Welcome to our
Fall 2019
Shorter Trips
It's the Tweener Season! We're done with our big trip, and now it's time for refining Ernie and making our next trip even mo' betta!
Part of that refinement is traveling without Ernie, to see what we're missing living in a van and its limitations. Is there luxury that we're missing, that we should consider embracing? I don't expect to tent camp again, even with our very nice setup of REI cots and Thermarest mattress: it's too painful to duck down getting in and out of the tent!
It's difficult, but I can fold my legs up enough to fit in an airplane coach seat. For the past several years we've spent one or two weeks in Mexico in November. This year, we thought some variety was called for. In September 2017 Puerto Rico was besieged by Hurricane Maria. Two years later, the damage is still evident. The hotel we chose to stay at used to have a beach, but the hurricane wiped out the beach along that section of coast. The waves now crash on the edge of the patio. The roads around the island were in surprisingly good shape, with many freshly repaved. Overall the road quality was better than most anyplace we've been.
The plan was to relax in the Sun, snorkel, mountain bike, hike, and paddle. The reality was pretty close. Hanging out at the Coconut Palms on the beach didn't happen, though we did enjoy the patio most afternoons. And we got a feel for that unique place that is Puerto Rico, where English and Spanish intermix, where flavors are distinctive and spicy, and where the drivers aren't nearly as crazy as I expected.
The plan after our one flyaway trip is to use Ernie. So we went to Palatka, White Springs (many times), South Florida (8 nights), Huguenot Park (along with Hannah Park, Jacksonville has very impressive City Parks for camping). Lots of time to refine our ride, see what we don't have, what we don't use, what we are missing or what we'd like to have while we're on the road.