Old Dogs, New Tricks {Part 1}

Enjoying a KY meal at the historic Old Talbott Tavern

I could fill the Grand Canyon with the amount of things we've learned on this trip in the last week and a half.  Has it really only been a week and a half??

We've learned things the easy way.  {youtube}

And we've learned things the hard way.  {don't ask}

We found it amusing when people would ask us how much we've RV'ed before this trip.  We knew taking our very first RV trip for 2 months instead of just a weekend was risky.  We knew it the way a young pregnant woman knows that having her first child will be hard.  We knew it because people told us, but since we hadn't experienced it yet, we couldn't know exactly what we were getting into.

In a nutshell:

It was AWESOME to take on this adventure.  And we were also completely ignorant of all that it would entail.  But now we're relatively settled {though every time I have thought that thus far we've had some kind of minor catastrophe...} and having a grand ol' time in New Orleans.  I actually am happy we didn't have any trial runs first.  It would have totally changed the experience and taken away some of the great and stressful memories we have had so far.

Working on their Junior Ranger booklets

So let me fill you in on the past 10 days.

We left in a flurry of excitement on Monday March 9th bound for Kentucky.  In the course of that next day or two I realized I had forgotten only half a dozen little things, none of which were all that important or unable to be purchased at a Walmart.  Our very first learning experience was finding out that the RV with a tow behind it was very difficult to drive for someone {Jason} who had never driven something that large before.  He white-knuckled it to the local Kroger for gas.

Learning experience #2: when we realized we couldn't get out of said Kroger gas station we had to unhook the tow vehicle, drive it separately from the RV and re-hook it up once we were clear of gas pumps and other cars.

We made it about 60 miles or so when Jason cried uncle and we pulled off to unhook the minivan for me to drive tandem.  This changed things a lot.  And we weren't even in Cincinnati yet.  Even now we have yet to hook the tow up again, though we plan on trying again at some point, and so this means double the mileage and significantly more in gas money.  Thankfully, I really enjoy driving, so I don't mind taking the wheel of the van.  And I've even now clocked nearly as many miles driving the RV as Jason.  More on that later.

Our trip to Kentucky was a mixed bag.  We had yet to de-winterize the RV, so we had no water.  It wasn't much of a problem as we had gallon jugs to use at the campsite and a decent bathhouse at the campground.  We had driven 6 hours that first day, including stops, and Jason was totally beat from the mental energy it took to drive the RV for the first time.

Learning experience #3: you can't make as many miles traveling comfortably in an RV as you can in a car.  It's just too tiring to drive.

Our muddy mess of a campground in KY

So once we were at the campground, it was late- probably near ten pm- and we had never hooked up before.  And it was raining.  A steady rain that was to last the entire week.  The campground was a muddy mess and we were able to move our reserved site to one that was on higher ground so the pond/creek wouldn't flood.

It was an interesting night.

So we got our stressed and tired selves bunked in for the night.  It was cold and rainy, and the RV gets humid.  so learning experience #4 was that we need ways to release the humidity, or absorb it.  We had read about this of course, but reading is different than experiencing it firsthand.  Within the next couple of days we purchased some Damp-Rid containers and the weather also eventually dried up.

Ain't we cute?

The kids have written about the Mammoth Cave and Lincoln Museum/Birthplace adventures, both of which were awesome, so I'll leave those trips to them.  Once we left Kentucky, we headed to Tennessee to see the Stones River National Battlefield.  It was a wonderful self-guided tour, with Junior Ranger booklets for the kids to fill out.  We have been so impressed by the rangers, volunteers, and tour guides at these historic sites!  They are so knowledgable and passionate about their parks and we feel so blessed to see things through their eyes!

Getting "sworn in" as Junior Rangers by Bob at Stones River National Battlefield.
He made them promise to bring him brownies should we ever pass through again.

Life in the RV has been an adjustment, but not as bad as I expected.  I didn't start sleeping well till we were in Mississippi, just due to the newness of it all and my constant late night worry that the kids weren't sleeping, or were hot/cold, but once I was well-rested I really felt I was "home."  The kids have had no problems at all, and we tear down and put back up the couch and dinette every day with their help.

Even though we've had crazy things happen, and the unexpected level of work to maintain this traveling life has taken us by surprise, I truly would not have changed a thing thus far.

{Our internet connection has been spotty, so we haven't been posting as often as we'd like.  Hopefully Colin will have a post up this week!}