Does an RV feel like home?

Trent is your driver for this post.

Last Sunday we left Texas for New Mexico.  On the way out of Texas I got a weird feeling that we were somehow leaving home. The next day I told Susanne this and she said she felt the same way. I wasn’t expecting that feeling at all. When we left Indiana I felt like if we broke down on the side of the road we would already be home because we were in the RV. 

The overlook of Ohio River in Hanover, Indiana

However, in western Texas I got the feeling that if we broke down we would somehow not be near home. That doesn’t make a lot of sense because although we are now Fexans (fake Texans), we don’t have a home in Texas - we have a mailbox.  I guess I was starting to feel our home was in Texas State Parks.  It’s also possible San Angelo, Texas felt a little bit like home since I lived there for 9 months in the early 90’s.

However, now that feeling is gone. The RV and our new RV park feel like home. We love our new place again and just signed up to stay almost another week. When we are out and about in Roswell, it feels like we are just a few miles from home. If we at a park and it's starting to get dark we ask Sam, “Are you ready to go home?” and when we walk into the RV it feels like we are home again.

Home

San Angelo State Park Campground in San Angelo, Texas

Trent is your driver for this post.

We stayed at the San Angelo State Park campground (south shore) for two weeks in early Aug, 2016.  Our original plan was to stay for a week but after a few days of loving our spot - we changed it to two weeks.

The gate agent was very friendly and pointed out we had made a reservation at the North shore campground but would probably rather stay at the south shore. She was right and so she switched our spot to a good one (#17) by the lake.  The state park has electric and water hookups but not sewer. We did end up having to dump about twice a week but that turn out to be easier than expected (but still not "fun").



The Verizon coverage was great without an antenna or booster. I was pulling down anywhere from the high teens to low twenty's Mbps.  You can see the cell tower is just on the other side of the park and up near the local dam.



Each spot comes with a nice concrete and shaded(!) table. We made good use of it to escape the August sun. The pictures below were not our spot - just typical spots in the park.


The view from our spot was great as were the sunsets. The first week we mostly had our corner of the park to ourselves and when more campers did come in the second week it still wasn't crowed.  There are research herds of Bison and Texas Longhorns in the park. We went and watched them a few times.  There were also plenty of birds and ground squirrels to watch.  One word of caution- there are fire ants colonies in the park. Check to make sure you are not setting up your RV in the path of ant colony. They will try to eat you for dinner or let you know that spot is taken. We got lucky and had no problems.

The park is just on the edge of town. A huge grocery store is just 2 miles down the road and there are plenty of things to do in town. The local pool ($5 per person) is great for kids! Sam had a blast. The rangers said you can swim in the lake but I didn't see anyone doing that and couldn't suggest it.

The bath houses were maybe slightly below average in terms of cleanliness for a state park but still ok and fine to use. I regularly took showers there to keep our gray tank from filling up too fast.

Can you spot the Road Runner?

Bathhouse

We would definitely stay here again! I hope next time the temperature is not hovering around 100 like it was during this visit.

Thousand Trails Medina Lake RV Campground, Lakehills, TX

Trent will be your driver for today's post.

We stayed at the Thousand Trails Medina Lake RV Campground in Lakehills, TX for two weeks at the end of July, 2016. Overall our review is we would happily stay here again.

Verizon coverage was good enough for work and Netflix for both our phones and our jetpack without using an antenna or booster.

There were lots of sites to chose from. They ranged from flat and shaded to not-so-flat and full Sun. We went for a flat spot with good morning and evening shade. Our electric, water, and sewer hook-ups all worked as expected.

The pool was nice and big.

The lake was nice but we chose to stay up on a hill in case there was a storm. We didn't want to worry about flooding and we thought there might be fewer bugs away from the lake. Bugs were not a problem for us at all, so maybe they would've have been a problem down by the lake.

Deer are everywhere in this RV park. They don't really care if you get within a few feet of them when passing by. If you want to see deer - this is your park. We also saw a Roadrunner and a dung beetle (someone has to clean up after the deer).

We seemed to have had the place to ourselves a lot of the time. I worked down at the rec house a few times. The WiFi there was very slow. It wouldn't be fast enough for work but would be ok for checking mail or maybe a website or two.

The laundry mat (building with ramp) was good for an RV park and the bathrooms were in decent shape. 

This is a Thousand Trails; the place could use some work but everything was functional. Nothing is in perfect condition but we don't really expect that for the price we like to pay.

Slowing down: Update on travel plans.

Trent will be your driver for this post.

Our original plan had us coming to Texas (check) and then heading out fairly quickly up into Colorado and toward the Pacific Northwest for the summer and fall and back down south for the winter. Now however we will be in Texas for all of July (Austin and San Antonio) and then only plan to make it to southern or central California by the fall or early winter by taking short hops west from Texas. We plan to head north in the spring and be in the Pacific Northwest for the summer of 2017 - a year later than first planned.

Why the change?

We like Texas a lot. 
We are dealing with the heat better than expected. Our AC unit keeps our living space cooler than our little window AC unit did in the house in Indiana so the summer is actually better so far. Plus we lived in Tennessee for about 10 years in total and the heat and humidity there are not that much different than here in Texas.

Slow travel is more fun and relaxing.
We moved quickly between Tennessee and Livingston, Texas. Moving every few days or every day is not as much fun as staying somewhere for a week or two.  Moving day ends up taking most of the day making getting work or anything else done much harder. Staying longer at each place makes it easy to work and allows us to explore more of the area before moving on.

Money: Instead of making two trips north and and one south we will be taking one trip west and north over the next year. This basically should cost about half as much as doing two trips in terms of gas.  Plus the longer you stay at RV parks - the bigger discount you can get.

All that said, our plans are subject to change. This is one reason we moved into the RV. If we change our minds - it is very easy just to drive in a different direction.

How to become residents of Texas so you can RV full-time!

Trent will be your driver for this post.

We chose to become residents of Texas after a bunch of research. Technomadia has a good blog post about choices and keeps it up-to-date. In summary, people who decide to become full-time RVers generally choose between Texas, Florida, and South Dakota if they don't stick with their home state. We picked Texas because given those three choices we would rather end up in Texas.

This is our step-by-step guide to getting Texas residency. We did steps 2-6 in a day and quarter.

1) Sign up for the Escapees Mail Forwarding Service.
This gives you a Texas address to use on official paperwork.

2) Take your RV to Livingston, TX.
Stay at the Escapees park (where we are right now with a good Verizon signal). You can complete these steps elsewhere in Texas but Livingston is an RV friendly town and state agencies here are used to dealing with full-timers. This makes everything easier.

3) Visit a local insurance agent
Get your insurance transferred to Texas or sign up for Texas insurance for your RV and towed vehicle. We used State Farm* since have been with them for a long time. The important part here is getting the paperwork showing you have the required insurance coverage for Texas on any vehicles you need to get plates for and the insurance paper work showing your Livingston address counts as one of the two pieces of paperwork needed to prove residency.

(*State Farm will not issue new policies for full-time RVers but if you are an existing customer with RV coverage you can transfer to Texas and keep your coverage.)

4) Get your vehicle state inspected. 

Bring your insurance paper work because it's required at the time of inspection.  This costs a total $5 per vehicle. We used Soda Auto at 6709 U.S. 190, Livingston, TX 77351 at the suggestion of the Escapees club and suggest you do, too. A single guy appears to run that somewhat rundown place but he is a member of Escapees and was extremely easy to work with. The inspection takes less than 10 minutes (maybe 5). We didn't even have to take the cat out of the RV. It was super easy and he later installed our plates for free (he needed to drill holes in front of the car) in exchange for a plate for his wall.

5) Know your GVWR and UVWR (or CW). 
The GVWR is probably posted in a plaque inside your driver's side door of your motorhome (I don't know where it would be in a 5th wheel). You will need to print or email a copy of this photo to the tax collection agency (the next step). We didn't know this ahead of time but I had taken pictures of every plaque in/on/under the RV and so was able to email the photo from iCloud as we were in the office.  They don't require proof of the UVWR or CW (I think they used a different abbreviation here - basically they want the unloaded weight).

6) Visit the local Texas Tax office to get your plates (M-F 8:00am - 4:30pm)
In Livingston the office is at 416 N. Washington Ave.  Take your insurance paperwork, state inspection paperwork, a check (or lots of cash - our cost was $438 for the RV and car), a passport, your loan(s) lien holder name and address, and registration paperwork from your old state. You will need to fill out a form. As stated above, you will need to print or email a photo of the GVWR plaque and know the unloaded vehicle weight. Pay your fee and get the plates and texas registration. The registration paper counts as your second proof of residency.

You don't have to have the passport as there are alternatives listed but having that makes it easier.

7) Visit the Driver's License office of the Department of Motor Vehicles (M-F 8:500)
at 1737 N Washington Avenue, Livingston, TX 77351.  It's across a parking lot from the police station. Take your passport, SS card, current driver's license, car/RV registration (1st form of residency and otherwise required to have), and your insurance forms (2nd form of residency and otherwise required to have).  You do not have to take a driver's test - just an easy eye test. I wear glasses for reading and was able to pass it no problem.

8) Have a drink
You are now a Texan - or as Susanne would say, a "Fexan" (a Fake Texan).

Scenes from Texas

We're in Texas now! AND we're Texans! With Texas plates and Texas driver's licenses! (However, a Texan friend tells me - and I believe her, because she seemed very serious about it - that we are  not actually residents until we make our chili without beans and have our photos taken amongst blue bonnets, some sort of flower that Texans apparently really love.) 

Yesterday we established our residency all in one day. It involved a lot of filling out of forms and writing of checks, but it got done and now we're Texans. Or fake Texans. Fexans. That sounds more honest. Trent is going to write a blog post very soon detailing how one obtains Texas residency. You know. Just in case you want to follow in our RV tracks.

As he'll describe, the first step to establishing a Texas residency is obtaining a legit Texas address. You could go whole hog and buy or rent a place, OR you could be cheap like us and get an address through the Escapees RV Club. 

 

That's right: you can get a mailing address that the DMV and tax offices will recognize and honor even though everyone involved knows that you're not a real live Texan. They will even welcome you to the state and do an Oscar-worthy job of acting like they want you here (I don't think that has ever happened to me at the DMV before now).

Escapees also has a campground, and that's where we're currently parked. Despite the heat (shockingly, it's hot), Clark is perfectly comfortable beneath a nice little stand of trees.

 

It's not a swanky RV park, but it's got everything we need and the management is super professional. They've clearly been doing this a while and know what RVers want, like laundry machines and shade.

 

To celebrate our Fexan status, Sam and I drove down to Houston today to visit the children's museum. Can I just say that Houston + heat + lots of children = a really loud museum experience? But that was fine. Sam enjoyed it, clearly:

 

 

 

A coup for us: the museum honored the ASTC reciprocal membership we have through the Kentucky Science Center, so the visit was free! (Parking was not.)

Two weeks in!

Yesterday marked two weeks since we embarked on our RV adventure.

Our route and the highlights so far:

June 1 - 5: Diamond Caverns RV Resort (Park City, KY)

Things we did: Trip to Mammoth Cave, swimming, learning how to cook in the RV

Best parts: Small but clean campground with a nice pool, close to Mammoth Cave National Park, gorgeous hiking/walking/running trails

Worst parts: None? It was a great few days. 

June 5 - 16: Natchez Trace RV Campground (Hohenwald, TN)

Things we did: Visited the grandparents in Nashville, walked through the TINY town of Hohenwald (including the visitor's center located in the old train station), ate at the Loveless Cafe, drove a lot (Hohenwald to Nashville is a 1.5 - 2 hour drive), went to the zoo, spent time with friends, checked out the Warner Park Nature Center, hit up Whole Foods, reading, swimming, running.

Best parts: All of the above! We also appreciated the consistency of the services (water, electricity, sewer) at our campground.

Worst parts: The campground is pretty and the site services are commendable, but it's also really run down. The roads are potholed, the tennis courts look completely dilapidated (not that we would be using them anyway, but other people might want to), the fitness center is closed, and the recreation center needs work. Given the large size of this campground, maintenance must be a major challenge... but it's a little disappointing that even the Recreation Center at the heart of the campground is falling apart. Hopefully, the management will find the funds to keep this place going and get it into better shape.

Next on the agenda: We're heading to Texas! Houston and Austin, here we come!

Some things we have learned

Biggest lessons learned so far:

(1) In certain places in middle Tennessee, Verizon coverage and wireless Internet are basically nonexistent. 

(2) The Instant Pot is like the best thing ever. I will now take it everywhere with me.

(3) It's... kind of weird to wake up in the morning and realize that you don't have a permanent home. Definitely an adjustment.

A few highlights from the past few days:

From June 1 - 5, we stayed at the Thousand Trails Diamond Caverns RV resort near Mammoth Cave National Park in central Kentucky. We played at the pool, visited the cave, and went for some runs on a beautiful path located right next to the campground:

We'd definitely stay at that park again, and we'd definitely recommend it to others. It's small, and it isn't fancy, but the facilities were clean and there was plenty to do. 

We then headed down to Tennessee, where we're parked for the next several days. The campground is massive and extremely hilly... so much so that my run this morning turned into more of a walk-up-the-hills-try-not-to-fall-down-the hills hike. 

While we're here, we'll be visiting my parents and some of our friends, running, doing yoga (well, I'm trying to practice yoga in the main room of the RV), learning to live with the spotty Internet, and practicing our RV vegan cooking skills.

Yup, we went vegan... Because why make just one major life change when you can make TWO AT ONCE?