The Cold Plunge
The degree to which you are not on the mark mentally is the degree to which you suffer.
Durango, Colorado | May 30, 2026
We parked overnight in a neighborhood in Durango. Still here this morning. Plenty of street parking, feels safe, no problem. I do a lot more of this type of camping than Shannon does. My van is set up well for it. I remember during the three years I spent researching this lifestyle, one of the things I kept hearing was that the way you imagine you’ll use the vehicle and the way you actually do once you’re out there are often very different. That was certainly true for me with stealth camping. Shannon calls it city camping. It was not part of my original vision at all. In my mind it was remote mountaintop lakes and wilderness all the time. Luckily I ended up with a van that’s perfect for it, because I wind up doing a fair amount. I love it, especially since I got the e-bike. I can go explore everything wherever I park. Shannon tapped on my window a few minutes ago, handed me a zip lock baggie of fresh mint leaves, and rode off to a hot yoga class.
Yesterday Shannon left camp around 10am to run errands in town. I stayed back and spent time working on what might be a new Hi-Fi Lonesome song. I was thinking about Willie Nelson’s “On the Road Again.” I often play it when I pull out and drive off to a new place. It’s always a great feeling. So I figured, why not make something like that for myself, a song I can play in exactly those circumstances, one of my favorite circumstances, that is exactly what I want to hear in that moment? I chased that song three times harder than I’ve chased any song before. I think I got it, but I’m going to live with it some more.
I planned to leave camp at 12:15, drive 45 minutes into Durango, run some errands, pick up my packages, and then roll on to the hot springs about 15 minutes past town. I got on the road at 12:15. Then halfway there I noticed my phone said 1:45pm. My computer had been showing an hour behind. This keeps happening as we cross time zones, especially hovering near the edges. So I skipped the errands, grabbed my packages, and went straight to the hot springs.
I loved the hot springs. Four or five hours, mostly going back and forth between the cold plunge and the hot one. They were right next to each other. The cold one said 43 degrees on the sign but my laser thermometer said 47. The hot one said 109 but it was actually 106. Shannon was off on her own most of the time taking birthday calls.
I noticed something different about my body in the cold plunge. Normally I’m able to flip a switch internally, moving quickly from the suffering of the cold to being in the zone, feeling nothing, the discomfort decreasing until it’s gone. Yesterday the suffering just kept increasing and I couldn’t make that transition. I think five months of keto may have something to do with it. It’s altered my sensory perceptions in many areas, everything seems heightened, and I’m significantly leaner. I know these cold water techniques activate brown fat as part of their mechanism. I have a lot less of it now. Whatever the explanation, I couldn’t break through at first. So I just kept going back and forth. After about five rounds I broke through, had the experience I was used to, and reached the state where the cold stopped bothering me. I came away with a strong feeling that I need to be doing more cold water training during this season. It has a way of hardening me mentally that I intuitively know I’m going to need over this next period of my life. The cold water is a great teacher. There is zero bullshit. The degree to which you are not on the mark mentally is the degree to which you suffer. So you learn. It is like a muscle you can strengthen. I’ll be looking for cold water in Colorado.¹
After the hot springs we debated where to go. Plenty of BLM land outside town, but we both wanted more Durango. Drove in, found our neighborhood spot, walked around downtown on a Friday night. I loved it. It has some of the western saloon feel of Telluride mixed with the small downtown charm of Ashland, Oregon. It’s changed and grown since I was here in college. I like it a lot.
I think we’ll spend another night here. I want to ride my bike around and see everything I can. Big food shop, fuel up, maybe laundry.
¹ A note on the keto and cold connection from Claude AI: body fat reduction is likely the primary factor. Brown adipose tissue generates heat in response to cold and is activated by cold exposure. Five months of keto means less insulation and potentially less brown fat to draw on. The heightened sensory sensitivity that comes with ketosis is probably contributing too. Ketosis affects neurotransmitter activity and sharpens sensory perception across the board. Cold would be no exception. The observation about it being like a muscle you can strengthen is well supported. Cold exposure training builds the neural pathways that make the transition easier over time, which is exactly what happened after five rounds.
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