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Severe Weather RV Safety Tips {we seek shelter from a tornado in Florida}

Jan 202016



Severe-Weather-RV-tips

Severe weather RV safety tips

Weather (and severe weather) is a part of life. When we lived in a regular ole house I paid little attention to the weather – being near Seattle, Washington it was almost always rain of some kind in the fall/winter and moderate temps in the spring/summer. It was nearly always manageable and all we really needed was a lot of layers and a decent rain jacket and umbrella.

Being on the road weather is a different story. Knowing the local weather is part of our daily routine – because severe weather could have severe impacts when you live in a house on wheels. We planned our route around the country primarily because of weather – the northern areas in the summer, the east coast in the fall and Florida/South in the winter. So far, this plan has worked in our favor and we’ve experience very little inclement weather.

Gettysburg-in-the-rain

We did change our plans last October to avoid Hurricane Joaquin which was slated to hit the east coast. Instead of being in New Jersey like we had originally planned, we headed inland to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to avoid the storm. We ended up with only a rainy weekend – and enjoyed an awesome tour of Gettysburg. And South Dakota last summer was frustrating because the tornado and hail alerts seemed like a daily occurrence – but we avoided them by racing across the state and setting up camp in Minnesota.

Lately central Florida (thanks to El Nino) has been throwing us some strange and unpredictable weather – like tornados. For example, last week while we were in the Fort Myers area we knew severe thunderstorms were expected to hit Saturday night. We would have probably rerouted to be farther north for the storm, but we had a repair appointment in the area all day Saturday. We couldn’t reschedule the repair appointment – we needed our water pump replaced – and RV repair appointments are tough to find in Florida in January.

We left our repair appointment in Fort Myers around 3 p.m. and started heading north to our reserved campsite, which turned out to be a disaster. It’s a long story – but the private campground where we planned to stay at was crowded, flooded, muddy and was too small for our trailer. It wouldn’t have worked – not even a little. So we scrambled to find another spot and thankfully ended up finding an opening at Sun-n-Fun RV resort up near Sarasota. More expensive than we usually pay for a spot, it was a gravel spot (no mud or flooding potential) and I knew it was a well populated park with lots of services and buildings. We ended up setting up camp in the dark (something we never do) and spent the night playing in the heated pool and relaxing in the family hot tub knowing the rain/storm would start around 2 a.m.

Tornado-Watch-Sarasota-Florida

I went to bed earlier than usual because I was expecting the storm. At around 1 a.m. I was woken up by a Tornado Watch alert on my phone. A tornado watch means there is a strong probability of a tornado but one hasn’t formed yet – I stayed up and monitored the storm after that. Around 2:40 a.m. the wind had picked up and I pulled the kids into bed with me.

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{ 13 Comments }

by Heather Filed Under: Travel Tips

Harvest Hosts – FREE camping and it supports local businesses

Oct 212015



Harvest-Hosts-free-camping

I’m a bit behind in blogging about our adventures– this is from our travels around September 5-6, 2015. Follow us on Instagram to find out where we are currently!

After spending a lot of time in Michigan our next “destination” would be Western New York to see Niagara Falls and to spend some time with my cousin near Rochester. Instead of taking our time, like we did in Michigan, we wanted to move a little quicker through the next couple states. There was a slight sense of urgency because we wanted to spend some time in New York – and then jump over to the east coast before the colder fall weather.

We try not to drive more than a few hours a day (we are all happier when we follow this rule), so we figured we’d need to stop one night in Ohio and one in Pennsylvania on our way to Niagara Falls. As we looked at our campground options, along our route, we weren’t seeing much – and the ones that looked convenient were completely booked due to Labor Day weekend!

We decided this would be a great time to use our Harvest Host membership! For $44/year, a Harvest Host membership allows you to stay for FREE at local wineries, farms and other small businesses. And in exchange for a spot to park for the night, you support the local business – perhaps by purchasing wine, vegetables/fruit, souvenirs. Or you can volunteer, perhaps helping with a harvest or another need at the business!

We LOVE this concept – because we love supporting local businesses and we think it’s great fun to spend our money on food or drink instead of “rent” at a campground.

Winery-Harvest-Hosts-Ohio

Our first night we stopped at a winery in Ohio. I won’t mention the name because it’s part of having the membership – but it was delightful. We had a nice big pull-through spot at the winery with a grassy area and picnic table. Jeremy and I took turns going into the winery and doing a $3 tasting – what a treat! And we purchased a bottle of wine. The winery closed around 5 p.m. and we had the whole place to our selves (except one other RV with Harvest Hosts). . .we had a crazy rain storm and then the most magnificent sunset!

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{ 6 Comments }

by Heather Filed Under: Budget, Destinations, Travel Tips

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