We’ve been doing our best to eat local
Jim
Our new and improved road trip soundtrack.
A while back, one of our readers declared that the RVer’s National Anthem should be Hank Snow’s I’ve Been Everywhere
“I’ve been everywhere, man
I’ve been everywhere, man
Crossed the deserts bare, man
I’ve breathed the mountain air, man
Of travel I’ve had my share, man
I’ve been everywhere“
Well, I finally got around to adding this to our cross country road trip soundtrack of travel tunes. While I was at it, I put some elbow grease into the page and added an interactive slideshow of CDs available from Amazon that include the songs we’ve added to our list. This way we’ll be able to update our soundtrack easier and more often.
Power your RV with wind energy.
A while ago, my sister Mariclair sent me a link to this manual for a Telescoping RV Tower. Rich, who together with M.C. runs O’Connell Solar – and designed our own RV’s solar energy system – had just spent three days at Southwest Windpower and thought it would be cool fodder for the blog. Cool indeed.
I looked into it further and discovered the tower is designed for using the Air X Marine small wind turbine with an RV.
Then when we were getting a tour of Tugboat Margot from my brother in law Tim back in Troy, NY, I noticed an Air X mounted on a boat docked nearby and filmed it in action.
While this particular tower mount wouldn’t work with our rig without some serious modification, seeing the wind generator do its job got me thinking…
Amazon finally got their groove on.
After driving for thousands of miles over the past few months, I have to say that one of the most vital accessories we purchased for this cross-country road trip has to be our iPod. We got a used 40GB iPod on eBay that has a good dent in it, but it was a deal!
I spent many a late night transferring most of our CD collection onto it before we left, and it was time well spent. I only wish I had copied all of our CDs.
While you can always find classic rock somewhere on the dial, much of this country has really, really bad radio. That’s why I was happy to find out that Amazon is finally offering MP3 downloads!
Remembering My Birthday Dinner in Virginia
Carol would call this one a Back Track … one of the hardest things about trying to blog about our travels is trying to keep everything current when there is so much to see and do. Hell, there is still stuff I could write about from way back in Colorado. At least this one only goes back a few weeks to my birthday dinner.
Rene got off easy this year. I was a cheap date. All I wanted was a to take the day off from driving and do nothing, other than barbecue myself a steak. So the day before – on Halloween – we went to the Blacksburg Farmers Market for some fresh produce, in search of some local meat. Having never seen cattle ranchers at a farmers market until we got to the East Coast, I was feeling lucky. And I struck gold, or black rather, as in Angus.
Applecare good. Urban sprawl bad.
By the time I was about to write about dropping off my Powerbook at the Charlotte Apple Store for repairs, they had already called to say it was ready to be picked up. This came as a pleasant surprise considering they said it would take five to seven days to be fixed at the service center in Texas.
So our stay in Asheville – a few hours away, in the Smoky Mountain foothills – was cut a bit short, but the couple days we did have there was plenty to get a feel for the area.
This little wrench in the works also gave us time to realize we never care to live our lives along an interstate corridor. As we criss-crossed North Carolina, the incredible population density and mass consumption of this country became remarkably clear.
We’re Gettin’ South Now…
Jim reviews Famous Anthony’s restaurant in Christiansburg, VA and reflects on his stay in Virginia
What the Wawa?
Jim discovers there is no Wawa store in Mawah, NJ.
Duh.
Jim describes the sign he saw in a campground which describes how trailers should back in
Going home? Don’t bother.
Jim visits his childhood home and the community of Chatham Township does not live up to his expectations.
Lunch Formation, on the Double!
It was nineteen seventy something or other when I remember driving right onto the West Point campus and climbing on the rocks while my father enjoyed mother’s famous Swiss Miss and bourbon “Cappucino” from a Thermos while waiting for the Black Knights to sink Navy, or beat Colgate. (Real men fight wars not cavities!) We would walk the parade grounds, run freely around all the statues, or check out the huge links of the Great Chain used to keep the British Navy from sailing up the Hudson.
Dad’s alumni ring probably helped us gain backstage campus access back then, but he’d probably need a lot more than that now to go anywhere other than on the guided bus tour. If he were alive, that is. But he’s not, so I had just had to return to West Point and check on another memory from my Right Coast childhood. But thanks to security initiatives put in place since 9/11, the public is no longer given free range among the cadets and pleebs.
Farmers and Philly Cheese Steaks at Reading Terminal Market
We went to Philadelphia last week, courtesy of our tour guide Brian, who was kind enough to take us there during a major rainstorm – with is two kids (is he a superdad or what?). There was only one place to go to in a downpour, with two small children, and that was the Reading Terminal Marketplace (pronounced “Redding” for the unfamiliar). What a treat!
This video includes an interview with a local farmer, Mennonites making pretzels, authentic Philly Cheesesteaks being made, and much more! We have also updated our Full-time RVing Videos page which now includes a playlist of all our interviews with local residents and business owners across the U.S.
Wanna see something really scary?
Jim and Rene spend a quiet Halloween in a Virginia State Park campground compared to previous hallowed parties.
Focus on what you don’t want
You never know what lies down the road ahead. While this applies to much of life in general, it is especially important when you’re hungry.
When you don’t know what might be found around the bend, it is impossible to decide on exactly what you want. There might just be something better. There may be nothing at all. Either way, the odds are against you finding what you set your mind on.
We discovered a simple solution that may save you a lot of stress. Don’t get your mind set upon one particular thing, whether that be an old fashioned diner, roadside burger stand, or a family run pizzeria. You probably won’t find it. Instead, decide upon what you don’t want. Rule that out, and something good is bound to come your way.
Where is my ubiquity?
Considering everything we can do with all the connectivity and communications technology of today, what’s really amazing is what we cannot. What happened to the last mile? Granted, escape is a great benefit of getting away. But one cannot expect to get away indefinitely unless totally self sufficient. Especially, if working from home means traveling full time. And why not? There is so much to see.
In other words, we must work, from the road. The biggest challenge of which is being connected. All the time. The defacto work week for the typical commuter is two days off, in a row, if you’re lucky. For those of us who commute from one line of sight to our satelite to the next, being cut off unexpectedly is a daily threat.
Entire idyllic communities like Humboldt county live in constant fear of losing their connection to the world. And they have high capacity fiber to the region. Well, one strand at least. My string is invisible and can be cut by any number of branches, including one.