Hello from Asheville, Charleston, Savannah

[bvanevery]

I've been car dwelling for almost 4 years now. I started out in National Forests with a lot of gear. I had a storage unit to clean out in Seattle, and in the course of performing that mighty task, I learned how to urban camp. It was mainly about minimizing the gear, to make my car more like a tent. It's a modest sized hatchback. I figured out that if I put the back seat down flat, I could sleep flat on the diagonal, even being 6' tall. I travel with my dog, which aside from good companionship, is an excellent source of warmth! We can handle 20*F pretty easily now, although we don't choose to remain in those kinds of conditions for long.

We mostly hang out in Asheville in the summer. I've started to develop a bit of a social life up there. When it gets too cold we head south. I have family in the Carolinas, which is why I'm trying Charleston this winter. Last winter we did a few months in Savannah, which we found to be fairly campable. I've been down to Florida a few times but don't much care for it. I'm willing to brave some colder weather farther north, just to be in more interesting cities. Coastal temperatures are not as bad as inland temperatures anyways. If the low on the coast is going to be 20*F, that means it'll get down to that just before dawn. Inland it means you're getting chilled most of the night. We could probably manage that but why bother. We go far enough south that my style is not cramped so much.

The purpose of the exercise is to write my own computer games. I also have various gadgetry projects I'm interested in doing, things that would be useful on the road. None have really panned out so far but I keep tinkering. Finally, I carry an easel and am determined to do more painting in the future. We did more travel when I was better funded in earlier years, but things are tight now. I do mostly urban camping nowadays, seeking to minimize gas and food expenses. I think I will yet prevail.

 

[PastTense]

Welcome Bvanevery.

But with this little space: where do you go to the toilet, bathe, cook, watch TV, store stuff...

 

[bvanevery]

Since I'm mostly doing urban camping, toilets are found at parks, grocery stores, Walmart, various big box businesses. In the woods, I dig a hole. If I only need to do #1 at night, I have a jar with a lid. I dump it at a later time somewhere unobtrusive, like on a tree with soil. If I'm ambling around and need to do #1 at night, I look for somewhere that has no light, no people, and has vegetation. I don't believe in peeing on concrete generally, because I think those smells will probably build up and not be returned to nature. Although in some cases like a rainstorm it may not matter.

I generally don't bathe. I'm not a stinky person AFAIK and nobody has complained. People do complain about my dog sometimes, but rinsing him with water removes the complaints. If I decide I must bathe, in warmer climates a plastic jug left in the sun counts as bathing water. If you're near a beach, there's often a shower for rinsing sand. I just rinse more thoroughly. I don't believe in soap for the most part, I use it very sparingly. I don't do shampoo either. For years I found that every shampoo I tried was making my hair frizzy. Then I realized the natural oils of my scalp were supposed to weigh down my hair. I do believe that changing clothes, especially socks, at modest intervals is important for sanitation. You could say I don't bathe but my clothes do. I carry 1 month's worth of clothing, in 1 frame pack.

I mostly don't cook. I buy things that don't need it, and I'm refining a "meat minimalist" diet now. The main basis of my diet is dairy and vegetables. When I do cook, I have a $10 hot plate and I plug it into an outlet at a public park. It has to be warm enough for me to bother. I prefer non-greasy foods that only need boiling, as that minimizes the mess to clean up. Ex. beans, quinoa, hard boiled eggs.

I don't watch TV. I do internet either at public libraries when it's cold, or whatever wifi signals I can catch outdoors when it's warmer.

My heavier possessions are in storage in my Mom's basement. After several moves including cross-country there isn't that much. I could get all of that into a 5x5 storage unit if I really had to, although I might have to pare down yet again. On the road, I'm not storing much of anything. Could give details of my full kit in another one of the subgroups.

It's very fair to call me a "lightweight" car camper. This is for the sanity of my living space, and for my stealth. I don't want to look like a theft target, or like a discombobulated person who's fleeing their home in terror. At night, everything except my cooler is below the window line. People usually have to be right up on us to notice we're in the car.

 

[blkjak]

welcome from s.w. florida .... blkjak

 

[Patrick46]

Hi Bvanevery, WELCOME to the site!

Sounds like you've got a good grasp of what you're doing. You should have alot to contribute around here, as folks could learn alot from your experiences.

There's several people on board here who live in their cars and small SUV's.

I spent a few years living in Hendersonville (right around the corner from Asheville), back in my high school years. Sure is a gorgeous area, especially the BRP!

Hello from Oregon!!

 

[sparky1]

welcome
from frozen southern Virginia 8.8 this morning.
have a great weekend.
sparky1

 

[bvanevery]

I spent a few years living in Hendersonville (right around the corner from Asheville), back in my high school years. Sure is a gorgeous area, especially the BRP!

Hendersonville also doesn't mind if you sit on a bench on their main street, plug into an electrical outlet, and use their wifi. It might be city wifi but I can't quite remember. Unfortunately the town itself is kinda dull / family / mostly rolls up early, so it's more of a pit stop on the way to other places like Asheville, the BRP, or the woods.

Marion NC has free wifi downtown and sometimes the electrical outlets are working too. Other times they're turned off. Never been bothered sleeping there, I tend to park in front of one of the big downtown churches. Not that exciting a town though, so again more like a pit stop.

 

[offroad]

Bvan - living in charleston. Let me know any questions you have about the area. Not a lot of free camping to be had unless you hit the national forest nearby.

 

[bvanevery]

Bvan - living in charleston. Let me know any questions you have about the area.

I'm curious about the local "loitering laws". 1st time in 4 years any cop in any city has accused me of "loitering". This was also absent any residential complaint, they seemed to have taken this point of enforcement on their own near Waterfront Park. Which deprives me of sitting in my car doing free wifi during the day. Found an article about Charleston having recently changed its loitering law to hopefully survive constitutional scrutiny, but haven't yet found what that law actually is. http://www.wltx.com/news/story.aspx?storyid=42420

In a similar vein, am wondering if there are homeless legal advocacy organizations in the area. I'm familiar with one in Asheville.

 

[offroad]

Downtown Charleston is effectively a museum from broad street south to water. They are very aggressive. Instead go to NORTH CHARLESTON parks or WEST ASHLEY area.

---

Look for the public library locations in those areas for wifi access, or McDonald's in those areas. Or Starbucks. --- also take a drive down to FOLLY BEACH and check out the waterfront north from the town. Should be quiet this time of year.

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Charleston city is a CRUISE SHIP destination. They want it very pretty. Oh and stay away from MY PLEASANT area. It's nickname is mt plastic because folks are very wealthy there and will ask cops to move you along. You can try the FRANCIS MARION national forest to boondock about twenty miles north along coast. But no wifi there.

---

There was an article about COLUMBIA sc being aggressive with homeless a couple months ago. Literally kicked them out of the city. Bet charleston will try to do that.

 

[bvanevery]

N. Charleston strikes me as too dangerous to car camp. W. Ashley is where that guy got killed sleeping in his SUV about 2 years ago.

Mt. Pleasant is so boring I wouldn't even need encouragement to move along.

I've done the Francis Marion. Not worth it as forests go. It's just not a beautiful forest, it's fairly nondescript. It's far away from stuff, you're really not doing Charleston if you're all the way up at the FM. Homeowners will call on you, but I showed the cops where the NF boundary marker was and they let me be. I'm really good with MVUMs, I showed them where I was on my electronic copy. Subsequently learned that you're supposed to have a permit for camping in the FM, given freely at the FS office. But that's a bureaucratic hurdle as the FS office is in the middle of the forest and only has certain business hours. Most forests don't have impediments like that, but in principle this one does. I figure it's because it's such a built up forest with so many homeowners in it. Same thing with the Sumter near Columbia actually, although that forest pretty much sucks weather wise, no reason to bother with it. Boil to death at 4 AM in the summer; we left. The Andrew Pickens district in the NW part of the state doesn't have any special permit requirements, it's a "regular" forest.

The Walmart on the way to Folly is like the slackest Walmart in the world. Some people never leave, and they run generators. Of course Folly Beach proper is another 7 miles down the road. Which is gas, a consideration for some of us. Haven't tried parking next to the beach proper. Didn't look sustainable in colder weather, as the library branch is only open 2 days a week. Good wifi signal outside of that library though, and there are electrical outlets at that pocket park. No parking for the pocket park though.

I fled the the coming winter storm. The news has painted it up as a big deal, don't know if it will be. I'm headed for St. Augustine, which has free wifi and electricity on the beach.

 

[offroad]

Bvan - very impressed. You are the Sherlock of cheaprvliving.

 

[Ladywolfe]

Bvan, you are my car hero! All of you that have been doing this type of living for a year or years, and have gotten your destinations and parking, etc down to a science---you rock!

thank you for the info in your posts (and everyone else) - nice to have advice from places that you have already been and things to see or things to avoid.

Stay warm!

 

[akrvbob]

The ACLU has done great work for the homeless and they should be somewhere in the area. Maybe give them a call?
Bob