The Firestarter Triangle

We left Bernalillo NM for the weekend and headed up to Georgia O’Keeffe country near Abiquiu. We had finished all of our housekeeping tasks and were waiting on a few deliveries that would bring us back to Bernalillo the following week.

We thought one of those deliveries would be our solar panels. But we got a nice surprise on Friday before we left town - our solar panels had arrived. We had planned to boondock in Abiquiu either way. Our new solar panels would make it much better. We picked them up on the way north. Now we could be truly off grid with the means to sustain ourselves.

We chose the Riana Campground at the Abiquiu Reservoir Army Corp of Engineers site. The drive from the Albuquerque area to the campground was breathtaking, especially along highway 96. It truly earns its green scenic route dots in the atlas.

I had read that the Puerco camping loop was the quietest. We headed around that one to choose our site. We used our most educated campsite selection criteria to date - downhill and upwind. Downhill wasn’t an option as the lowest campsite on the loop was already taken by a group we suspected as firestarters (we weren’t wrong). But we did get upwind of everyone. For a few days we were free from breathing smoke, even though fires were lit and we stayed on guard for a wind direction change.

We have gotten into the habit of staying the Sunday night of most weekends wherever we are. Most of the weekenders, who also seem, in our experince, to start the most fires, leave Sunday during the day. We can then get at least one day and night smoke-free. We decided to do this at Abiquiu.

On Sunday, the campers who had started fires were leaving. We looked forward to a beautiful, fresh air night.

Then other campers started to arrive. The first couple drove to a site downhill from us. Before they set up, they drove back up the hill toward our camper. Pat was outside.

“How is it here? Quiet?” the man in the RV asked.

“Oh yeah, very quiet. And no smoke either. We love it,” Pat said.

It hadn’t been all that quiet - our previous downhill neighbors thought we all wanted to listen to their music two nights in a row, but at least they turned it off by 10 p.m. Pat was proud of himself for fitting in his comment about smoke. They didn’t look like firestarters but dropping a hint wouldn’t hurt. The couple nodded, thanked him, drove off, and were soon back at their chosen site.

After a while I saw them walking up the road. When they returned, they were carrying wood they had collected. Oh no. It was 3 p.m. and the wind had shifted. Sure enough, soon I smelled their wood smoke.

Before the night set in, two more campers showed up, one setting up nearly straight across from us and one directly uphill from us. All three had a fire going that night.

Sunday morning, before any new campers had arrived, we had discussed staying another day. The firestarter triangulation sent us on our way the next morning. We both acknowledged that we were liable to find the same thing at our next camping location - no use kidding ourselves the grass is any greener, the air any clearer elsewhere. We have yet to find our no campfire mecca. But we remain hopeful and keep searching.

Our solar panels were awesome. I had the most fun watching the controller register the charge to our battery. Our most amazing sun - I thank you.