Sunday, April 12, 2015

Gloucester, VA - Ain't RV'ing Fun?

We had a nice short trip over here to the coast area of Virginia. One of our neighbors in our last campground said it’s fun to drive around the coast of VA but you always have to look for the bridges to get across all the little fingers of water. Since there aren’t that many bridges and none are in a straight line between you and your destination, your trip is always longer. There is no straight road anywhere around here - there is always water that has to be crossed by bridges which are never where you want to cross or by ferry which takes time. We wanted to go somewhere on the other side of this little finger of land - 22 miles as the crow flies, 48 miles if you don’t want to swim and have to use a bridge.

Next to us is a couple in a brand new RV. They bought it a while ago but this is their first time camping in it. It has not turned out to be the best experience ever. Last night after they had set up the RV, all of a sudden the levelers decided to go up - all the way up. So high that they have a huge step down when they get out of the RV.

This morning they wanted to take their dog out for a walk and couldn’t get the door opened. They called out to a guy walking by and asked him to use their key to try to open the door. Nope, wouldn’t open. So, they took off their emergency window in back. All off. He climbed out, she handed him the dog and waited. He returned and worked on the front door to get it open so she could get out. OK, that’s the levelers, the door lock and the back window. And, it’s going to be 42 degrees tonight. They taped some cardboard over the window and seemed to have made it through the night. Ain’t campin’ fun?

Today, they are leaving to head back home and he put the car out into the road so that she could back the RV up to the car to hitch up - with him right between the two motioning her to come back further. Hmmm. Now, usually, we drive the car forward to the RV and Gary always stands off to the side. I hope they’re going to be OK.

Meanwhile back in our RV, we had washed and waxed our RV and the our last day in Charleston, SC. Nice day and it was time to stay home and get some home chores done. 2 nights later it rained - so hard that our bottom storage doors were covered with sand and dirt that the cute little rain drops had splashed up. And, for some reason, we had lots of white spots all over the RV. When we looked at our RV in the morning,it looked worse than it had before we had washed an waxed it. What a waste of effort.

We have lived with that dirty RV for the last week and a half, not having time to wash it again. Ugh, I had a hard time looking at it - though I had done the windshield, the front of the RV and the front door area so I wouldn’t have to see the dirt there. The rest, I tried not to look at. But, we had some more rain in Cape Hatteras which had washed some of the dirt and sand off and it didn’t look so bad so I could live with it.


Today, when I started breakfast, I looked out the kitchen window and the sun was at such an angle that I could see that it hadn’t been cleaned for a while. Shucks. So, after breakfast, I told Gary that I was going to wash the windshield, the front of the RV and the windows. No more. That’s it. Finis. I’m sure you can see where this story is going. Gary felt badly for me out there in the sun washing the RV and he came out to join me. He came out to spray the dirt and sand off the storage doors and then chamois them dry. Meanwhile, I had mission creep and I was doing the whole RV. Now, we didn’t have to wax it since we had just done that about 2 weeks ago but we did get it washed.

Then my sweet hugga bunch said in his dulcet tones: ‘What about the car?’ Yeah, what about it?

Guess what? Our car is done too, now.

All ready for the rain on Tuesday.

Then, while I was doing dishes I looked out the kitchen window again and - oh, no, now I’ve got to do the insides of all the windows.

What happened to the life we see pictured in the RV ads where everyone is sitting around by the lake watching the sun go down with nothing to do?

Well, we followed the frantic washing with a nice hike around the campground. And, by ‘around the campground’ I don’t mean just walking the road around the RV’s, I mean that we found a trail that circled the campground and, after a little bushwhacking through brush, we made it back to our RV. At first we were following a trail, a nice long trail through the woods with birds rustling through the leaves and squirrels jumping agilely through the tree tops. Very neat but it was a trail through the woods. Has to go somewhere, right? It can’t just end since it’s used by ATV’s and not just hikers. But, right there in front of us was a loop back and a choice to be made. Do we follow the loop and just hike back the way we came? Dull, Boring. OR do we bushwhack overland to where we think we’ll find the campground? Actually, we’ve got a reliable hiking program in our IPhone with our trail clearly marked in red. If we head back towards the red, we’ll be back at the RV. So, we’re not just hiking with no clue.

‘You never know how many friends you have until you rent a house on the beach.’

                                                                                         Anonymous

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