Although the epic parades were cancelled this year in New Orleans to prevent the spread of COVID, they tried to keep the Mardi Gras spirit alive by decorating their houses. They called them “float houses” and we were lucky enough to see some of them during our stay.
Here are some of the houses we saw while in New Orleans. (There are a lot of images, so it may take awhile to load. Sorry!)
One of our favorites!Bernie sightingEven a RV was decorated at our campground!Balconies (even the police station decorated!), Bernie sighting #2Balcony decorations Even Walmart decorated!
One of the things I love about New Orleans is their zest for life. Although it is clear that the pandemic has hit this tourist town pretty hard, their resilient spirit shows in how they live their daily lives. Thanks New Orleans for bringing a little joy into this tough situation. Laissez les bon temps rouler…. even if we have to be a little different than normal.
This Thousand Trails location is located in Willis, Texas near Houston. There were RV spots (mix of pull through and back-in) and cabin rentals. The map lists tent sites, although I did not see anyone tent camping. There was also a section for long term stays. The cabins and the front RV spots looked very nice. The front RV spots were back-ins with concrete pads.
Those were not what we got. We went to check in and the Ranger (not wearing a mask) at the gate told me how full they were and was just not very welcoming. I told him we had a reservation and he pointed me to the back of the lot saying only one lane had openings. Spots back here were gravel, the roads in the back of the park were rougher (not the nice paved lanes like the front of the park), and sites were tight together. We picked our site from the few open in the lane. Driving around later, we saw other open spots that were not given to us as an option. I am not sure if it is because we are Thousand Trails members and we just get assigned the worst spots in the park and the non-members who are paying per night get assigned better spots.
Ice was sold at the Ranger station at the gate for $2.25. The campground had bathrooms and a laundry room. Washers were $1.75/load and dryers $1.50. The campground did not offer change or a coin machine. Half of the washing machines were also out of service when we were there.
There was also a single station car wash for $1 and a vacuum for $0.50. The car wash did not have any soap in it, but we could at least get some of the dust and dirt off of the truck. There was also a tire air station there.
Gate codes changed on Tuesdays, which we were not told until our code did not work.
The pool was open Tuesday-Sunday and was not heated. It was a nice sized pool with tables and chairs. The spa/hot tub was not working while we were there. It wasn’t closed off, just told it wasn’t working. There were bathrooms and two outdoor showers at the pool area.
There was a playground, a putt-putt course, tennis courts, and small basketball hoops. Across from the office/laundry/pavilion area was a small field which was nice for the boys to play ball in. Fishing was mentioned on their brochure, although the office did not sell bait. You could walk to a small beach area on Lake Conroe. The beach area also had a volleyball court and picnic tables. It was too cold to go in while we were there, but I can see it being nice in the summer.
The office was technically open, but they kept the doors locked during open hours, so you had to get their attention to get any assistance. We had some problems in the laundry room (a washer broke mid cycle) and had to get someone to help with the water that was leaking and refund the coins. The younger woman in the office was helpful with the laundry problem, but the rest of the staff seemed grumpy and not interested in interacting with anyone. The staff at the gate never had masks on, even when talking to people checking in. There was another building at the office/Pavilion that was closed for Covid.
We had decent reception with Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile. The water pressure did drop one day, but came back to normal in a couple of hours.
It was close to a Kroger, some fast food restaurants, and a park. Houston was about an hour away, Galveston 1.75-2 hours, Waco 2.5 hours from the campground.
I don’t think we would stay here again. Houston was not our favorite town in Texas to visit, so I don’t see us coming back to the area. Even if we did, the park wasn’t very welcoming. I think if you were in a cabin or in one of the nice front RV concrete pad spots, it would probably have a completely different feel.
SUMMARY OF CAMPGROUND:
Our rating: 2-2.5 out of 5 hitches
Cell Phone Reception: AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile
Laundry: Yes
Bathrooms/Showers: Yes
RV Sites: Pull through, Back-in
Pop Up Tents/Gazebos/Outdoor Rugs On-Site: Technically no, but we did see a few people put up outdoor tents.
Amenities: picnic table, fire pit/grill, cable, playground, putting area, tennis courts, basketball, dog park
Cabins: Yes
Tent Camping: Yes
Full Hook Ups: Yes. 30 or 50 Amp sites
Pool: Yes
Food On-Site: No
Camp Store: No
WiFi: No
Accepts Mail: No USPS, $5/package from FedEx or UPS
We have always done a gingerbread house at Christmas. We found a really cute RV kit at Target this year.
The kit came with the gingerbread pieces, gum drops, candy beads, light bulb candy, red and black decorative icing, and a white Royal icing. There were a few paper decorations as well: Santa, a grill, and a picnic bench/tree.
There was a plastic tray with indents for the wheels. It did help a lot as the RV sides set. The directions said to do the front/back/sides and let sit, then add the roof. If you don’t have it perfect, the roof doesn’t fit in easily. Next time I may put the roof on as soon as the sides/front/back are iced together, so that the icing is still pliable and it can all set/dry together.
The boys had a blast decorating it and it turned out pretty well. They especially enjoyed eating it for Thanksgiving dessert!
In high school one of my favorite English teachers had us read Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (a Nigerian Novelist). It was a short but powerful book that I would still recommend. Although google tells the adult version of me that the novel dealt with how the prospect and reality of change affect various characters, the most vivid memory I have of this book was the delight the high school version of me had at discovering the publisher stamped “Things Fall Apart” on the inside binding of the cover.
Our adventure has a lot of parallels to the book. Each member of our family has dealt with change differently along our journey. We have each had ups and downs as we have adapted to our 400 square foot space and completely different, changing landscape. There have been arguments, tears and plenty of pouting and that was just me. In the end though, the good have greatly outweighed the bad and our laughter carries us through the tough days.
One thing that remains consistent is the amount of things that actually fall apart on a travel trailer as you bounce your home along the road at 60 mph. Going into this experience, I knew things broke easily on a traveling home. We had seen it in enough videos, but I was not prepared for just how quickly things actually broke.
June 4th: Buy RV and get it home. Modified the bunkroom and resealed the storage door. The caulking wasn’t great and we could see gaps. We checked the caulking on the outside and touched up a few spots. Boys slept in their beds and broke the aluminum mini blinds the first time sleeping in them. Sarah later upgraded these from Aluminum mini blinds to custom fit black out curtains that velcro in place.
June 9th: Move RV to Waynesville. After several water dripping, shampoo barely our of our hair showers, we replaced the shower head with an Oxygenics*. This was more of a mandatory upgrade rather than a repair.
July 1st: The kitchen faucet got stuck on the shower/spray setting. This was the second time, but now we can’t get it to go back to the steady stream. Sometimes more features just mean more problems.
July 5: The left hand small drawers in the kitchen came loose and were hanging crooked. When we took the drawers out to see why, it looks like they were only held up by the drawer tracks and two screws at the top. There was no bottom support at all. I got it reattached at the top and also put in a bottom support. We discovered some more storage space when we removed the access panel to reach the back of the drawers. Repurposed the panel to protect the water lines, but it is now moved back and attached to the new bottom drawer support. We have our bread in a storage bin under there now. (The cupboard was too warm and the bread was growing mold quickly.)
July 9th: After traveling to our first stop (boondocking), the trim around the main door was popping loose. Reattached it with the staple gun. We also learned that normal highway driving knocks the half moon shower doors out of their track. We close and lock them, but the left side keeps popping loose.
Not really broken, but maybe forgotten? All the blinds in the RV have some sort of hold back (cords attached to the wall, or hooks to attach the bottom of the blinds). The master bedroom blinds by the bed do not. We have gotten pretty level, but the RV still makes small movements when someone walks/turns in bed. Sarah attached sticky velcro to the wall and to the bottom of the blinds to keep them in place. It is now so much quieter when we are sleeping!
July 18th. One of the small kitchen cabinet doors ripped out. I reinstalled it, but it ripped out again. Problems of having short people (aka kids) putting away dishes. They are hard to open cabinets and I think he was just pulling downward too much instead of outward.
August 11th: Upgraded to a fancy new bike rack over the trailer hitch jack, the Jack-It*.
August 12th: Realized we damaged the passenger side rear stabilizer strut while installing the new bike rack. Still not fixed for lack of the right materials. Need to source materials not found in normal hardware stores.
August 12th: New bike rack also reduced the truck to trailer turning radius resulting in damage to one bikes tire rim and dents to the truck while backing into a tight RV space. Touch up paint and a new bike to the rescue (benefit of a cheap Walmart bike).
September 12th: Trim around main door popped off towards bottom again but on both sides this time. Closet door in master bedroom, left door fell off/screws came out. Learned from the kitchen cabinet doors and was ready with the upgrade and better installation. Based on the design, I bought enough bolts, washers and nuts to replace every cabinet door hinge in the travel trailer.
October: We didn’t move and coincidentally nothing broke. Easy living in California! We did finally upgrade the CO2 alarm to a less sensitive model. The model that came with the travel trailer would alarm daily (normally at 3:00AM, 4:00AM, or 5:00AM). The sensor sits immediately outside the boys bunkroom and the alarming frequency increased based on Mom’s dinner menu (strong correlation between beans and alarming). Once we upgraded to the Kidde Carbon Monoxide & Explosive Gas Detector Alarm* our late night wake up calls went away.
November 7th: Barely clipped gas station bollard while turning out of a tight Diesel refueling area pulling the travel trailer. Luckily just cracked the electrical cover plate. This could have been much worse. Until we get a new cover, we have resorted to a makeshift plastic bag and have been blessed with very little rain.
General:
The finish on the bathroom door is peeling off by the doorknob.
The floor grates are not designed for everyday traffic even though they are in high traffic areas. Sarah sourced and replaced the most offensive grates in the bathroom and master bedroom with a heavier grade.
Command strips are strong enough to pull off the wallpaper. We have had to do some cosmetic repairs when the Command strips won the battle.
Although things continue to inevitably fall apart, we are grateful it hasn’t been anything significant. On the positive side, we have had many opportunities to practice our engineering, visit hardware stores and my apprentices have started to learn how to repair things on their own. Things change, we can either go with it or let it break us. Maybe I have spent too much time with my surfing buddies in California, but we are just going with the flow dude.
The boys and I went on a walk/hike today. I chose an easy one since my back has been giving me some problems the last couple of days.
The trail was nicely paved for parts and gravel for others, but all of it was nice and flat. There was not a lot of shade on the trail, so I am glad everyone put on sunscreen and wore their wide brim hats.
The trail wove across a few bridges, went near the lake, and through several prairie dog locations. We loved seeing them run around and call out to each other. They are so squeaky! (No wonder dogs loves squeaky toys.) I have a quick video up on the YouTube channel of them calling out to each other. The beginning of the path had a lot of bikers (bicycles not motorcycles) and even had a repair station with an air pump and some tools.
After hiking, we ran into Target to get Nick some new shoes. (This kid is rough on shoes!) We bought a few other things as well and headed to drop off some postcards. Once back in the campground, we did another load of laundry.
Ben wanted to run into Ikea when he was done with work, so off we went looking for couches. The couch in the RV is actually loveseat sized and not that comfortable long term. You can’t really lay down, the arm rests are too low to really give support but at the same time too high to use as a seat. Since we are going to be in here for a year, we thought we could replace the couch. It seemed fine when we bought the RV, but like anything you use daily, you quickly discover if it works well for you or not.
We found a couple of possibilities, but none that worked really well in the space. We’ll just keep looking.
I think the kids’ favorite part was when we were leaving. This store had an escalator ramp!
June 9th started our adventure. Although we had been living in the RV for a month now, it’s very different trying to pack it up, move it, and then unpack it all again.
We have watched countless YouTube videos. Seriously, we have been watching for about a year or so now. Trying to do this in real life is so much different (and harder) than watching all the videos would make you think it would be.
The night before we packed up all loose items. All loose items: coffee pot, radio, paper towel holder, baskets holding remotes, Nick’s plants, dehumidifier, all cords/games/etc.. Everything had to be moved out of the way of the slides. Anything that could move had to be packed away, shut away, etc. We even took out the microwave glass plate and wrapped it up after hearing about how the door could open in transit and the plate could fall out and break.
We also packed up the cooler and the snack bag for the truck and preloaded everything we might need. The slides were put in, and we thought we were good to go.
It still took us almost two hours in the morning.
After finally getting on the road, driving was ok. We hit a few spots of construction where there was heavy stop and go traffic. We had to slam on the brakes once when the person in front of us slammed on theirs. There was a semi behind us. Of course, the semi is larger and heavier than even us and stopping is even slower for them. He ended up pulling onto the shoulder to avoid rear ending us. Based on where he was sitting on the shoulder, we definitely would have been hit. We were very lucky. My heartbeat took awhile to get back to normal.
We ended up stopping every few hours for bathroom breaks and/or for fuel. Indiana had surprisingly nice rest stops with lots of larger parking spots for semi trucks and RVs.
Will took a turn in the front passenger seat when Ben had some work to do. (For some reason the back seat has more space than front passenger seat.) He took a few pictures, but quickly fell asleep!
Stopped traffic, Will’s reflection in mirror taking pictures, sound asleep minutes later
Iowa was very green. As we were driving through, we checked with the BassPro Shop that we were planning on stopping at for the night. They told us that the city had recently put out No Overnight Parking signs, so we could not stop there. As we were trying to find a new place to stay for the night (we were planning on boondocking), a big storm rolled in and with it a tornado warning. So much fun. The visibility was extremely low, even with headlights and wipers on full blast. It got extremely dark very quickly. It was a harrowing part of the drive. When it cleared up a little bit and the sun came back out, we decided to call it for the night and looked for another place to stay. With a little more research, we found Riverside Casino in Iowa. They did allow overnight parking.
We got the RV parked and went to find some dinner at their cafe. I’ve had casino food before and it’s normally not something to write home about (excluding Las Vegas). This place was delicious. We got several items to split between us: fish tacos, pizza, salad (with chicken), and an amazing poutine. It was a wonderful dinner. We also got a chocolate chunk cookie and a zephyr (glazed donut filled with mouse/cream puff filling, topped with sugar and glazed walnuts).
On our walk back to the RV, we were greeted with an amazing sunset. All in all, it was a decent day. But now I want more of that poutine and another zephyr!
