"Don't you absolutely love back back-to-back RV travel days," said no one ever.
That's what we're doing.
A cross country road trip from Tampa, Florida to Fryeberg, Maine, 1400 miles, 10 states,
and all with the newborn baby.
Are we crazy?
So, in addition to our crazy tree event this morning, technically we're not supposed to
be traveling today, but here we are.
Today, not like yesterday, is going to be a great day, because we are going to have
nothing but smooth sailing all day.
When we got home last night, we were exhausted.
A GPS approximately four-hour trip took us seven hours.
And with all the big cities, you guys saw how our stops went, and it really wasn't all
that great considering Dash is with us.
So, we did some quick research.
And we weren't supposed to travel today.
Today was supposed to be the day where we leisurely dump tanks, got some work done,
did the laundry, and then drove again on Wednesday to our next campground, but it's another four
hour GPS time.
And well, we're in the Northeast, so there are a bunch of cities in between here and
where we're going.
So, we decided we would find an in between campground.
Luckily it's when we've stayed up before, so we know it well, but it's in New Jersey.
So, it's a good halfway stop, only problem is, we still had to get laundry and the tank
done and a bit of work.
So, we're not leaving until 4:15.
And it is approximately two hours and 45 minutes GPS time, so you know that's going to mean
probably more like three hours and 45 minutes.
So, for chasing the sun.
Hopefully we are not getting there in the dark because we know one thing about this
park, it's really dark after dark.
So, hopefully, this one will be smooth for our unplanned travel day.
We just arrived in New Jersey, the Campground, and this is the second time we've been here.
The last time we were here, we were here to run the New York City Marathon.
It was one of our favorite spots when were here last.
And I just backed up into the spot, and believe it or not, it is perfectly level.
No levelers needed.
Awesome.
You can't ask for much more.
Considering we're just here for one night, that is a win
Getting settled in for the evening, but you have got to see what laundry on-the-go looks
like.
It's not pretty.
Normal laundry setup, laundry being spread out all over the house.
Yeah, this is lovely.
That'll make you miss a Sticks & Bricks laundry room, no doubt.
Mommy, you're doing the best that you can.
You all are crazy trying to drive across the whole country.
But on a positive note, I'm only two months old and I visited so many states.
Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, we're in New Jersey right now, we
were in, where were we?
Delaware last night.
We were in Delaware last night.
You've got Delaware, check, check.
Dash is already very well-traveled at two months old, bam.
One day he's going to be helping daddy drive the trailer, right?
You're going to be driving that trailer for daddy.
All right, travel-day number three, which was one of our planned travel days, but thankfully
our trip is shorter today than it would've been had we not added our New Jersey stop.
Today we're traveling approximately three and a half hours from New Jersey to Portland,
Connecticut.
So, we're keeping our fingers crossed things will stay smooth.
We had a bit of hiccup this morning.
We were thinking that our checkout was at one 1:00, which is super rare.
It was actually at 11:00, so we had to re-jig some things.
We were totally late, which was really unfortunate.
We're getting back in the swing of things.
Forgot.
But I think Daniel and I, moving forward, are going to be assuming an 11:00 AM checkout,
because you never want to inconvenience the campers that are coming in after you, or the
campground, because that's rude and not cool.
Thankfully we didn't run into that today, but we almost did.
So.
Don't be us.
Well, the good news is that the car trip was uneventful.
It was.
Still more traffic, more craziness, of course.
If you've driven up here in the Northeast, then you know what I'm talking about.
Lots of construction, lots of shifting lanes.
But beyond that, we made it.
To Connecticut, yay.
Yay.
Connecticut.
This is Dash's I-don't-even-know state, so that's fun.
But unfortunately we're in Portland, Connecticut, and they are under an extreme heat advisory,
which is the first place that we've been since we left Florida that is hotter than Florida.
The heat index is over a 100 right now.
So, it's toasty.
We have the most amazing tent that keeps the heat out.
Unfortunately, since we were going from one campground to the other, obviously the AC
wasn't running at all, so it's warm in there, and it will not cool down because-
The electric is not appropriate.
Exactly.
So-
Looks like the towers are down.
That's exactly right.
So, we're having some power issues.
The breakers keep tripping, and it's just too warm in there for little Dash.
Normally, if it's just Lauren and I, honestly, if I'm being honest with you, even without
Dash, we would make our next moves.
It would be the same, right?
Probably.
Right?
So-
But it makes it easier with that.
But it makes it easier.
So, since there's no way to cool the airstream, we basically are without power.
We have battery power and solar, but that's not going to run the ACs.
Because of that, we are-
Going to just go grab a hotel close-by.
That's right.
It's one night.
It's not really that big of a deal.
That's right.
We'll get a legit shower.
And yes, we did try calling the campground.
It's a small local place, and it doesn't look like anybody has, or nobody answered.
So, it's not really that big of a deal.
We're just going to take it in stride because it's already almost 5:00, we're tired, we've
been traveling, obviously, for a long time, and-
We need a good night's sleep because we have a long drive.
Well, we have another drive tomorrow.
We've driven every day this week, actually.
We have two more drive, so-
Yeah.
... we're just going to go make sure that Dash can have a cool night's sleep, pack up
and call it hotel night because this is what you do when you live RV life and something
just goes wrong and you just either don't feel like fixing it, or can't.
That's true.
Yeah, when you're tired, you just say, "Screw it," and you just go grab a hotel and you
figure it out in the morning.
So, that's what we're doing.
Taking Dash back to the air conditioning in the car, because poor little dude is really
sick of the heat.
Yep.
Lauren's going to stay with Dash in the truck with the AC running to keep him cool, and
then I will get us packed up and we'll head out of here.
All right.
Yeah.
So, we did bring his bougie bed to the hotel because it rocks him to sleep, and he's so
used to it.
And we haven't weed him off of it, so we're not going to start tonight.
And no, it is not travel-friendly.
It's pretty heavy.
We brought a ton of stuff with us.
Okay, 20...
This is what happens when you don't stay in hotels for a long period of time, trying to
find our room.
Hey, they have laundering in here.
Who uses campground laundry when you have hotel laundry.
Dash's first night in hotel, and on Lauren's birthday.
In reality, I think Lauren went out there and sabotaged our power just so we can come
stay at a hotel.
Okay, I'm putting the camera down because I think we're lost.
Dash's first night in a hotel went great.
But one thing that I will note about RV life is that this hotel, although it would've cost
us about 220 bucks for the night, if we were to just book it regularly, one of the things
that we always do is that we pay attention and utilize credit card point systems.
So, this night was completely free utilizing points from our Bonvoy Marriott card.
So, that's one thing that I will say, for risk management around RV life, playing the
credit cards point game is really legit.
It is officially day four of our crazy five-day, 700 mile adventure, and luckily, today should
be a chill one.
We are going from Portland...
Where are we?
A beaver, look.
Oh yeah, there is a beaver right there.
We're going from Portland, Connecticut to somewhere in Massachusetts, but we only have
to go two hours to get there.
And we have full hookups at the next campground.
So, we're pretty excited to get our final setup prepared for arriving at the Airstream
Rally tomorrow.
Good morning.
Travel-day number five.
Thank heavens our campground last night, zero drama.
It was absolutely adorable, actually.
And this morning I snuck out while Daniel and the baby are still asleep, and I'm going
to go grab some groceries, because one of the things that you may not know about living
RV life if you haven't ever done this, there's no guarantee that there's going to be a grocery
store that's close to you.
So, one of the things that I do, if we're going to be somewhere for a week or two weeks
is, I always search on Google in advance of leaving for that campground to see if there's
a grocery store close.
If there is, great, I'll deal with it later.
But today we're going to Fryeberg, Maine.
And I've already Googled it, and there aren't a whole lot of grocery stores close by.
But there is this really cool little family grocery store here close to our campgrounds,
only 10 minutes away.
So, I'm going to go ahead and grab some groceries, and hopefully, I will make it back before
the boys even know I'm gone.
All right.
These are beautiful, not what we're eating this week, but they're so pretty.
Yeah, they won't like that.
There's really pretty produce here.
Okay, just checked the app, the baby is still asleep, so if we can get checked out really
quickly, then I'm going to be winning.
Okay.
Eight minutes, and I beat the boys from waking up.
And there's the house.
All right, let's see if we beat the boys up.
No screaming baby.
Dash and daddy are working on getting up.
But daddy needs some coffee.
What am I going to do with these lazy boys?
What do you think Mister?
700 miles complete soon?
We've got about a two and a half hour drive before we make it to the Airstream Rally,
and we are ready to be done with this travel week.
Who's excited?
Are you excited...
(Music)
Hey there.
We just made it to the Fair Grounds and we are online with all the other shiny hineys
here.
We're making our way towards our camping spot for the week.
It's really exciting.
There is aluminum everywhere.
Most RV manufacturers have some rally on a regular basis, and it's where everybody gets
together and hangs out for a week, typically.
But this week has a lot of shiny hineys.
You are at the largest attended international rally since 2007.
(Music)
One of favorite parts about the Airstream Rally is the community.
And tonight we are getting a whole bunch of Airstreamers together at Saco River Brewing,
a local brew house here in Fryeberg, Maine, to all hang out and just celebrate being awesome
together.
It's going to be fun.
Hey, clown, where's the beer?
We've got to get going, come on.
Come on, Dash.
Dash is ready for some brews-
That's right.
But if you guys don't know this cool couple behind me, this is Randy and Diane from Zephyr
Travels, and they also have a killer Airstream channel.
So, we'll add the link here.
You have to check them out.
Hi.
That would be too much to hope for.
What's the age difference between your three?
About three years.
Are there any Airstreamers in the house?
We're having a great time at the Airstream Rally.
Hope you guys are as well.
We are going to give away some beers here.
We're going to make this fun.
You're ready?
Who wants some free beer?
Okay.
Unfortunately, we're going to have free beer for everybody, but we've got some free beer
for some of you.
So, let me start with, it's going to be more of a trivia question.
And you guys can follow up with this as well.
We've got Zephyr Travels here, we've got Luv Subbin, Stream and Airheads.
So, the first trivia question, you're ready?
The first person to answer.
How old is the youngest Airstreamer here at the Rally?
10 weeks and three days.
What is the total number of Airstreams that had attended this year's annual Rally.
What did you say?
980.
We have a winner.
All, if you don't know who we are, I'm Randy and this is Diane.
We're Zephyr Travels.
We travel around in Airstream with our two dogs, Monty and Zephyr.
First person to do 10 jumping jacks.
Green shirt in the back.
Oh, man.
There we go.
Hey, everybody.
Thanks for coming out.
So, our trivia question is, what is the name of our Airstream?
Shining Hope.
Hello, everyone out there in Airstream land.
So, if you haven't heard of us, we're Luv Subbin.
I'm Rich, and this is Cindy and we...
Woo-hoo.
Thank you.
And our trivia question is, what is the terminal velocity of an unladen swallow?
Are there any Monte Python fans out there?
What's the answer?
What's the correct...
You get beer, and that's the correct question.
Drink some beer, be safe, have fun.
The 2022 Airstream International Rally was an absolute blast.
We met so many wonderful people.
Shout-out to all of you all.
And we can't wait to make the trip to Rock Springs, Wyoming, in June next year to do
it all over again.
But with the Airstream Rally behind us, it's time to head just a few hours north to explore
Dash's very first national park, Acadia.
Want to join us for that adventure?
Make sure you subscribe to our channel and hit the little bell so you'll get a notification
when it drops.
But until then my friend, make sure you wander local this week because as you know, it's
good for the soul.