Homeward Bound..and HOME(s)

Our road home took us back from Colorado through Kansas, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio and finally Truxton, NY and then Brooklyn, NY. Long trip with mostly overnight stays, with an important stop in Jackson Center, OH – home of Airstream. We wanted to take the tour of the Airstream factory but also needed to get a couple of things on our trailer checked out & repaired. More on that later…

Those of you who know me, know I usually have a plan. Taking this 3 month trip helped me get comfortable with having a plan that covered the next 2-3 days. Very different from my typical several month (ok, year) plan. So traveling without reservations meant no plan; plan as you go. So we accessed Harvest Hosts, an app/membership that we sign on to that gives us access to farms, wineries & breweries where we can stay overnight for nothing (or next to nothing) and if time available, experience these businesses and their products. First stop, we stayed in Higgensville, MO at Arcadian Moon winery & brewery. We arrived late and had ample warning that cook was absent – so though we could stay, no food was available. We checked in and bought a bottle of wine (note, it was great).. felt since were we staying for free, we should try their offerings! But we needed food and B wanted to try some local BBQ. After settling the camper, we headed in to town to get some BBQ at Red Shanty BBQ & Roadside Cafe. B enjoyed some brisket and we both savored flash fried brussel sprouts and deep fried green beans. Delicious… We were exhausted after so many hours on the road, so boondocking (no electric or water) there was no issue since we were ready to sleep as soon as we got back to the winery.

BUT – the weather thought we should have an adventurous night. Winds whipped up and I woke worried there might be tornadoes. We were in the “zone”; so legit. B, sound asleep but he woke later as rain thunder, lightning came through. He stepped outside to do what guys can do outside, and rain started as he finished. He checked the Weather Channel app, determining it was moving north, so we’d be fine. It calmed enough for us to fall back to sleep only to have a close and super loud thunderclap wake him (and then me) violently from sleep. It’s funny now, but it was really scary then.

Next leg would take us to Indiana, Terre Haute KOA. Super nice campground where we could enjoy our last campfire after a delicious birthday (mine) dinner at Taj Mahal – I love Indian cuisine.

In and out the next day to travel to Airstream in Jackson Center, OH. We pulled in early looking for lunch – there were few choices and we wound up in a nearby bar satiating hunger with really bad pizza. Oh well, can’t all be good.

The Airstream Center is Airstream Central. Customer Service looks like you are looking at a camper. We engaged service to take a look at our camper as we went on the factory tour. It was really interesting to learn the history of Airstream and see how the various lines are made. The “factory” still produces handmade trailers – automation is limited. We saw so many campers – new and old; next gen and vintage. Not allowed to take pics inside the factory; but could take pics of some vintage as we travelled the outside lots. Loved it all.

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Our service tech let us know that the issue we saw on the floor of the camper was indeed a water leak causing mold. They would need to remove and replace the entire floor to fix the water leak and eradicate the mold. UGH… Even though we were past warranty, Airstream said they would replace this without charge — as if we were, in fact, covered by warranty. OMG – how fantastic is that? What business does that anymore?? If you were on that tour and you got a sense as to how much this product means to the people who produce it, you would understand why they did that. The pride of the workforce was evident and I am so grateful to buy and support an American made product. They are in process of building a new plant; expanding their production capabilities for both Airstream trailers and the Mercedes touring coaches.

So, we had to decide — do we take the camper home and bring it back for service or leave it here now? They would not get to service our camper for at least 3 months they are so backed up and we want to be sure we can camp again in the spring. It’s an 8 hour drive from Truxton to Jackson Center to bring the camper back vs. figuring out if we can empty this whole thing out – leaving the camper “empty” — for service.

What to do…what to do. Emptying the camper seemed like a monumental task; can we even fit everything in there – including our bikes – in the truck? We debated our options and decided leaving the camper was our best option, so we spent the next several hours moving everything out of the camper in to the truck (or the garbage). We got it done and set up our service the next day – and hit the road back to NY without our trailer. It felt a little sad. She took us to so many beautiful places in this country and we weren’t bringing her home. Weird. We did experience a very cool spot Lucky Louies Beer & Weiners on our travels that offered a vegan option (note, few and far between) that I wish was always in our back yard.

We travelled on and got back to our country home in Truxton to feel such ease to be “home” and cooked dinner in our kitchen and slept in our comfortable queen size bed. We saw nature’s visitation on our home evidenced by shedded snake skins and a hornets nest in the unused grill…very cool. A nearly full moon and delight of space to enjoy created calm as we reset being home. And then further on to our BK home.

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Plans for what is next were so up in the air given when we expected our granddaughter to arrive. LSS, we decided to head back to the city since traveling to San Francisco was easier than getting there from Syracuse. As we got back to Brooklyn, I felt happy to see my city skyline despite the honking for no (or stupid) reasons. Gleefully got a parking spot on my street, emptied the car, put everything away and went out for dinner.

Text from Kevin…inducing labor Sunday, expect Ava’s arrival Monday. Now, get planning…

What an amazing trip. We need time to process it all. Whenever I have been on a meditation retreat my teachers say it takes months to actually feel the effects. This trip has been a long meditation – so I know the effects will take some time to evolve in to my consciousness. This is the end of our trip from a logistics perspective; but I will add to this as we process the impact.