We haven’t written on this topic for a while because we’ve largely sorted out these matters. But we do want to share with you a new solution we found to one of our limitations while dry camping. We have 3 basic constraints when we dry camp: propane supply for the heater, stove and refrigerator; water supply; and electrical power to run lights and the fans on the heater and refrigerator. Our propane tanks are good for at least a couple of weeks, and so far at least, we haven’t had trouble tracking down free water to re-fill our supply tanks, so that has left us feeling only that we need to be very careful about our electric consumption. When we went to Costco in Cabo San Lucas last week, Bob picked up a small set of solar panels for $28, shown in the picture here. They connect to the Chalet’s batteries with alligator clips. We had power hook-ups at Los Barriles and La Paz since purchasing the solar panels, so we hadn’t had a chance to try them out yet. However, last night at Playa Juncalito where we have no hook-ups, we went wild and crazy using our batteries: we used two lights inside the Chalet, the outdoor “porch light” while cooking dinner and later to read by, and we used the inverter to power some iPod stereo speakers. This morning we checked the status of our batteries, and they were down to about 12.4 volts, from roughly 13 volts when they were fully charged as we left Paz yesterday. Bob hooked up the solar panels at 9am today and by 5:30pm when we returned from Agua Verde and the sun was down behind the mountains, the batteries had recharged up to 12.8 volts, almost fully charged! We’re very pleased to be able to eliminate this constraint. Of course this solution may not work quite as well back home where there isn’t the all-day, every-day sunshine that there is Baja, but then we won’t do as much extended camping as we do here either.
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