Nov 6, 2020
RV quarantine Day 1: making possibilities happen
I’m gonna say this now. RV living is going to take some getting used to but it’s not impossible.
First off, as far as quarantine goes, at the campsite, we must stay on our site with the exception of dumping garbage, and a designated walking path for walking dogs, kids, or recreation. No laundry or showers or bathrooms. So it’s a good thing we planned ahead for that. We are allowed essential travel which pretty much is limited to medical needs, groceries, getting mail and going to work if your work is okay with this.
Because we have no car yet, Tyler is working from the RV. Which means his large desktop computer has joined us in the Glamper and it’s like another body, standing in the way at all times. We should be getting a rental car on Saturday so with luck, he can get to his rented office space and set up. But until then, it’s a badly choreographed dance to get around the computer.
But inconvenience aside, Tyler was able to get some work done and both boys got through their school classes with no problems! I was even able to clear out some space and do my Zumba class right inside the Glamper!
Vermont is beautiful right now (as much as we can see). Weather is lovely in the 60s and clear skies. Can’t wait to see more when we are released.
And a second offer in the house came in late last night! We will find out today what it is. But all is good. The cats are restless and confused but we have both of them so that is good! We may just make it through this!
Nov 7, 2020
RV quarantine day 2: who said quarantine would be boring?
Woke in the morning and walked our designated quarantine “path”. It’s not much but it’s something. I’ve seen many new and interesting plants along the way and I’m glad I have a local friend to ask what these things are.
Although they aren’t strict on quarantine and I won’t have the covid police come after me if I wander outside my area, the most important part is to reduce contact as much as possible in order to control contact tracing. Which is what we’ve been doing the past 7 months, venturing out in public only when we absolutely need to. We did find ourselves in need of getting a P.O. Box so we can get mail. Which is included in our “essential travel” restrictions. But because we don’t have a car yet, I found myself walking the mile and a half to the post office. The walk was quite welcome and I’m already in love with Vermont small town life. Everything is just “adorable”, for lack of a better word. I feel like I’m on the set of Gilmore girls. However, once I got to the post office, I found that my 2 IDs of a license and a passport were not acceptable forms if ID and, in fact, the “acceptable” forms were nothing We had with us in Vermont. So back I went to figure out how to get our P.O. Box.
Tyler ordered our rental car after much persistence. And by persistence, I mean repeating not 1, not 2, but 6 times that his email is “bigsixty. All spelled out. B-I-G-S-I-X-T-Y” this person was obviously not very good at her job and we still don’t know if she got it down or if a car will arrive today.
At night we decided to attempt our first ever movie pizza night in the RV, which is a weekly tradition for the family. I had a pizza recipe for the IP and we got the computer monitor set up to watch our movie sitting at the table.
After much adjusting, we got it working and we were good to go! However, 1/2 way through the movie, I started hearing some loud screaming outside. We flipped the movie off and all we could understand in the chaos was “WE NEED A FIRE EXTINGUISHER!” I sprung into action, grabbed our fire extinguisher, and was out the door in 10 seconds flat.
Arrived at an RV down a few from us and found several men quickly moving propane tanks and burning hay bales away from a large RV. Handed them the fire extinguisher and got back out of range in case everything blew. Assisted with questions the lady on the phone with 911 was asking and watched helpless as they struggled put out the fire. The last flames were squelched as police showed up. Luckily, the only injury was one man got some severe burns on his hands from moving the hay. And the RV is singed but should survive. No idea what caused it. Just know it could have been worse.
And now I’m out a full fire extinguisher.
Went back to my own RV to try to finish the movie after that excitement. I gotta admit, it’s a little hard to get back into an RV after seeing that.
But we survived another day in RV quarantine. And we shall see what tomorrow brings.
Nov 8, 2020
RV Quarantine Day 3: Halfway through our 2 week survival pack.
When we started this journey, I calculated that we would have 4-5 days of driving, Tyler would have 1 week of quarantine and then 1-2 days waiting on test results. So I planned for 2 weeks of food and clothing. I packed the RV with one week of each and the other week of supplies would go in the trunk to be switched out halfway through. Yesterday marked that halfway point. It has meant rewearing some clothes a couple times and we didn’t plan on the extra couple of days it would take to get out of Utah, unfortunately. But I added a few extra supplies and have been able to ration things and make them stretch.
So yesterday was extreme clean day. Food was restocked. 5 suitcases came out from the trunk, their contents placed in cupboards. 2 bags of dirty clothes were put in the suitcases and placed back in the trunk. Then I reorganized, scrubbed floors and the bathroom (which took some high end olympics as it is a 4×4 foot room containing both a shower and a toilet.) And got the Happy Glamper back in ship shape.
Tyler did get his car yesterday (after calling to confirm) and was able to take his computer to his office since it was the weekend and no one would be there. And it felt so good to get that computer out of here! Opened up a ton more space and far less moving things to get to other things.
Yesterday was an almost TOO warm 71 degrees here. Good thing I packed a couple shorts and t-shirts just in case. The temps will be gradually dropping after Tuesday but no sign of freezing temps for the next week and a half. I’m sure it will get colder but I am slightly enjoying the warmth while Utah is about to get snow dumped after all the warnings I got of how cold Vermont is. We will see what the next months bring though. We hope to be in a real house before it gets too bad. Closing date is Dec 3 and we will be viewing Vermont houses as soon as quarantine is over.
My biggest hurdle I’m finding is the morning schedule. I am an early riser. The rest of the family is not. And because we are in close quarters, I am forced to lay in bed for a couple hours waiting for people to wake up. This is REALLY hard for me. I hate laying in bed, doing nothing when I have things to do. Hence why these posts happen in the morning.
I did get an update on the RV fire. Apparently the hay bales were either placed too close or knocked over close to the heat vent and the vent threw a spark when the Wife was taking a shower. Mostly only cosmetic damage to the RV thankfully. The injured exes fireman who helped clear the hay suffered 2nd and 3rd degree burns to his hand and will be undergoing burn treatment. Time will tell how well it will heal.
Also, because we actually have been asked this question, no, none of us are ill or dying or having an existential crises of any kind leading us to spend our last days touring the country. We simply wanted to move at an ideal time in our lives, which happened to occur during a pandemic, and tried to come up with the safest way of going about it and figuring it out as we go along.
Nov 9, 2020
Day 4 of quarantine: the one in which we explore Vermont.
Can I just say how difficult it is to look for a house when you know absolutely nothing about the surrounding area. The house itself might be absolutely breathtaking. But it says nothing about whether quality internet can reach an area, if there is a reachable town within a 10 mile radius, or if your next door neighbor lives in a boarded up junk yard/meth lab with 25 Dobermans.
So we decided to take a drive through a good chunk of Vermont to look at some areas and get a feel of things. A couple things we noticed other than the fact that half the time we literally had no internet access, was that I almost certain every road has a moose crossing sign. And there is water everywhere! Creeks, rivers, falls, brooks, streams, ponds, lakes. Everywhere! We pulled over to a creek, no people in sight, and had our lunch. So peaceful!
There were so many waterfalls and new fun restaurants we would have loved to stop at. And I’m telling you it was HARD! But we were good and stayed in our car away from the people. Only 3 more days and Tyler can get tested, 6 more until we are all free!
Nov 10, 2020
Day 5 of RV Quarantine: Getting our ducks in a row
Settling into the swing of things. Calvin and I walked back to the post office and finally got our P.O. Box once I realized our RV was ALSO a car a car we owned and we had it’s registration with us to be used as ID. This also gave Calvin his PE credit for the day since it is much harder to do his 30 minutes of daily exercise when trapped in an RV. For some reason I can’t convince him to do zumba with me. But mail has been forwarded so according to the USPS, we are officially residents of Vermont.
But other than school this was really all we accomplished for the day which is good because it means things are starting to settle down some.
We also got a back up offer on the house. Decent enough but not as good as the offer we are working with. But we will counter and get that set up as a “just in case”.
Our cats have taken to RV life in very different ways. Gingerbread (the escapee) hates it. She’s grouchy and screams to be let out all the time and tries to dart when we leave. She is our active cat and being confined to a small space is of no interest to her. Cuddles (our hider), on the other hand, seems to be quite taken to life in the RV. Being high anxiety and rather antisocial, we are finding her to be more cuddly and social, hanging out near us most of the time. Of course, there isn’t many places that AREN’T near us and I’m sure she would love to find a nice hidey hole to crawl into but she doesn’t seem overly opposed to the situation.
In other news, Vermont air has had its effect on our hair. Everyone keeps commenting on how silky and soft the cats’ fur is. The only comment I get on my Vermont do is, “it’s big”. And we are all taking bets on when Tyler begs me to cut his hair. I brought the trimmers just in case!
Nov 11, 2020
Day 6 of RV Quarantine: A view of RV life
Yesterday, Vermont put a ban on all non essential travel in and out of the state in order to put the stop to Covid growth in the state. Which means we got here just in time. But also means we can’t venture out of state to find free covid testing like some suggested. Tyler gets tested tomorrow, but results are coming in later now due to more people getting tested so he may not get his negative result until Monday or Tuesday.
I have to say though, I prefer on-the road RV life to stationary. When you are on the road, you have something to look forward to. And can move away from unwanted neighbors and situations. With stationary you are stuck.
Our neighbors are about 6 feet away on all sides of us. There is a thin line of small trees in between but once fall hits and leaves disappear, they do nothing for privacy. Last night, our neighbors were up past midnight winterizing their RV with a full skirting which included sawing and drilling just feet from our beds. Needless to say, we were not amused.
Not actually having met my neighbors and keeping mostly inside the Glamper, I spend my time making up stories about my neighbors. Dimitri and Michail are to the right. They are on the run from the Russian mob and decided Vermont would be the last place they would look for them. But often spend time outside on the phone with their insiders. And Tami and Huck are newlyweds on the right but Huck can’t go anywhere without his big brother Karl so they brought him along on the honeymoon.
Other than slightly losing my grip on reality, I clean a lot. The floor needs to be swept 2-3 times a day. From people going in and out and from cat litter that is constantly everywhere. And dishes. Dishes are done after every meal. They are hand washed. Because food particles can’t go down the drain with no disposal, all dishes are wiped clean with a paper towel and then washed in the sink. It’s a process even with just a couple dishes.
But I’ve had time for free time as well. Reading and cross stitches have been finding their way into my hands for now and I have brought many art supplies and books to work through. And I’m hoping for some hiking when quarantine is over. Hopefully before it gets too cold.
Yesterday Donovan was assigned to make a quick mock up of the solar system using things from home. Some quick thinking brought us to using recyclable lids. It was a quick job but I think he did pretty good considering the limitations! Even used Nerds for the meteor belt.
