It’s been a quiet couple of weeks while RoVer was at the dealer for repairs. We picked her up this past Tuesday and so far, so good! The 45-minute drive back from the dealer was uneventful, and the touchscreen is still fully attached to the dash, where it belongs! Seems like such a simple thing, but for us, it’s HUGE! There’s no tape or cardboard in sight. The climate control buttons all work as intended, and we can use the touchscreen to choose radio stations, set up Bluetooth connections, and more! And the audio in the RV is SO MUCH better now – the volume elsewhere in the RV (e.g. when sitting on the couch) is actually reasonable now (previously, the volume in the cab would be fine but if you were on/near the couch, you were getting blown away by sound!). Yay! The true test will be once we hit the road on Monday, but we’re hopeful the problem is solved. Oh, and we even have a remote control to operate the audio…never received one before, so we’re not sure if this is a newer version that includes the remote, or if they just never bothered to give it to us before!

We had found that making the beds in the RV was incredibly challenging, since there is only about two feet where you can actually get to the side/bottom of the mattress for tucking in, etc. because of the walls and base. Well, I came up with a solution that made the process SO MUCH EASIER! We turned the mattress 90 degrees so it was parallel to the back of the RV, resting across the other bed, and with me on one side and Mark on the other, it was a breeze to get the sheets/blanket on…then we just rotated it back in position and pushed it down into place. Probably took 1/3 the time of our previous methods. Yay! I guess owning an RV is a great way to keep your mind sharp in retirement, since you have all these new things to learn and new challenges to overcome! I’ll take this any day over the stress of trying to achieve marketing objectives!

RoVer had her first bath…not an easy task given how tall she is. But Mark bought a brush with an extendable handle so we can reach all the way up. It worked great on all the bugs that keep joining us in our travels…

One of my cousins asked me recently how we know RoVer is female, since I keep using she/her pronouns in this blog. There’s no obvious way to know for sure, but since she’s not afraid to ask for, and follow, directions, I lean toward the feminine. <chuckle, chuckle>

We’re excited to have some new toys for our RV travels! We treated ourselves to two new electric bikes. After spending some time at campgrounds, we debated bringing our regular bikes, but then researched e-bikes and we were sold! They’ll be awesome for traveling around campgrounds! We like this model because they can be pedaled like a regular bike, or you can turn them on and just ride…up to a whopping, but safe, 15mph. The battery has really good life, and the bikes fold down to a reasonable size so they’ll be easy to transport. We put them together yesterday and tested them out in our neighborhood, and they are FUN to ride! I’m guessing the UPS guy didn’t love delivering them to us, as the boxes were quite large and awkward. The bikes themselves weigh about 40 lbs. each and they even have carrying handles! I’ll share pictures of us on them soon, but here’s one in the garage, and the box it came in. I know they look a little clown-like, but they are comfortable and human-sized, trust me!

We also bought a Solo Stove Ranger…it’s a portable stainless-steel fire pit that should cut WAY down on the amount of smoke that a campfire generates. It uses wood just like a regular fire pit, but it’s specially designed to minimize the smoke that can be really annoying every time the wind changes! Perfect way to enjoy s’mores without smoky clothes to stink up the entire RV! Can’t wait to use it next week!

Made a trip to the gas station and learned something new today…some gas stations put dollar limits on how much you can pump. Obviously, with a car, this would never be an issue, so we’ve never seen it before, but at BJ’s Wholesale Club where we usually fill up locally, the pump automatically shut itself off when we got to $100, and the screen said “maximum limit reached”. Fortunately, the tank was pretty much full at that point so we didn’t have to start a 2^nd transaction, but we did get a good laugh out of the whole thing…

And, for a change, RoVer’s tires didn’t need any air. They had needed to be filled on every gas station trip, but today, pressure was right where it should be on all six tires. Small victories! We need to get our food and clothes loaded this weekend, and we’ll hit the road on Monday for our first of several NY State Parks…this one in Ithaca, NY. More posts to come soon!