Our first trip - N.C. to MI

What do we do now?

     We started a master plan of where we wanted to be and when, but that is constantly changing. One of the biggest changes is that we decided to go to Michigan in September instead of over Thanksgiving / Christmas break. Almost all of our family lives within an hour drive of each other and we were really looking forward to seeing them again. Why change the dates though? After enduring 35 Michigan winters, we have seen enough snow for a lifetime - that's why we moved south! Our usual route to Michigan travels on smaller back roads through Virginia, West Virginia and Ohio, and is about 750 miles. We wanted to stay on more major highways while I got comfortable driving the RV, so we opted to take I-40 straight west across North Carolina, then get on I-75 around Knoxville and take that straight north to Michigan. That added probably 100-150 extra miles, but it was worth it for my peace of mind. We planned on averaging a few hundred miles of driving a day, less on weekdays because of school and work, more on the weekends because of no other commitments.

Day 1 - 9/3/20 - Goodbye House to South Mountains State Park
    We pulled out of our driveway around 11:30am, just after the kids finished their school work for the morning. Katie took a quick trip around the block so the kids could say one last goodbye to their friends. We left just in the nick of time, because when she drove back by the house, the new owners were already in the driveway! Our plan was to get some lunch then drive over to our campground while the kids used the Verizon hotspot to connect and do school for the afternoon. One slight problem though - while Katie made a quick trip into a store and I waited with the kids, the AC in the car stopped working, then the radio and DVD player stopped working, and then the car completely died! It was Fuquay's last attempts to prevent us from leaving, but thankfully we got someone to give us a jump, got the kids all logged on to school, and we were on our way.

    Sticking to our mileage plan, South Mountains State Park was just at the right distance - 200 miles away. Once we got on the highway, it was pretty smooth sailing from there. I was set up in the right lane, going 55-60mph, completely content to let everyone pass me as I drove at a speed that was comfortable for me, while I was getting used to driving an RV. We were also told that going much over 60 will really affect your gas mileage, and we already only get like 8-10mpg, so I didn't want to make our gas bill any more expensive than it already was. We quickly learned was that you can't do math based on the speed you would travel in a regular car. We are so used to thinking a 200 mile trip will take 3 hours, but driving at RV speed that 200 miles might take 4+ hours. With our late start and our GPS directions not taking us directly to the campground, we didn't get there until about 6:30pm. Once we got the RV parked and went through the "setting up" process, it took about 2 seconds for the kids to find a short little trail down to the river next to our site. We went out and did some rock-hopping for a bit, then got some dinner (I think we just made PB&J sandwiches), the kids watched a movie, and we settled into our new house for our first night.

Day 2 - 9/4/20 - South Mountains State Park to Berea, Kentucky
    We woke up early to make sure the kids could connect to their hotspot at the campsite. We were pretty far from any major civilization, so not, surprisingly we had a very weak signal with both our Verizon hotspot and the hotspots on our phones (also Verizon). I drove up to the welcome center and they had Wi-Fi access there, but that didn't work either. So I quickly drove over to a gas station, filled up the Pilot, and we hit the road around 8:00am. We hoped that getting back onto I-40 would give us a clear signal. Aurora missed parts of her first class, but after that they were pretty well connected. Katie had to stop for a while to help the boys (1st and 3rd grader), as they have a hard time focusing and paying attention. I continued on, eventually being almost an hour ahead. 

    I stopped to get some groceries since I was so far ahead. We finally met back up at a rest area, hoping to set up for an hour or so while the kids finished up school. There was absolutely no signal there, so we decided to press on. I gave them a bunch of lunch foods and on we went. I realized I needed to get gas, something I hadn't done before. This was a whole new adventure in itself. I had a lot of issues and I tried at 3 different stations before being successful. That cost me a good 30 minutes, and because of the difference in speeds we were driving, I was now about 50 miles behind Katie. Our original plan was to get near Knoxville, but it was still pretty early in the day, so we planned on stopping in a small town in Kentucky that was another 150 miles. That didn't seem like much, but we were still doing "car driving" math and thinking that's about 2 hours, but in "RV driving" it is more like 3. I was already stressed out from everything else going on, then I started getting nervous that something might happen while I was driving alone and Katie was over an hour away. She sent me the location of the campground she found us for the night, and I just white-knuckled it the rest of the way. By the time I got there, I had driven the RV over 310 miles through the mountains, and it took me about 9 hours start to finish. I said that we were never doing that again - getting that far separated or driving that long in one day. I had a beer to relax my nerves, and it wasn't long before we were back in bed, thankful for the day to be over.

Day 3 - 9/5/20 - Berea, Kentucky to Wapakoneta, Ohio
    Finally it was the weekend. We didn't have to worry about school for the kids. We could just get on the road and go, after the kids jumped in the pool in 55 degrees of course. We would now take plenty of breaks, about every 100 miles or 2 hours or so. We had 230 miles to get back to where we camped with family back in July. We are on a family plan with Outdoor Adventures camping group, which allows us to camp for free up to 14 days at a time. What we didn't know was that we could switch locations as long as we used consecutive days. So we planned out seven nights in four different locations.

    Day 3 I was finally getting comfortable driving the RV, so we decided to let the kids take turns riding in it. It was fairly uneventful except for the drive around Cincinnati, where they had a lot of construction going on and the lanes felt like they were narrower than the width of my RV. Having the cones and concrete barriers lined up directly on the edge of the lane while semis passed on the other side was pretty stressful. At this point I had 500+ miles driving experience, so I was able to manage. We pulled into the campground and were able to get into a pretty huge site, and we set up the outside TV and watched a movie before bed.

Day 4 - 9/6/20 - Wapakoneta, Ohio to NOWHERE!
    After 3 days of driving over 200 miles everyday, we were excited to have a day where we didn't have to drive anywhere. I was able to get in a run through town early morning, the kids went and played at the playground, we got to play basketball and mini-golf, and topped it all off with a swim in the heated indoor pool. It was a fun relaxing day and we are looking forward to many more like this one. We want to keep our driving days to a minimum, and when we get somewhere, we want to stay there for a few weeks. We joined the Thousand Trails camping group, similar to what I described with Outdoor Adventures, but this has 1,100+ campgrounds across the country. We bought in for less than $1000 for an entire year. Our goal is to utilize it as much as possible and book everything as early as possible, so we know where we will be staying well ahead of time.

Day 5 - 9/7/20 - Wapakoneta, Ohio to Mount Pleasant, Michigan
    Another day of driving with no school. This was Labor Day so we expected to roads to be busy with people traveling home after the "last weekend of summer", but it wasn't too busy. Our excitement for the day was finally getting to see family! We stopped in Lansing and got to see my parents for about 45 minutes in the Meijer parking lot. It was great to see them for a while, but then we got on the road to Mount Pleasant to see Chris and Michelle and their 3 kids, but not before stopping into Quality Dairy to get some apple cider and doughnuts (the best anywhere). As we headed "up north" (that's where people in Michigan go on summer weekends), the traffic was ridiculous heading back south. One great thing about living on the road is that we aren't on the same schedule as anyone else. That evening it was so great to see our kids playing with their cousins. Even though they have been so far apart for so long, when they get together it's like they haven't missed a beat.

Day 6-10 - 9/8/20 to 9/12/20 - Mount Pleasant to Gaylord to Mount Pleasant to Fowlerville, Michigan
    We got up on Tuesday (the day after Labor Day) in Mount Pleasant and there were maybe 10 sites out of 200 with campers still there. We were anxious to get on the road to go camp with Grammy and Grandpa Couling for a few nights, but we had to wait until the kids were done with school. Even though check-out was at noon, the lack of demand for sites allowed for us to stick around until 2:00 when school was done. A short 2ish hour drive and we were there. I got my first experience backing the RV into a spot, and may or may not have had a run in with a tree branch.
    Once we were set up, we made dinner together, but the kids had to get to bed because they had school the next day. This whole adventure is going to be difficult, because there are things we will want to do and people to hang out with, but we have to stay focused on school and work. However, once the kids were in bed, we stayed up and played cards for a while. That would become part of our daily routine while we were with family. The one big thing we did while in Gaylord was make a trip to the Mackinaw Bridge, one of the largest suspension bridges in the world at 5 miles. We skipped stones in two of the Great Lakes, visited the lighthouse, drove across the bridge, climbed up to Castle Rock, and ate at a small local burger joint that was delicious.
    After 3 nights, we were going to head back south to set up and the Couling's (Katie's parents) house for a few weeks. But we didn't want to drive for 3-4 hours after I finished work, so we went back to Mount Pleasant for a night. Of course we got together with Chris and Michelle and their kids again, this time getting pizza and taking it over to their house. We had a campfire in their backyard, the kids were outside long enough to make s'mores and hear a spooky impromptu story made up by uncle Chris. We headed back to the camper and after a long day the kids were falling asleep on the car ride.

Day 11 - 24 - 9/13/20 to 9/27/20 - Two weeks with family in Fowlerville, Michigan
    We got up the next morning and drove down to Fowlerville. They had recently built a very nice new barn and we could hook up electric and water for our RV. We were looking forward to finally having our long term setup, as we had driven 7 out of our first 10 days, covering over 1,400 miles. This also gave us a bit of a return to "normalcy". After having 10 days in the RV, we could catch our breath, mostly live in a house (except for Katie and I sleeping in the RV), and have time to unpack and get things we needed and get ready for the rest of our adventure.
    Our time in Fowlerville was incredible. We spent more time with family than we have in over 5 years. We celebrated my niece's 12th birthday one weekend, and my dad's 70th birthday the next weekend. Katie and I went out on a couple dinner dates, which was great, knowing our opportunities to do so without kids will be few and far between. We played hundreds of games of cards, got to watch the field behind the house fill with 25+ white tailed deer every night, and heard countless giggles and saw countless smiles while the cousins all played together. We are hugely thankful for this opportunity and the memories that were made in this first leg of our journey. Our family is the most important thing to us, and we couldn't have asked for a better start to our Adventure of a Lifetime.