Working the dream life for 17+ years.
I haven’t written any posts here in a while since I have been frantically developing the final touches for our latest online venture …
We are proud to announce that the long-awaited RVblogz.com is now online! With RVblogz.com you can get your own free travel blog to document your adventures and keep in touch with friends and family while on the road.
Be one of the first to take advantage of this new free service and join the growing community of RVbloggerz today!
With a wag of his tail, our dog Jerry always seems to bring us such good fortune. On Saturday, we took him to “Bark Harbor,” an upscale pet boutique in Bar Harbor’s downtown area. As we walked in, we noticed a flyer that advertised the business as being for sale, along with the building which has an upstairs apartment, and a separate home away from downtown. Woah!
We’ve often said that our next business would be some kind of dog-oriented operation, and the opportunity to start one was right in front of us, in one of the most beautiful locations we have been to yet.
How to clean fresh lobster and make Lobster Alfredo with some great information about finding groceries near Bar harbor Maine while camping at Blackwoods Campground in Acadia National park.
This was a new site for me at a National Park campground. When we first drove up to the easternmost camp site from where we began our trip, I guessed this was a communal lobster pot where you could boil your fresh catch from Bar Harbor and feast on bugs by the fireside.
My silly dream was crushed when I discovered it to be a sink for dumping camp dishwater with a strainer basket and nearby trashcan for nasty bits. This is a good thing I suppose. After all, like the signs read, “A fed raccoon is a dead raccoon.”
But it sure felt good anyway to finally sit by a campfire again without bugs feasting on me. Especially after enjoying an authentic Down East lobster feast in Northeast Harbor. Just remember, when it comes to overindulgence, it’s not the volume of lobster one consumes, it’s the butter factor. And it is clarified butter that makes a breaks an establishment from the fine dining list.
From California to Maine, we’ve seen some of the best and worst grocery stores across the U.S.A. There’s been many a week when we haven’t found anything resembling fresh local produce. Lucky for us, there’s been a handfull of large chain grocery stores that have kept us from getting iron deficiencies and scurvy when no local farm stands were to be found. Here’s a handy list of some of the higher quality ones that may scratch your foodie itch while traveling cross country.
In just our first few months on the road as full-timers, we’ve met tons of great, fun people. Now that school’s back in session, we’re meeting more fulltime RVers, most of them retired. One thing I’ve noticed is, there hasn’t been a person of color in the whole bunch (I’m assuming this of course, based on outward appearances, however right or wrong that may be). But as a brown skinned person, this kind of observation is just something that one tends to notice throughout life. Please; I’m not saying it has any sort of impact on what I think of people or places, or whatever.
But I find myself wondering; why aren’t people of color getting in on the full-time RV lifestyle?
Team Agreda and their Tripod dog Jerry reach the Atlantic Ocean in Acadia National Park, Maine. Driving over 7,000 miles towing their RV 5th wheel trailer, they have gone from the Pacific to the Atlantic.
Not Just Aimless Wanderers
Not having to watch a clock has given us the really precious gift of being able to go with the flow, follow our intuition and just let things happen. How sad that life as working fools, we are all too busy to meander down streets of different places, or stop to chat and get to know people. Why should this great learning experience be reserved for retired folks only?
Not charting a strict course is less about aimlessly wandering around the map, and more about listening to intuition, so that we can open ourselves up to what lies ahead. Doing so has brought us many adventures, and helped us to learn tons about where we might want to set down roots.
We Found a Contender: Plainfield, Vermont
Recently, after leaving Burlington and moving toward New Hampshire, Jim and I were completely starving for some grub. We kept looking for a good place to turn into, but the countryside’s driveways don’t give much room to stop an 8,000 pound trailer. Finally, we spotted one of Vermont’s unobtrusive roadside business announcement billboards (Vermont, Maine, Alaska and Hawaii are the only four states that have outlawed billboards).
Back in Wisconsin, we picked up some local maple syrup. As good as it was, we desperately tried to finish it before we got to Burlington where we just had to pick up some pure Vermont maple syrup straight from the source. Then I realized, why wait? Let’s get some from both states and have a taste test.
Below are the results from our head to head comparison of these two pure maple syrups.
Having been an avid reader of nearly all the early Stephen King classics, our stay in Bangor, Maine would not be complete without a drive-by of the horror master’s manor. Surprisingly, it is easy to find, and very accessible. As to not disturb mister King, we rode by on our bicycles, took a quick photo and quickly fled the scene. Watch the movie of our …
We’ve actually been receiving some flack for our post about reasons to consider emigration to Canada. You won’t, however, see these flaming remarks here on the blog because, well, it is our blog and we don’t intend to give these so called patriots the time of day or glory of assuming their comments actually get to us.
So as mother always said, if you don’t have something nice to say… don’t bother because you’re just wasting your time with comments that get sent directly to the spam pile. After all this is indeed America as these right wing fascists so proudly declare, and we are proud to have the freedom of using our delete button.
While they call us “unamerican” [sic] and would gladly help us pack our bags, they’ve got us all wrong and are merely substantiating our beliefs about certain factions that continue to make this country a target for international enmity.
How appropriate that this has all occurred as we crossed the state with one of the best state mottos. While we enjoyed our stay in neighboring Vermont – “Freedom and Unity“ – New Hampshire’s “Live Free or Die“ is now our favorite state motto. Attributed to New Hampshire Revolutionary War Hero General John Stark
Beware of Moose when driving New England Roads. RV and Auto collisions with moose cause severe damage and injuries. Readers share their stories and photos.
When we embarked on this trip, I often imagined kicking back in my hammock with my Powerbook and enjoying my new office. Well, the first couple times that I have actually strung up the thing I ended up not spending any time in it at all. If my hammock time wasn’t called on account of rain, there was either too much on my RV honey do list or simply too much of the outdoors to go enjoy.
I am now happy to say that my vision has finally come true. The view from my new office is well worth the wait. The only thing missing is our internet connection.
We’ve traveled many miles searching for our ideal community. A few times, we thought we might have found it. But . . . The thought of moving into a small town is nice, but few have the diversity that we feel makes life more interesting. We crave the solitude of 40 acres in the sticks, but fear we might go nuts being so isolated. And …
YouTube Director Creekracer talks about the restoration of his 1981 Scamp 16′ travel trailer in this video blog (vlog) interview with Rene the LiveWorkDream.com full-time RVing lifestyle blog.
