'Sista Time', Crabs, Clams & Oysters

July 3 - July 5, 2014
Rest-A-While RV Park
Hoodsport, WA

After picking my sister up from SeaTac yesterday we had plenty of time to catch up.  Since we closed our retail business 4 months ago we have hardly seen each other.  It was a good test to see how we'd handle overnight company in the trailer.  Kris stayed for 4 nights and she said the sofa bed was actually very comfortable.  I added a mattress pad and quilted cover to it.



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My husband, Steve & my sister, Kris

We drove from Dash Point State Park in the Tacoma area west to Hoodsport where we will join a bunch of friends.  They really do up this event!  This is a beautiful little park nestled in the woods right across from the Hood Canal.  We couldn't have asked for better weather.  Low 70s and sunny.

We were off to a slow start.  Seems the "seafood" is winning the war.  When the crab pots were checked there was only one crab.  One single crab.  And two pots came up missing.  Clamming wasn't too successful either as the tide was up quite a bit once we were able to get out there.

Fishing hasn't been too successful either.  Tuesday we head out early for some guiducks (not sure of the spelling).  Maybe some Butters and some Manillas too.  After all how are we going to make clam chowder without clams!  The first night we had whole oysters right off the grill.  They were pretty good.  I'm not a seafood person, but I'll try new foods at least once.  I was surprised how fun all this harvesting is.  We really have a great time.  Of course, the friends we are with have the most to do with that.  We are with a couple Hawkins families and the Whites.  Great people we've known for about 15 years through 4-H (dairy goats mostly).  Hopefully we'll have a lot more luck as the next couple days there is negative tide.




Saturday July 4 2014

We did better at the oyster harvesting but now have a big blister on my palm since I forgot my gloves.  The first time I was shown how to shuck an oyster, I thought, wow, that's a lot of work.  Why not just use a cordless drill instead of that knife?  Voila!  A much quicker and painfree way to get those nasty shells open!

 

Finally, the clamming

honey hole! 

 

 

When we were heading back with our limits, we found a baby seal that decided not to wait for momma seal to come back at high tide, so it decided to swim and cry its way down to the deeper water.  Only problem was a bald eagle sat nearby looking at it like it was a nice snack.  I think if there weren't people watching, that baby probably wouldn't make it to the deeper water.

We had the best fireworks show put on by our group on the pier over the water.  It was fantastic!  It's about 25 seconds and REALLY COOL for amateurs.  Unfortunately the colors didn't really come through.


Happy 4th of July!

3 - 2 - 1 - Blast Off !!

Saturday, June 28, 2014
Seven Feathers Indian Casino

We MADE it!  We escaped!  Finally, after 2 months of major purging, goodwill drops, dump drops and storage bin runs, we are on the road full time!  The house isn't sold yet, but we aren't letting that keep us from the road.  What an exhausting time!  In our last few days some very good friends of ours gave us a special gift.  Seems it's a very well known story in motorcycle circles.  Our friends thought it would be a fitting gift for us even if it were going in a 5th wheel instead of a Harley Davidson.  We love it!  The story goes...

Legend has it Evil Road Spirits have been latching themselves on to motorcycles for

 as long as there have been bikes on the road.
These Evil Road Spirits are responsible for mechanical problems and bad luck along a journey.
Legend goes on to say that by attaching a small bell onto your motorcycle, the Evil Road Spirits will become trapped inside the bell where the constant ringing drives them insane, making them lose their grip until they fall to the ground. (Ever wonder where pot-holes come from?)
It is also believed that the mystery of the bell carries twice as much power when it is purchased by a friend or loved one and given as a gift.

 

Thanks Mike & Rose!

 

There was no shortage of beautiful views along the drive.  Many rivers that I did not get the names of too.

 

  Lake Shasta, CA

Mt. Shasta, CA

 

We are not typically private RV park types.  We prefer state/county/COE parks and boondocking.  We love to hike, kayak, bike and fish as opposed to the private park type of amenities.  We'll wallydock when we need to.  We'll also stay at private parks too when that is more advantageous for whatever reason.

Our first outing will be in the Hoodsport area of Washington for a Friends & Family reunion.  On the way we decided to stay at Seven Feathers India Casino RV Park in Oregon to break up the drive.  What a gorgeous place!  So lush and clean.  Decently spaced, flat areas.  Very natural looking.  I know there are many amenities, but we were there only one night.  I believe it was $40 a night for full hook-ups, but with the first time casino member card, we received 20% off.  We took the free shuttle to the casino and had an ok dinner, gambled our free money and then went back "home" and collapsed.  It was a longer drive than we prefer to do, but that's how it goes sometimes.

 

 

Sunday, June 29, 2014
Dash Point State Park, Federal Way, WA

We didn't remember until we almost arrived that we had been here before with the kids about 7 years prior.  It's a nice park.   Lots of greenery and fairly decent spaced spots.  We even have full hookups.  They have a pretty complicated tiered system of pricing.  Like 6+ different levels.  We are here for 4 nights.  This allows us time to decompress and organize the things we just stuffed into the trailer.  We shopped and put things away.  Feeling really comfortable now.  Great weather for the area.  Sunny to partly sunny, 70s to low 80s. 



Tuesday, July 2, 2014

Today we had a wonderful surprise visit from Allen & Donna Ferguson (Fergizmo).  We have followed them from their launch a while back and enjoy reading their blog.  We knew they were in the area, but a bit northeast of us.  Well, they decided to drive the 45 minutes, one way, to pop in and see us even though I was not on the computer and could not acknowledge we'd even be here.  When we heard the knock on the door, I had a feeling it might be them. We only had about an hour to visit as I had to pick my sister up from the airport and they had to get going also.  It sure was nice to meet them face to face.  They are as lovely as they seem from their blog!  We will both be attending the RV Dreams Fall Rally in Indiana, so hopefully our paths will criss-cross from WA to IN.

I picked my sister up and we are having a great BBQ's steak dinner.  Filet Mignon, what a treat!  I sure love my steak even though I try to limit my red meat these days.  We leave the Tacoma area tomorrow for Hoodsport.  There will be lots of friends, clamming, oystering (is that a word?), crabbing and lots of fresh pasta rolling!  Good times for sure!

Will it EVER end?

For these past two months we have been VERY busy!  We have a target date to begin our fulltiming of June 28, 2014.  Will we make it?  Get back to me Monday.  We are in overtime to finish off the garage.  If we can pull that off, we'll be on our way next week :-)

Pack it, haul it, stack it.  Drive to the dump, drive to the storage locker, drive to goodwill.  Load the trailer.  Whew!  I do this every few days.  This has been the most exhausting time ever.  More than I ever thought.  I was so tired last week I was near tears from sheer exhaustion.  I think the only reason I've found a second wind is because visually, the house is emptying and I so want to make it out of here on schedule!  It will be very close!

We've also had 2 kids graduate college, put the house on the market, get our vehicles registered in SD (just got the plates!) switch all our vehicle insurance and get the Montana road ready!

We still have to sell the old truck, give away 2 older cars and move a couple of pieces of furniture to the storage locker.  Everything else goes to goodwill.  Lots of loose ends to tie up this week!  Hopefully my next post will find us out of California and in Oregon!

First Official Outing

Union Valley Reservoir
Wench Creek Campground

Not counting the quick trip back from Michigan to California, this was our first official time out to enjoy being on the lake.

 

 



 

It's a beautiful lake that's only about an hour from us and we've hiked and kayaked in this area often.  We knew the roads and campgrounds can be small, so we had our friends let us know how their rig fit before we left.  It was tricky and we probably wouldn't bring it back there again.  But we sure enjoyed the weekend.  Our first time cooking and just thoroughly enjoying our time.

 

Summarized from Wikipedia:

Union Valley Reservoir is about 20 miles northeast of Placerville. The 277,000 acre feet at an elevation of 4,870 feet.  It was formed in 1963 by the 453-foot high earth and rockfill Union Valley Dam on Silver Creek, which is a tributary of the American River. The reservoir is part of the Upper American River Project, a public electric utility, which operates the dam and many other dams in the area.  It stores snow melt runoff during the spring and releases it during the summer when electrical demand is greatest to a chain of hydroelectric power plants downstream. The reservoir is fed by Big Silver Creek, Jones Fork Silver Creek, Tells Creek, Wench Creek and the outflows of Robbs Peak and Jones Fork powerhouses.

 

 

Site #74

 

 



I'm not sure we'll be out again until we head out end of June.  We still have a lot to do to get this house on the market and sold.  Our daughter also graduates in the middle of June.  Last of four :-)  And as soon as the house/ranch sells, we are on our way fulltime!

Bringing our New Rig back to CA

May 8 - May 17, 2014
Thursday


Normally one would like to have time to get used to a new truck AND trailer AND driving them both a little at a time.  That's how we had it planned, but as it turned out, we needed to be back to CA for our sons graduation from CSU Fresno on the 16th.  Initially we tried to break up the drive to be no more than 8 hours of driving each day.  But since we were behind a day due to the hitch issue, we really wanted to pick up our pace so that we would still have a couple of days in Arizona on the way back to visit friends and family.  So we thought we'd see how we feel, and if we felt like pressing on, we would and try to make up that lost travel day.

Our first day hitching up and heading out was in a horrible downpour.    We drove 450 mi, 8 hours.  We left Muskegon, Michigan, drove through Illinois, Indiana and ended up in St. Louis.

By time we got into Illinois, the rain had stopped and the drive was quite nice.  Indiana was also uneventful except for the fun time on the turnpike.  Good thing we had LOTS of quarters left over from the Laundromat as we didn't have a lot of change at the time.  It wasn't too bad.  We only made one mistake getting off and right back on which somehow cost us an extra $8.  Not sure how that happened.  We normally try to steer clear of toll roads.

In Indiana we came across more severe thunderstorm warnings.  The winds picked up but luckily for us we dodged the worst of it and sailed into St. Louis just in time for commute traffic on Friday.  We took a southern route and ended up missing it all.  Lucky again!  We got to see the skyline and the arch without all the traffic.  This is the best picture I could get.

 

We were headed for a Wal-Mart for our first official "wallydocking".  This is RV talk for parking overnight at a Wal-Mart.  The same can be done at larger stores like Cabelas, Bass Pro Shop, Camping World, Costco and some other places.  With permission of course.  This works very well when you're arriving in the evening and just need a place to sleep and leaving in the morning. You want to be discreet and park at the far end of the lot.  We don't usually put out all the slides.  Luckily it was late and the heat had gone away and a nice breeze for sleeping came in.  On the way here, I thought we'd just eat at a McDonalds which was conveniently across the street.  When I mentioned this to Steve he said, "Are you kidding?!  We're in BBQ Country!".  I asked him if he really wanted to risk finding a place to park this beast just for BBQ.  Well my iPhone showed a great place at the next exit.  I had enough time to google map the area and amazingly there was a large pull off along the side road with a huge turn-around at the end.  Steve was in heaven!  Super Smokers BBQ.

                  

Steve also bought a couple of very small fans.  One runs on a 12v battery and was perfect to put on the shelf right next to me.  The other runs off a USB port which is at the foot of the bed on the dresser and is perfect to bring in the cooler air directly from the window.  Both of these are nice when you have no electric hookups.  The USB runs from our battery bank.  No generator needed.

Friday

After a nice meal and a good sleep, we got up early, had some granola with yogurt and some fresh fruit.  Grabbed a coffee and hit the road.  We drove through Missouri and into Oklahoma.  500 Miles and closer to 9+ hours of driving, we pulled into another Wal-Mart.  There were several other RVs here besides us.  It was an uneventful day of driving.  We've driven this route before 15 years ago when we moved from Upstate NY back to CA with 4 kids and 2 beagles in a very packed mini-van at Christmas time!  So this somehow seemed much easier.


Saturday

This part of the drive through Oklahoma, 550 miles took closer to 10 hours.  If you haven't driven this part of I44 is quite boring once you get almost out of OK.  Fairly flat and not much to look at.  The winds picked up the more we drove.  The Texas panhandle is flat with not much going on.  There was an occasional patch of colorful wildflowers, but not much else.  The wind wasn't helping and was picking up quite a bit.  We were very impressed on how smooth the truck drives pulling the trailer even in the high wind.  The more we drove through New Mexico, the worse the winds got.  There was a high wind advisory all the way into Arizona for the next several days.  Another uneventful wallydocking and we went to bed early as we were getting restless with the driving and tomorrow was going to be the longest yet.  It really is nice to pull into Wal-Mart and not even have to unhitch.  Had a quick breakfast and a Starbucks and we were off to Phoenix!  Well, Surprise really where Steve's Dad and some really good friends of ours which live a bit north of there.


Sunday

Only 460 miles to go!  This was the worst part of the driving so far.  It took more than 10 hours to drive with the horrible winds.  The headwind really killed the gas mileage.  Down to 5mpg.  Otherwise we do a surprising nice 11 mpg.  Seems like we were getting gas and  DEF constantly!  (I will do a write up on DEF on a later post.) The winds just got worse.  By the time we stopped for lunch we were starving!  Stops were few and far between after Albuquerque so we grabbed some lunch and gas.  We got sandblasted after stepping out of the truck.  By the time we crossed the street we had sand in our hair, mouth, ears, yuck!  We sure hoped the rig wasn't getting permanent damage.  Off we went and the sandstorms were all around us until we got to Winslow, Arizona.  The winds calmed a lot and the scenery was prettier.

We stopped for more gas in Flagstaff and were happy to almost be at his Dad's where we would be "moochdocking".  You guessed it, this is where you mooch off your friends or family and park for free at their place :-) What wonderful family and friends we have!!  This would be the first time Steve had to back into a pretty tight spot, under a 13 ft canopy that we BARELY fit under!  It was a great 2 days in which we could relax a bit and not drive.  Had a great time catching up with family and visiting with our good friends Doug & Dotty and Dotty's Mom.  They were nice enough to drive all the way down to Surprise from Wilhoit to visit with us.

                               

Wednesday

 

After I washed the truck, what a job that was, we headed out for Fresno.  Yet another WalMart stay in Bakersfield.  It was late once we went up and around LA.  Strangely, traffic was very light.  Truck and trailer did beautifully on the grapevine and we made good time into Bakersfield.

 

 

Thursday

 

I didn't get a picture, but we pulled in to Blackstone North RV Park not far from the Fresno State campus.  It was a really nice little park that was very clean and quiet with lots of shade trees.  Perfect for our situation.  Normally, we are not the private RV park types.  We much prefer the settings of State Parks and boondocking.  More privacy, less people and usually on or very near a beautiful lake, river, etc.  We would recommend this park when you need a 1 or 2 night stop over.

 

 

Friday

 

Our 3rd youngest son graduated from California State University Fresno with a Psychology degree.  He works with  Autistic children.  Most of our family was there.  We had a great dinner at the Outback Steakhouse and then we headed home the next day. 

 

We were able to get down/up our steep dirt roads and able to back it into a spot at the bottom of the property where we can get power from our barn.  Not too shabby!












WHEW!!  It was a crazy but fantastic 3 weeks!

 

Picking up our New Truck & Trailer

Clinton, IL
Monday

Right after the RV-Dreams rally in TN finished we drove north to pick up our new truck in Clinton, IL.  The drive wasn't too bad.  We made it with enough time to meet Curt & Glenda of  Illinois Campers for dinner.  I've been following their blog for a while now.  They are in the same phase of full-timing we are.  We're both just waiting for the house to sell!  They are both very nice and it seems we have a lot of interest in common.  I'm sure we'll meet up along the way many times in the future!

We bought our truck on-line through Douglas Dodge.  They were fantastic to work with.  It's a new 2013 Dodge 4x4 Longbed Laramie Longhorn Dually.  Whew, what a mouthful.  Very pretty too, rootbeer brown/gold. 


Meet "Hoss"






Muskegon, MI
Tuesday

As soon as we returned our rental car, we were off to Muskegon, Michigan to do our PDI and pick up our new home!  This was the most exciting part of this trip, hands down!  We stayed in a nearby hotel for the night we arrived.  In the morning we excitedly arrived at Lakeshore RV.  Again we bought our 5th wheel over the internet.  Such an easy process.  We were very happy with the process for both.  Our new 2013 Montana 3582 had just had a bath and was waiting for us!

And of course, "The Ponderosa"

The "Ponderosa" is 39 ft of beautiful living space with lots of storage.  There are 3 slides, 6 way auto levelers, kitchen island with lots of counter space and cabinets, fireplace, 2 A/Cs and a tub/shower.



Wednesday

At Lakeshore RV, they really want to make sure you have plenty time to learn about your rig and get used to it.  They have a little "campground" on their grounds.  Concrete pads, hookups and nice trees around it.  They wanted us to practice hitching and unhitching, turning, backing etc.  What a great  dealership!  It also gave us time for a couple last minute add-ons (they are VERY accommodating) and a couple of shopping trips to pick up some necessities and some non-necessities.  Yes, dear, I do need those new pillows and that rug and those...  It's looking so homey already!  Wow, do we love it!

Thursday

We ran into a little delay when the original hitch were going to have installed by Lakeshore would not work.  Apparently there is an issue with 2013 Dodge 3500.  This caused a frantic search for a solution as we had to get on the road to drive back to CA for our son's college graduation. -- From Steve: Dodge installed a plate on the chassis above the axel that prohibits the standard receiving hitches from being installed.  The only company that has addressed this so far is B&W that makes a custom kit to integrate into Dodge's chassis setup to allow the installation of a turn over gooseneck setup (model #1314).  There is a very helpful youtube video on this exact installation.  Then you can integrate the B&W Companion 5th Wheel Receiver (model #3500).  The big advantage of this setup is that now you have the flexibility to use either a gooseneck hitch or a 5th wheel receiver.  Plus when you're not towing, you have the full use of the bed as both assemblies come out very easily. --

Friday

Of course when we were ready to leave and hitch up for our first time ever, it was POURING.  The hitching went off perfectly but since I forgot to pack an umbrella, I was soaked.  We drove a few miles away to have new tires put on the trailer.  "New?" you ask?  I won't get into all of the details, but the tires put on many Montana's of our size are Goodyear "E" loads and they have a very bad track record of blowing out.  It is many, as well as our, opinion that a stronger "G" load rating is safer.  We had Discount Tires put on 4 new Goodyear G614's.  It was still raining very heavily.  Since our rig was so large for their lot, they had us pull alongside the building and they came out like a NASCAR pit crew.  They had 4 guys out their in the rain putting those new tires on in no time flat!  It was quite amazing to watch.  We were very appreciative to them as we had to postpone the installation 3 different times due to the above mentioned hitch issue.  Kudos to all three of these dealerships.

 

 

Now we are heading back to California to see our son graduate from Fresno State.  Go Bulldogs!

RV-Dreams Rally

Plantation River RV Resort
Sevierville, TN

This was our first rally and we had a blast!  Howard and Linda of RV-Dreams put on a fantastic rally full of seminars geared to fulltime RVing.  We learned so much and finally got to put faces to all the names of friends we have "met" over the past few months.  Great food too.  My favorite was the walk-thru in others RVs.  Nice to see how real, lived in trailers look like.  We got many good tips and ideas too.  Some were really decorated very nice!

Most of the Class of 2014 Full time Grads!


 

Before we made it to the rally, we had to drive through severe thunderstorms.  This was the week of horrible storms in TN & AR and surrounding states.  We just missed one really bad cell which was almost bad enough to make us pull over as the rain was so bad it was hard to see anything.  That's when I took this video below.

  

 

Crazy Thunderstorm between Tornados

 

 

This has been a very busy week.  We have had a great time at the week long rally, and now the real fun begins.  We leave for Illinois in the morning to pick up our new truck and then off to Michigan to pick up our new trailer!



Picking up our New Home!

There's a fresh coat of paint (snow) on the mountains by us from yesterdays storm.  Weather will be a very big part of the next 3 weeks for us and will make this quite an adventure.

Originally we had a week's vacation planned to fly from CA to TN for the RV-Dreams Spring Rally.  As it turns out, we found our new truck and 5er out this way so our 1 week vacation turns into 3 weeks.  We'd love to take our time getting home, but we have our sons college graduation on May 16 back in CA so we can't take too long to get back.

We will fly into Nashville on Monday the 28th and spend the next several days near Knoxville at the rally learning and meeting friends that we feel we've known for a long time already. 

Then on the 4th, we drive to IL to pick up our new truck and hopefully meet up with Curt & Glenda that we connected with through RVillage for dinner.  The next morning it's off to Muskegon, MI to pick up our new home!  Our Montana 3582. We are very excited!  We'll spend the next couple of days learning about our new home, how it works and practice driving.  We hope to meet up with another couple, Lonney & his wife, we also met through RV-Dreams.  It's always nice to meet with others that share the same passion and interests as you.  Even though you may have only had a chance to talk for a couple of hours, it's one of those times that you feel you've known each other much longer.  It's also nice to talk about RVs, hiking, fishing etc with someone else that loves it as much as you do.

Around the 8th we'll head back West for CA with hopefully a day or two to visit friends and family in AZ.  Much will depend on the weather.  Already, we're seeing severe thunderstorm & tornado warnings for Oklahoma and the plains.  We may have to switch our route north or south or hunker down depending on any predicted storms.  It will mean driving more hours in one day than we prefer, but that's how it goes.  More pictures as we go along!

Met some new RV Friends, Thanks RVillage

If you haven't heard about the new RV site called RVillage yet, you need to check it out!  It's kind of like facebook for RVers.  One of the really neat features is a real-time map that shows where everyone is.  You can narrow that down by searching just your "friends", "groups" or other options.  This way you can plan to meet up with someone that might be camped nearby or even in the same campground.  It's a great way to build camaraderie or find others with similar interests.  Maybe someone to go to a museum with, kayak, golf, try out that famous restaurant or just have a good time around the campfire.

http://www.rvillage.com/home/action/home


So tonight Steve and I met up with Ron & Rene of RnR.  They actually live about 45 minutes from us.  We met for dinner and had a really great time with them.  We are planning on heading out full time this summer and they are hoping to head out 2015/16.  We actually had quite a bit in common.  It's nice to be able to talk about RVs, truck, and such with others that are as excited about it all as you are.  Sorry that I did not get a picture of the four of us.  Next time!

Had to have something to pull the new rig with, right?

We'll be pulling our Montana with a 2013 Dodge 3500HD Laramie Longhorn Dually.  Should definitely do the job!  The truck is in Illinois, so we'll pick it up on the way to get the trailer the first week of May.  It gives us time to practice with each before we head back to California for our son's college graduation.  I hope I'm going to be able to handle that beast.  I've not driven a dually and really didn't want one.  We'll wait a few months and see how fulltiming goes.  Then we'll consider getting a moped or something to zip to the grocery store or around the back roads to sightsee.  I don't look forward to parking that thing.  I sometimes have a difficult time getting our current Megacab in and out of parking spots in our small town.



Aint she purty?!

Well now that we have the 5er and the truck, we can get back to purging the house to get it listed.  Looks like I'll be getting a storage locker to speed up the process.  Too many boxes of stuff stacked everywhere.  At least rooms, cabinets and closets are getting empty!  Now if we can just get my husband's 1930 truck sold!  - Edit: It's SOLD! - Once we get back from the rally we'll sell our current truck and the two cars.  Whoa!  Things are really moving quickly!!!

Home Sweet Home, We bought our trailer!

We are so excited!  We found our home.  It's a 2013 Montana 3582 5th Wheel.  Only it's in Michigan, and we're still in CA. 

It works out pretty well though.  We'll be in TN for the RV-Dreams Rally in 3 weeks, so we'll pick it up then.  While we'd rather have it before the rally, looks like we'll get it after, just in case there are any problems or bad weather, we don't want to get stuck.  Next up, is the new truck because we need it by the end of April!

It Feels like Spring

Each morning I keep forgetting that I don't have to go back to work.  Then I smile.  Today was a beautiful day so Hurley (aka The Pooch/Hurlsabutt/Punkin) and I finally went on a little hike.  It was so much work closing the business that I haven't had a day off since January.  I needed a few days to catch up on sleep and it has been raining most of this week.  It was great to be back outdoors again and on a trail in the sunshine.

Driving up to the lake, I noticed how it looks and smells like Spring around here.  The seasons have flown by and with it the stages of getting ready to fulltime.  I have a lot of closets and cabinets to finish cleaning out to get the house ready for market.  Each month until Summer, we will have many milestones we go through.  It'll be a lot of work, but we are looking forward to hiking many new trails and enjoying the seasons in different parts of the country.

"Welcome Home"

That was the nice notice I received today in an e-mail from Americas Mailbox.  We now have a "home" in South Dakota!  This is part of our FT process.  We have decided to domicile in South Dakota mainly because there is no state income tax (Steve will still be working).  That alone is a big bonus.  Other benefits are: only a 3% sales tax, very inexpensive vehicle & RV registration, no inspections, no wheel tax and very low rates on vehicle/RV insurance.  They will handle all the transferring of our registrations for us while we are still here in CA.  When we head to Indiana in September, we will stop into town to get our Drivers Licenses, register to vote and see our new "home".  I love that we've completed another step in becoming Full Timers!

First Year on the Road Schedule is coming Together

Now the best part of fulltime RVing is that we will have the time and flexibility to change our plans whenever we need/want to.  The following is just a loose plan for the year with two concrete stops.

It's starting to feel a little bit more real when I made our first campground reservations today, so our new lifestyle of living on the road has its first planned campground stops.  Really was very exciting!  We still hope to head out in summer, but if the ranch doesn't sell, then these first plans will simply become vacations rather than "stops along the road".  Our only concrete plans are to head from Placerville (just East of Sacramento) to Seattle, WA where we will stay at Dash Point State Park near Tacoma.  We will be picking up my sister who will fly in for the reunion on the 4th of July week.  After a few days there we will all head to our intended destination, the Rest-a-While RV Park near Hoodsport, WA where we are meeting friends for a family reunion.

If our place does sell, then we'll head from Washington, east to South Dakota in August where we will finalize our change of address and get our new drivers licenses.  I'll add more about how we did our Change of Domicile later.  If it does not sell, then we'll do this part later on.

From South Dakota we have reservations for our second rally in September in Indiana with RV-Dreams (hopefully with our new rig)!

After that, I have ideas of where I'd like to be: Upstate NY where we use to live to visit friends, Vermont/New Hampshire for change of fall colors, Virginia where my husband is from to visit our nieces baby, and then down to the Florida Keys for Christmas!  Ever hear the song "Toes in the water, toes in the sand" by the Zac Brown band?  That'll be our new Christmas song!  We hope to fly the kids down to Florida to join us for our first Christmas on the road, but that's just too far ahead to know for sure.

And 2015, maybe head back west along the gulf states :-)  Oh the planner in me loves this part!!  I just LOVE maps!  Finding those special out-of-the way places and boondocking are what we love.  Anyway, back to today's reality :-)

The dreaded garage sale

Actually it was a flea market near town.  Since we are on acreage on a dirt road, it made more sense to do the local flea market.  I was dreading the 4am wake-up as you are supposed to set up at 5am.  NOT FUN for me.  Steve didn't mind it.  He's always enjoyed garage sales/flea markets etc.  Not my idea of a fun time.  But I'm committed to getting rid of all of our excess stuff.  Hubby prefers to make a few dollars, I would prefer to drop it all off at Goodwill and be done with it!  Today was our first time and we made about $235.  Still not worth it to me, but Steve has decided to dedicate each Sunday through February to do it alone while I am closing down our retail business.  Whatever doesn't sell by then, needs to go as I'd like to get the house on the market by April.  Many more closets and the garage to clear out.  So onward we push and hopefully we can clear things out quickly and even make a bit of money doing it. 

Looking for Buried Treasure

At the last minute, we decided to take a hike instead of riding our bikes on the American River Bike Path.  We went to Folsom Lake as we have been watching on the news how low the lake has been due to the drought.  Settlements and structures left over from the Gold Rush days are visible.  We brought our metal detector and had a great time seeing what we could find.  While you are not allowed to remove historical items, it is ok to search and look.  We found old nails, pennies, pipes, cans and old pop tops.  Unfortunately no gold.  My arms are still sore from digging.  While it is amazing to see these structures and even an old bridge, we really need the rain/snow!

 

Lake Folsom, CA



Making progress!

The past two days I have been off work and I finally dragged several bags to Goodwill and several more to the dump.  Dang that felt good!  Actually getting those bags OUT of the house made me feel much better.  I've been sorting and bagging for a couple of weeks now.  Oh, I still have SO many closets, bedrooms and cabinets to go through, but this was a great start!  Now with one empty bedroom, we have made a Garage Sale section and the other part will be for the what-seems-endless e-bay pile.  As busy as today was, I still snuck out with the pooch for a little hike where we ran into some old friends.

 

We are in desperate need of rain/snow in California, but if that isn't going to be the case, then I'm loving the sunny and 70 degree weather!



Happy New Year!!

Wow, I can finally say, "We'll be heading out THIS YEAR!!".  Still hoping to be out in Summer.  We've been looking at more RVs and came close to buying a truck today.  I've also almost finished cleaning out one the kids bedrooms and large closet.  Making a little progress.  Some goes to the dump, a lot to goodwill and some that still needs figuring out.  I've found some great future campgrounds from fellow bloggers to keep me motivated in the meantime.  I had a friend visit and we did some nice winter hiking to one of my favorite waterfalls nearby.

Waterfall at Sly Park