January, February and March of 2012
were uneventful regarding me doing anything but sitting in the
driveway freezing my tailpipe off. John spent all day at work and
evenings in the townhouse; while Rana worked on home projects and
money saving activities to stretch our tighter budget. There was
something to look forward to, a trip to Alabama in April to help
usher in Spring.
The big trip had arrived and I looked
forward to being able to stretch out on the open road and pull John &
Rana's home away from home again. Close to a 1000 miles of towing;
but not the same roads as my first trip to Alabama because John
didn't want to drive through Illinois again; “I-39 is too boring”
he said and I have to agree. So Rana planned a route (she's the
navigator) that followed the Western side of the Mississippi river
through Iowa into Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi and
finally Alabama. We took two and half days to travel the entire
distance and it was well worth it. John kept telling Rana what a
great route with all the new things to see as well as easy driving.
The route Rana planned used far fewer
freeways than all of us have traveled in the past with the trailer
(they prefer to call it “the coach” instead of the trailer; makes
them sound more upscale) relying on US or state highways. John was
worried that he could have trouble finding places to refuel or stop
for breaks. Didn't happen. What they did find were places to pull
off the road and take a quiet break or have lunch without all the
noise associated at a public rest stop. John would pull into
warehouse parking lots (businesses that were closed) or a corner fuel
station with big rig parking. In fact we didn't stop at any
restaurants or fast food places on the way down; just made sandwiches
in the coach and used our bathroom for restroom breaks. With the
price of fuel as it is the savings are welcome.
This April trip was mostly to help
Rana's mother around her house with projects that are too big for her
to handle alone; do as many projects as we could and then head back
home to Minnesota. Without getting into details I'll just say
mission accomplished. The trip home was also uneventful thankfully;
but I was not looking forward at going back to sitting around in the
driveway until the next trip. Well to my surprise John & Rana
had decided to change every body's living arrangements by packing away
all their belongings into a storage container and move into the
trailer (sorry coach) for the Summer.
Just before Memorial weekend I pulled
the coach over to a small RV park just outside of St. Paul called
Landfall
Terrance. The park is located in a small town/village of
Landfall which is made up entirely of mobile and manufactured homes
along with 13 RV sites. The sites are available daily, weekly or
monthly year round! They were able to find a large site with a patio
and parking for me as well as the minivan. So this is our new home
until it gets colder.
I think I'll leave this post as is and
add a couple of catching up posts as to where I have been traveling
when I'm not lounging in Landfall.
See you down the road and safe travels,
Max
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