Monday, August 22, 2011

A not so good day in the life of a fulltimer…

2011-08-21 drive to Vermont 019

We got up early to leave Camp K and planned to be on the road by 9:30 am. So we had coffee and packed up and got the motorhome ready for travel. We planned to hook up the toad at the end of the bumpy dirt road before leaving New York.

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Well here is where the day began to go a bit south… our break buddy for the toad would not adjust right and after about 5-6 failed attempts at getting it to work right I finally figured out that we were pointing down hill and it wouldn’t set up correctly without throwing an error. So we moved to a flatter location and it finally set up correctly.

2011-08-21 drive to Vermont 022Next up was that none of our GPS enabled devices wanted to work this day, no satellites would connect. I must have had a premonition about this event as the night before I had hand written the route down for us just in case we had troubles with the GPS when traveling through Saratoga Springs, NY. So with hand written route in hand off we went… Now we were about 30 minutes behind schedule.. no big deal right? Wrong!

We still had to drive through Saratoga Springs where Sundays horse race began at 1:00 pm. With 20,000 extra cars going to town the road to Saratoga was slow with lots of stop and go traffic. Congestion in and around the race track was everywhere… tight roads, tight turns but we finally passed the horse track and everything got better…

The drive through the Green Mountains was the highlight of the day as the quaint little Vermont towns were scattered along the route through the lush green mountains and valleys. We were really looking forward to getting to our campsite so we could do a bit of exploring.

2011-08-21 drive to Vermont 021Then the rain started to lightly fall. We had gotten to Hidden Acres Camping Resort and were driving over to our assigned site when we noticed there was a truck and some stuff still on the site. So back to the office and we were told to take any site that was open and come back and let them know. By the time we pulled into a site the severe thunderstorms that we were unaware of had hit… So we sat in our motorhome while the strong gusty winds and heavy rain pelted our home on wheels. After the rains and wind subsided we set up camp only to find out all the power was out in our area… We also had no water since the water was using an electric pump to provide service to the campsites.

So with no power and no water we set up anyhow and we decided to go into town and stock up with groceries and just check out the surrounding area with the remaining daylight. We swung by the office to report which site we had taken only to find out that they had made a mistake and the site we set up on was already taken… You have got to be kidding right? No, so it was back to the site and we broke down our camp and moved to yet another site and re-set up.

While moving the RV and setting up we had noticed that our ABS warning indicator would not go out. I knew the brakes had gotten a bit hot as we rode down the 8 and 9 percent grades in the mountains and hoped that it would go out after they cooled off (oh please, oh please, oh please go out). It finally did but will require monitoring in our future.

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After all this turmoil in our day we finally got to head out of the campsite in search of groceries… Off to a nearby town in New Hampshire and with groceries in hand all that was left in our day was to take a scenic drive back through the mountains of New Hampshire and Vermont. We returned to camp and hoped we had lights and water and as you may well have guessed the way this day was going… no lights… no water…

By about 7:00 pm the lights came back on (YAY!!!) and the rain began to fall again (Booo) but little mattered now as we settled back into our home and had a happy hour and a quiet dinner…

Just another uneventful day in the life of a fulltimer…

14 comments:

  1. A bad day with the RV is better than a good day at work!

    I hope you didn't have to pay at that campground!

    www.travelwithkevinandruth.com

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  2. Always learning experiences and glitches in the rv lifestyle, but like Kevin and ruth said still better than a good day at work. Stuck in traffic your are still at home, better off than people sitting in their cars. If you have microsoft streets and trips at least you still have a map program with our without the gps. Tomorrow will be a better day!!

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  3. Sounds like Murphy was at work yesterday. Kevin and Ruth are right, I'll take a bad day in the RV over a bad day at work. Hope tomorrow is better.

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  4. WOW!! What a day!! Hope things go smoothly for the rest of your stay. :-)

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  5. Murphy has been a busy guy! I agree with Kevin and Ruth!

    :)~

    I hope things improve!

    Erik

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  6. Funny thing, our GPS wouldn't work on the way back from Albany yesterday. We left Harry & Jess's house at about 3 pm, and the traffic was a nightmare going south.

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  7. Wow, that certainly was a stressful time! Sounds like happy hour helped improve things. And, I agree, any day in an RV is better than any day at work.

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  8. We learned at Sunspot that the sun is entering a more "active period" and we can expect more disruptions in our gadgets that rely on satellites. We may all be lost soon :)

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  9. It's all an adventure. You're really moving - Florida to Vermont in a month!

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  10. Couldn't you use your generator?

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  11. Whew that sure was one of THOSE days. When I read the title I was fearing the worst so I'm glad nothing major happened even though it does sound like the campground for sure should have paid you to stay there.

    Sherry
    www.directionofourdreams.blogspot.com

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  12. OH MY...sooo sorry you had such a terrible day! We have had a day or two like yours. Just remember all the great days that went by without a hitch! Enjoy the ride.

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  13. The office should have given you a list of available sites - they weren't doing their job! But glad it all worked out in the end. Nothing like being settled in for the day/night. And with light!

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  14. Isn't it odd how often a whole bunch of problems (thankfully, small ones this time) gang up on you on one day? We carry gin and tonic for those evenings. :)

    And in case you are wondering why the late comment on this post, I just now (after so long of seeing Heyduke50 on various comments) found your blog and subscribed, so was poking around. Glad you weathered Irene OK - must have been a little to exciting!

    Safe travels,
    Laurie

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