Pack up the RV, long hugs, tearful goodbyes, hit the road
Land outside Flagstaff, AZ, at the Meteor Crater RV Park
First time camping in below-freezing temperatures! Have no idea what to do with that. Put antifreeze in the gray and black tanks, leave the tank heaters on, and don't put fresh water in the fresh water pipes. And crank the heat up, because Galia gets cold if it's less than 72.
Discover that our hubcaps were stolen. Seriously? Who steals hubcaps? Find most recent picture taken of the RV, realize they could have been stolen any time in the last month. C'est la vie!
Side trip to see the giant meteor crater! It was very big and cratery.
Drive to Santa Fe, NM, pick up my friend, Desiree, from work (in our RV!). Head to her house and meet her partner, Tiffany. Realize that Desi and I haven't seen each other for five or six years, which is a bummer, but also reaffirms my previous knowledge that I could go any amount of time without seeing Desi and it would feel like we'd seen each other the day before. We had a brilliant time with them both; they're such open, interesting, and reflective people that you feel like you can ask them any questions, and they can ask you any question, so you can get right to the meat of the interesting stuff. Mike immediately understood why these people are My People! Mike and I also learned that we can still achieve our goal of deep meaningful connection even if our stay is short. Deepest thanks to Des and Tiffany for opening up their home to us on a random Tuesday night, and right after they had previous guests leave, too! Obligatory New Mexico Mexican food (chile sauce on everything!), excellent conversation, and interesting stories made for a wonderful evening.
Oatmeal and coffee with Des before she goes to work
More driving! Head to Oklahoma.
Start running out of gas. Next gas station isn't for 25 miles; the following one is ten miles after that. Anxiously make it and pull in; the gas pumps are down. After some commotion, discover that at least the diesel is working, so we won't have to find out the hard way what happens when a giant RV runs out of gas in the middle of nowhere.
Long driving day with nothing much to look at. Getting exhausted. Learning that more than a couple days of driving in a row can be rough, and these 8+ hour days are pretty difficult.
Somewhere around here is when I start to realize that, while it's perfectly possible to work on the road, I simply just don't want to. I'd rather sit and watch the scenery (even if there isn't much to see) and hang out with Mike than be responding to emails. I do some work this week to stay on top of things, but finally admit to myself that I should probably just plan to not work on travel days. Luckily, there will be few times this year where we'll have as many in a row as this week.
But do learn how nice it is to be able to get takeout food and then eat it in your portable house instead of inside a fast food joint or gas station.
Make it to Oklahoma City; neither of us had been to Oklahoma before. It was so cold that the electric heater shut itself off in the middle of the night to protect itself from breaking. (That was a feature we were as yet unaware of.) We were low on propane, but luckily had enough to turn the propane heater on instead to get us through till the morning.
Spend a few hours exploring Oklahoma City. Yummy breakfast at a place called Hatch, then a cold but pleasant walk around town. Visit the Oklahoma City bombing memorial, warm up inside a beautiful big skyscraper, walk around a nice garden park, and check out the canal at Bricktown. Can't quite get a good read on OKC; seems like they're working really hard on redevelopment and revitalizing the city, but you still can feel the undercurrent of the people and places that they seem to be trying to erase over. Like any gentrifying town, this stress felt a bit uncomfortable to us as we appreciated the new but could still feel the old.
Fill up the propane, so we won't have to worry about the heat again!
Drive to Austin, with a stop for Galia's first-ever meal at Cracker Barrel.
Austin! A day of recommendations from my BFF, Earnest:
Late lunch at Magnolia Grill, walk around that neighborhood and see the iconic Welcome to Austin mural.
Get a Fat Elvis donut at Gourdoughs (with peanut butter icing, topped with grilled bananas and bacon).
Find a place to store the RV in New Orleans, but the owners say we have to send the paperwork in within an hour, so we go back to the RV park and Mike sends the paperwork while I take a post-sugar-rush power nap.
Back to downtown Austin. Look for a recommended coffee shop but it's not there anymore, so grab caffeine at a coffee shop that's inside a giant bike shop, make jokes about hipster towns.
See the capitol building, walk a few blocks down Sixth Street, walk to the water, then down Rainey Street (which I adored).
Lyft across the river, check out the view from this cute spiral hill, then get really yummy bbq at Terry Black's, followed by frozen custard at Sandy's. Pick up Tiny Pies to go, and head home.
Really nice to have a day off of driving just to hang out and have fun. I love Austin. If it were closer to anything/anybody else that I loved, I'd consider moving here.
Note: We are in the South now. Most of our pictures will be of food.
Since we have no fresh water in the RV due to low temperatures, we have to shower at the RV park showers. We made sure to book parks with super nice bathrooms, but the only issue in Austin was that the bathroom was really far away. This morning, I bundled up (it was still really cold), walked all the way there, unpacked all my toiletries and whatnot, and then realized I didn't bring a towel with me. Powered on anyway; used shirt to dry off. Laziness breeds innovation.
Drive south, with a stop in Katy for surprisingly delicious gyros from a restaurant attached to a gas station.
Meet up with Mike's sister, all get groceries and coffee. Her friends come over and we all hang out, order pizza.
Also, since we're comfy and with family, take the opportunity to do laundry and dishes!
Sleep in the RV in the driveway so she doesn't have to do our sheets. Reinforces how convenient this thing is.
Eat cereal all together, then have to take off and say goodbye.
Drive to Louisiana, with a stop in Scott to pick up boudin at Don's, at the request of our AirBnB host. (I love the people here.) Mike is in Meat Heaven; we walk out with boudin, a stuffed chicken, fresh beef jerky, and literally a pound of freshly fried pork skins. Welcome to Louisiana.
Make it to New Orleans. It's hard enough driving around New Orleans with a normal car -- you never know when you'll discover a huge pothole, downed electrical wire, or overgrown tree. But in an RV, it was downright traumatic. Every other street had a No Trucks sign, which we assumed to mean Do Not Enter If You're an RV Either Because We're Too Lazy to Trim These Trees in Particular, so we spent a really long time trying to find a way across town that wouldn't somehow end with property damage. But we made it!
We ended up renting a house here for our six week stay, because the only RV park that was right in town was literally more expensive, and since we won't have a car to get around, we felt it was important to have a place in town to stay so we can use the bus. As soon as we got here, I knew the decision was a good one -- the house is adorable, comfortable, an absolutely perfect location, and has plenty of space for us to settle in to life and work.
We unpacked the RV, and then took our second perilous journey back out of town to drop it off at an RV park in Belle Chasse. Jokingly reflect how little we're staying in our RV on this RV trip.
Back to the house, order in piles of fried food, including the largest pile of fried pickles I've ever seen. New Orleans, I'm happy to see you again.
Since then, we've been taking the opportunity to settle in, explore our neighborhood, and catch up on work (Galia) and rest (Mike). One really awesome thing about being in a town for such a long time is that you can take your time, explore the details, feel like you really live there, and not like you have to cram in every single meal and activity into a few days.
