January and February are dangerous days for Airstream plumbing. We, along with most full-time RV’ers, go south to winter. Louisiana’s not as warm as Florida or Arizona, but it’s usually nice and we have family there. Winter is also when we work on our rig; this time Kat installed a stainless steel backsplash, and she is so proud! We’ve spent the last four weeks in the New Orleans area camped at Fairview – Riverside and then Fontainebleau Louisiana state parks. This marks our third south Louisiana winter in our Airstream. Just being here brings on reflection on our life as full-timers, and the lessons learned along the way.

We both pull our rig pretty well now, but it was not always so. Kat has become an accomplished trailer backer and I have learned how to communicate in ways that will not lead to shoulder bursitis. I can usually eyeball a site and know where and how many levelers to use under the wheels. We’ve mastered use of our generator to preserve battery life while reloading our laptops and phones. Water management has been mastered, and neither of us has crushed a wheel chock in almost two years!

This year we plan to roll up the eastern seaboard. We might catch a spring training game in Florida. A ranger-guided canoe tour of Congaree National Park in South Carolina is on our wish list, but reservations are eight feet beyond a gimme.   Chesapeake Bay seafood is on our menu along with Atlantic scallops and fresh fish. Maybe we’ll run into our old Texas buds Clark and Deborah at Hilton Head, and Kat has scheduled visits with Shreveport friends and family. There are a couple of new museums to see in D.C. and if we miss that ballgame in Florida, maybe get tickets to one there.   We’re gonna see the wild horses of Assateague National Seashore, and maybe we’ll get another look at Gettysburg National Military Park. If so, Oil City, Pennsylvania and its Yellow Dog Restaurant are in the conversation. Then we will summer in West Virginia on a trout stream in the Monongahela National Forest as campground volunteers.

We’ve learned a lot, and seen a lot. Our travels have been informative, inspirational, and fun.  Ol’ Neil Young was writing about us (or was it his ’48 Buick Roadmaster hearse?) in a song he and Stephen Stills put together back in the 70’s:

“We’ve been through some things together, with trunks of memories still to come. We found things to do in stormy weather; long may you run.”

Maybe you should hear again it to refresh your memory, or if it’s for the first time, you’ll enjoy it as music and poetry. Here we go.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIk1O8l2czk