Life in an RV Park

So this post is a little about the interesting things we've noticed about people that are doing this full time or at least know how to spend a week glamping! 

1. Some travel with potted plants, including tomato plants. Why miss gardening!

2. MANY people travel with pets.  Our neighbors had two cats.  They'd been in this one spot since January. You could see the cats climb around the front window.  Many also travel with dogs. Some are on tethers/leads outside the RV doors. And some have a whole yard set up for them using gates.  See example below.

3. Some decorate out side their RVs 

4. Lots of people have golf carts to get around while on the campground.  Some are large and seat 8 people, some are regular size and some have been personalized. We saw several with nice rims and colorful ones.  The kids pointed out that black seats in the sun might not be a good idea.  Here's one we spotted today. Reminiscent of the wood paneled station wagon.

5. There are people here from everywhere.  So far in our alphabet game (using licence plates) we have 29 states covered and three provinces (ON, QC, NB)

Goodbye Pirateland. Here was our setup.

The Ocean and its many treasures

The beach here is beautiful.  One of the first things we did when we arrived Sunday night was to walk the beach.  It was 7pm, maybe 65 degrees and the kids ended up fully submerged in the water and loved it!

Beautiful sunset

Please note i'm in a fleece zipped up and my daughter is in the ocean!
I don't think kids feel cold!

You said go ahead and get soaked right mom?
hahahaha NO!

We have discovered many treasures on the beach.  We've walked the beach in the morning a low(ish) tide and found jelly fish the last three days.   On the first day, Katelyn insisted we try to save one and put him back in the water.  Today we found one with its tentacles still in the sand so we're hoping he survives.

And the shells!  Wow I don't remember seeing shells this thick before. And the orange color we're finding are beautiful.  

Here are some other adventures on the beach 

The blowing sand on the beach with the tide pools. 

Kite flying on a crazy windy day. Day after the storm. 

Exploring with Mimi. 

What have we found here? I have no idea what they were exploring! 

Beautiful sunny morning.

Survived Tornado Watch and Warning Last Night

So we knew there was a storm coming in last night. I was saved from getting completely soaked in the unheated outdoor pool by thunder!  And we knew the rains were about to set in, so we headed out to dinner.  The three adults were aware there was a Tornado watch in effect till 8. It was 6 pm.  About 5 minutes outside Pirateland (where we are staying) both Len's and my phone's emergency alerts go off.  It announced that a Tornado Warning was in effect until 7 pm.  Those driving or in mobile home parks should seek immediate shelter in a sturdy building.  The notice also said that the storm could bring damage and/destroy mobile homes.  Now usually you can ignore those, but we were staying in an RV.  Good thing we were headed out to dinner.  So we found the closest restaurant, an Italian restaurant.  No one else looked concerned.  But we were happy to be inside.  It was getting windy. No rain yet.  The radar did show a nasty band of storms headed our way.  The Tornado warning was for most of North Carolina and 8 counties of South Carolina, including the the one we were in. 

Dinner was uneventful, we left after the warning was lifted and it wasn't raining yet.  We drove around downtown myrtle beach and then headed back to the campsite.  It started raining pretty good now!  And the lightening was really bright, especially through the glass part of the sunroof in our rental car!

The good news about camping near the beach, the ground drains really well as we're on sand.  It rained really hard and all night long.  The wind was pretty strong, as I could hear the neighbors flag flapping as we went to bed.  It was sleeping in a tent, you could hear all the rain drops, but without the threat of getting wet!

And the morning after the storm this is the sunrise, well after sunrise, but this is when the sun came through the clouds. And now we have a cloudless day but windy.

The Saga of the leaking valve

So we're pretty sure the unit we rented was in winter storage before we rented it.  The unit was de-winterized, which means all the antifreeze etc that has been in the unit is flushed etc.  

Well about an hour into the trip we notice some water on the tile outside the bathroom door. So I go and check the bathroom, and it appears the waterline into the toilet is leaking. Luckily this is clean water I am wiping off the floor.  I tighten the threaded connection, put a towel down and hope for the best. Its not a steady leak, just a drip.   About an hour or so later, the kids say, there's water on the floor again. So I go check it.  Still dripping and the towel is soaked.  So second towel gets added and we decide to take a better look when we stop.  

So needless to say the drip doesn't stop. By the end of the day its dripping more.  I tied a bag around the leak and propped the sides of the bag with towels (credit goes to Ben and Austin from work - I saw them contain a pump leak this way).  Sorry never took a picture of this setup. Second day of travel I call the rental company. The guy has us check somethings and call him back after we have.  We arrive at the campsite,its more of a spray now.  We decide the valve is cracked, not likely to be repaired by tightening by us.  I keep emptying the bag, about a gallon at a time every couple of hours. We talked to the rental guys again and then when we tell him where we are he said we should take it in to a RV place down here to get the valve replaced. He agreed it was cracked. 

This is the repaired piece but this
shows where it was leaking from.

So Monday we're walking around the campsite, dreading having to unhook everything when we walk past another camper that is having repairs done by a mobile unit.  So we get their card, and give them our site number and an hour later they come by and fix the problem and we never had to move the trailer. YIPEE!!!!

Interesting one of repair guys had a chihuahua with him, named Jezebel.  A very unlikely looking pair.  Calmest dog ever. She's a therapy dog.  The gentleman hasn't had to take blood pressure medicine in the three years he's had her.    He was on blood pressure medicine for 15 years before getting her. Interesting.  She rides in the repair truck all day, goes on his motorcycle etc.

The purging of the tanks

One of the joys of being in the RV is purging the tanks.  There is a grey water tank for all sinks and shower and a black water tank from the toilet.  There is a control panel on the inside of the RV that tells you how full each is (empty, 1/4, 1/2, 3/4, full). As we do not have permanent hook up, any time we need to dump the tanks, I hold the end of the hose in the dump pipe hook up in the ground and Len controls the valves.  You dump the black tank, then the grey, the grey water acts as a hose rinse. 

Some full time hook ups are pretty sweet, this is not ours. 

Well we dumped the tanks on Tuesday and the black tank didn't seem to drop much in level on the control panel but not much was coming out.  So you read a little bit more and realize we might have a blockage.  It is not recommended to snake the lines in RVs.  One suggestion if you get 'build up of solids" is you put ice cubes and salt in the tank and drive the rig around.  I assume on the bumpiest road you can find so that the ice moves around in the tank and loosens everything.  So we decided to try a few other things before having to pack up the rig and drive it around. 

There is a rinse option, where you connect the water hose to a different connection on the outside of the RV and it rinses out the black water tank. So we tried that and also filled the tank with water (just running the toilet) and kept dumping it.  That worked after a few times. Avoided moving the rig again, wahooo!

Here's a picture of our setup. Len holding the hose and the kids working the control valves. Brave man. 

The Rig & Driving the Rig

So Len is the mastermind behind this years trip, he did the research, he reserved the rig. There are 5 of us on this trip, Len's mom joined us.  Go big or go home, may describe what he had in mind when reserving this thing.  I'm typing this in the RV, the 32 foot Class A Storm by Fleetwood.  Yes its a bus.  And it drives, like a bus. 

Credit goes to Len he did almost all of the driving on the way down, and will again on the way home.  He cut his teeth driving it from General RV in Wixom to our house in Novi (5 miles maybe) on suburban streets. Then once we had it all packed up he drove for about 9 hours with stops on Saturday. He had to drive through some crazy construction zones where there was very little room on each side of the RV.  And then some rather comfortable divided highways with little traffic.  

The Day 1 Navigator was none-other than
 Margaret Rogers outfitted with her hard copy map.

We ended up in a small bare bones campground with RV hook ups just south of Charleston, West Virginia.  A small adventure in the dark involved missing the turn off for the campground and ending up at a dead end at US Armory gate.  So on his first day of driving this crazy bus, he had to back up the rig about 300 feet in the dark around a curve!  Needless to say he earned his glass of wine, as soon as we had the rig set up!

Day two involved several 5% to 9% inclines and descents as we traversed portions of the Allegheny and Appalachian Mountains.  This also included two tunnels through the mountains, where there was NO room for error!!!  

I tried to give Len a break with the driving for about an hour on the second day. The divided highway is okay, you spend more time looking in your side view mirrors than forward to make sure you're staying within the lines.  And then we ended up on an undivided one lane each way road, and that is nerve wracking!  Len took over only to have to go through a round-about and then back to divided highway but more traffic.

Note Len's sense of ease - drinking his coffee

Note my death grip on the steering wheel. 

On our way into Myrtle Beach we swung by the airport to pick up a rental car.  Driving over the wide speed bumps we were just hoping we didn't bottom out the jacks! Alas we did not!

A few other notes: 

The cup holders are made for regular coffee cups.

You know you're up damn high when you can see
right in the truck drivers window at equal height!

The kids watching a movie in the back, seat belted in.
This area becomes their bunk beds when parked. 

The passengers at the kitchen table en-route.

Even with not having to sit in a traditional car the whole time,
the kids (as were we) quite happy to stretch their legs along the way.

The Surprise - We're going in an RV

The kids knew we were going to a beach, they didn't know which beach.  They knew Mimi (Len's Mom) was coming with us and that we weren't taking a plane.   I'm pretty sure they thought we were renting a condo somewhere by the stuff we were packing, sheets, blankets, towels, food, etc.  They did not expect us to drive up in this.....

Here's what the surprise looked like from inside the RV.....

And here is a picture of all of us right before we left for the trip to Myrtle Beach.

The Landale's Year in Review - 2014

We hope that this finds you and your families healthy and happy.

We have had an eventful year.

We started the year off with a bang, celebrating new years twice. Let me explain it was after two days of travel from Michigan to Hyderabad, India where we spent the first few months of the year.  Our first celebration was while skyping with Len's sister in Windsor at Midnight EST and then the second time we enjoyed some fireworks from our balcony in our apartment when 2014 was ushered in local time in Hyderabad.  This was followed by 10 days of naps at weird hours and boiling pots dry because we kept falling asleep while adjusting to the time change, 10.5 hours difference.

The kids and I spent two months in India, Len spent one more month.  While we were there we spent a week in Sri Lanka.  Here are a couple of pictures. We blogged about the adventure to keep everyone up to date at home, you can look back at those pages (see blog menu).

We were lucky enough to miss most of the harsh winter that engulfed Michigan and much of the northern US and Canada.  The kids and I got home in time for a few more snow days and some cold weather.  The kids wanted to know why no one was out playing in the snow. Its hard to explain to kids that haven't seen snow for most of the winter why no one else wants to play in it!  We had a similar experience in India when our kids wanted to know why no one else was swimming and the local kids told them it was because it was winter. Okay winter was 75F and sunny.  Granted the pool wasn't heated, but there was three feet of snow at home so in the pool they went.

In March, Tyler celebrated his fourth birthday.  He is a happy, funny and energetic kid.  This kid likes any sport that involves a ball.  He tried T-ball this summer and had a blast and then one day hit a bucket and a half of balls at the driving range with my dad.  So far he continues to be a lefty.

I participated in a Guinness Book of World Records attempt to have the most number of Rosie the Riveters in one location at the same time.  We did it, there were 778 Rosie's. The record setting event was part of the fundraising efforts to "Save the Bomber Plant"  to preserve part of a WWII  Bomber assembly plant that will now be turned into a museum.  Here's me and a friend from work and a whole lot of Rosies.

In June our neice Caleigh graduated from Grade 8 and is now attending high school !

In June the Landale's ventured to Niagara Falls and enjoyed a boat ride near the falls as well as watching a large ship go through the Welland Canal locks.

We had two family reunions on Beth's side of the family this  year.  In July we headed to Maryland to see all the Tortorelli cousins.  It was a great time. We spent some time on an island that has wild horses, yup they just roam, pretty cool.  And the cousins paid a visit to see Kristin's grave.  My sister and I hadn't been there since the funeral in 2008.

The younger generation

In June the Ruddy side of the family all gathered in Novi, Michigan.  We had a great visit and got some great full family pictures.

In August the Landale side ventured on our annual cottage week.  This year it was on the west side of Michigan.  We swam in Lake Michigan (brrr), went on a wild dune buggy trip (twice), picked peaches in the rain (and I mean downpour), finished a big puzzle, created our own color run and competed several ice bucket challenges.

Katelyn started Grade 1 and Tyler started Pre-K in September.

Len and I completed the Warrior Dash in July.  This was a more challenging 5 km obstacle course than we have completed in the past but it was fun.   After this the kids decided they wanted to do a run.  So we signed up and participated in Detroit annual Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning (US). We ran the Mashed Potato Mile.  A one mile loop that finishes at the same finish line as the 5 km and 10 km races.  Kids got race shirts, race bibs and the coveted race medal!

You can't have a Landale annual update without some kind of renovation right!  Well this year its the master bathroom. The kids were integral in the demo of the previous bathroom.  Geared up with safety glasses, hearing protection and gloves the kids went to town breaking up tile and pulling things off walls.  They followed that up with helping a friend paint her house.

Len and I have continued to make some more batches of wine this year.  The new addition is the oak cask for aging.  The first batch is still in it, A Spanish Rioja.

This fall we got a few apple picking trips in.  Kids were having a blast climbing the trees to get apples.

We cut down our first Christmas Tree this year, it was more difficult than Len or I thought it would be. Holidays are always fun and special when spent with family. Here are the Tortorelli side cousins at US Thanksgiving and the Landale cousins at Christmas.

December 2014 marked the year anniversary of the passing of Len's father Ellis.  In honor/honour (depending where you're reading this) of him,  Len participated in Movember by growing the handle bar mustache that Ellis was famous for.

Today is Katelyn's 7th birthday.  She had a science themed birthday party (her request) last week where we did a whole bunch of experiments. The kids had a great time.  She's enjoying Grade 1 and is loves any type of art/arts and crafts and teaching Tyler.

Len moved to a VP position this year with Secure24.  He's enjoying the challenge of an ever busy and growing IT hosting company and works with a great group of people.   We recently attended the Christmas party and what was a 40 person or so company when Len first started in 2008 now a 400+ person company. Quite a group.

I continue to work for Conestoga-Rovers and Associates.  We merged with an Australian company, GHD this year, although our name doesn't change until next year at which point it will look like I've worked for more than one company in the last 15 years!

Wishing you and yours all the best of health and happiness in 2015.

The Landales