Wowww!!!! The last week was so much harder than I
thought it would be in so many ways!
First off, we had to stop and thank God for the beautiful weather we had
during the last week. We had the 5th
wheel open and we were able to take multiple trips hauling our essential
belongings from the house to our new home without tracking in snow or mud or
having to wear coats! It was gorgeous
weather for packing.
Monday morning
we got up early and packed the last of our belongings then left to go sign the
papers on the sale of the house. We
stopped at the bank then headed home to hook-up and leave. The whole way into town to close on the house
we were so giddy. We talked about how
exciting this was and how hard we had worked to make this happen. No tears – just huge grins! But, I will confess, when we got back to
hook-up and pull out the tears started.
I made the mistake of walking through the house one more time…stupid,
stupid, stupid! I took pictures and
cried as memories slammed me from everywhere.
I have to say right now, though, that there was never a time we ever
doubted our decision. Even in my sadness
of leaving our home of 23 years where we raised our boys, I still knew that I
wanted to continue down our chosen path, but the actual leaving was
bittersweet.
 |
| Our Old Home and Our New Home |
 |
| Clark preparing to start out on our new life! |
We didn’t pull
out until 2:00 in the afternoon. Our
destination was the Escapees’ Rainbow Park in Livingston, TX where we will
officially become Texans. We weren't
sure of the specifics of the trip to get there.
We thought we had a plan but we changed our minds and decided to drive through
Oklahoma City during the night to avoid the horrible traffic we have
experienced there in the past on I-35.
 |
| Driving through the gate one last time. |
 |
| Pulling away... |
 |
| Looking back one last time... |
We saw quite a
few other rigs on the road but they were all heading north. We appeared to be fish swimming
upstream! I am sure they were thinking
we were idiots and were heading the wrong way.
We know we were thinking that about them! We were telling them to turn back – it was
still cold up north! The trip was pretty
uneventful other than the wind. We drove
into the wind the entire way to Livingston.
We will not do that in the future unless we have to, but we felt the
need to get down here so we could get our truck and 5th wheel
licensed as our tags expire at the end of the month.
Oh what a
beautiful sunset we saw on our first night of freedom – from the cab of the
truck but that was ok.
 |
| The sky looked like it was burning. |
Anyway, we spend
our first night in an Oklahoma rest stop between two semi-trucks. We thought it was wonderful and it was within
our budget!
 |
| Our beautiful view at our first "site" (the Oklahoma rest stop) |
We crawled into bed and
snuggled under lots of blankets because it was pretty cold. We lay there and talked about all of the
thoughts still bouncing around in our heads.
Clark finally drifted off. I know
this because he began snoring and I thought, well, that’s it for me – no
sleep’s gonna come my way! I started
singing 100 bottles of beer on the wall in my head, and got into the 70s but
kept losing track where I was.
Thankfully, Sleeping Beauty finally rolled over from his back to his
side and the snoring stopped. Normally,
I don’t have a problem poking the bear to get him to roll over, but since he
was going to be driving me - and all of the things I decided I must have - down
the road the next day while I slept, I thought maybe it would be best to let
him sleep while he could!
We woke up
(yes, I did finally drift off) a tad chilly but finally forced ourselves to get
up and at it. Boy was it cold but we
were so excited to be on the road again.
When we got to Fort Worth, we realized we would have been better off to
drive all through the night to get through the traffic there! Two words…road construction…we idled our way
down the highway for more than an hour!
When we finally got to go 10 mph we thought we were flying!!!! We didn't care; we didn't have to be
anywhere, so we patiently got through that mess.
Of course, that
was enough to screw up our arrival time at the park. We called ahead to let them know we would be
in after office hours and asked what sites we could pick from when we got there
– I told Sunny we planned to stay for 2 weeks.
Boy were we shocked when she said she only had one site available for
that duration – and grateful that there was still one left. We hadn't even thought about making
reservations! This was all new to us because in the past when we traveled on
the Harley we rode until we felt like stopping.
Reservations…we don’t need no stinking reservations! (Think Sierra
Madre). Well, it turned out we
didn't need reservations THIS time but we may need to rethink our opinion about
reservations. Again – thank you God for
looking out for us!
We arrived
after dark (but not after quiet hours) and backed into our spot. Not our brightest move (yes, pun
intended.) Our new neighbors were
getting home about that same time so they pulled their truck in and left their
headlights on for us so we could see better.
We got all set up without any issue but we don’t want to make a habit of
setting up after dark! We slept in this
morning and boy did that feel good. For
awhile, we sat in our chairs, which we turned around to look out our big back
window, and gazed out at all of the other rigs in the park and just
smiled. We were “home”.
Tomorrow we
will be more productive than we were today. We plan to talk to the Escapees
people here in the park about what we need to do and where we need to go to
become residents of Texas. They help
folks like us do this all of the time so we are grateful to have them as a
resource.
Lulu was very
happy when we made camp. She has been
out of sorts for the past few weeks and Monday morning when we were running back
and forth carrying things out, she refused to come back into the house. She just lay down by the truck and waited to
leave. She had been in the 5th
wheel with us all week as we were packing our belongings away, and she knew nothing
in the house was as it should be. She
may not have understood what exactly was happening but she at least thought we
were going on a trip and she knew she wasn't going to be left behind. Dogs are so smart! Her happiness was short –lived though because
she got a bath tonight!
The cost for
this park for a 50 AMP site is $128.00 per week. This includes electricity and is the price
for Escapee members, which we are.
