Tag: a year to volunteer

WheRVe we been? Our travels, 2nd quarter 2021

I’m pretty sure you could figure out our travel path from April-June if I just tell you about the food. We went from Amish baked goods, to dairy products, to corn, to tacos, back through corn, to trail mix, to potatoes.

If you’re not as food motivated or fascinated as I am, here’s the map to help you out.

We started on the east side of this Y shape and went from IN to WI to IA to OK to TX, and then right back up through OK & KS to NE to CO (our 44th RVisited state) to UT to ID.
RV miles traveled this quarter: about 4600 
(Map does not reflect exact routing.)

Indiana

The RV spent a little over 2 weeks having yet more kinks worked out at the DRV Factory Service center in Howe (our 4th warranty visit), and the two of us spent that time in two hotels and one historic state park lodge.

They weren’t quite ready for spring yet in northern Indiana.
April 1st brought snow for us fools.
You know you’re in Amish country when there’s designated buggy parking at the Walmart…
… and mmmmmm donuts are the reward for a bicycle ride along the Pumpkinvine Trail.
When we learned that repairs to the RV would stretch into another week, we decided to switch up our accommodations. Goodbye, generic roadside stay-suites; hello historic Potawatomi Inn.
By the time we left Indiana, spring had arrived for real.
So what’d we do?
Rolled even farther north, where spring was trying hard to show up, but hadn’t quite made it yet.

Wisconsin

One of Tim’s cousins had bought some rural property just before the pandemic hit, and we were finally able to visit. Worked out well for all of us: we got free dry camping, and Cousin D got help framing living and work spaces into one end of his new pole barn.

Moochdocking on the front 40
It’s… well… there’s really no other way to put this.
It’s two white guys building a wall.
And yes, you can laugh, because sometimes a wall is just a wall, and has nothing to do with politics, and even if my sense of humor isn’t for everybody, I still think we could all stand a good chuckle.
Laugh, dammit.
It wasn’t what I’d call ice cream weather in Wisconsin in mid-April, but there was a dairy just a few miles away, and the cheese curds we bought were for lunch, so I still needed a dessert — you know, to keep my meal balanced.

Iowa

We had to start heading back to Texas for some commitments in May, and since Iowa was on the way and was still on our “need to visit” list and some good friends were already staying at an RV park there? No brainer.

We’ve known full-time RVers Andrea & Shawn of 40foothouse for a couple of years, and have deliberately crossed paths in several states since then. We have a tradition of snapping selfies in front of oversized objects, so in Iowa we went extra corny.

Texas

We’d only been away from our home base since January, but May brought family birthdays, a graduation, a wedding, a relocation, and a lot of other stuff in between. We had the time, the will, and the wheels, so we went!

First task: helping our younger son move from Austin to Bryan/College Station.
Not sure the BFT has ever towed anything that petite!
We also volunteered for a couple of days at an Escapees Co-op RV park near Hondo, after disaster struck. A night of intense wind and hail storms totaled numerous buildings and vehicles, and we felt called to assist our own.
Click here for that story.
In Texas, we eat tacos.
And if our amigos Phil & Stacy of You, Me & the RV are in town, we get a table for 4.
And we also ate cake — three in two days!
Our niece graduated from high school the same day as Emily’s mom’s birthday, and the next day a friend’s daughter got married.
Yeah, that was a lot of frosting. But who wants to celebrate a big occasion with salad?

Nebraska

We wanted to check the Cornhusker State off our list, but we were headed from Texas to Colorado, and it’s not exactly on the way. So we said screw it. There were people we wanted to see badly enough to make the detour.

Footbridge work is fun. Race ya!
If you’re interested in other work we’ve done with A Year to Volunteer, and how you can get involved too, start here.

Colorado

By visiting the Centennial State, we’ve filled in all the “big ones” in the lower 48, and now have only four little Eastern Seaboarders left (NJ, DE, RI, CT).

A funny thing happened when we decided to hit Colorado.
I asked our friends Marc & Julie of RV Love if they’d be around, and to heavily paraphrase their response, they said, “YES! Come play with us! Just keep going west over the mountains!”
So we did
(Photo: J. Bennett)
And then a funny thing happened on the way to the western slopes.
I looked out the window from our pitstop site at the Boulder County Fairgrounds, and the chillest dog in America was looking right back at me.
It took some time for me to regain my composure, and I think the only way to explain this is that you can’t spell cool without CO.
Our chips definitely knew we were at elevation.
Luckily I’ve learned a trick or two in our travels, and I remembered to loosen things like condiment lids and the flip tops to our toiletries very slowly to let the air out without a messy explosion.
Forgot about the chip bags in the pantry though, so let me be the first to advise you that Fritos make terrible confetti.
Speaking of explosions, late one night at the campground, Tim heard the unmistakable sound of water spraying.
Turns out a gasket in the kitchen sink faucet had failed, and water was shooting all over the place. Tim’s quick dash outside to shut off our city water connection saved us from major damage, and his fixit skills and tool collection saved us from a major repair bill.
And that’s why I’m going to sneak in a plug for RV Love’s new book here. It’s called “RV HACKS: 400+ Ways to Make Life on the Road Easier, Safer, and More Fun!” and we’ve both got tips published in it.
Tim’s is in the Repairs & Maintenance section, and mine’s in RV Living.
Release date is next week, and we can’t wait to get our hands on a copy!
(Not an ad. We gain nothing from your click or purchase.)
Our campground was situated within striking distance of several stunning hiking areas…
… and that’s why I chose trail mix as the designated food for this state along our path. We went through the better part of a large bag.
We closed out our visit to Colorado with day trips to two of its national parks. This is the view from Warner Point at Black Canyon of the Gunnison…
And this is a view from Rim Rock Drive in Colorado National Monument.

Idaho

We arrived in Coeur d’Alene at the end of June, and we’ll stay for about 3 weeks. Tim went to high school here, and the roots still run deep. Not a day has gone by without spending time with old friends, and his parents have just arrived in town for a visit as well. I know I should be capturing all the smiles in photographs, but I’ve been trying to set my phone aside and focus more on soaking up these moments together. Plus, most of these moments involve food (including Idaho potatoes in a multitude of glorious forms), and who wants to pose while grinning dopily around a mouthful of spuds?

Where to next?

We’ll head to Washington first, to visit our older son on the Olympic Peninsula, do a little hiking, and soak up some adventure at yet another “summer camp for grownups” at the Escapees Cascade Mountains Hangout. That’s not their term; it’s one I chose to describe the program after our first Hangout, nearly two years ago in Maine. In late August, we head east to Montana for the Escapees Glacier Country Hangout.

We’ve been to both locations before, but we find it hard to resist the allure of group events for which everything is planned and organized by someone else — stuff we wouldn’t normally arrange on our own — and all we have to do is pay our money and show up. We don’t even have to find a place to stay; the campground or RV park is reserved in advance, and we know exactly what we’re getting when we roll in. Full-time RV life is not a vacation. Hangouts are!

We haven’t figured out September yet, and I’ll fill you in on October’s plans in my next quarterly update. Until then, you can check up on us on Facebook, Instagram and/or Twitter for updates as we go.

We started full-timing in August of 2015, but I didn’t think to do an annual review until the end of 2016, and it was just a listing on Facebook of places we’d visited. After that, I started using a quarterly format.

Double Feature: “1st Quarter Travels” meets “Volunteer State, Part III”

The first feature is more of a short film — just our travel map, a pair of puppies, and a collage of tranquil waterscapes.

Why so brief? Well, since we spent most of January, February and March in state parks doing service work with A Year to Volunteer (Y2V for short), and I’ve blogged 3/4 of those experiences already (see links below), there just wasn’t much else left to show ya.

So since my usual quarterly update coincides with the highly blogworthy wrap-up of our final Tennessee project with Y2V, I’m combining the two, which means you get a ROGO (Read One Get One). And, since we continue to host this blog without advertisements or affiliate links, it really is free!

Free?
Why that’s as uncommon as a donkey smiling for a selfie.
But I got that to happen in Tennessee, and now I should probably stop taking selfies because it’s going to be really hard to top this one.

Feature 1: WheRVe we been? Our travels, 1st quarter 2021

We went from FL to TX to MS to AL to GA to TN to IN, and added our 42nd RV state with that 5-day stop in Mississippi, which had always been a pass-through state for us.
RV miles traveled this quarter: about 3700 
(Map does not reflect exact routing.)

Our RV accommodations for the quarter included the friend’s driveway where we closed out 2020, a casino, a Harvest Hosts winery, 3 Army Corps of Engineers parks, 2 military fam camps, a 24-hour diner, 5 state parks, and our manufacturer’s service center.

The friends whose driveway we occupied in Florida? Avid animal rescue/foster/adopt people.
So our year began with a limitless supply of puppy kisses!
The beauty of Army COE parks is that they are always on a body of water.
Top left: Wilson H Fox in Granger TX
Top right: Twiltley Branch in Collinsville MS
Bottom: Gunter Hill in Mongomery AL

Feature 2: Volunteer State, Part III

Thanks to Y2V, we spent 6 weeks volunteering in the Volunteer State, culminating with a park named for the original volunteer himself, good ol’ Davy Crockett.

The main objective for Y2V at David Crockett Birthplace State Park was to build an outdoor stage with amphitheater-style seating. Check! Our crew of 32 also constructed a bridge, cleared a trail, removed excessive riverside vegetation, painted a couple of bathrooms, beautified the park entrance, relocated a fence, and created about 80 new signs.

And by the time our stay was up?

Our original schedule included 10 weekdays of work from March 15-26, but two were rained out.
We got it all done anyway.
If you’d like to see it in a single uplifting 13-minute video, it’s right here on YouTube.
Tim & I spent the first week on the bridge building team with Jeff & Susan of Happy2Serv, and a new Y2V participant named Gary. Since Gary & his wife had a prior commitment the following week, John & Wendy of A Road to Nowhere stepped in to help finish up.
When we arrived at the proposed site, the park rangers had only 4 telephone poles and the mere hope that a footbridge could be put there.
No plans, no other supplies, just a dream to make that bumpy, washed out part of the Homestead Trail easier for park visitors to traverse.
We evaluated and conferred.
Susan sketched out a design and came up with the supply list.
And we started building that very day.
Look what I learned how to use!
I didn’t like it (note my look to the side for help at the end) but since I’d invested in that there pair of bonafide big-girl work pants to replace the inadequate ones I’d ruined at the prior Y2V project, I was willing to risk finding out if they’d given me any sort of superpowers.
Meh. Jury’s still out.
These are my new work pants.
(Not an affiliate link; I gain nothing if you click through or purchase.)
And there’s why I was digging.
We needed deep holes for the concrete molds to help hold the bridge footers in place.
We poured concrete at the center pivot point too, and I gave it a tattoo before it set.
It took some muscle to get those four telephone poles into place, and I’m pretty sure there’s a good joke here about a twenty-mule team. I should have asked my smiling donkey for help. He wasn’t that far away!
Our engineers, Susan & Jeff, solved the central pivot puzzle by fanning deck boards, marking them, and ripping them to fit.
Yes, a straight footbridge would have been easier, but there were two boulders at the mid-point, and excavating them would have weakened the riverbank, so we angled the bridge between them.
On our 4th work day, we completed the decking, installed the rail posts, and repurposed a couple of railroad ties to create steps at each end.
From nearly nothing to a completed footbridge in just over a week — which included delays while we waited for rain to stop and for rope to arrive.
For Week 2, Tim and I parted ways, each of us contributing to a project that allowed us to work to our strengths. He helped out with construction of the amphitheater stage …
… and seating …
(photo credit: A Road to Nowhere)
… while I got to brush off my design and layout skills from … well, from wayyyy back when graphic design was done without benefit of computers.
On the signage team, I stenciled one sign after another, then passed them along for routing, then sanding, then painting.
Partway there
Finished product!
And speaking of finished products, look how nicely that ampitheater stage showcased all of us for the official Y2V group portrait.
(Photo credit: A Year to Volunteer)

We stood distanced, grouped by RV household, and removed our masks for the photo above. When working and socializing, we took the usual COVID precautions. All the measures we volunteers agreed to follow on our first gig were also in place for this one, with the addition of TN’s state-mandated daily temperature checks and symptom questionnaires.

Some side perks and benefits from our two weeks at David Crockett Birthplace State Park? I’m not even sure where to begin. Wait. Yes, I am.

We were within an hour’s drive of family from my father’s branch of the tree, and we gathered for a COVID-safe Sunday afternoon of much cherished togetherness.
This pendant was a gift from one of my aunties.
The rangers treated us to a homemade breakfast on our final morning, and let me just say that Ranger Gary’s people taught that boy how to make biscuits & gravy right. Very right indeed.
That evening, we went on a stroll through the park to visit each of our completed projects, and toasted every single one with champagne. It was like a pub crawl, but with a greater sense of ownership.
And speaking of toasts (see what I did there?), l got a little bored on one of our rainy days, and made my family famous homemade bread, but twisted into the Y2V logo.
There was just enough for each of us to enjoy a small slice with our champagne, and you can compare my doughy version to the official one below.

Where are we now, and what’s next?

We’re in a holding pattern in northern Indiana while our RV is being repaired at the DRV service center in Howe. Again. It’s complicated, and we won’t discuss what is still an ongoing process, but we’re hoping for a better fix for some of the issues we’ve been experiencing since we bought our 2018 Mobile Suites.

The repair schedule will keep us in the area for the next two weeks. After that we’re not sure, but some happy friends-and-family events in May require us to aim ourselves toward Texas, so we’ll just figure it out as we roll. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and/or Twitter for updates along the way — wherever it is.

To learn how we got involved with Y2V in the first place (wine), read this, and for more about their upcoming projects, visit them on

David Crockett Birthplace State Park was our fourth service project with Y2V. Others were

Our Pandemic Caveat
We are traveling a lot less than we normally would, and as often as possible we choose destinations that offer ample outdoor opportunities, and are unlikely to be crowded. 
When we gather with friends or family, we keep our numbers small, and we request honest communication beforehand about their comfort level. 
We continue to wear masks in public and wash/sanitize hands frequently, we limit our outings, and we will soon be able to report that we are fully vaccinated.
 ~ The rrrrOHHHHRRRerrrrs, March 2020 – ?

We started full-timing in August of 2015, but I didn’t think to do an annual review until the end of 2016, and it was just a listing on Facebook of places we’d visited. After that, I started using a quarterly format.