More plans

Seems we are always adding plans to our life even after I got done saying we wanted to just settle down and enjoy our time in Florida.  We've been busy.  I've been having an issue with my computer since it was new, but it wasn't really important enough to take a bunch of time out to take care of it.  But after a long phone call with Applecare, it was recommended that I take it in and have it looked at since it was looking like a hardware problem.  So I backed everything up to the best of my knowledge and off went to the new Apple store in Sarasota.  They wanted to keep it and run diagnostics on it and then would call to let me know.  They called late in the afternoon, said they found some problems and they would need to send it off for a week to get it fixed, and they would be able to send it immediately that evening.  Super!  So I go back, hook Jan's computer to my external hard drive to be sure all my backups are there, and what, the info isn't there!  The problem I was having evidently had affected the back up as well, so I panic, call the store hoping they haven't sent it off yet, they hadn't, so raced up there to intercept it before they sent it at 6pm.  Got it back and was able to move all the unique data off my computer onto Jan's, so I was good to go.  Now I'm just waiting to hear when it comes back, and I'll tell you, it is cold turkey without it, although I steal Jan's every chance I get:-)

Then we needed to go back up to Creative Coach to pick out material for our captain's chairs that we are going to have recovered.  That ended up taking quite a bit of time as there are many, many types of material and tons of colors, then we had to decide whether to go two tone or solid, but eventually Jan got it down to two different ultra leather companies and we took the samples back to our motorhome.  Then with a bunch of back and forth and messing around we chose the color and material.  While we were there we discussed yet another project we have on our plate.

For some reason Monaco, our coach's manufacturer changed out our windshield wiper system 4 coaches down the production line from ours.  How do we know that, well, a few years ago we pulled into a campground in Denver, and lo and behold we parked right next to our twin!  Same color model etc.  BUT it had the upgraded slide topper awnings that we recently changed over to, and a robust, rugged windshield wiper system as compared to our puny one.  So we compared our coach numbers and build dates, and sure enough their coach was built a couple weeks later than ours.  Wipers are like a leaking roof, you just don't worry about it when it isn't raining, but then on that blowing, pouring down day going down the road they come back to haunt you!  In fact ours are so bad that if there is any headwind with the rain, the driver's wiper comes up and across right to left, and goes right past the edge of my windshield then stalls there.  It may take up to a minute or so for the motor to cool, the wind to abate and finally back it comes.  So this was a project we wanted to address, because as much as we are daylight fair-weather fans, sometime mother nature bites you.  I had been in contact with the company that built the upgraded rugged wiper system and they assured me ours could be retrofitted, so I ordered and they sent me the parts.  Well on close inspection with the new parts it appears that there is a good chance that a little fiberglass work may be required to beef up the mounting attachment points, so we asked Creative Coach if they could handle our wiper replacement while we were there and of course the answer was yes.  So hopefully our week visit with them will still be only a week when all is said and done.  

And, wow, just got an email that my computer is back from repair, so off we go!

The how, why, and where of Campgrounds

One of the major pluses of this kind of lifestyle is our ability to change our view.  We can almost at a whim pick up and be in the mountains, along a lake, on the ocean, etc.  You get the idea.  I want to discuss how we do that, why do we pick this campground over that campground, how do we get information especially if it's in a place we've never been?  I want to make clear these are Jan and my methods and they work very well for us, and having done this for about 20 years so far, we have only been burnt or even disappointed a few times out of the hundreds of campgrounds where we have stayed.

First of all you need to realize there are several different kinds of campgrounds and different reasons that make one more desirable than another.  It would also depend on why you are traveling, obviously if you are on a weeklong vacation camping trip with 4 young kids, you'd be looking for something much different than what we seek out.  There are destination campgrounds, lots of times resorts with amenities, the campground is why you are going there, lots of folks go to these say over Memorial day to play and swim in the lake, have a campfire, meet some friends or family.  Or it could be you are visiting, say Disney World, Yellowstone NP, Washington, DC, and need a nice campground with easy accessibility, or you want a central location to explore an area, say southwest Colorado, or Moab for example.  Sometimes you need a campground near family or friends for a visit, or just a stop along the way to another destination.  It is also a lot like hotels, you can stay in a hostel with nothing more than a bed or go to a 5-star hotel with every amenity you can imagine.  Campgrounds are the same with a few differences.

You can find a campground that includes electric, water, sewer, cable, and wifi, or you can find basically a spot where you can park and utilize your own self contained unit to provide said electricity, water, sewer, satellite TV, and a hotspot for internet.  The spot might be as cheap as free, all the way up to well over $100/night in certain destinations such as Key West, Lake Tahoe, Big Bear Lake, or along the Oregon coast to name a few.  That affects your budget obviously, but it is also something you can control by determining how much you want to spend on a place to spend the night.

With the internet and apps readily available more and more information is at your fingertips to help with your decisions.  And maybe we are a bit more old school than most, we still put a lot of emphasis on hardcopy guides.  As we map our intended rough travel route, we decide what are our destinations, our worthwhile visiting spots, and finally where do we need just a place to stop for the night.  

There are numerous apps such as Good Sam Camping, Recreation.Gov Camping, Allstays camping apps, and Reserve America camping to name a few.  And we do use some of these but our primary method is as follows.  The first thing we do is pull out our trusty go to bible of campgrounds, 

Good Sam RV Travel Guide, a 1664 page listing of over 13,500 campgrounds in the US, Canada, and Mexico, all rated.  They use a 3 number rating system, on a 1-10 scale, such as 9/8/9.5.  The first number is amenities, the second cleanliness of the restrooms/showers, and the third visual appearance.  Now for us the amenities are not a draw most of the time, we don't need golf courses, playgrounds, mini golf, tennis courts, etc, and we don't use the restroom/showers, we have our own, so the number that is the most important to us is the third and we have found over the years we want at least an 8, although if we are somewhat desperate to find just an overnight stay, we will accept a 7- 7 1/2.  Also in the listing is the size of the site which is critical to us, being 45' long, and one more description necessary to us is "big rig".  That indicates that the roads, turns, overhead limbs, etc are all wide enough and high enough for a "big rig" which is a rig at least 40' long.  So that usually yields us several choices, then we go on the internet to RV Park Reviews to see what other RVers have said.  This is a website that has reviews submitted by everyday campers and travelers, and just like reading reviews on Amazon, you have to temper the ratings, but very quickly you can garner a ton of information about a specific campground, and it is rare that there aren't ratings and reviews for the campground of interest.  And then if more than one has emerged as desirable, we peruse the detailed description in the guide and pick one.

So we map it out, go to the Good Sam book, pick out a couple places with good ratings, check on RV Park Reviews, make a reservation if needed.  And for those just stop for the night places, we use the same process, and will even alter our route somewhat, veer off course a bit, make the day longer or shorter to be sure we have a campground that will meet our needs, the only other requirement we typically add is a pull through site.  A pull through site is a site you "pull through", you don't need to unhook your towed vehicle which makes it nice and easy on quick overnights.  As far as reservations for overnight stops, our normal procedure is to wait until our lunch stop, confirm how far we want to go, then call for a reservation.  Reservations tend to be important for us most of the time strictly because of our size, in fact, there are many campgrounds that we just don't fit into.  So that's how we do it, and here are a few of our campgrounds over the years.

Top of the mountain in NC

Sunset right along the Mississippi

A lovely spot with Karen in the Adirondacks

Also with Karen near Thousand Islands

Boondocking in Yellowstone NP at sunset

Along the Oregon coast

View out the window, Oregon coast

Deer Creek SRA, in Utah

Along the Swanee River in FL

Impending flood in Georgia

Parked across from our "twin" in GA

By the water in Anacortes

Idyllic spot

Out the window in Washington

Private spot in Juneau

Lovely spot in Portage, AK

Enjoying the view

Taking it easy at our campsite with Karen

A little tighter in Palmer, AK

In the wilds of AK

Tail to tail in Homer

Looking the other way

A vistor in Homer

A perfect spot in Meziadin, BC

Nice!

Out the window nearing sunset

In the woods along the water in SC

Sunset looking out our window

A little snowy in a favorite spot!

The flip side, in a parking lot waiting on a part:-)

In Ernie's backyard getting our floor installed

And home sweet winter home in Florida

So just a small taste of the many beautiful spots we have been fortunate enough to see and stay at.  It is so very nice to go so many different places and always sleep in your own bed!

Supershow time!

Every year in January at the State Fairgrounds in Tampa is held the largest RV show in the US, and probably the world.  Jan and I try to do a whirlwind visit on opening day every year.  This makes about the 10th time we've been.  It is something to behold, not only 3 buildings full of vendors, but hundreds of RV's in every shape and size.  From Prevost conversions and Newells that cost upwards of $2.5 million, yeah really, to the tiniest of teardrop trailers, popups, and trailers with Class A's, B's, and C's, fifth wheels, toy haulers, etc. in between.  Every manufacturer is represented, and other than the Prevosts you can inspect and experience every one.  I think you need a secret handshake for the Prevosts:-)  Actually you can go on them as well, you just need an appointment.

It is an extraordinary opportunity to look at every shape and size and type of RV, so if you are in the market there is no better place to do your preliminary study.  And if you are like us and not in the market for anything, you can stroll around the vendors, asking questions, getting all sorts of information, and maybe come away with a bunch of "stuff". We like to poke our heads into several coaches to see any new ideas, and seeing if there are any that catch our eye.  We had an interesting encounter with Mike Snell, the president of Monaco and Holiday Rambler now under the umbrella of ASV, Allied Specialty Vehicles, the parent of Fleetwood and American Coach.  Since we have a old time Monaco built coach we are always interested in what the latest iteration of Monaco looks like.  So as we were poking around in one of the new 2015 Monaco Dynastys, we were asked how we liked it by one of the, we thought, sales people.  We responded that we were old Monaco customers and we liked the "real" Monacos better.  He asked us why so we said it seemed they had taken lots of the storage out in exchange for bath and a half models, and there were many examples of doing things differently that we weren't impressed with.  Well it turned out the "salesman" was Mike Snell, and to his credit he showed us the better points of one of the model's galley areas and we had to admit that there was quite a bit of ingenuity in its design, and not to his credit he kind of blew off my questions about the new spot for the batteries and the inaccessibility of working on them.

We looked at some new Entegras, American coaches, and a couple Newmars, and decided we had seen enough.  We went back to the vendors and picked up something I've been looking at for some time, a light for our flagpole.  We love to fly the flag and we know it needs to be lit at night, so we have kind of cheated by putting a cheap little solar landscaping light in the end of the pole above the flag and called it lit.  In reality it is a pretty tiny light.  So we bought a real solar flag light, a disc that mounts above the flag and actually illuminates it.  It looks good!

So after flying around the tons of displays and vendors we left a bit after noon after speaking with Creative Coach, a RV collision repair and renovation company in Lakeland, FL that has a stellar reputation.  We need a bit of repair to be done after our encounter with the hail last spring, and a damaged wheel well from hitting the tire on a precarious uphill tight turn out of a driveway that will remain nameless:-)  It's pretty much fixed now I might add.  So they suggested that we would be better off to go visit the shop itself to go over our pictures of the damage and they could give us an estimate.  

Our wheel well oops

Our hail damage

Our friend Harvey had told us about a not to miss place along the way, Parkesdale Market.  They are the largest Strawberry and Citrus Market in Florida and harvest more than 3 million pounds of strawberries each year, but more importantly Harvey told us they had the best strawberry shortcake and milkshakes in the world.  So we checked it out, and found out it is absolutely true!  The strawberry milkshake might have been the best milkshake I have ever had, period, not just the best strawberry milkshake, and the shortcake was superb.  

Man it was good!

If you are ever out on I-4 near Plant City put a visit on your list, but they only serve the shortcake January through mid-April.  They also have a fantastic produce stand.  So after a delicious lunch of shortcake and milkshake we visited Creative Coach.  We got our estimate, talked a lot about what needed to be done and how they would do it, and ended up making an appointment to get all fixed up, and also plan to have them recover our captain's chairs that are needing attention as well.

Plans for the new year

Friends have asked how do we come up with our plans for the year's travel?  Well, they just come to us.  Sounds lame doesn't it?  But it's true, while we are sitting here in Florida with some down time we start talking back and forth, picking up on thoughts and ideas we had the previous year, and before you know it a plan starts forming.  Sometimes we have big projects that determine where we need to be, like this past year with our remodeled floor, but this year, thankfully, we don't have any BIG projects.  Now that's not to say we don't have little projects :-)  If you've been reading this for awhile you know we always have something going on....

And sure enough a plan is forming.  Jan and I love the Durango area, we visited there twice last year, in the spring and in the fall, so Jan had mentioned several times how nice it would be to go back in the fall and spend some real time there, so we are, in fact, out of character, we have even made a reservation for 5 weeks this fall.  It is a very popular destination so in this case a reservation is required.  Also tying into that is another of our favorites, Santa Fe, so we have also made a reservation there for almost a month after Durango on our way to Albuquerque for our visit with Jan's mom, Viv, and  Nancy and CT.  

We get out a map, and I open up our mapping program on the computer, we use Delorme's Street Atlas, and we start to add the other places we want to visit on our big circle eventually back to Venice, Florida.  

We normally, when we reach the end of our stay here beeline for Atlanta to get the vet visit, doctor visits, dentist visits, and of course, family and friend visits in, but we said, whoa, not this year, lets mosey out of Florida and visit Jacksonville, Savannah, and Charleston on our way to Atlanta.  You are probably wondering why we plan this much at all?  We had the idea that after I retired that we could just wander around wherever the wind blew us, never on a schedule, never knowing where we would end up or how long we would stay, and we know that works for some people, but not us.  We do alter things quite a bit, but that total freedom thing hasn't worked out.  Some of it is probably due to 35 plus years of flying for the airlines, having to here and there on time and living by the clock and calendar.  But a bigger reason is we have things to do and people to see, and that is very important to us.  We need to see our kids, and our grandkids, and our family is spread around the country as are our friends, and we are fortunate to be able to come to them, so we try to build that into our travels.  The other thing is the doctors and dentists require appointments weeks and sometimes months in advance so we need to plan for that, and if we are having work done to the coach, those appointments need to made months in advance.  So as you can see hard deadlines start appearing and defining our time and route.

We are paid here in Florida until the 13th of May, but it's rare that we can wait that long to leave.  We get itchy to get moving, and it starts getting hot.  Yeah I know, what complainers, too hot, then too cold, well that is one of the advantages of living as a nomad, we just keep moving until we like the weather again.

So after Atlanta we will head north to Louisville to see Karen and Tom, and Kelly, Todd and the kids, then will probably continue north up through Michigan to the Upper Peninsula, and then go west.  We have spent very little time in the northern wilds of Minnesota in the boundary waters area, and then will continue westbound to Oregon to have a little work done to the coach.  Yeah, we were so impressed with Elite Repair and Amazing Creations that we want to go all the way to Oregon to have some things done!  Then we will work our way back to Durango for our reservation the end of August.

So that will define our big circle for 2015.  Of course we will slip in all kinds of destinations, stops, goals, and fun things to do along the way, and the best thing about most reservations is they can be changed when life gets in the way:-)

And before I leave you, an exciting event is unfolding right here in our park.  A pair of eagles are building a nest, something we have never seen before.

Getting more sticks

Working together

Quick catch up

Just so you didn't think we motored off without telling anyone, I wanted to give a quick update on the last week.  It's not very exciting as we have a bunch of housekeeping chores that have been beckoning us.  We have been working on, I guess I should say, in, our storage unit.  We are trying to make a real effort to clean out, give away and reevaluate our "stuff".  The final goal would be switching to a smaller, or can I even say it, getting rid of our storage unit.  But we have come to realize that unless we really change things up we are stuck with it for now.  Although Goodwill did get several loads:-)  We've listed on eBay a lot of the parts we were able to salvage from the old Aqua-Hot, and have even sold some already.  Got the scooter a new battery and a oil change.  Fought with the new control box for our TV lift mechanism for 1 1/2 days to finally find out the new control box was bad, frustrating.  So now we are ready to enjoy our time here in ernest, and of course get just a few little projects done along the way.

In between we have been enjoying ourselves as well.  We are catching up with Ray and April, and had a wonderful "traditional" New Year's dinner with roasted pork, collard greens, black eyed peas, and cornbread to ensure the new year will be a good one.  We had a unexpected visit from Jason, hit several of our favorite restaurants, and we have been making the rounds in the campground enjoying our friends.

Jan and I had a wild New Year celebration, enjoyed no sunset, it was cloudy, but still nice at the south jetty, toasted with some wine and shrimp, made it to at least 10pm, which is still better than some other years, don't groan, some of us are just not cut out for late nites:-)

Our New Year's party:-)