Day 29 – It’s Not All Peaches and Cream

Posting blogs about our travels is a bit deceptive. Although our posts show pictures of pretty places or interesting locations, it’s “not all peaches and cream” as the saying goes. Every trip has its challenges. During those difficult times we rarely get pictures because we are in the thick of figuring it out.

For example, on this trip, when planning our direction of travel, a number of times there were weather warnings. We dodged “Winter Weather Advisory” warnings throughout Idaho and Utah. And then there was the “Severe Thunderstorm Advisory” when in the hill country of Texas. We talked to another traveler who had heard that there had been golf ball size hail in that particular storm. Well, that would have put a “dent” in our travels. There was also a “Tornado Warning” in east Texas, which we missed as we sat on the beach at Port Aransas. In both Texas and Nevada, when entering our destination in the truck’s nav system, we got the “Your route appears to take you into a flood advisory location”. Of course, when those appear we scramble for information on the internet to see how it will impact the drive. With all of our years camping with the Scouts in the back country, we are pretty weather-wise, but sometimes storms still sneak up on us. 

Speaking of nav systems, we usually travel where we haven’t been before. That being the case we typically have the truck nav system set for the destination along with at least one of our phones. Often, we have both phones set with different mid points. And then, yes, we use hard copy maps. Yes, maps, “plural”. We have a US map for “The Big Picture”. We also have an oversized atlas with all 50 states, plus Canada. In addition, we usually have at least one local map, whether for the whole state or a local park system. Even with all those resources, there are many instances where we say, “Which way do we go?”. One time on this trip the nav system said to exit the freeway for a fuel station. We took the exit onto a road that ran north as far as we could see with no sign of a gas station, or any other human habitation. Needless to say, we turned around and got back on the freeway. We’ve found that the technology is great sometimes, but you also need to use your eyes and commonsense. The nav system sure does get mad at us when we ignore it.

Another issue encountered by RV’s has to do with size. Although, our truck with a basement camper isn’t as large as the big busses or the huge trailers, we still get in tricky situations. One example of that on this trip occurred in Silver City, New Mexico. We had gone into town and stopped at the historical museum. Well, that building happened to be in the historical district where the streets were narrow. There were many one-way streets that had vehicles parked on both sides. We turned into one of these and it seemed to get narrower the further down the street we went. Eventually, I asked Pat to fold the mirrors in so they wouldn’t scrape against the parked cars (Luckily, with our truck, that is just the push of a button). Once we got out onto a wider avenue, Pat asked if I'd gotten a picture of the skinny street. I was too busy crossing my fingers to snap any pictures!

Then there are the idiosyncrasies of different areas. Did you know that in Texas, they have freeways circle around the center of town? Sometimes there are numerous concentric circles around the larger towns. Imagine a huge roundabout going 70 mph and try to get the right exit. Yikes! 

Also in Texas, they have one-way frontage roads that parallel the freeway on both sides. If you miss an exit for a gas station, you can’t just get off, turn right and go back to it. Nope, you have to get off, turn left on the one-way road, turn left under the freeway, turn left onto that one-way frontage road, guess how far back you need to go, turn left under the freeway, turn left onto that one-way frontage road, and hopefully find the gas station you missed! Yep, that doesn’t always work.

All this is to say that traveling has its challenges. However when we get to those unique, interesting, and beautiful locations, it makes the struggle worthwhile. So, we roll on looking for new places and new experiences. The majority of them are great!