Mini-Visitors Visit Minivan Camper at Horse Thief Springs |Vanlife| 

To prevent rodents from trying to nest in your vehicle, spray liberally with diluted peppermint oil. I had mice chew the cables in my brand new van over the first winter, costing Way Too Much to fix. So now I use 40+/- drops of peppermint oil per 2 cups water in a regular squirt bottle and spray once a week in the wheel wells and engine compartment. Doesn't hurt anything, and the van smells nice 🤗

Beautiful shots❤

👋😀 I'm glad to hear that you didn't take any mice home with you. 👍 Except for the mice it seemed to be a very quiet and restful adventure, I very much enjoyed it. ❤ Your meals made me hungry. 😅

Thank you for showing how good vegan food can be! Cheers!

I use some solar Xmas lights. I toss the string under the van when I park and have them on an alternating pattern.

First thought, yea mice are everywhere. But then hearing them, oh my, I also couldn't sleep with that. I've used both peppermint and cedar oil to keep them out of a vehicle parked for a while. A few drops on round make-up pads placed around, including in the cabin air filter seems to work.

That feeling of accomplishment when you succeed at something under not the perfect circumstances is just awesome. Thanks for the video. I solo tent camp a lot in the mountains, high altitude and love the feeling of doing things in a very unconventional way and succeed at it. Get granulated coyote urine, dissolve with water and spray around the van, mice won’t come near the scent of a predator and don’t worry you won’t smell it but they will, Amazon sells it and it even works on marmots, they’re worse than mice.

I make my vegan mock tuna salad sandwiches with hearts of palm, celery, sweet onions, veganaise, and seasonings. If I am feeling fancy I put green apples and green grapes in it. I imagine minus the fruits this would toast up wonderfully as a melt sandwich as well.

LIGHTS!!! Lights under the van will keep them out.

That first spor is called the Little Grand Canyon. Oddly enough perfect Internet and text etc connect up there via puttng your phone on wifi.

Always a pleasure viewing your videos, Kelly ✅️! I myself am skiddish about being out in the middle of nowhere (wish I wasn't), but in a way I can feel like I can as I watch you being so brave and adventurous out there. A real nail-biter at times. When you said you were getting out of your van at night, I said NO, don't do it! Too bad you had to leave because of the mouse populations trying to get into your van. I would have made that exact decision, too. Once I saw a mountain lion walk by my campsite in Laguna canyon and I wouldn't leave my suv after that so I just drove home, took a shower, then drove back the next morning to finish my "peaceful " camping experience. After all, it was paid for😉.

Adventuring with Amanda swears by Grampa Gus's Rodent Repellent. I think it's peppermint and cinnamon. Loved the video. Hugs from Alberta, Canada.

Save yourself somewhere and tear it is small microwave You can make anything in it the extra small one you don't have to worry about rice cookers coffee makers

there is a saying that the world is small but watching your videos it can also be very big. HI

You always have informative content that's a pleasure to watch. Mice can make for big $$$ trouble. I thought your pine sol idea was clever, and hoped it would succeed. Me? I'd avoid the area during mouse season.

I'm so sorry you had to go through this!

Chocolate has l-tryptophan( amino acid its helps you tolerate pain, also lets your sleep be true.So chocolate pancakes is a great meal ( anytime in my book) and coffee well the drink of cowboys and cowgirls.Thanks for your first person account of Horse Thief Canyon Camp...need more eagles and hawks to eat those mice.Hmmm perhaps you could travel eith a pet falcon.....

Thanks for taking us along again! Yes, purple quartz is amethyst. 👍 I'll take a look at what info I can find, once I am done watching, because you've gotten my interest with those pretty rocks and I have no idea what the geology is like there. Well, granites and stuff, I suppose? If I look at those rounded hills behind you there, yes, that is what granite weathers like. I used to collect rocks in my teens, used to go to Idar Oberstein in Germany where you can find similar pretty rocks - quartz, amethyst, agate, smoky quartz etc - but back then I had no idea of the local geology there, I guess. Anyway, laterzzz. Speaking of vegan sort of mayonnaise, look into aquafaba. I used chickpea juice for the first time about ten days ago and I made a sort of mayonnaise with it. Love it! Need apple cider vinegar, ground mustard seeds, olive oil or the like and perhaps a little bit of salt, but not necessarily. Been trying other things too. You can for instance use pea juice and tofu liquid too. Plenty of protein in that juice. Did a quick search and found a BLM page that says "Horse Thief Camp, Horsethief Spring and Amethyst Trail are all located within the Tecopa Pass Historic Trails Special Recreation Management Area (SRMA)." Googled a little more and found that geologically speaking, it is the Tecopa Basin and there are all sorts of rocks there, including granites, yes, and gneisses, but also volcanic rocks. There's a pdf by John W. Hillhouse at nrc.gov and usgs.gov that goes with a map, if you want to know more. You can find fossils in the area too, apparently. It's a bit of a smorgasbord, lots of different things. This sounds cool too: "A dominant feature of the Tecopa area is the Amargosa River, which is dry except during infrequent thunderstorms or near permanent springs at Shoshone and Tecopa." Oh! According to Wikipedia, it flows mostly underground, actually. Isn't that cool? It goes to Death Valley, but it goes into the apparently even deeper underground there.

Gorgeous photos!

I put a red apple in my regular tuna sandwiches so I'm sure it would be good in vegan one.

I sometimes car camp in a Yukon and I used to use a bigger ceramic heater (12/14 inch one) and it was way too much heat for the space, so i bought one like the one your using and its perfect, I used it in February (I'm in the mid atlantic area) it was about 25-30 degrees and I couldn't even use it all night just got to hot (strong for it's size) so I used it before I got into the sleeping bag and right before I got up, I was at a campground plugged in so power wasn't an issue (no dispersed camping around here) it's the perfect size for car camping highly recommend it to others. Btw I didn't see that heater on your list.

I'd try adding some Old Bay seasoning to the Vegan Toona melt. I have a Ridge Monkey too. Have seen a lot of RU-vid videos recently using a Pie Iron. Similar concept, just longer handles for a campfire. I like the compactness of the Ridge Monkey. You were my inspiration for buying a GoSun Go last year, which led me down a rabbit hole into solar cooking.

Basil goes on everything 😊

I can't blame the mice when you keep producing all these food smells 😅

Generally,a light will keep them away.set a portable lite on under your engine,they love to chew your wiring

Peppermint strong for mice

To keep moles out of the garden, I believe that there is some sort of a device that emits a “frequency “ that repels rodents. It might be worth looking into for future adventures. Love your channel.👋😃🇨🇦

Be careful; In 2020 I was stalked/harrassed by a (meth head? psycho?) at Horse Thief. He repeatedly ripped by on the dirt paths at highway speeds while screaming threats that alternated between obscene and incoherent . Then parked behind a nearby hill and watched for a few more hours. No reception as you saw. I can defend myself but I want to be talking to 911 at the time if it comes to that. I no longer camp in areas without cell reception. I've only had three seriously unpleasant experiences in my 6 years of campervan living, and all were in that particular state. I've since crossed it off my list.

Enjoyed your camping trip. The mice are abundant and a pain.

Hehe..... You're near the place where a famous, huge, youtuber lives. Maybe she'll drop by ?

👍👍👍👍

I make curried chickpea salad sandwiches. Or add grapes and apples and eat it as is.

Buckwheat.. growing up we knew an old man who ate buckwheat, and anything healthy..I think my Dad made us try it lol..I'll have to get some now and see if I like but even if I don't it's probably good for me..and definitely a Thelma and Louise canyon..I'd be scared even as far as you parked LoL

I'm interested to see how you're managing a plant-based diet. Do you have leftovers? As a plant-based eater, I live on leftovers (or meal prep). Been thinking how I'll manage that when I have my van.

OR…..bring a cat as a companion! Maybe two cats!😊

Found a mouse nest in my air intake,put in a wire screen.

Blow your horn; get some peppermint oil spray and cayenne pepper sprays and spray into your car. Mice hate those smells and there is RODENT REPELLENT at Walmart have this product that you could put up under your van when you are parked. Hope this helps.

I guess it is too cold when you made this video for the rattlesnakes to be out yet. All those mice would attract huge numbers of snakes to eat them. I wonder if a disconnected rattlesnake rattle would scare them off? Van lifers would love if you could figure out a way to keep them out. Pine sol doesn't work. Peppermint and herbal stuff doesn't work. I know people that just put out half a dozen snap mouse traps under their van and just kill the local mouse population off. There are 5 gallon bucket live traps around that could catch them without killing them.

Beautiful location. but c'mon now, a Vegan tuna melt? why not just call it what it is? I mean really, it is a bean and potato and corn starch sandwich.. why do vegans have to call their meals things what they don't like or want.. if you don't like dairy why call it cheese, if you don't eat or want tuna, fishes or meats, why call it that.. I just don't understand this mentality, so bewildering

My BIGGEST FEAR about being out in the middle of nowhere like that, or out on my sailboat in a large body of water, is waking up with a UFO hovering silently over my van... or a USO GLOWING under the water underneath my sail boat. I think I would just DIE from HEART FAILURE. And I worry about who would rescue my cat?