You can spend a few night at a time in the southwest camping for free, then go to the campgrounds every 3rd or 4th night to recharge the batteries, and fill the fresh water tank, dump the black stuff, do laundry.
Solar panels can really help with the dry camping. I figure that I saved well over $3000 dry camping, even at a conservative $10 savings each night. Now you can get a solar system for only a few hundred dollars, so why not, it will save $200 in just a week of camping fees.
SunElec.com They had a 12 volt 140 watt panel on sale for $229 a few weeks ago. Get one with a 12 volt "Nominal" volt rating, and use a PWM controller. It will have a open circuit rating of around 19.8 to 22 volts when nothing is connected to it.
For mounts, I used 6" long 2" angle aluminum, with three 3/16" holes for #10 screws into the roof, and 5/16" hole for a 1/4" bolt into the panel metal frame (do not get frameless panels installed only in houses).
I wired the panel with #10 wire UV rated through the refrigerator vent to my closet (where the controller was mounted) to the battery.
It goes in pretty easy, just like a dot to dot drawing.
Check out this site for some free places to camp.
FreeCampgrounds.com I have listed some of my favorite campgrounds and BLM locations around the southwest.
You might tell all your realitives that you 'must' leave by October 1. The ALbuquerque Hot Air Balloon Fiesta will happen the first week of October, and surely must not be missed. And once you are there, you can start to travel from free BLM area to another all across Arizona.
http://www.balloonfiesta.com/index.php/event-schedule?page=event-info/event-scheduleTell all your friends that you can pick up 2 of them at the Phoenix airport for Christmas, but otherwise will be out west this year, out of the snow too! They will (might) understand!
I hope that you are drinking alkaline water now, and no acidic sodas. . .
Good luck,
Fred.
