Travel Means Life

Internet – when we want it, where we want it

We live in an age where internet is a necessity. We are not in the position to retire, so I need reliable internet to work from any location we happen to be in. From my experience, campground wireless internet is hit and miss. Even if I am connected, it is not fast enough even for basic work.

So what is the answer? There are several different options out there, but the best and most reliable is cellular. I have an iPhone that I can “hotspot” my computer to, and so far it has been working great! The challenge is when cellular signal is not good.

What? I can’t hear you!

Covid 19 in 2020 was and continues to be a big deal to everyone. I don’t need to tell you about it because everyone in the entire world experienced the “shutting down” of life as we knew it. On March 19, 2020, I experienced something different. I became 100% deaf. I was Hard of Hearing (HoH) for several years. I was deaf without my hearing aids but with lipreading and the aids, if I could hear the cadence of the voice, I did pretty well. But all that changed on that day. Thankfully, we knew this would happen at some point but were a bit shocked it came earlier than we had hoped. Over the past few years we have been learning American Sign Language. What a blessing! Kevin and I are still able to communicate by using this beautiful language.

Below is a picture of me watching a movie on my iPad. I have to have the closed captions on. Sometimes they help but sometimes they are a mess!

The fun logs is the balcony of Daniel’s Summit Lodge. We spent a great weekend here including lots of walks in the mountains, relaxation, and even our first time on Razors. Whoa, what a blast!

Be sure to follow along because I will be sharing tips, tricks, and my experiences as I navigate this world and traveling while being deaf.

I get cold, he gets hot…I need a blanket!

I noticed something that other ladies probably already know. When Kevin and I travel, he usually feels hot and I feel cold. From the car to planes to hotel rooms, the temperature is either too hot for him or too cool for me. What should I do about this problem? I definitely don’t want to roast Kevin out of the room! I will design and sew a Travel Quilt.

I added several states. California, because it is such a great place to visit. Kevin and I have been there numerous times, from the southern end to the northern line. Florida, because that is where we have been getting on our cruise ships. Utah, because it has such beautiful landscapes. From “The Mighty 5” National Parks, to State Parks, deserts, red rocks, mountains, trees, lakes, high elevation to low, definitely a state to explore in its entirety.

It was fun putting this together. On the back side is flannel with blue and red anchors. I keep it on the bed of HOWE (Home On Wheels) because it looks so pretty there. I should probably take it off and wrap myself in it when I get cold.

With a kitchen like this…

I like to cook. I like to cook a lot! So much so, that when we look at travel trailers, the very first thing I look at is the kitchen. I am not as talented as many cooks who are able to use a small space to create amazing dishes. Nope, I need room and lots of it. As soon as I saw this kitchen, I was “sold”! The stove has a cover that folds back and gives 3 large gas burners. It has an oven, which made me squeal with visions of all sorts of food coming out of it. The microwave is fine, I don’t normally used one much. Kevin likes microwave popcorn so this is nice to have. The sink is very large and is the “farm style sink” which means it is one big open space. I don’t mind it at all. If we are boondocking, I will use a small wash basin if I need to conserve water. I can’t wait to share with you some things cooked in HOWE (Home On Wheels). Of course, we don’t limit ourselves to only cooking in the travel trailer. Lots of cooking is done outside. Watch for more posts about food, cooking, storing, packing, and of course, eating.

We have a truck – Now what?

Thursday, August 27, 2020 I got a call from the dealer in Bozman, MT that one has sold. That afternoon, we went to General RV in Draper. Jefferson Moser asks us how much we want to spend, first thing. That was impressive because he never wavered from it. He drives us in the little golf cart to the upper lot and shows us a 2020 Shadow Cruiser 225RBS and we absolutely “love” it. We saw two others but the kitchens were tiny and the floor plan was choppy with bedroom walls and doors. We bought it immediately! We were told by several salesmen that, like us, many people wanted to travel or get away and aren’t able to because of all the restrictions and so people bought travel trailers and camped locally. The new truck needed a special trailer brake put on and they couldn’t do it until Tuesday. Jefferson said some people had to wait more than 2 weeks this summer. That would have been very sad.

Friday, August 28,2020 We start buying all sorts of things that are needed for the truck and trailer. It was a blast. Like we did before when we had a trailer for a summer, we bought everything new to pack it completely with what is needed.

Tuesday, Sept 1, 2020 Pick up day! Our appointment was at 8:30 AM. It took a little more than 2 hours to be shown everything and to sign the papers. Oh, so exciting.

The beginning of RV fun-Buying a truck!

2020

Charla and I really miss traveling due to Covid restrictions. We have had several cruises cancel (including a big one to Ireland) and no one knows for sure when cruise lines will be allowed to open up for travel. Over this summer, we have taken a few small road trips: in June we went to Burley, ID and visited City of Rocks National Park, Shoshone Falls, and Snake River. For Kevin’s birthday, we went to Daniel’s Summit Lodge and had a fantastic time. But we miss going and traveling more.

Monday, August 24, 2020, Charla and I decide we want to buy a travel trailer. We look at some RV dealers online and find one we want.

Rained sideways

We were staying at the beautiful Zion River Resort in Virgin Utah. If you would like a campground near Zion National Park, this is it! The staff there are very nice. We got a site near the river, and all was well. Charla and I always sleep so well in HOWE, our Home on WhEels.

At 5 in the morning, I woke up to hard rain – but it was not raining on the roof, It was raining on the side wall next to my bed! For some reason Charla didn’t hear it. 😎 It took me a minute to wake up enough to realize what was happening. Then I remembered our hot water heater is on that side of HOWE. I was afraid that somehow it had ruptured and was spewing water. I stumbled out of bed, found some pants, and went outside. Water was running off the side of the trailer. I walked up to it and realized where it was coming from. There was a tree nearby, and irrigation line was ringed around it. I think it was supposed to have a soaker hose or small nozzle there, but it was missing, and a geyser was shooting from it hitting the side of the trailer! I implemented a very sophisticated fix for this situation. I put a tote over the top of the geyser and put a block of wood on top of the tote!

Right about my feet is where the geyser was. I had to relax the next day to recover!

I went back inside, and now Charla was awake. She was asking me what was wrong. But a dark trailer in the dark night is not conducive to communication with a deaf person. I used a text to speech app to tell her the story. She instantly fell back asleep. I however took quite a while for the adrenalin to settle down. Oh the fun of RV living.