edible notables
FANTASIC VOYAGE
Gypsy Getaway Wagons blazes new frontiers in travel.
WRITTEN BY KURT BICKEL
PHOTOS BY ASA GILMORE
So let’s say you’re heading off to the playa for Burning Man. Or you’re sojourning through small town America to peddle the 32 cases of Dr. Miggilicuddy’s Cure All you inherited from Uncle Stuart. Or you just want to spend some time under a large sequoia with the family. You’ll need shelter. A Winnebago conjures up images of a big-screen TV on an endless Pixar loop, and your significant other thinks that a tent meets the Supreme Court’s definition of cruel and unusual punishment.
Jeff Deming, known by some as the Gypsy King, has a homegrown solution. Inspired by the karro campo Basque wagons that carried sheepherders and their supplies along the western slopes of the Carson and Washoe valleys, his company, Gypsy Getaway Wagons, can rent or build you an individual, rolling work of evolving and towable art.
Far from roughing it
Step inside a gypsy wagon and it’s a completely different experience from anything else on the road. Wood-beam vaulted ceilings are speckled with light filtering through a stained-glass window. The benches and tables are hand cut and sanded hard woods designed to incorporate with the shapes that nature provided.
The exteriors are equally extraordinary in shape and decoration. Deming leaves the front wall intentionally blank on his rental units and encourages people to express themselves with paint; start your own work or build on what others have left. And, he notes, the canvas roof lets nature play her own tune in the wind and rain.
The trailers come supplied with solar power, a shower, two-burner propane cooktop, and outlets to recharge your devices. You pick the place to recharge your soul.
Kurt Bickel is giddy to be back in Reno after a stint in Texas, where “portable cabins” are mostly because of tornadoes.
Resources
Gypsy Getaway Wagons
844-497-7949 • Gypsygetawaywagons.com
Midweek rentals run $89 – $109. Weekend rentals are $109 – $149. Special rates apply for Burning Man. Delivery to your site is available. For purchase, each wagon is custom built and can include items such as radiant heat and a composting toilet.
