Day 15 on the road – In New Orleans

Gary from Northshore RV came by today with his helper and installed my new slideout toppers in the midst of a thunderstorm.  Brave souls!  I can’t tell you how thrilled I am to have them replaced.  The Beast looks much less ratty now.  If only I could get her detailed and polished, she’d be practically like new!

New slide out topper

The fridge continues to stay cool.  Gary confirmed that it was working within an acceptable range.  Apparently, the thermostats are preset not to go under 39 degrees.  He said 39-45 degrees is standard, and it’s been sitting between 42-44 all day.  We’re good!  The milk isn’t spoiling, and that’s all I can ask.

I’m teaching an online course this summer, so I do have papers to grade, discussion forums to moderate, and e-mails to respond to.  I even have to keep online office hours.  Since we’ve been here in New Orleans, it’s been tough to stay motivated.  There’s so much to do and to see here; seems a shame to waste my time with a silly thing like work!  Alas, it’s a very short term, so I have to stay on top of things.  That means I spent the entire afternoon grading essays.  Occupational hazard as an English teacher.  I can’t complain; the money I’m earning for this class is helping to finance our trip.  Work hard, play hard, you know?

I’ve tried to explain to friends and family that we’re traveling; we’re not necessarily on vacation.  Lex only has a few days off during this entire trip, and most of those were back in Williamsburg.  She does have off this coming Monday, so she’ll be able to relax for a moment after our trip from Louisiana to Texas.  That’s it for her until August when we have the three-day push back home, and that will be no holiday.  I’ll be done teaching this class in a week and a half, so technically I’ll be on vacation after that, but I have quite a bit of preparation to do for my fall courses, and I can’t wait until we get back to Maryland to do it all.  That means that I’ll be doing some reading, lesson planning, and online course design during this trip.

This isn’t a vacation in the usual sense of the word not only because we’re both working but also because vacation implies leaving the usual to go visit something different.  By that definition, we’re only about halfway on vacation.  We are visiting different places, but we’re doing it from the comfort of our own home.  We sleep in our own bed, cook in our own kitchen (when we feel like it), and use our own shower.  It’s only the view that changes from time to time.   It’s a very different way of thinking about travel, but I’m finding I like it quite a lot.

Because we are engaged in the usual mundanities of day-to-day living, travel for us doesn’t mean just moving between hotel, shops, and tourist attractions.  It also means things like doing laundry, going grocery shopping, finding repairmen, doctors, drugstores, pet supply shops.  It takes us off the beaten path and into the neighborhoods.  Like I said in a post last week from Georgia, it’s one way to sample real life in new places, especially since we’re doing most of the things would usually be doing if we actually lived in that place full time.

I keep meeting interesting people along this journey.  Last night I took the dogs out for a walk (well, a hobble, really), and on the way back to the camper, Ivy started barking at the woman at the motorhome next door.  She was sitting outside at her picnic table having a smoke and seemed to want to pet the dogs, so I let them approach her.  We started to chat, and it turns out she is from Norway and is traveling the US with her husband and two boys.  The husband came out to join us.  He’s an architect, and she’s a kindergarten teacher, and they decided to travel from Albany to California by way of Orlando  in three weeks.  That’s insane!  They are stopping no more than a day or two in any one place.  I can’t imagine taking a trip like that.  I mean, if there was someplace we needed to be, I’m sure Lex could put the pedal to the metal and get us there, but that’s not my idea of a good time.

This morning while my slideout toppers were being replaced, a gentleman came over from the site across the way.  He also has a Cedar Creek fifth wheel, the same year as ours (but not the same model – I have to say that I think ours is prettier).  We got to talking, and I learned that he’s a retired trucker from South Carolina who bought the camper so that he and his wife could travel two or three months out of the year.  I told him that I guess he couldn’t stop driving, and he said yeah, he figured it was in his blood.  He said that he saw plenty of interesting things when he was a driver, but he saw them all at 65 miles per hour.  Now he just wants to slow down, take his time, and enjoy those interesting things close up.  I agree with him, but I don’t feel like waiting until retirement to do that.  I may not make it that far, who knows?  No time like the present!

Alexis hasn’t slept well at all this week, so we decided not to play tourist this evening.  Instead, we went out and grabbed something to eat, brought it back home, and watched some TV.  Lex crashed early, so I hope she gets caught up on her rest.  With her working during the weeks and driving on the weekends, I know she must be tired.  I want her to rest up because once we get to Texas, our time won’t always be our own.  We have too many friends and family we want to visit.  Five weeks hardly seem like enough, but it’s more than all the visits home I’ve had in the past five years combined, so I’ll take them.

As of today, we have completed 25% of our 60-day trip.  I’m acutely aware of how quickly the days are slipping away.  Soon we’ll be back in Dundalk and there will be no more traveling until the Christmas break. Insert wistful sigh here.

Tags: New Orleans, people, repairs, rving, Travel