Ice Cream sounds like Airstream: Things I learned in Fort De Soto

So there we were, packed up, hitched up and ready to roll out on our first trip with our Airstream. We were headed down to Fort De Soto in St. Pete. The truck was running and Winston was getting cozy in his backseat pillow fort. Eric and I were going through the checklist we made. Awning secured? Check. Hoses and power cords stowed? Check. Stabilizers up? Things inside latched tight? Check and Check! Break lights work? ---- "Babe, are the break lights working?" "That's a big negative Darling, none of the lights are working".

We spent the better part of an hour diagnosing and fixing the problem... Since nothing at all was working, we were pretty sure it was a ground wire somewhere. Sure enough, the the ground wire on the trailer end of the power cord had come off its post. Fairly easy fix. It turns out we also had a few blown fuses on the truck side. My Dad says this happens a lot when towing a trailer. It's lucky he was there because we didn't have any spare fuses, my father of course, did. 

Yep. There's your problem.

Always have spare fuses with you when you're pulling a trailer.

Lesson 1- It's probably a ground wire.

Lesson 2- Always have spare fuses.

Lesson 3- Plan on running late.

After an hour delay, departure is a GO. The first part of the drive was fine. We were on mostly familiar roads and we knew where we were headed. Things got a little stressful once we got further down the road. 

We're driving over that? 

Going over the Skyway bridge made me want to throw up. It was fast, high and windy up there. Eric kept his cool and got us over it like a champ. I almost blacked out. Maybe after we have been doing this a while I will get used to this kind of thing. 

Once we arrived to the campground we were instant celebrities. Everyone we came in contact with was enamored with Petunia. My favorite was the 11 year old boy on his bike. As he rode up I heard him say something about an 'Airstream'. I smiled at Eric, and Eric quickly responded "he said Ice cream not Airstream, don't get excited". The kid then rode by and said "WOW that is the biggest Airstream I've ever seen" I smiled again at Eric...this time with a touch of 'I told you so'.  The boy stopped with his friends and inquired "Is that your Airstream?" I told him it was and he gushed "Oh man that is, THE COOLEST!"  That kid totally made my day!

The trip itself was great! I highly recommend Ft. De Soto! While I dont have much to compare it to, the campground was really nice. The North Beach was beautiful and there were great places to hike or go for a bike ride. They also had lots of prime kayaking and fishing spots. 

Sun sand and beer can't beat that!

One of the best parts of this trip was getting to see my good friend, sorority sister and fellow Tough Mudder, Brooke! We met up with her at a BBQ and Brew place in downtown St. Pete. We spent the evening catching up and reminiscing. Don't you just love those friends? The ones you can go ages without seeing and then pick right back up with! 

Love you in AOT my sweet friend.

We learned a lot on this trip. The whole time I was making lists. Stuff we still need to get, things we can do without. We learned we prefer back roads even though the navigation is a bit more stressful. We need to get used to literally not knowing whats around the corner. It was a little scary navigating our rig through roads we'd never seen before. I definitely feel more prepared now but I'm still a little freaked out by the fact that we are leaving in 10 days. Yep thats right, we are officially hitting the road on August 4th! More on that shortly...

Home is where you park it...

Eric and I have been crazy busy getting our new home ready for our travels. I say home because that is exactly what the Airstream is now... we have been living full time in our Airstream since just after my last post. It has kind of been a construction zone the whole time, but slowly it is feeling more and more homey.

We are lucky enough to be able to park our new home at my family's nursery. I am literally living in a trailer, parked in the truck bay of a warehouse. So yeah, our view isn't exactly amazing right now, but it's nice because I'm like 2 seconds from work and the parking is free! Also my parents are always close by if we need help, which is often.

I've been so busy actually doing projects that I haven't had time to blog about them. We did have to do some repairs. When we got the Airstream we didn't know it, but the fresh water tank was leaking, luckily it was just a drain valve so that was a pretty easy fix. We were also unaware that the water pump wasn't working, that was a little more in depth but Eric fixed it. He's awesome like that.

There were a few upgrades we planned on making from the beginning. Before we even bought the Airstream, Eric and I decided to upgrade to a composting toilet. The thought of emptying a "black water" tank (ie sewage) really grossed me out, so this was a must on our to do list. We decided to go with the Natures Head composting toilet. I read a lot of reviews written by other RV'ers, the Natures Head was by far the most popular choice and everyone seemed extremely happy with it. So far we have no complaints! I'm sure you have questions about how this works... I'll be happy to answer them in another post.

Because its normal to take a photo when you get a new toilet...

We also painted the entire interior, made new curtains, updated the dinette cushions, got a new sofa, installed an aluminum back splash, repaired the awning, removed a ton of dated stuff and had a new AC unit installed. Oh and my personal favorite we decoupaged a bunch of maps on the end cap.  

Progress...
(idk what we will do about our painted sofa, but check out those maps!)

I'm not sure we expected any of this to take so long. Originally we planned to be on the road by APRIL! I think one of the biggest life lessons we are learning with all of this, is to be patient and enjoy the process. I have been so busy, anxiously preparing to finally begin our adventure, that I hadn't stopped to realize the adventure has already begun. The other night I was sewing our curtains, Eric was working on the water pump and Winston was busy painting our sofa (no, not really. He was napping under the dinette, but he did get white paint all over our new sofa the other day). I looked up from my needle and thread and thought "OMG we're actually doing this... this is really happening". I realized how far we had come in such a short amount of time. We had this totally nuts-o idea just a few months ago and we made it happen!

Y'all stay tuned because next week we are taking Petunia on her maiden voyage... well at least her first time out with the new crew ;)