Back on the Road Again

On Sunday, May 4th, we resumed our life on the road. After spending three days of schlepping stuff from the vacation home to the RV (my Fitbit says I did over 15 miles of walking and the rig was only 35 yards away), we pulled out of Sun’N’Fun and headed up I-75. Although our destination list was a bit unplanned, we did have an arrival date of Thursday, May 8th in mind because we wanted to attend the last two days of the AARP Convention in Boston.

After a couple of days of rain while we were trying to load up, the weather turned very nice for Sunday. Day one took us over to I-95 on US 301 and I-10 and into Georgia. We decided to cut the first day short and so were in the campground by 5:00. Along the way we made the obligatory stop at a Florida Citrus store.

Day two saw very nice weather again and took us into South Carolina and toward the coast when we decided to make a stop in Myrtle Beach. We stopped at Apache Family Campground and Pier and parked just a few yards from the beach. Late in the day, Geoff was reading on Facebook when he found a post and a picture from some fellow RVers and he recognized that the picture was of a rig just two spots away from us. He went over and talked with them and found out they were new to full-time RVing and the stop at Myrtle Beach was the first of many. They were actually in the process of helping the neighbor between us bring in one of their slides.

The next morning, Ellyn discovered that we could take Jordy out on the beach until 10:00, so we took a nice long walk along the surf and Jordy got nice and wet and sandy before we headed off on the road again. It was another nice day for driving and we made our way slowly Northwest until we got back onto I-95. Before we left the Carolinas, we wanted to get some BBQ for lunch. We pulled off at one place Ellyn saw and thought it would be promising, but it turned out the BBQ places she had seen on the web were only open on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Drat! So instead we visited a place that had a Southern Cooking Buffett. Fried chicken, but no BBQ. That evening found us at the Pohick Bay Regional Park just south of Washington DC.

Day four was a long one as we were starting to come into the more densely populated areas of the Northeast. We skirted the DC area pretty well and looped around Baltimore, across the Delaware Memorial Bridge and up the New Jersey Turnpike. We had some options in the NY area but most everything was bottle-necked coming through on a work evening so we just took the path of easiest negotiation and crossed the GW Bridge and on up I-95 and I-87. Our target was Croton-on-the-Hudson and Croton Point Park, where our friend, Peggy, was already camped and had gotten us a reservation for the night. We had been to this park before for the Clearwater Folk Festival but never before in the RV. The campground is a little funky but we had a nice evening having a picnic dinner with Peggy and then sitting around the campfire until it got uncomfortable to sit outside any longer. The day had been a bit rainy but the weather was good to us while we ate and visited. We finished the evening off with dessert in or RV.

It was good that we were not going anywhere in the car because the battery died. It is generally a problem if we tow for several days without driving the car anywhere because starting the car several times to get it ready for towing and then running the Brake Buddy from the car’s electrical system without getting the battery recharged will drain it. Geoff had added a wire to the cabling between the RV and the car to allow the RV to supply power to trickle charge the battery and keep the Brake Buddy running while towing, but something had gone wrong with this system. (As it turned out later, the connector at the car end had gotten rusty and the wire for the 12V supply had broken. A new part was acquired in Boston and some liquid electrical tape was applied to hopefully help alleviate this problem in the future.) A battery trickle charger was applied overnight and the car was ready to go the next morning.

Another rainy day took us to see another set of friends from Sun’N’Fun, Myra and David, at their home in Trumble, CT. We had a nice lunch with them and David and Geoff took the dogs for a nice long walk. They are planning to go see their kids for Memorial Day but we are going to their place again while we are visiting in CT right after Memorial Day.

Our last stop was Normandy Farms Campground in Foxboro, MA. We will be here for two weeks while we catch up with our kids and do some other fun things around Boston. The AARP Convention was the first order of business and it had us up earlier for the first two days and running coming in exhausted at the end of the day. The second day, we met with Logan, Brian, Katherine and Oliver at a restaurant for dinner near the convention center. The rest of the time here we hope to see our Grandson, Oliver, a lot and we will be going to a Red Sox game with everyone on Geoff’s Birthday. Then it will be off to the Danbury, CT area for Memorial Day week and then up to Winter Island Park in Salem, MA for the rest of our time in the Boston area before we head off on our next journey.

Spring 2014

We are winding down at Sun’N’Fun. I should probably not think of it as “winding down” now but rather as “gearing up” to our summer travel time. On Sunday we will get the RV out of storage and put it back on a real campsite so we can start cleaning it out and getting it stocked up with the stuff we want to take with us as we go traveling this summer. Sarasota is now really our home and we will have to close up the house here for a few months and will be traveling with only a portion of our belongings. And when we come back here in October, it will really be a “home coming” for the first time. Very strange.

So we will be doing a deep cleaning of the RV for the first time since we moved into it. There is still a lot of stuff in there, much of which can be thrown out. There is, of course, some things which are specific to travel in and the use of the RV. Those will stay but there is a lot of debris which can be eliminated. Then we will do a lot of actually cleaning, dusting, and scrubbing to make the place really clean before moving stuff in. The carpet in particular needs a real deep cleaning. Something which will need to be cleaned which cannot really be seen is the fresh water system. There is a procedure to flush and sanitize the system which will have to be done before we start traveling and living in it for the next 5 months.

Our plan for the summer is to visit the Northeast for about a month and then head out to the Great Lakes. We will be spending a lot of time in Michigan but also in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, and Ontario, Canada. In September, we will go back to Boston for our Grandson’s first birthday. It should be a fun time and we will be covering much of it right here in our travel blog, so come back and see how it is going.

We have been spending a lot of time and money getting our vacation home here in Sarasota set up the way we want. We’ve got lots of new furniture and gotten Ellyn’s sewing area set up for her. Of course, as with much of our living space, there is clutter already. We have tried to keep it to a minimum though, so we can really enjoy it. Of course, its best feature is that it is in Sun’N’Fun, a great place to live, and we really are looking forward to being here again in the fall for the new season.

The Next Phase

So we have entered into the next phase of our lives, and it involves more time in Florida at our favorite park, Sun ‘N’ Fun. We have moved out of the RV, for the time being, and into a vacation home. After nearly 5 years in a 40 foot motorhome, this 35 foot place, which is more than twice as wide, with the lanai, seems like a palace. It is allowing us to bring some of the more homely things out of storage which we put there when we moved out of the house in Connecticut. It means having real dishes and glasses again, since this home never goes bouncing down the road, and having real bookcases for our books and desks for our computers. Ellyn will have a work area for her sewing and Geoff has lots of room for his tools.

Jordy had to make an adjustment at first, since he seemed to think we did not belong in someplace so spacious as this, but he quickly adjusted, and now knows right where all the doors and his crate are. The RV moved into a storage facility they have here at the park and we will take it out in May, get it cleaned up, and go back out onto the road for the Summer. We have trips planned for the next two years and then we will have to make some decisions about our future on the road. But we will be spending our Winters and parts of our Autumns and Springs right here.

A Return to Sun and Fun

But sadly, to more sun than we had bargained for. Due to the construction of several new vacation home units adjoining the space we occupied here at the Sun’N’Fun resort in Sarasota, FL, most of the trees we enjoyed were removed. This was particularly distressing to Geoff, who used two of those trees to string his hammock. He really looked forward to getting this site last year because of those trees, but now, if he wants his hammock to use, will have to get a frame for it.

This picture shows the site last year and nearly every tree that is visible in the foreground is gone. The reason for this work was so that our site could be moved about 14 feet to the left to make room for the vacation homes which will be placed on our right. Now we are not happy about this, especially since this work was supposed to be mostly done this passed summer, and now, there will be a lot of construction done around us while we are here. However, this is not our land and we have no control over it.

We did get back here in nearly record time after leaving the Northeast after Thanksgiving. We actually left the Boston area on Wednesday before T-Day and drove 3 hours to the Danbury, CT area. We spent the first night of Chanukah with our friends in Bethel, CT and then drove up to New Milford, CT on Thursday morning to spend the day with Logan’s in-laws, Marc and Diane Dubrieuil, and also with Logan and Maureen. On Friday morning, we left their cul-de-sac and started the 1300 mile trek to Sarasota. The first day we made about 500 miles and stopped in southern Virginia for the night. The temperatures that morning had been just below freezing and, even in VA, the temps were still only in the 40s.

The next day we drove until dinner time and, while eating, decided we did not want to spend another cold night in a strange park and, with about 6 hours left to drive, decided we would push on as long as Geoff could handle it. At 2:30 AM, we pulled up to the Welcome Center at Sun’N’Fun. Although they could not put us on our site after midnight, they let us park temporarily and then, at 8:00 AM, Geoff got up and moved the RV to our site.

Now we have been able to go to some of the activities which have already started and, on Saturday, we will head out again to Walt Disney World up in Orlando, where we will meet up with our friends from New York State who are down here for a week. Then we will come back and likely park in the site next to our current one while ours is relocated to its new position. It is still nice to be back in Florida, our adopted home.

One Month of Oliver

Grandparents for only a month but we’re still trying to get used to the idea. We have gotten to baby-sit twice now while Brian and Katherine went out to a lunch and a dinner. Both times, Ollie was peaceful upon exit and on return (we can’t say how he was in between). We’ve gotten to change diapers, take pictures, get our own exercise bouncing him on the exercise ball (his favorite activity). That seems to work magic on him. Each of us has had him fall asleep in our arms while doing this. On our latest visit, he was cooing, pushing off with his legs and arms while being held, and looking around at everything.

Our Wait is Over

In February, we learned our son Brian and his wife, Katherine, were expecting our first Grandchild. They told us on a rare Skype call on which they showed us the ultrasound picture. They said the due date was September 18th. A couple of months later, we found out the gender of the child; a Grandson. So we made our plans for the year. We did not want to do as much driving as we did in the last two summers, so we planned on spending a lot of time in the Northeast in a few key places, and then to finish up the season in the Boston area to be there for the birth and to spend some time with them in the first few weeks of his life.

This worked out pretty well, as you can see from our previous posts, and so we have been getting more and more excited as the 18th approached. On September 15th, after keeping our phones at the ready, we got the call at 7:15 am that they were at the hospital and things were happening. We got to the hospital, a good 45 minutes drive from our campground, about 10:00 am, and started waiting. Brian told us how far along they were and said we probably had time to go get some lunch before there would be any more activity. We did so and, while there, got a text that things had changed and that an emergency C-section was being done (seems the baby was in a occiput posterior position and was getting stuck in the birth canal). When we got back to the hospital, Brian was in the nursery with their son and Katherine was in recovery.

We were able to view them through the glass in the nursery and, although they were still trying to decide on a name, Brian was able to tell us that he was “Oliver”. We already knew the middle name was going to be “Geoffrey” because both of the Grandfathers have that name. It was an emotional moment for both of us.

They we hurried back to the waiting room to do some emailing to our relatives and closest friends. We were instructed to avoid Facebook until Brian and Katherine had broken the news. While we were doing this, Brian came by with Oliver in his bed on his way to take him to Katherine in recovery. It was a wondrous close encounter.

We gave Katherine some space to start recovering from the c-section and for both of them to get used to catering to their new bundle of joy.

The next day, we came back for some snuggle time and to properly congratulate Katherine, although she was still feeling the after-effects.

It was well worth the wait and we are still basking in the glow. Tomorrow, we go back to our lavish lifestyle and head up to the Big-E in Springfield.

A Summer of Lying Low

Our Summer of 2013 has been somewhat less adventurous than the previous one, but that is precisely what we were going for. By this time in 2012, we had logged more than 9,000 miles since leaving Florida; this year, less than 3,000. After 6 weeks in Massachusetts, we headed for Maine, and the Wild Duck Campground in Scarborough. This quiet little campground is on the very edge of the Scarborough Marsh, the largest marsh in Maine, and is an Adults Only park. This doesn’t mean anything risqué (necessarily) goes on there, but rather that there are no little kids running around. I think the youngest person we saw was the guy living in the small fifth-wheel trailer next to us, either late twenties or early thirties, and his friends who were sitting around the campfire one night. The park lived up to its name by having a flock of wild ducks hanging out in the small pond at the entrance every day. They also have a can of corn meal near the office where you can get a handful and feed the ducks whenever you like.

We met up there with our friends, Howard and Helen, who had been at Normandy Farm for the last week we were there. In this location, the trees prevented us from getting a satellite signal, but they provided good cable, so we switched over from our DirectV DVR to our TiVo programmed to receive the cable signal. For some unknown reason, the TiVo was unable to tune the NBC affiliate on the cable, and we missed out on a few weeks of Dexter on Showtime, but otherwise were able to keep up on all our favorite shows. But, of course, we were not there to watch TV, so we headed out to do some sight seeing. The very first evening we went to the local Lobster Pound. It was the first of many seafood meals in the four weeks we were there.

Scarborough was a great location, being close to Portland, where we went for entertainment, good restaurants, and a wonderful boat ride around some of the local islands. There is a mail boat and light car ferry, which goes to five different ports on the islands off the coast, delivering mail, groceries, supplies, people, and cars. Many of the people on the trip were just tourists like us, who went along just for the ride. The day we went was the first nice day after almost a week of rain, so the boat was pretty full.

Another great day was spent in Perkins Cove in Ogunquit. Ellyn and I had been there a coupe of times before, once with our friends Nicole and Pieter from Belgium, when they came for an Autumn tour of New England. Howard and Geoff walked a portion of the Marginal Way and nearly got lost when they left it half way and then tried to find their way back to the cove. Fortunately, Geoff had his GPS on so was able to track their start. We also took a lobster boat trip and got to see them pull up a few traps. Each trap was loaded with lobsters and even a few crabs.

We were also very close to Old Orchard Beach. We went there one evening and ate out on the pier. We walked along the midway and Geoff rode on the Bumper Cars.

We left the Wild Duck Campground for two nights and to Augusta, ME, for a quilt show. Ellyn took a class and even provided an art quilt for the show. The theme of the show was the State Rock of Maine, Tourmaline. We then returned to Scarborough for the final week of our stay in Maine before we moved on to Quebec, Canada for the Newmar Kountry Klub Rally. Howard and Helen left Wild Duck while we were in Augusta and went to another place in Maine for a week before joining up with us in Quebec again.

In Quebec, we toured the city with the Klub and L’ile D’Orleans in the St. Lawrence River. We had several meals with the Klub and lots of socialization time. It was our first Newmar Rally since the national rally in Goshen, IL in 2009 right after we started our travels. Now we are planning to be at the next national rally in Escanaba, MI in 2014.

Continuing along the St. Lawrence River, we went to Montreal, QC next, also with Howard and Helen, and stayed at Camping Allouette, about 40 minutes from downtown Montreal. We were there three nights and enjoyed riding the tour bus around the city, going to the museums and churches, and eating some very tasty food. The weather, as it was in Quebec, was marvelous. Temps in the 25C range and sunny nearly the entire time. The campground featured an RV wash and we availed ourselves of it on the final morning before heading out on the road again. The facilities for clean the outside of the coach are not always available to us in campgrounds, so it is nice to give it a bit of a scrubbing when we can.

From Montreal, we split up with Howard and Helen again, and heading back into the US into Vermont. We spent a couple of nights in the White River Junction area and visited with Mom a couple of times. She is quite happy in her little apartment with her TV, Quiddler games, and weekly sing-a-longs. In February, we are planning to fly up from Florida to celebrate her 90th birthday with her.

Then we drove back north again about 1 1/2 hours to the little (!) town of Peacham, VT, where they were holding their third annual Peacham Acoustics Festival. Musicians from all over came here and there were workshops and jam sessions which Geoff joined in with and lots of music in the evenings inside the “most photographed church in Vermont” and also outside in tents. Again, the weather was excellent and we had a wonderful time. We were able to get hooked up with a couple who had a house on top of one of Vermont’s mountains about 15 minutes from town and we shoe-horned our RV into their front yard. They even provided us with a 20 amp drop and we were able to get satellite reception. When Geoff first turned onto their road, he was not sure about it, since Cow Hill Rd. made the Top of the World Highway in Alaska look like an Interstate.

Now, as our Summer is winding down, we have gotten back to Bethel, CT for a few days, and then we will be heading back to Boston for the blessed event in September. Our next blog post may be a big one.