Weinstein Travels

I realized this week that it’s hard to write this blog when things get difficult. We had an appointment to pick up the trailer on Monday, March 28th.

We spent about 4 hours with Zack, learning all the ins and outs of how things work in the RV. We learned how to de-winterize, sewage stuff, leveling, latching, unlatching and cranking. Can you tell I was paying attention? We learned what hoses go where and what NOT to do (if you do that… the fridge is ruined… if you do that, the hot water won’t work). After we finished learning all these things— after more than 4 hours hanging out with Zack in our new trailer, Jason said…

I’m not sure this will fit in our driveway.

WHAT? Did we just buy this gigantic thing and we don’t have a place to park it? Yup. Exactly what we did. So on the 4 hour drive back to NJ we racked our brains about who the lucky winner would be… and it’s DAVE & ANDY! They are kind enough to let us park in their driveway this hunka hunk of burnin’ love until we have a better plan.

We got to Dave & Andy’s house at about 7pm. Luckily it was still light out for about a half an hour. Jason masterfully backed up into their driveway. A little bit of history here: I grew up with a pop-up camper that my dad struggled to back up. He just could not master it, even after years. Here Jason drives this thing that’s 4x bigger than a pop-up (at least) and drives it with the comfort and ease of an experienced truck driver. I am in awe. Clearly I married the right man for this adventure. It was freezing cold and windy, and while we had learned how to hook up the camper, we weren’t shown how to UNhook it. Jason could figure that out, but when we got to the last step, we could not get the ball to release from the hitch. The wind was howling, it was 20 degrees out, we had a 12 hour day… and it’s stuck. Jason is cranking the handle to bring it up and the car is lifting right along with it! The frustration level is high. I remembered from my childhood pop-up experience that the lever on top of the ball hitch needs to go from flat to 90 degrees up. Ours would only go to 45 degrees. We brought out the WD40 and BAM! It released like magic. My proudest moment of this adventure so far.

We go home and Jason starts doing math and I make phone calls.

I called around to all the self-storage parking RV places within an hour of us. They are all full, some have wait lists. One has a spot, but it’s $179 per month and not close to our house at all. This is when I started… feeling the stress in my stomach. Jason started doing math. His concern was that we would bottom out the back of the camper on the incline at the base of our driveway. He also wasn’t sure we could make the turn at the correct angle because we have a divided median in our street— so it’s not as wide as a regular street is. After 2 days of thinking about it, Jason said the magic words:

I think it just might fit.

I learned a lot this week. We started planning this trip in September. We researched and shopped and plotted and planned (all that should really be in the present tense, as it is ongoing). This is a dream, but it’s a hard one. I have to keep in mind that this is only the first of many frustrations and bumps. We are a team and we will get through the good and the bad. Dreams don’t just happen. Nothing about this adventure is just falling into place— we are making it happen.