An adventure begins with an unwanted adventure

Our first snow bird flight south began with the need to fire up the snow blower and clear 4-inches of snow away from the trailer and driveway. It should have been a warning. The first night included a Tahoe sleepover. Not at Lake Tahoe, but in our Chevrolet Tahoe.

Hooking up the trailer in sub-freezing temperatures is not as easy as it is on nice spring day. I keep learning new things all the time. The snow removal and hook-up problems caused my plans to leave by 9:30 a.m. to slide a little. But we hit the road at 10:20 a.m. in a light snow and heavy wind.

There was a brief moment that I wondered if we should have delayed a day or two, but the forecast for Michigan did not get better as the days went on. We figured if we drove slowly, we would be OK. Besides, what’s an adventure without a little difficulty?

The weather radar showed that the snow would clear up south of Ann Arbor, and that was accurate, for a time. As we entered Ohio, there was no snow, even a glimpse of the sun, but the winds picked up. Frankly, I’d rather have a light snow than heavy winds. Wrestling the trailer in high winds can be a lot of work and worry. It’s also like wrestling with a bear.

We had a brief scare at a gas station in Lima, Ohio when, after gassing up, the car wouldn’t start no matter what I did. The key fit in the lock, but it would not turn. I was trying to imagine how we would deal with a 33-foot trailer and a broken car blocking a gas pump, but I played with a few buttons on the gear shift knob and the truck started again. I can only guess I hit some kind of ignition lock. I’m really going to try NOT to do that again.

As we approached Cincinnati about 4:30 p.m. we encountered more snow, but gratefully light traffic. Because this is our third trip on I-75 south we already have some favorite gas and rest stops and we used all of them on this trip and added a couple new ones we hadn’t used before. One adventure and difficulty I don’t want is to ever run out of gas.

Before we left on the trip, I had scouted a couple of possible first night stops. One was in Corbin, Kentucky (about 490 miles in) and the other was in Sweetwater, Tennessee (about 586 miles in). Joan called the Corbin RV Park from her cellphone and was told that the roads into the park were nearly impassable due to heavy snow and ice. The owner of the park asked Joan to ask me if I was comfortable driving our rig down an icy hill into the park with a severe risk of jack knifing. The answer to that was obvious. See you on the next trip, Corbin.

So we moved on to the Sweetwater, Tennessee RV park and pretty much got the same warning from them. The snow was still falling and the winds still blowing in northern Kentucky, but I was having good success handling the rig and asked Joan how she felt about just driving on as long as we could.

After all, during the Hurricane Katrina disaster, I made five long distance truck driving trips to New Orleans and always enjoyed the driving during the middle-of-the-night segments better.
Always a good sport, Joan said to just keep driving. So we listened to our favorite XM Channel, “60s on 6” with Cousin Brucie. (By the way, he is one of those people who does not look like his voice). That helped pass the time until 10 p.m. at which time I switched to an NHL channel and listened to the Anaheim Ducks and St. Louis Blues hockey game until about midnight.

There were a good number of fights during the game and in an odd way that helped keep me awake. Thanks for the bruises guys.

We had planned to eat Sloppy Joan’s, her version of the Sloppy Joe sandwich, for dinner but with the change in plans we decided to eat at a Denny’s, in Walton, Kentucky, which proves the adage that no one eats at Denny’s unless they have to. We had breakfast and it was very good.

Driving fatigue started to settle in just north of Atlanta about 12:30 a.m. and coincidentally with the end of the hockey fisticuffs, so we pulled into a Georgia rest area and camped out in our Tahoe (the trailer was frozen inside and there were no electrical hook-ups or generator to warm it up). We slept until 2:30 a.m. and then I drove for two more hours through Atlanta.

It was a little frustrating to be sleeping balled up in my driver’s seat, looking in my rear view mirror with my mobile Holiday Inn sitting unused behind me.

The City of Atlanta had just suffered a bad snowstorm and only two lanes of the freeway were ice free, so it was a blessing to pass through the city with very little traffic to contend with. Last year it took us nearly two hours to negotiate a 20-mile section due to rush hour/spring break traffic that converged at a construction zone, which regrettably is still there. But we breezed right through early today.

With another two hours of driving behind us, we stopped at a Pilot Travel Center south of Atlanta, gassed up and then took another nap until about 7 a.m. in an RV parking lot they have there. We basically slept until all the heat was out of the car, I would run the engine for a few minutes to heat the car up again, shut the engine off and then we would go back to sleep. Or, I should say I went back to sleep, because one thing Joan is really good at is staying asleep.

At 7 a.m. we pulled out of the Pilot Travel Center and headed south on I-75. About an hour after we left the travel center we passed Perry, Georgia. Originally we planned a stop there for our second night on the road. But with a second wind and now good weather and driving conditions we continued on to Valdosta, Georgia where we found River Park RV park that let us check in early so we could finally crash in style.

Perhaps one of the more frustrating parts of the first day was that it was 19 degrees when we left Lapeer on our journey to the sun. The highest it reached during the trip was 26 during our trip through Ohio. It fell to a low of 14 in the mountains of Kentucky and Tennessee. It was in the teens when we were sleeping in the Tahoe.

We finally reached a high of 27 degrees at Georgia Mile Marker 90 near Asbury and Ashburn, which is just 90 miles north of Florida about 10 a.m. today.

The trailer heater ran for over an hour after we got set up until it reached 70 inside. We plan on showers this afternoon, a nap, dinner, a little TV, more sleep and then a short (350-mile) run to Jonathan Dickinson State Park in Jupiter, Florida tomorrow. And yes, this is the same park we stayed in for a few days last April.

At least our quest for warmer weather promises to get a little better tomorrow as temperatures in Jupiter, Florida are supposed to be in the 70s for the week.

During our final leg this morning I suggested to Joan that maybe we should do all our driving at night. Through her bleary, bloodshot, too-long-with-the-contacts-in eyes, let me know that she would have to think about that.

Time Out: 10:20 a.m. (January 12)
Mileage Out: 52144

Time In: 11 a.m. (January 13)
Mileage Out: 53153

(Total mileage 1,009, Time 24 hours and 40 minutes, including two highway nap periods of 4 ½ hours total)

The pictures above don't really capture how filthy the outside of our trailer is. As soon as we get settled in some warmer weather I'm going to wash the salt and dirt off the trailer. Please note in the last photo that we didn't hook the water up to the trailer tonight because a hard freeze is predicted and the trailer is still winterized. We'll make do with the restrooms at the park and use disposable products tonight.