Category: Hop Inn

After a lovely time with my mother we are back on the road. As of today we have visited 21 states (see map below) and still have a few more to go along the route home.

Tomorrow we are pushing towards the Airstream Factory to not only take a factory tour (as we did at The Rouge where our F150 was built) but to make an appointment for some warranty repair work. We are dipping down so that we cross into Virginia and West Virginia before entering Ohio.

After our appointment and tour we’ll be heading over to King’s Dominion to visit the third Cedar Fair park of the trip (fifth of the year, that Season Pass is getting it’s workout this year). Then it’s onto visit a friend in Saint Louis, another in the greater Kansas City, MO are, then off to the biggest ball of Twine in the country.

After twine ball number two, we’ll either visit friends in Denver, or cut down directly to Santa Fe, it’s still up in the air…

After visiting the world famous Iggy’s Chowder and Clam Cake house down in Warwick, Rhode Island with Jay and Pat, we made our way to Wawaloam Campground in southern RI, just a few miles away from my Mother’s place. It’s a nice campground.

Unfortunately, our hitch jack has malfunctioned and is no longer operational. My assumption is the worm gear is stripped… We couldn’t separate the camper from the tow vehicle…

A quick change to location within the camp ground and we were able to disconnect, acquire a jack, tools, and leveled for the night.

Today, after lunch at my Mother’s, we will be heading back to Massachusetts to get a new hitch lifting jack…

It was an interesting day…

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One more day and we will be at our east most point…

Today I cleaned the outside of our Airstream. Yesterday was all about the inside, today was all about the outside. I started from the top and worked my way down.

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While I was tending to the detailing, Sean doubled our stored power by changing out the lead acid batteries with lithium ion batteries.

We should have the ability to go five to seven days on battery alone for basic needs (lighting, fridge low volt system, inverter to charge computers, and television).

Each morning we would wake up at six, change into our work clothes, make a pot of coffee, and get to cleaning. The first four days were spent sorting the things to be saved, the things to be sold/recycled/re-homed, and the things to throw away.

The dumpster showed up on day three and was filled by the end of day four. It was emptied and returned on day five.

Day six we had a yard sale to sell/re-home as much as we could. It went okay, but not as good as that Grafton yard sale back in 2009. Many thanks to Giza for stopping by to keep us company and enjoy some much needed beer.

By Sunday (Day 7) we were exhausted and, with the help of a friend, staged all the items to be sent to Uncle Mike in the now clean garage.

Sunday Afternoon we visited Dorney Park in Allentown, PA for lunch and a few rides before admitting defeat and returning to the house to rest. Sore muscles demanded naps. Later in the afternoon I got my second wind and cleaned out the office getting everything ready for travel.

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Now it’s Monday, and the house has been broom swept in the basement, floors have been wet-mopped upstairs and carpets vacuumed. The only two rooms with things in them are the office and bathroom, which we are using (as well as the island in the kitchen, which is our staging area for cleaning supplies).

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Uncle Jed and Aunt Pat are coming up to pick up some heirlooms today and go to dinner with us.

Later tonight I will take yet another shower and do yet another load of laundry.

We are now starting week two of our house cleaning project. We’ve managed to get the two bedrooms, office, dining room, kitchen, living room, and garage mostly cleaned out and ready for this weekend’s estate sale. The dumpster is almost full, another day of lugging stuff from the basement should fill and send it off to dreamland – we will need a second dumpster…

Today’s goal is to get everything for the yard sale into the garage and haul more trash out of the basement.

For those in the King of Prussia area, check out our estate sale at https://www.harvillc.com/estate-sale-holstein-road-king-of-prussia-pa/.

Take two: didn’t hit the save.

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Last night, after a day of helping Uncle Mike clean, pack, sort, and prep for his move to the great north (Massachusetts) we headed back to our camp site for dinner. While we were away from the campground more people moved it! Every available spot is now occupied by a camper! They played bingo last night.

We have arrived at Uncle Mike’s place – well sort of… We’re staying at a campground about 30 miles north of Uncle Mike as we want electricity, water, and our own bed. Tomorrow starts the sorting, boxing, and final prep for Mike and his cat’s move to Massachusetts. Next week we start the boxing and prep to get everything Mike wants to his new house.

Today was more corn…

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So far we have driven 3082 miles in 61 hours with an average speed of about 51 miles an hour with each of us behind the wheel for about 30.5 hours.

We are here for at least three nights. After that we’ll decide what to do next.

We made our way to Sandusky, Ohio today – short drive filled with stops for meetings and work related stuff. I decided that we needed to make a detour to Michigan so that we could say we’ve taken the trailer to yet another state on this journey.

Eleven states so far!

Once we got to the campground we learned that the 50 Amp circuit on the pole has a dead phases (only half the trailer worked on AC Power). Simple fix, plug in next door.

We left Minneapolis this morning and traveled through Wisconsin and Illinois into Indiana for our overnight. Tomorrow we head to Ohio!