Monthly Archives: March 2017

RV LIFE – From Clean Blue Skies to Smog

Traveling full-time and living our RV Life, we get to experience different landscapes, different weather, and different air quality.

After being in northern Nevada and Palm Springs, California for several months and enjoying the clean blue skies, it was difficult to readjust to the smoggy skies in Bakersfield. However; the smog-sets are quite beautiful and we were even mesmerized by a smog moon one evening.

The skies in the Minden/Carson Valley area are stunningly blue.

Autumn in Minden was beautiful with the blue skies and the multiple colors of Autumn.

Even in Palm Springs, the contrast of the bright blue skies and the snowy mountain tops were breathtaking.

I’m always entranced with what I call a “day moon”. It’s just so cool to me to be able to see our planet’s satellite, even in the daytime.

Blue skies and palm trees.

So, we go from the beautiful blue skies shown above and head over the hill from the Mojave Desert and see the smog covered Central Valley. Blech!

I cringed as we headed down the mountain into the muck and instantly felt sorry for my daughter and her family that are breathing this pollution every day.

There have been a couple of days when we’ve traveled around town and the smog is thick enough that you can see the haze only a couple blocks away.

Although the sky in the day is sickening, it does provide for some quite stunning sunsets.

One evening, the smog was so thick that the moon looked like a giant pumpkin in the sky and was a hazy orange.

So, as you can see, beauty can always be found if you look at it in just the right way.

Each evening we look to the west to see just what the Universe will do with its paintbrush to turn the dirty brown into vibrant orange and pinks.

RV LIFE – Baking Cranberry Bread

It seems that so many RVers are afraid to bake in their ovens, or have had difficulties with burning what ever they baked. So far, so good with all that I have cooked or baked. The only thing that I do differently than a sticks-and-bricks home oven is that I rotate what I’m baking every 10 minutes. I’ve actually even done this before in other ovens that didn’t exactly bake evenly.   There are suggestions out there to use an unglazed tile from the hardware store, however; we haven’t been able to find any and we aren’t going to spend mucho dollars for a pizza stone. : )

We featured a few of the baked goodies in our Tom and Lori RV Life video: https://youtu.be/FM9G83F8QEc

We’ve had some requests for the cranberry bread recipe, so here it is. Enjoy!

(Cranberry Bread in top right corner)

Cranberry Nut Bread

Ingredients:

  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 1 1/4 cup sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 3 cups flour
  • 1 Tablespoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 3/4 cup water
  • 1/2 cup orange juice
  • 1 1/2 cups fresh cranberries, cut in half (cut the berries in half horizontally, you should have a “star” or “flower” in the middle showing where the seeds are)
  • 1 cup chopped walnuts
  • 1 Tablespoon grated orange rind

Directions:

  • In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar, then blend in eggs.
  • In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
  • Add flour mixture and liquids (water and orange juice) alternately a little at a time, mixing well after each addition.
  • Fold in cranberries, nuts, and orange rind.
  • Pour into greased and floured 9×5 loaf pan ( I prefer to use parchment paper on the bottom of the pan. Spray the pan with Pam WithFlour and then lay the piece of parchment paper on the bottom. The Pam keeps the parchment paper from shifting when you pour in the batter.)
  • Bake 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 1 hour and 10 minutes.

Let us know if you tried the recipe and if you’ve had success baking it in your RV oven.

If you have comments, suggestions, or requests, please leave them in the section below. – – Lori