[speaker001:] Okay.
[speaker002:] All right. What, uh, what kind of camping is there in Texas?
[speaker001:] Well, there, there are quite a few, um, parks, I guess, state parks, and there's a couple of national parks, I guess, that you can camp at.
[speaker002:] Uh-huh.
[speaker001:] Um, most of them have pretty good facilities. I don't know if the camping that I've done is really roughing it without a, a whole lot of stuff.
[speaker002:] Yeah. So, you do, uh, like backpacking and the like?
[speaker001:] Uh, done a little bit of that, mainly just, um, like camping out at the state parks, I've been to a couple in Texas and there's some real nice ones in Arkansas.
[speaker002:] Uh-huh.
[speaker001:] Um, I think Arkansas has one of the best parks departments around.
[speaker002:] Huh. Is the Ozarks in Arkansas?
[speaker001:] Uh-huh. Yeah, part of them are.
[speaker002:] Yeah, so, that's probably a pretty nice place to go [pause].
[speaker001:] Yeah, they've got, uh, real nice lake system, and, around their parks. One of them, uh, the gray, I think that's one of the ones we've been to, it's real nice there, a bunch of lakes around it, there's a golf course and, um, just a whole bunch of camping sites.
[speaker002:] Yeah.
[speaker001:] What about you, where have you, uh,
[speaker002:] Oh, I've been camping for years, not on a regular basis but, uh, I first started camping out in the desert in California.
[speaker001:] Uh-huh.
[speaker002:] And then sometimes in the mountains also in California and, uh, then I moved to North Carolina and I, I didn't camp for a long time, and then I started to, uh, go camping again kind of in conjunction with white water rafting, so, I'd go up somewhere and camp overnight and then do some rafting.
[speaker001:] Uh-huh.
[speaker002:] And then maybe camp another night and drive home. And that was, uh, that was pretty good so, I went out and bought a whole bunch of camping gear and, uh, you know, I still do it once in a while.
[speaker001:] Yeah, I think we've collected stuff off and on over the years. The more times we did it, the more serious we get about it.
[speaker002:] Uh-huh. Yeah.
[speaker001:] Where, where is Raleigh, in North Carolina?
[speaker002:] Uh, well, it's, it's, uh, in terms of north, south I would say it's, uh, a little, a little more towards the northern border of the state and pretty much in the eastern half of it.
[speaker001:] Okay.
[speaker002:] So what i-,
[speaker001:] Are you kind of away from the Blue Ridge Mountains,
[speaker002:] Well, it,
[speaker001:] an area.
[speaker002:] it's, uh, actually the, the Blue Ridge in Virginia are closer to Raleigh. They're about three hours away if you go due north.
[speaker001:] Uh-huh.
[speaker002:] Um, of the Blue Ridge in North Carolina I think are much nicer and you can pick those up going west, but then you're talking about six to eight hours.
[speaker001:] Yeah.
[speaker002:] The way it works. But, um, it's a real, it's a real nice place to go and camp, and there's some pretty decent campgrounds although, I don't think Raleigh, I don't think the state of North Carolina takes, they probably just don't spend as much money as a lot of other states might.
[speaker001:] Uh-huh. Yeah, my wife's from the western part of Virginia, we've been down the parkway a lot, but I didn't know how much, how much camping areas there were along there.
[speaker002:] I think there's quite a few. I can't say I've checked them all out though.
[speaker001:] What, what's it like camping in the desert and California, that seems,
[speaker002:] It's, uh,
[speaker001:] like a challenge.
[speaker002:] it's actually kind of incredible, it's really, really nice. Um, I like it better than almost anything I've ever done. Just the sky is so amazing. You know, you really can probably count thousands of stars,
[speaker001:] Uh-huh.
[speaker002:] and, uh, it's, it's just kind of nice. I like the, uh, I think the desert has a rare kind of beauty which, uh, a lot of people don't realize, you know, they hear desert and they think of scorpions and snakes and sand and being real dry, and lack of water, course it, it has all of those qualities but it also has a certain quality of beauty that you just don't find anyway else except in a desert.
[speaker001:] Uh-huh.
[speaker002:] So, it's pretty nice. The, uh, the movie, THE DOORS, has so-, some nice desert scenes, those guys all go camping out in the desert.
[speaker001:] Yeah.
[speaker002:] Of course, they drag a lot of drugs with them but, um, the, uh, the shots are, are pretty nice and it's sort of like that, I mean, it's just almost surreal, in some places.
[speaker001:] Huh.
[speaker002:] It's very pleasant.
[speaker001:] Are the temperatures real extreme there or the, the,
[speaker002:] They can be, yeah. I mean, you got to, you sort of have to choose your season carefully and know what's going to happen.
[speaker001:] Uh-huh.
[speaker002:] I've been camping in Death Valley, one doesn't go in July [LAUGHTER].
[speaker001:] Yeah, [LAUGHTER] true.
[speaker002:] But it's beautiful in February.
[speaker001:] Yeah.
[speaker002:] I mean, it's just beautiful. The days, get up into the high eighties, uh, maybe the nineties but it's, it's quite bearable and then the nights are reasonably warm, you know, sixties or seventies. It's just great. It's really very nice.
[speaker001:] Yeah, we've talked about planning a trip up through, um, I have a sister-in-law that lives in New Mexico, up through New Mexico and into Colorado and the Grand Canyon area. [Very faint] I don't know, don't know when I'm going to get a chance to do that but,
[speaker002:] Yeah. Well, that would be, that would be pretty nice. I've been, I have been camping on the south rim the Grand Canyon. That's okay. A lot of people like to go down and camp down inside, I was just too lazy that trip to do all that walking,
[speaker001:] Uh-huh.
[speaker002:] especially with my gear.
[speaker001:] I'll bet. That one, one thing you said about the stars is really true it's, when you're close to a big city like Dallas, the, the lights kind of wash,
[speaker002:] Oh, yeah.
[speaker001:] wash off the star so it's nice to, to get away. It's just amazing,
[speaker002:] Yeah, it,
[speaker001:] how, how much you miss.
[speaker002:] Yeah, it, yeah, it really is. I mean, I don't think I ever see the Little Dipper, you hear people talk about the Little Dipper.
[speaker001:] Huh [very faint]. Uh-huh.
[speaker002:] But I don't think I ever see it except when I go get out of the city and go camping in the desert or in, in the mountains. Otherwise it's just too faint [pause].
[speaker001:] Well, I guess we've talked as much as we need to on the subject.
[speaker002:] Yeah, I think we fulfilled our obligation. Well, thanks for calling, nice talking to you.
[speaker001:] Yeah, it was good talking to you Robert.
[speaker002:] Okay, bye-bye.
[speaker001:] Bye-bye.