Oftentimes, I think the RV life is painted as beautiful and simple. People rarely talk about the hard parts, kind of like the collective hush about the horrors of childbirth.
My life experiences have caused me to always value the truth above most other things. You can make your own choice, read along and hear the good and the bad … or skip to the next post if you’d rather gloss through the “social media reel.”
I cheered quite loudly as we passed the border sign indicating our departure from Florida. The kids rolled their eyes and called me weird, but I felt a sense of relief surge through me down to my toes. The new truck, yet to be named (suggestions anyone?), drives beautifully. The ride is less bumpy on my back and it handles great.
For our first day of travel, we selected a destination slightly further than we normally would so we could collect packages that were shipped to Galveston Island. We arrived in Houston on a dark, rainy night. The campground was interesting, but felt safe enough for an overnight stop. Kaeli went to walk the dog as John and I set up in the rain.
Almost immediately, we heard screaming. Kaeli hobbled towards us, cradling her arm. She had tripped, falling directly on her broken arm. Needless to say, the evening was not the respite we had hoped for at the end of such a long day. After we were setup, Kaeli resting on ice, John put in a call to the first orthopedic specialist Kaeli saw while driving the hour each way to pick up our packages.
We were advised to treat her arm with ibuprofen and monitor for significant increases in pain. Essentially, the only thing to do was keep the arm in its cast. Traveling with medical conditions that require durable medical supplies is a challenge. There are also times when continually transferring prescriptions between pharmacies gets … well, complicated. Breaking an arm while traveling makes continuity of care more difficult, but it is definitely possible. You get a built in second opinion, but the process is slightly different with each doctor.
We woke in the morning to a torrential downpour that was not meant to let up for most of the day. This resulted in us getting soaked, including my slippers (which ended up wet and cold most of the week), sneakers, and even the rug in our slide out! Because it was raining so hard, we didn’t clear off the tops of our slides, leading to leaves and muck when we settled in New Mexico.
As John went to untwist our hose from the site’s water, the handle from the spigot crumbled in his hand. He called maintenance and we waited, cold and impatient, for them to come with a hose. Had we just unhooked and left, we would have left a huge geyser of water in our wake.
We pulled into our next stop in the daylight and I was able to enjoy the sunset with the kids while we played ball with Ginny in the dog park. Ginny loved the free time, but wasn’t impressed with the lack of grass in Texas (or later, New Mexico). Overnight, the start of an uncharacteristic southern freeze began. John had connected the wrong tank and accidentally turned off the fuel sensor app, so his “alert” was waking in the night freezing. He couldn’t access our full tank in the back of the trunk, so he covered us all in extra blankets, waiting for the office to open so we could refill our propane.
(Kaeli is holding tumbleweed)
Our final leg of the journey was only a few hours. We arrived in Carlsbad, NM ahead of schedule and were able to visit the caverns that same day (more about this to come)! When we were reassessing what to store in Florida before we left, I elected to bring the heated water hoses “just in case.” Thank goodness.
(and we thought we were escaping the cold!)
Overnight, the temperatures plummeted. I woke in the early hours of the morning and lay in bed, covers curled around my chin, listening to an odd periodic thumping sound. Snow flurries appeared sporadically throughout the day with all surfaces covered in a solid layer of ice. Our front door literally kept freezing shut all day.
By noon, John had called a mobile RV technician to take a look at the furnace and turned off the furnace “just in case.” The technicians delivered the sobering news … our furnace needed to be replaced due to holes in it and was not safe to use. It took us a few hours to pack our things, winterize our rv, clear out the poopsicle and descend on the warmth of an Airbnb.
You heard me right … poopsicle. That’s what those in the RV world call a frozen mass in the sewer line. Poopsicles are a bit traumatic for me. My first experience with one was in the very, very cold days after returning from my mother’s funeral while John and Kaeli set off on an out town task driving across the country. After the early days using the dump tank, John has taken over “poop stick” duty. Our deal is simple: John clears the toilet clogs and I don’t complain. Without John’s muscle, I braved the poop stick, but was unable to break apart our frozen poo, so Riley and I survived nearly 24 hours using public restrooms at stores (most of the facilities in very northern campgrounds close during the winter). I finally cleared the toilet and it was this incident that spurred our quicker than anticipated retreat to Florida.
The good news is that our sewer tank has never been cleaner, we actually enjoyed sightseeing this week and arranged for a repair in our next stop.