Healthy Traveling – Canned Comfort

More Challenges!

We came back from a 12 day cruise, after the COVID shut down we can now move around the world, kinda. This cruise was planned 3 years ago. It was a beautiful itinerary that kept changing as time passed. Wow, how to be flexible. We did learn so much about history as well as how age does effect your travel-abilities. I know that my mind doesn’t know how old I am. My bones do. But, our minds can be healthy and still adapt and learn. That was the exciting part.

We had so many hoops to jump through. Vaccines, antigen testing, re-testing and passports, excursions were cancelled, new ones made and flexibility was a must. We did see so many wonderful places, learned unknown, to us, history and even the rain and cold did not slow us down.

This was a way for us to see a world we had not experienced before. Well we have sailed on 5 night cruises, Trafalgar Tours of Europe and of course driving and pulling our Airstream CC!

As our physical abilities have changed, we changed. Due to health issues we had to go from a towable to a small class C. For me the challenge is learning to love the new way as much as I had our Airstream. Our Leisure Travel Van Unity FX to be precise. The Unity is smaller than our 27 ft Airstream. The Leisure Travel Van is 25ft total. It really is a physical and emotional shift. Funny how we connect to our vehicles and how we feel while we are in them.

We had promised ourselves that we would not drive more than 4 hours a day during our travels. Well we drove 10-11 hours. The dogs were not comfortable. We did stop every couple of hours for them to relieve themselves. We even stopped for lunch and ate in our coach after walking the dogs. This was a family event trip. We had time frames to be in different cities to see family and be home for my hubby’s work schedule.

Hopefully, this will be the last time this happens to us. A challenge to work through. I have made a list of goals for our future travels. Not on a ship but our little motorhome. We still have not been able to agree on a name that would reflect her personality and our feelings about her.

Here are a few of my goals: 1) learn healthy meal planning that will take advantage of the plates we travel through and keep a budget. Good health and new flavors are a challenge; 2) Use the tools we have to plan how to take advantage of boon docking, Harvest Hosts and with some full hookups interspersed; 3) Develope a financial stream to help augment our goals and dreams while on the road.

Do you have travel dreams/goals? Please share your goals/dreams of how you are looking to solve the puzzles. Happy Travels.

Write a comment and let me know what you think about and would like to hear more about.

Keep traveling, be healthy and enjoy your world.

Let’s Look Back at Our Winter 2018

Best plans for starting at the beginning were changed by a rush of plans and invitations to go visit family and friends! img_1037-1

We put 15,000 miles on our new coach in 3 months! I used the H2O liquid cleaner to quickly wipe down the dust and accumulation of the new rig. There were labels all over the inside stating “no abrasives or cleansers”. Cleaning was quick and easy and we then quickly stored everything from the 20 ft FC and prepped for winter travel!

Well, as often happens, on our way to Colorado our water pump had stopped working. We had just had it repaired from a short trip to California and had picked up the rig at the dealership on our way out of time. Luckily we found a dealership in southern Colorado that refreshed the pump for us at no charge!!! What luck.

We soon learned we were not at all prepared for our trip. Yes we had food, winter clothing, doggie supplies etc. We had too much stuff. We really had not really learned much from our last 12 years of travel. This was a longer travel through new roads and byways. We just rushed to get needed repairs for damages made on the maiden voyage from California to our new home in Henderson, Nevada.

My hubby tried to back up our rig into the court we had lived in and introduced our back aluminum panels to the street sign!!! Our new rig needed two weeks of repair! Ouch, ouch, ouch!

The repairs finished just as we had to leave on our 3 week trip!!! Not a great way to start. Grumpy, short tempered, rushed and hopeful that we were prepared! What another adventure we were to have.

We forgot that there was less daylight and lots of semi-trucks zooming along eastbound Hwy 10! Thank God we had a new tow vehicle and the rig was in one wonderful piece. We finally got to our destination KOA in NEW MEXICO! Rolled in at 1:00 am and rolled out at 8:00 am! Not a way to start.

Day two began with sunlight, 46 degrees and a wonderful hot cup of coffee! After taking the dog for a walk we realized why we have our coach! We had a cozy, comfy sleep in our own bed. We did not have to check-into a hotel, lug stuff in and out of our vehicle. We just parked, hooked up the electric and went to bed!

The next part of the trip was rushed, as we were afraid of the snow possibly falling too soon. The great part was the vistas we enjoyed, the road conditions and we had our own good hot food and could stop to walk about to stretch.

After staying at another KOA in southern Colorado, quite nice too. We arrived at the ranch and enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Of course we had an electrical panel problem we tried to repair but all dealerships were closed. We were able to make it home and to the dealership without problems! Thank goodness my son is mechanically inclined and helped out!

Whew home, safe rested and the rig is getting repaired! Still on warranty too! What luck

Hopefully before our next outing in one week we can review the cleaning and updating of our new rig. Happy travels.

The Long Road to Smiles!

After more than 15,000 miles in 4 weeks we realize every turn shows us many new vistas? Our new 26-U Airstream Flying Cloud is being pulled by our 2018 Ford Expedition! My husband had to have this new comfortable “truck” as they are our forever dream. I know our doggie was very happy with her posh back seat all to herself also.

Our first adventure was our roundtrip Thanksgiving loop to Colorado. The last time we drove over Interstate Highway 70 in our old true blue Explorer. We went up through beautiful mountains, deep valleys and truly magnificent canyons. We just knew that our next trip would be even more spectacular because our home was coming with us. The big difference in trips was the snow and steep climbs made us rethink traversing the Rockies with all new equipment on this first big winter trip. So we chose south on Highway 10 then up to Colorado through Arizona, New Mexico and a tiny piece of Texas with 3 days “camping” at the ranch.

We learned a lot about having a tiny home following us wherever we went and also learned how different 12 years makes in Airstream innovations. We grew from a 20 foot cute cozy Flying Cloud to a 26 foot little home. We have a big girl refrigerator and freezer that more than acomodated our needs. Of course I had to over prepare because we were not sure how things would go.

We did not realize that this Airstream did not have a water filter. Our 20 footer did. I did do prep work for making soups etc quickly as we went. We were only staying overnight as we went.

We planned on leaving about 10 in the morning but left at 5:30 pm because our Airstreams pre-flight repairs and adjustments were not ready as promised. This put us way behind. We promised ourselves no more driving through the night to rush anywhere. Well that did not happen. We arrived at our first stop at Gila Bend KOA Arizona. I thought we were lost in the Mexican dessert as there were few to no lights on the highway and we had never driven on this highway before, not even in the daytime. Oh yeah, I think this highway is owned by truckers, great big 52 feet long semi’s that swoosh by you and we felt like ants.

The KOA at Gila Bend was very clean, well maintained and we got a pull through! We were cozy and it was so easy to shower, have coffee, walk the dog and make my morning shake. We prepped for our lunch on the way, made sure we refilled our water bottles and off we went. I would recommend Gila Bend to people going that way as people were very nice, courteous and we felt safe there. I was happy that we got to witness the Air Force flying their wings in the morning sun! What a thrill. We had doggie snacks and water cup for Kona our 9 year old mini Aussie and our protien bars, Fit Chews and Fizz sticks to keep us alert, hydrated and energized.

Looking forward to seeing where we are going this days ride!