Civil War Tour

Though it wasn't actually planned this way, the last two weeks have been an amazing refresher about the American Civil War.  We arrived in Appomattox, Virginia after leaving Raleigh and realized we had landed in the heart of the civil war surrendar that occurred in April 1865.  Our RV park was across the road from a new Confederate Museum and we were only a few miles from where General Robert E. Lee surrendered the armies of Northern Virginia to General Ulysees S. Grant.

Because it was the annual anniversary of this surrender, we caught the end of a week-long series of events and presentations about the war in both the museum and at the Appomattox Court House grounds where the surrender actually occurred.  We both found ourselves remembering small pieces from our long-ago school history lessons, but we definitely got a much more detailed experience.

While in the area, we also spent a day with former Austin friends, Bob and Karen Rasmussen.  Funny enough, they took us to another historic site -- Thomas Jefferson's second home in Poplar Forest (west of Lynchburg VA).  Besides being a cool place to tour, there was a craft beer festival going on to raise funds for the organization who is maintaining/restoring the site.  Needless to say, we had to contribute to the cause and sample some of the special brews.  Below is a picture of the 4 of us in front of Jefferson's house.

Our next RV park was in Louisa, VA, for a night to visit with a special cousin, Annie Gavan Tillack and her husband David. He is an avid (and successful) hunter and we were fortunate to drive away with a lovely chunk of venison bologna to fortify us for our next stop -- Washington D.C.

I can't say enough about our 9 days there.  We were in Cherry Hill RV park which is specifically known for its D.C. proximity. It was easy to access the metro to go in to the city -- which we did almost every day.  We even drove the car in several evenings... once with the bikes so we could ride all over the Mall and see the big monuments.  We both lived in nearby towns as children and remembered bits and pieces of visits there, but to enjoy and appreciate the museums and history as adults is definitely something special too. I even got my picture taken with the cherry blossoms!

We decided to pace ourselves and not try to do more than 2 big things each day with one exception... the Holocaust Museum by itself was enough for one day.  To continue our Civil War experience, we made it a point to go to Ford's Theater where President Lincoln was assassinated only 5 days after Lee surrendered to Grant in Appamatox. In fact, John Wilkes Booth's original plan was to just kidnap him and perhaps ransom him to end the war in the South's favor.  The war surrender changed all of this and he went for a kill instead.  We didn't get to do everything on our D.C. list, so we'll just have to come back!

I write this update from our next stop -- Dover, Pennsylvania.  So far we have made day trips via car to Hershey (to visit the chocolate) and Gettysburg (to visit the battlefields). Though the exact spot where Lincoln gave the Gettysburg Address in 1863 isn't marked, we did get to see the railroad station where he arrived and see the house he slept in before that speech.  The National Park Service has a fabulous museum, painted cyclorama, and movie about the 3 days of the battle. Before the invention of "moving pictures" to visually tell stories, Cycloramas were used.  This one was opened to the public in 1883, is 27 feet tall and 359 feet in circumfirence, and is mounted in a circle so you can see the full battle scenes (and resulting devastation) in a full 360 degrees.

Not sure that we have any more Civil War history in any of our next stops.  Guess we'll find out!

Spring break cruise and then further North

After suffering through a cold month in Raleigh (have already decided to wait an extra month before heading up here NEXT year), we took a break and enjoyed a Caribbean cruise over the school "spring break" with Jeffrey's brother David, his wife (and my college friend) Mary, and their 3 terrific kids -- Karl (age 17), Anna (15), and Isaac (13).  They had never cruised before, so we got to enjoy watching them explore cruise ship life for the first time.

We sailed on the Norwegian Epic from Miami to St Maarten, St Thomas, and the Bahamas.  The boat held over 4000 passengers (biggest one we've ever been on), so there was no lack of things to do.  I must say that bowling and playing pool when the boat is rocking is an interesting challenge. We also really enjoyed the shipboard entertainment which included Blue Man Group and a Cirque show.  Mary even got tapped to go on stage with the Blue Men to be part of the show and was a celebrity for the rest of the cruise as fellow passengers came up to her commenting about it.  I have included a few pictures from our snorkeling adventure below.

Got back to Raleigh and was pleasantly surprised by beautiful warm weather.  Our RV neighbor said it was cold and rainy the entire time we were gone (glad we missed it).  We have proof of the rain part as our tupperware container that catches water from our small slide leak was just about full.  We had this leak addressed at our last service appointment and it no longer leaks when the slide is OUT, but now leaks when the slide is IN... go figure.  It is back on the list to re-look at when we have another service appointment in the summer. Luckily it doesn't stop us from traveling... just a nuisance.

As promised, below is the next few months of our travel itinerary!

4/12 - 4/13:  Appomattax, VA -- Parkview RV Park to see friends Karen & Bob Rasmussen
4/14: Louisa, VA -- Small Country Campground to see 2nd cousin Annie Gavan and husband David
4/15 - 4/23:  College Park, MD -- Cherry Hill RV Park to pig out on Wash D.C. museums & monuments
4/24 - 4/30:  Dover, PA -- Gettysburg Farm RV to enjoy more USA history
5/1:  Lake Ariel, PA -- Just a one night stay to get us closer to our next stop
5/2:  Wallkill, NY -- Newberg KOA to visit friends Thorne Ventura and gal pal Lynne
5/3 - 5/9:  North Branford, CT -- Totoket RV Park to connect with Jeffrey's cousins Tim and Pete Martin + see the CT coastline
5/10 - 5/16:  Old Mystic, CT -- Seaport Campground to see college roommate Lisa Pickett and her husband Zack + maybe a car day trip or two into Rhode Island
5/17 - 5/18:  Back to North Branford to catch a quick visit with friends Guy & Joan Clark
5/19 - 5/23:  Hightail it back down to Raleigh NC
5/24 - 6/23:  Another month with our Raleigh friends and family
6/24 - 6/28:  On the road back to Florida
6/29 - 7/5:  A week near Gainesville, FL in the Williston Crossings RV Park
7/6 - 7/7:  A few days in Seffner FL prepping for our RV service appointment
7/8:  Max goes into the shop to have his floor worked on AGAIN.  Hopefully they'll get the grout right this time... plus fix that slide leak.  We are proud that we haven't managed to break anything else yet!

Chasing the cold weather to NC

Wow, how time flies when you are having fun! It has been over 3 weeks since my last post as we were about to leave Gainesville FL on our way to a 6-week stint in NC. Heavy rain and storms chased us across FL to Jacksonville for a one-night stop so we could visit with Jeffrey's brother Richard and his wife Cathie. We almost stayed a second night to wait out some heavy rain activity, but were lucky as the weather moved past us by late morning so we could drive through Georgia for our next one-night stay near the southern border of SC and then another night near the northen border.

This gave us a chance to try our new annual Passport America membership that gives you discounts for short stays at certain parks.  If these are along your route, they are a great deal at 50% off.  We haven't yet tried the "stay overnight in a Walmart parking lot" option as we prefer a park instead. It may sound like we aren't driving very far every day, but we have determined that 200 miles a day or less is ideal and we like to get to our destination by 2pm to have some day left to explore or relax.

Made our final road trip "leg" on February 28th to get us near Raleigh, NC where we have two of Jeffrey's brother's, their wives (both of which Maren went to college with), two nephews, and a niece.  We also arrived just in time to celebrate a milestone birthday of my maid-of-honor.  She also happens to be one of our sister-in-laws, having met one of Jeffrey's brothers at our wedding.  Lucky us!

Max is parked in nearby Clayton (since Raleigh itself does not have RV parks), but we are only a 25 minute drive to the nearest family and are spending as much time as we can hanging out with the them as well as connecting with former IBM friends who are now based here. We are also getting lots of experience with cold weather.  We have had numerous nights that dipped below freezing and require us to decide to run either our propane furnaces, our heat pumps, or both.  Thankfully, Max's dark paint warms him/us up quickly once the sun comes up, so we aren't needing heaters during the day.  By the way, this dark paint is NOT as welcome in the summer months!

Our plan is to be here until mid-April, but We have been busy planning our travels for the few months beyond NC so we can find parks along our path. It is really quite a process -- decide where to go and who to see, what parks are nearby, do they match our needs, get a reservation, etc. Some RVers don't bother planning in this detail, but we are still newbies and prefer to have things arranged ahead as much as possible.  The size of our rig (41 feet) also limits what parks we can stay in as some only have spaces that are smaller.

I'll post our next itinerary soon :-)  For now, enjoy the picture below... Max hanging out with the "big boys" at a rest area we stopped at on the way north. 

Final Gator sports before leaving Florida

We have really enjoyed seeing so many Gator sports while staying near Gainesville -- several men's and women's basketball games, women's lacrosse, and even women's gymnastics.  We cap it off with a final men's basketball game tonight before we hit the road again.  Didn't make time for any baseball or softball, so we'll save that for next year's visit.  We have already made a reservation for this same RV park for March of 2014.  It is amazing how busy Florida is for RVers in the winter, so you need to book way ahead for a nice RV park.

Aside from Gator sports, we have had a great visit with Jeffrey's parents and even made it down to see my uncle Marshall and aunt Diana in St. Pete one more time while letting Lazydays in Tampa have Max a few days to replace a part that wasn't available on our first service visit.  We are hoping that things will even out and we'll have fewer issues now that we've had a few good "shake down" months.  We opted to defer having the floor grout fixes done until this summer, so we'll get back down here sometime early July (yeah I know it will be hot and humid!)

We also drove down to Brooksville for a day visit with our new "RV" friends, Bill and Linley Zinger.  We met them on our first trip to Lazydays as they were purchasing their first Class A motorhome and will be fulltiming as soon as their house is sold.  It is fun to share experiences with folks who are also choosing to embark on this somewhat wild lifestyle :-)

Our adventure now takes us over to Jacksonville and then up the east coast
to North Carolina, so stay tuned!

Jeffrey with his parents, Jack & Evelyn Martin

Go Gators!

After enjoying our final week in Lake Louisa state park, we made the short drive to Williston Crossings RV Park in Williston FL, less than 20 miles from our alma mater, the University of Florida in Gainesville.  This also put us close to Jeffrey's parents who retired in that area.

Our first 3 days were a happy whirlwind of watching live Gator sports... first a swim meet Friday night, then men's basketball Saturday night, and finally women's basketball Sunday.  I'm in heaven!  Hopefully we'll be able to squeeze in a few more matchups before we move on later this month. 

Our new park is really lovely.  We have barely had time to explore, but we managed to find the clubhouse and take advantage of the $4 pancake and sausage breakfast they host every Saturday morning.  Our nice pull-through site is surrounded by tall trees, but Jeffrey was still able to get our portable satellite dish to work (after the roof mounted one couldn't get a clear signal).  I have attached a photo of Max "head on" in his current home with his slides extended. 

We also met our neighbors on one side, CW and Sue.  Everyone we have met on this adventure has been extremely nice and these folks are no exception.  It doesn't take long before you start swapping experiences, park recommendations, maintenance tips, lessons learned, and my favorite -- problems that you've had and how they were fixed.  All of the these items are PRICELESS when you live this lifestyle!

We head to North Carolina by plane tomorrow to attend a friend's wedding and as soon as we get back, we take Max back to Lazydays for his final 2 service items... fixing a few issues with the tile floor and replacing a "slide lock" (helps keep the wall slides tucked tight). 

We're Free!

We are finally free from our Lazydays experience!  Actually, in all fairness, they did a fabulous job getting our variety of little things fixed and we plan to make them an annual stop if we have anything that needs to be addressed in the future.  They were also great at "putting us up" each night -- wether in a service bay or in a parking space -- but always with at least electricity and sometimes with water/sewer connections too. We also saved a decent amount of money from refunds from the on-site campground we barely used.

We still have 2 items to get addressed (waiting on parts), but we knew there would be a re-visit at some point in the near future -- hopefully before we leave Florida in late February so we'll have a clean slate (at least until we manage to break something else!).

Moving on, we are now in Clermont, FL in Lake Louisa State Park.  We got a surprise in that our site does not have full hookups -- electricity and water only -- so we'll likely have to drive the rig over to the dump station a few times during our 2-week stay to empty our gray and black tanks.  That being said, so long as we don't do a bunch of laundry, we should be great.  In fact, the campground has a small laundry facility that is cheap ($1 a load to wash) and is MUCH faster than our own smaller washer on board.

We have only been here a few days, but have already "cleaned house" (doesn't take long!), re-provisioned our groceries, and visited with some of  Jeffrey's local family.  Today is a "down day" -- catching up on some email, making the next allergy shot appointment for Jeffrey (which involves finding a new doc in the next town), arranging our next mail delivery, etc... our new "normal" life while on the road.  The good news is that we do all of this with a beautiful view of one of the park lakes right out our window (see picture)!

New experience in Tampa

Okay, I know pretty much every day is a "new experience" in this lifestyle we've chosen, but this one deserves a little reflection.  We arrived in the Tampa area at the Lazydays campground to enjoy the sights and get a little final warranty work done on Max while we are here.  Little did we know, but it turns out Lazydays is somewhat famous nationally for their RV sales and service business.

After enjoying a quiet weekend and terrific evening visiting with family, we took Max over for our Monday morning appointment at the Lazydays service center.  Our service experiences so far have been very "hit or miss", especially with a rig as big as ours, so we were a little stressed.  Nevertheless, we turned over our "home" to strangers so they could tackle our remaining warranty items.

As I write this, we have been in a service bay for 3 days now and the service techs are REALLY kicking butt and getting things fixed!  Almost all of our items are minor things and none are preventing us from traveling, but maintenance and repairs are part of life when your house drives down bumpy roads. Instead of having to return to the campground every night and pay there, they save us a few bucks and just give us any hookups we need and just let us stay in the service bay. The only downside is that our roof satellite dish can't see the sky, but we have a portable unit that we set up on top of the car instead.  We are far from alone as there are folks living in their RVs in the service bays around us (this place has over 200 bays!).

Lucky for us, most of our issues are already fixed and a few others are just awaiting parts being overnight air-shipped from Winnebago (what a great company!). Lazydays is offering us free breakfast and lunch every day and also has fabulous free  seminars so we can stay entertained and learn more about using, maintaining, and enjoying our RV.  We are anxiously awaiting the outcome of investigations into a few remaining repair items ... so stay tuned to the next blog entry!