 “Try not to make too many ruts,” my brother said before we pulled forward onto his property in Michigan. Not wanting to repeat our experience of having to be towed, we had called him the day before to check on the wetness of the land. Steve assured us we’d be able to park in his farm yard. “That thing is heavy,” were the next words out of his mouth as he assessed the damage left by Tagalong’s weight sinking into the soft ground, a result of 4 inches of rain the week before and ½ inch that morning. Bob spun our 18,000-pound trailer around so he could back it into position, carving 6-inch deep ruts in the process. I guess you could say we made a mark with our RV. As Bob stepped on the gas pedal to back into place, our heavy rig moved only slightly before Gulliver’s dually tires spun out, gouging even deeper ruts. Gulliver couldn’t push Tagalong out of the deep-seated grooves in reverse. Driving in forward instead likely would have been a different story.  A Sticky Situation In bare feet (his norm), Steve ran over to get his Jeep. For the third time in our five years of full-time RV living, we had gotten Gulliver and Tagalong stuck. Only this time, we didn’t have to rely on a commercial tow truck or the goodness of fellow campers — and four-wheel drive likely wouldn’t have prevented this sticky situation. Although we didn’t pick up tire chains like tow truck driver Cody had advised after rescuing us from Jim and Jenny’s front yard nearly two months earlier, we were prepared with a sturdy tow strap, and Steve was prepared with a Jeep. Bob connected the strap to the back of Tagalong, and Steve attached it to the front of his Jeep.  This time as Bob attempted to back up, Steve helped pull Gulliver and Tagalong out of the ruts they’d created and farther back in the yard. But we didn’t get fully into position before stopping … and getting stuck again. Steve repositioned his Jeep, and he and Bob doubled the strap to shorten the connection between the two vehicles. We were running out of yard space. The trailer wouldn’t budge. Unable to move our big rig back any farther, we considered our location good and separated the Jeep from the trailer. I stacked two boards in front of Tagalong’s driver-side tires, and Bob drove forward to pull the trailer onto them and make it level side to side. Then we ran through our normal checklist to disconnect Tagalong from Gulliver and set up camp.  Piece of Paradise
We’re enjoying farm living in Michigan, eating fresh produce, listening to the natural sounds of cows lowing, birds singing, roosters crowing, farmers plowing, mowers humming, and children playing. Cool breezes refresh us, walks down the dirt road invigorate us, and hearty farm cooking makes us rub our bellies in delight — and fullness. Rural life has a lot of appeal. Each farm offers an escape from the hustle and bustle of city life where life is simpler and more serene. It can also be an incredible amount of work for those who choose to take advantage of its fertile soil and wide expanse. Our appreciation for those hard workers grows every time we find ourselves in a rural area, which is much more often than not. In our wake, we’re leaving Steve even more work to clean up our tracks — and a mess to meander when he mows. He has a plan to restore the surface of his yard. We hope carrying it out goes smoothly. You might also like The Benefits of Moochdocking.
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 Since 2017, Bob and I have volunteered to go on tour for two to three weeks every summer with the Commemorative Air Force Airbase Arizona. Bob first went in 2016. It took him a year of inviting me to activities at the airbase when we lived in the Phoenix area before I finally agreed to become a member. I haven’t looked back since. We had planned to head east this year on our travels before we knew the B-25J Mitchell and B-17G Flying Fortress WWII bombers were going to do the same. As a result, we found ourselves in somewhat close proximity to them many times. In fact, we visited the tour stop in Ashland, Virginia, when we were in that state. Typically, we board a commercial airline to one of the warbird tour stops and then fly with the B-25 or both the B-25 and B-17 to the next couple of stops before flying home on an airliner. This year, we got a call from the airbase crew scheduler asking if we could help at a stop that wasn’t part of our scheduled tour segment. Since we were in the vicinity, we decided to pitch in. That meant delaying our trip from Massachusetts to Michigan to fit in a weeklong stay at a campground in Plattsburgh, New York. And that meant Gulliver got to go on his first warbird tour. Historical Significance Plattsburgh is only about 20 miles from the Canadian border. The Plattsburgh International Airport, situated on the shore of the 435-square-mile Lake Champlain, was once the Plattsburgh Air Force Base. It still features the buildings and tower that hearken back to its military days in the 1950s, during the Cold War. But the airfield’s history doesn’t start there. The airport is actually known as “the longest active military installation in the U.S.,” dating back to the Revolutionary War, with involvement in every American war thereafter until the airbase's closure in 1995. Designated as a base for Strategic Air Command, the airport’s runway spans 11,750 feet and stretches 200 feet wide. Its size made it an alternate landing site for the Space Shuttle between 1981 and 2011. During WWII, the base served as home to B-47 Stratojet and FB-111 Aardvark bombers. So it made for an ideal stop on our warbird tour — other than the extra long runway. (The passengers didn’t mind, as it gave them a longer ride experience.) Call of Duty We arrived in Plattsburgh on a Sunday and watched the B-17 fly in the next day. While I worked, Bob spent most of the week wrenching on the B-17, which was due for its 100-hour inspection. Since he’s a certified A&P (airframe and powerplant), he needed to be there to sign off on the maintenance work. I was able to carve out a few hours during the week to help train two new ride coordinators on the flight system and proper procedures.  Gulliver transported us to and from the airport (about 3 miles from our campground), as well as to and from restaurants and the hotel where the rest of the crew stayed. He also helped shuttle crew members between locations and hauled tools and supplies from a hangar to the tour trailer after the maintenance was complete.  Gulliver was even on standby to tug the B-17 out of the hangar for its engine check but didn’t get called on. Instead, a tug did that job.  I took off Friday from work to help with the tour stop. Weekends on tour tend to be quite busy as passengers arrive for flight operations on both planes and purchase souvenirs from the tour trailers before we open for static tours on the ground. Then, people from the community show up to climb through the planes, take pictures, and buy mementos. The weekend in Plattsburgh was no different.
I helped as a ride coordinator and flight loadmaster, looking over passengers and engines during flights. Bob pitched in wherever needed. The B-25 arrived Friday afternoon as we were wrapping up flights on the B-17 for the day. After two full days on the airplane ramp, we packed up Tagalong and hooked him up to Gulliver. The next morning, we parked our rig at the fixed base of operations for the last day of flight ops for the tour stop. We stayed for a couple of hours before Gulliver whisked us away to our next destination, grateful for the part he played on the warbird tour. You might also like RV Living vs. Vacation.  Of the three main types of camping — hookups at a campground, boondocking off the grid, and moochdocking — the last has a lot of appeal, for a number of reasons. Let’s look at the benefits of moochdocking. What Is Moochdocking? Moochdocking is the term we use to refer to parking our rig on the property of family or friends. This can range anywhere from a driveway to a spacious farm. Although no two moochdocking setups are identical, they usually include some sort of electric hookup, a way to get water, and laundry facilities.  Some arrangements have beefier electric hookups than others. With a normal 15-amp circuit, we can run the essentials in our fifth wheel: lights, outlets, refrigerator, electric water heater — and charge our laptops and phones. And if we switch the refrigerator from electric to propane and turn off the electric water heater, we can use our microwave. With a 30-amp circuit, we can also run one of our two air conditioner units. Depending on the time of year, we may not need that option. With a 50-amp circuit, we can easily power everything inside our rig all at the same time, including both air conditioners, the microwave, refrigerator, electric water heater, vacuum, and more. Dedicated Time with Friends and Family One of our favorite aspects of moochdocking is the time it affords us to catch up with family and friends. By staying at the homes of loved ones, we get to enjoy meals with them, fun activities, reminiscing, and lots of laughter. Thanks to our affiliation with the Commemorative Air Force and our experience with Continental Singers and Orchestra (where we met), we know lots of people across the country. With those friends and our spread-out family members, we have someone to visit in nearly every state. Moochdocking offers us more frequent opportunities to see those loved ones than we’d get living in sticks and bricks. Cost Savings As you might imagine, mooching electricity and water from others helps the bank account. And by spending time with our hosts, we tend to take fewer trips in Gulliver during a stay, which saves on diesel costs. That’s not to say we take advantage of loved ones in this type of setup. Quite the contrary. We realize the blessing it is to spend time with and benefit from family and friends’ generosity and are quick to compensate where possible. That compensation can come in the form of cooking meals (something Bob loves to do and is really good at), helping with home projects, reimbursing toward an electric bill, or taking our hosts out for a fancy meal — or a combination of things. Longer Stays As a result of the cost savings and additional resources moochdocking offers, we’re often at liberty to stay in one location longer. By using hosts’ bathroom and kitchen facilities, our black and gray wastewater tanks don’t fill up as quickly as they otherwise would. This in itself provides a number of benefits. We have more time to help with projects, more time to catch up with people we haven’t seen in a long time, and more time to investigate the area. That’s how we were able to do quite a bit of exploring in Virginia, for example. It’s also why we were able to get a true Cajun experience in Louisiana.  Longer stays also give us opportunities to take care of needed maintenance and repairs on our rig. The key is not wearing out our welcome so that we can return for another visit.
Helping Others We’ve always enjoyed gaining and employing skills and experience by doing manual labor. With moochdocking and longer stays, we’re more readily available to pitch in on various projects, and we take joy in it. I once termed this “tradedocking” — working for a free place to stay. Not only does this help family and friends, but it also gives us memories together. We helped paint, renovate a bathroom, lay laminate flooring, upgrade computers and equipment, do construction projects, trim trees, and more. Sleeping in Our Own Bed One of the biggest benefits of moochdocking is being able to visit loved ones for a week or more and sleep in our own bed every night. As the saying goes, “There’s no place like home.” Likewise, there’s no place like our own bed for a good night’s rest. Moochdocking is a truly welcome experience. We’re thankful for our many friends and family scattered across the country, both those who have space for us and those who don’t. Being able to visit you all is a blessing we treasure. You might also like 4 Perks of Full-Time RV Living.  The weather warmed up in Virginia, indicating the time had come for us to move on. So, we headed north to Massachusetts, trading nearly 90-degree temperatures for pleasant 70s. After two beautiful days, a heat wave brought sweltering, unseasonable 90-degree temps, giving us an extremely warm welcome. Moochdocking at Bob’s brother Bill’s, we were plugged into a 15-amp circuit for electricity, which meant we couldn’t run air conditioning in our trailer. Operating even one of our two air conditioners requires 30 amps of power. We opened all of our windows and turned on our RV vent fan in the ceiling to help propel any hot air out. Despite our efforts, Tagalong couldn’t combat the area heat advisory that brought hot temperatures and high humidity with a heat index of up to 99. The thermostat in our bedroom peaked at 97 degrees. With sweat beading on our foreheads and pooling in our arm and knee pits, we were driven out of the RV. Thankfully, we were able to hang out in the air-conditioned house.  Unlike summers in Arizona, where even nighttime temperatures hover around 100 degrees, the air in Massachusetts cools as the sun fades, making it possible for us to sleep in our own bed. On the hottest day, our bedroom thermostat displayed a balmy 87 degrees at bedtime. With fans in front of our bedroom windows pulling in cool outdoor air and our ceiling vent fan moving out hot air, we were able to doze off. Hope on the Horizon The only way to run Tagalong’s air conditioners in low-powered conditions like we found ourselves in was to power up two generators, something we’d never used them for. Since we were parked between two houses in a small community, we thought we better not try that. We had been wanting to replace our power inverter for a while for one that would allow us to combine energy from shore power and our solar panels. Evicted from our rig, we decided to fork out the nearly $2,000 to purchase the unit. And to our surprise, we found it on sale for 40% off. That sealed the deal. Before the part arrived, Bob watched videos and researched how to install the unit. Equipped with that knowledge, he ordered some other parts for the installation. Delivery day came. We had ordered a 12-volt unit. We received a 48-volt one, not compatible with our battery setup. Bob called customer service after normal business hours. The out-of-country rep said he made a call to the warehouse and received confirmation that the correct unit was in stock and would be shipped to us — scheduled to arrive a whole week later. The delay risked our ability to install and benefit from the unit before departing Massachusetts. While we waited for the replacement, Bob prepped the trailer: changing our three lithium iron batteries to lay on their sides, lowering the shelf above them to allow more room for the larger unit, and changing wires and connectors to accommodate the higher power of the new unit. Anticipation
The replacement arrived a day early. Yay! Only it was the wrong unit … again, the same model we had received the first time. Bob quickly sent it back. Lacking confidence that Amazon could provide what we requested, he ordered the correct unit — for the same price — from a different vendor. With time running out and the Fourth of July holiday potentially affecting shipping, we had the unit sent to an upcoming destination to make sure we didn’t miss it. Bob continued ordering more parts and doing more prep work to make the installation go as smoothly as possible. Meanwhile, the heat wave ended, and cooler temperatures returned, allowing us to spend more time in the trailer. You might also like When Things Go Wrong in RV Life. |
AuthorThis is the travel blog of full-time RVers Bob and Lana Gates and our truck, Gulliver, and fifth wheel, Tagalong. Categories
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