of classic clam shows on the particular stretch of beach we were on. At one point, we could see moisture being pumped by clams well below the surface, but they weren’t leaving any shows. Eventually, we did manage to find enough shows or partial shows to get our limits, but it was certainly easier to find them the last time we were here when they were making classic shows. We were on a slightly different stretch of the beach, so perhaps tomorrow we’ll go to the same spot we were in 2 weeks earlier. 

We got the clams cleaned and put up. Ben had brought our Waterpik to use to give the clams enemas. This was a lot easier and faster than using a hand syringe, but even after enemas, some clams just seem to manage to retain some sand. 

When we got up in the morning, the batteries still had 75% charge, so we decided to try to do the clam cleaning with the induction cooktop because it brings water up to temperature much faster than the LP burner. This was working well until Ben put on the Keurig to make a cup of coffee. All of a sudden, everything shut off, including the lights. The generator panel was dark, but Ben tried pushing the start button anyways, but nothing happened. 

Just as Ben was about to pull open the battery compartment lid to jumpstart the system, assuming the BMS had shut down the Lithium batteries from the overload of running both the induction cooktop and coffee maker, the generator started up, and after stabilizing, the lights came back on and normal power was restored. The BMS may have just temporarily shut the batteries down. When we checked the BMS monitoring app, it reported the charge state at 50% and charging at over 30A. 

We’ll just have to remember not to run the coffee maker or toaster when using the induction cooktop. 

In addition to forgetting our fishing licenses, Ben realized he had forgotten to grab his medications. So we did have to run into Westport after getting our clams cleaned and put up to see about getting emergency meds sent to a local pharmacy. We used the WiFi at the public library to message Ben’s doctor and also had the pharmacist at Twin Harbor Drugs call Ben’s doctor. 

We had lunch back at the campground and then went for a walk along the Westport Lighthouse trail. We headed back to the pharmacy. The doctor’s office finally sent prescriptions at 3 p.m. Instead of just getting a handful of pills, Ben ended up with 30-day supplies of his blood pressure and cholesterol-lowering meds. The copay for these emergency meds was higher than for the usual mail-order refills, but it certainly was less than the cost of driving all the way back home. 

We also came to the realization that although our Senior Off-Season pass is only good Sundays - Thursdays, Thursday is May 1st and the pass expires after April 30th, so we had to re-register our campsite so we leave a day earlier on Thursday instead of Friday. 

20250427 Price Marathons, We Head Out to Clam

 20250427 Price Marathons, We Head Out to Clam

Price ran in the Whidbey Marathon, his first full marathon. Ciara and Tom had flown in from Chicago to support Price. We cheered him on from several viewpoints, and he managed to finish 57th overall with a time of 4:04, which is remarkable for a route with nearly 2000’ of elevation gain.  

After recovering for a bit, we all had lunch  at Orlando’s BBQ. Ciara and Tom then headed to the airport. 

We weren’t sure if we needed to stay home for the night to support Price after his first marathon because he was pretty beat up after his first half marathon. However, he had trained properly for this race using his Garmin smart watch and marathon training software. He had also invested in proper marathon running gear, so he actually came out of this marathon in much better condition and didn’t need us to stick around. 

Our Senior Off Season camping pass expires April 30th, and there is a daylight razor clam opener this week, so we packed up the RV and headed off the island at 4 p.m. We made a refueling stop at Samcor and a second refueling stop at the Lacey Costco. 

We did run into heavy traffic starting in the Northgate area. It must have been Seattle residents returning home from seeing the tulips in Mt Vernon and other weekend outings. Fortunately, south of downtown, the traffic cleared, and it was clear sailing from there on. The weather was also fine for the most part with moderate clouds and only light rain as we got to the coast in Aberdeen. 

We arrived after dark at 9 p.m. It’s a good thing the campground was only lightly occupied, and our prior site #221 was available.  Ben had also installed area flood lights on the rear of the RV and puddle lamps below, so backing the RV wasn’t done entirely in the dark. 

As we got settled in, we realized that we had forgotten to grab our fishing licenses. Ben and Price had left them on the boat after fishing for halibut. Ben ran the Bronco into Westport, where he could get a cellular signal and was able to download images of our license document numbers from WDFW’s servers to show any wildlife agents who might happen to want to check us. 

The Lacey Costco warehouse was closed when we stopped to refuel. Fortunately, we arrived 10 minutes before they closed the gas pumps. But no Costco pizza for dinner. 

Ben just had a bowl of Costco instant ramen with some rotisserie chicken brought from home. 

Tomorrow, the low tide is -2.0’ at 7:30. If the weather cooperates, we hope to be able to find our clams pretty quickly. 

20250415 Tuesday, April 15, 2025 One More Limit and Home

20250415 Tuesday, April 15, 2025 One More Limit and Home

The weather has gotten very pleasant, so digging clams for the 8 a.m. low tide was both easy and pleasant.  It didn’t take long to get our limits and head back to the campsite.  

There was a family with a minivan that got stuck at the beach access that looked like they needed some help. Unfortunately, we didn’t have a recovery strap in the Bronco. We got back to our campsite, dropped off our clams, got out of our waders, and loaded up a recovery strap from the RV into the Bronco.  By the time we drove back to the access, someone else had rescued the stranded family, so it was good to know someone helped them out.  We did have to move the Bronco anyways to get it hitched up to the RV. 

We left our morning’s catch soaking in salt water in a bucket in the sink of the RV while we packed up the RV and reconfigured it to hit the road.  

Overnight, the batteries had discharged to 60%, but with full sunshine and several hours on the road ahead of us, we didn’t run the generator this morning at all.  We hitched up the Bronco and were headed home at 9:15 a.m. from Twin Harbors.  

We did stop at the rest area in Montesano where they have trailer dump facilities.  There are 4 lanes, but only one was open for use. Fortunately, there was only one class B ahead of us and they were storing away their hoses when we arrived, so we didn’t have to wait long for our turn.  

By the time we were ready to pull out, another RV was just pulling in behind us, so that site sees a steady stream of RV’s.  We also transferred the clams from the salt water soak onto ice in the refrigerator so they wouldn’t drown from lack of oxygen.

We refueled the RV and had Costco Hotdogs for lunch in Lacey.  The drive back was pretty easy with no problems with traffic except for the approach to downtown Seattle, but the express lanes were open. 

We made a final refueling stop at the Angel of the Winds Casino, where we filled up both the RV and the Bronco.  The casino has the least expensive fuel by a significant margin.  Anything to lure people into the casino.  By the time we got to the casino, the solar panels had fully recharged our lithium batteries.

It was nice to pull up in front of the house in the mid-afternoon instead of the evening.  We got dirty laundry and clams unloaded from the RV. After processing today’s catch, we had dinner at our local Chinese restaurant.  

It’ll take a while to dig out from 3 weeks’ worth of mail and get readjusted to being back home.  We had an enjoyable and productive road trip, and were glad to have an excuse to visit family in the Bay Area and get the most from our Senior Off-Season camping pass and shellfish licenses.  We did have quite a contrast between the rather terrible conditions and difficult clamming at the start of our trip to the pleasant and easy limits at the end of the trip.  

We also learned a couple of new things about living in the RV with regard to the generator, lithium batteries, and solar charger.  It turns out, reassuringly, that these systems are all working as intended.  The charge rates vary depending on the state of the batteries.  High current is allowed when the batteries are drained, but the current is reduced and even pulsed as the accumulated charge increases.  The generator can deliver up to 80A of charge current when the batteries are 20-50% charged, but the charging circuit in the inverter and onboard battery management circuits throttle the charge rate down as they fill up.  At 70% capacity, the charging circuit and onboard battery management circuits limit the charge rate to no more than 3-10A, cycling between low, higher and resting current states. The Solar panels can charge at up to 10A with full sunlight and discharged batteries, but are adversely affected by shade on any of the solar panels.  With full sun, we can be self sufficient without running the generator, but with shade and clouds, it may be necessary to charge the batteries with the generator up to 50-70% in the morning, and let the solar top up the batteries from 70% on.  If we’re careful with out power consumption, it is easy to make it through the night on 70% and have adequate reserves to be able to start up the generator in the morning if needed. But if we start the night with less than 50% charge, we may end up needing to jump start the batteries and generator in the morning, as we have had to do in the past.  Knowing what we now know, hopefully, jumpstarting the batteries and generator will be a thing of the past.

We have also gained experience and more confidence in towing the Bronco through mountain passes.  The Mercedes Sprinter chassis is a capable platform, and having the Bronco is great when we have a basestation where our RV can be set up for several days without relocating. 

20250414 Running into Data Limits along with Razor Clam Limits

20250414 Running into Data Limits along with Razor Clam Limits

We got to the beach by 7 a.m. with plenty of daylight, blue skies, and calm winds.  It was pretty much ideal clamming weather, although a coat and waders are still required because it was in the mid-40s.  We got out our limits easily and have found in general that the clams here at Twin Harbors have been larger than those at Cape Disappointment.  With a lower tide, it was also easier to spot shows higher up on the beach, so there was no need to be working the actual tide line where the waves wash up frequently and erase new clam shows. We were headed back to the RV by 7:30 a.m., a half hour before the bottom of the low tide.  

We have gotten into a routine for cleaning the clams which works pretty efficiently.  Ben gives the clams enemas and puts them into a tray while Janet heats the water for shucking the clams.  The clams go into an ice bath immediately after being shucked out of their shells.  From there, Janet cuts the siphons open and separates the stomach and foot from the rest of the body.  Ben then cleans the foot by cutting off the stomach and turning it inside out to remove the intestinal tract.  The cleaned feet and bodies get reunited in quart zip-lock bags for freezing.  A limit of 15 clams fits pretty nicely in a quart-sized zip-lock, although these bags are notably larger than those we prepared at Cape Disappointment due to the larger size of the clams.

Once the clams are put up, we clean and tidy up the RV.  We start up the generator at 9 a.m. to bulk charge the batteries and run it for about 2 hrs or until we get to 60-70% charge state.  The charge rate drops significantly at that point to just 2-3 amps.  This is the same rate that the solar panels can easily generate with a sunny day, so we shut down the generator and let the solar take care of the balance of the absorption charge.  If we don’t get up to 80% after the sun has set, we may run the generator during dinner preparation to make sure we have adequate reserves in the batteries.  

While the generator was running, we ran the Bronco back down to the beach to dump the clam shells and go for a walk.  

After our walk, we had lunch, preparing some of the Jalapeño Cheese sausages we got at the Gather and Feast Harvest Host, along with some green beans and bread.  The sausages were quite tasty.  There was a vendor selling sausages at the Mermaid Festival yesterday for more than $10 each, so we did pretty well on the Harvest Host sausages.  We had to take the sausages out of the freezer to make room for more razor clams.

With the sun out, we hung our waders and work towels to dry.  

In the afternoon, we drove into Westport and discovered their public library has free Wi-Fi.  Yesterday we used the Wi-Fi at Merino’s restaurant.  During this trip, Janet got notification that she had used up her 15GB data allowance with Mint Mobile, so we ended up having to upgrade her to an unlimited plan, but then found that if you use a mobile hotspot, it is limited to only 10GB of data.  Well, Janet uses her iPhone as a personal hotspot for her iPad a lot.  Then Ben got notification from Xfinity Mobile that his data usage had exceeded 30GB, and although it is an “Unlimited Plan”, beyond 30GB/month, the data is throttled to 1MBPS, which is pretty slow.  It’s okay for email, but not for streaming any video content. We’re not entirely sure why our data usage was so high in March, but being on the road does make us much more reliant on cellular data, and when traveling, we do take more photos which are synced to iCloud.  Our Egypt trip generated a lot of photos, but we would have thought those would have synced over our Wi-Fi at home, but Ben’s 30GB usage was well over his normal usage.

Tomorrow will be the last day of clamming and camping for us, even though the razor clam opening extends to this Friday.  Janet has a hearing appointment on Wednesday and is running out of her medications.  When we started out on this trip, we didn’t know how long we’d be gone, but had anticipated having to be back before the tax filing deadline.  We’ve had an enjoyable and productive trip.  Chinese Visas in hand and lots of razor clams to last us the rest of the year.  Plus we’ve learned more about our RV’s LP and electrical systems.  Tomorrow’s low tide is at 8:33 a.m. and will be -0.3’.  We hope tomorrow morning will be as nice as today was.