WE’RE OFF!

No, we don’t smell like old fish.  After months of pretending to plan, and a frantic last week where we actually got started doing so, and washed and waxed the rig, installed new electrics to monitor the batteries (why are those lights dimming?), prepped the house for getting along without us for a couple of months, and generally exhausted ourselves (this is supposed to be fun, right?), we are off!  Southeast U.S., here we come.

We were supposed to leave Sunday morning, but . . . first the farmer’s market for last minute provisions, Gelson’s for some breakfast buns (yum), last watering (with fertilizer) of the plants, setting lights on timers, loading the food, loading the scoot, unhooked the electric umbilical, started the propane flowing, another run to Ralphs, cut the last of the avocados off the backyard tree and distribute the largess to various neighbors, multiple deep breaths as we stood in the entryway muttering “what did we forget?,” we cranked ten cylinders (burning a quart of gas in the process), we pulled out at 2:20pm.  Gosh, PCH won’t be TOO crowded with beach traffic, right?

Actually, it was, but it flowed, as did we, all the way out to San Bernardino where we made a stop at Camping World to get a roof vent cover so we can breathe when it pours rain in the deep south.  Chucked it in the shower to await a place and time to install it.  Back on the road for the quick run out to our first stop, Laughlin.  Our new Garmin 1450 GPS, which we have named three times, now settling on Dora the Explorer (suck rocks, Disney), cheerfully displayed that we had only 231 miles to go.  WHAT?  It’s already 4:00.

Off on the 215, to join with the 15, to join with I40.  All uphill.  Isn’t there some law of nature that says what goes up must eventually come down?  This trip is living refutation of that proposition.  I can actually see the gas gauge moving in real time.  And, of course, the second law of RV travel materializes:  a steady, strong wind in our face.  That sure helps our mileage.  The scenery doesn’t help our mood.  Let’s face it.  The Mohave is really a homely desert, and endlessly so.

Daylight fades and turns to night just as we exit I40 for the cowpath that leads to our stopping place, the Avi Resort and Casino, just outside of Laughlin.  How they make it work with an access road like this is amazing.  It’s DARK out there in the desert, man.  GPS to the rescue, almost.  Dora wanted us to continue for 4 miles past the entrance road to the place.  She must be the doppelganger of Gertie, our TomTom unit, who was retired because her map update would cost almost as much as a new unit.  Gertie rides with us as backup.

The Avi actually is quite nice and, despite being a KOA franchise, had reasonable rates of $23.63 including tax for full hookups, including cable.  That’s less than half the going rate for any other KOA we’ve ever passed up.  A late supper of a risotto salad, a new “Foyle’s War” on Masterpiece Theater, ten pages of Henning Mankell’s latest, and ZZZZZZZZZZ.