Maren and Jeffrey's Adventures: Kicking off 2022 with Challenges

Sometimes life cruises along peacefully according to plan, sometimes there are a few unexpected small speedbumps, and sometimes -- hopefully rarely -- there are big potholes. Unfortunately 2022 started out with several big potholes. I usually save the "RV lifestyle" ruminations for the end of a blog post, but I'm going to reverse it this time since pothole #1 started just before New Year's Eve, thus giving it priority welcoming us into 2022.

We always enjoyed bragging to our fellow RV friends that we've always been able to "start" Max and what a comforting feeling that is. Depending on where we are and where we are traveling to next, a "no start" condition could be a big issue. A few days before New Year's Eve we turned Max's key just so we could move in our big slides and --- nothing. No cranking sound, no clicks, just silence. You both looked at each other with big eyes. Absolutely NOT what you want to have happen right before a huge holiday weekend when no service places are open right before you must move on to the next campground.

Lucky for us, the RV coming into our site in two days was going to be late so we could stay longer if we needed to. Unlucky for them it was because they were stuck in Canada quarantining from COVID. We really didn't want to get towed and there wasn't anywhere we could get towed into since everyone was closed for the holiday. Thankfully, Jeffrey is pretty handy and immediately got on the phone to 1-800-"freightliner". Over several days and several phone calls to test different scenarios (plus the curious input from RVers around us), we were thrilled to find a "workaround" that let us start the engine successfully -- and sleep at night again. A transmission computer needed replacing (hello, extended warranty!) but we now had time to find a service place and drive there on our own power.

Within a few weeks we had this issue fixed and were able to enjoy the rest of our south Florida plans, including flying up to Washington to help Sheila with her own pothole (long awaited back surgery). With Sheila more comfortably back on her feet when we left, we made our annual migration up to the Gainesville area to spend March near Jeffrey's dad. Sadly, we only had a week with him before he went in the hospital with a worsening medical issue and he didn't make it out. He was 93 but somehow we still struggled to accept that he wouldn't be there for several more years at least. Most days he had more energy than we did and even worked out more than we did!

Young Jack Martin

Much of the next few months was focused on handling his affairs and some are still being worked. The labor shortage has affected everyone, so dealing with accounts/etc has been a slow process, but we will be forever grateful for his organizational skills and preparations. He clearly wanted the process to be as easy as possible for everyone.

We next moved up to Gaffney, SC, where we get Max's annual fluid/filter/etc changes done. All was going great until we woke up to our refrigerator no longer cooling. Thankfully we caught it before Jeffrey's allergy serum spoiled and all food in the freezer was lost. Since we couldn't keep the food frozen it was given to new RV friends sharing the parking area with us. Out of kindness, they actually cooked and fed us some of our own food the next day. We'd been through this routine before with a failed cooling unit, so we hopped over to Lowes and picked up a dorm fridge to hold us over. We already had an appointment in Indiana in 6 weeks to replace this unit as we weren't happy with it's ability to cool in hot temps -- and its getting darn hard to avoid hot temps ANYWHERE in the country lately. This pothole got deeper when the mini-fridge itself got temperamental and off we went to Home Depot. Never thought I'd have THREE refrigerators in Max at the same time (2 of them broken)! Mr. Extended Warranty again picked up the tab to fix the main fridge and we are pretty happy with the latest cooling technology.

We hoped this put the potholes behind us and the 2022 road ahead is smoother -- we'd even take a little "boring" thrown in! This may sound like RV life is one big headache sometimes, but the benefits always outweigh the sometimes stressful potholes. There were plenty of fun things sprinkled into these months too.

For example, after Gaffney we spent a month in the Raleigh NC area visiting family and friends, then moved on to spend 4 days touring the Louisville, KY, area with brother David and his wife (my college friend) Mary. We had fun exploring the city and surrounding area (umm, distilleries). No surprise to any of you that Jeffrey and I even made it over to the Louisville Zoo, though the giraffe weren't interested in being hand-fed. The highlight of that day was a baby elephant. He had no trouble entertaining himself and the crowds that watched.

Four Florida Gators trying to stay out of trouble at a distillery

The closest I could get

Should I crawl out of this mud puddle?

Nope, I'm gonna flop down back into the mud!

Moving up to Indiana, the Fort Wayne Zoo had giraffe but for some reason none of them were outside when we finally got over to the deck overlooking their habitat. We even hung around the area for an hour (okay, there was ice cream involved) in case whatever was up in their barn would be done soon but to no avail. Because of the avian flu issues, all the zoo's birds were not in their outside areas either, so there were lots of empty exhibits. You don't realize how many bird species are in a zoo until none of them are visible.

No giraffe, but a really cool lion right next to the front of the exhibit

One advantage to getting our fridge fixed at the factory in Shipshewana, Indiana, is the huge Amish community that lives there. Once we had a freezer again, I was thrilled to go the Amish butcher and load up on some great meat, cheese, and locally made condiments. You have to be careful driving around all of the horse-drawn carriages, but it is somewhat soothing to hear clop-clop-clop as they go by while you are eating your Amish ice cream cone. Another bonus is an RV surplus store not far away that is worth a visit to explore the many bins of RV parts to see if anything jumps into our cart. I was planning to recover our bed's headboard and was thrilled to find a good replacement upholstery option for a fraction of what I might have paid elsewhere.

Our next stop was to see RV friends near Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Unfortunately, crummy weather decided to visit for most of our time there so we didn't get to explore the area as much with them, but we at least got in some good visit time before moving on to Forest City, Iowa, where the Winnebago factory resides. We settled Max into the local campground, completed a few projects (bed headboard and new headlights), and packed up for a trip to Las Vegas to visit with Sheila for a week.

The Martins and the Marlins enjoying the one sunny day we had together

The three of us had a fun time walking around and looking at some of the Vegas attractions -- even getting to celebrate Sheila's birthday with her in person for a change. Did I say the potholes were done for 2022? Silly me! We all returned back to our respective homes and then -- wait for it -- COVID! Ugh. After so long dodging this darn virus it got all three of us. I guess what happens in Vegas does NOT stay in Vegas! On the "positive" side, we don't have to move Max for 3 weeks and we so far have been able to move our service appointments and Jeffrey's allergy injection around to give us time to STOP being "positive". We were all fortunate to have somewhat mild cases thank goodness.