-After returning home on Sunday from our test trip, we made a whole new horrendous list and worked like mad all week to get it done. We planned to leave on Friday. But that didn't happen. We planned to leave on Saturday, but that didn't happen, which was a good thing because I got a last minute listing appointment Saturday morning. We were finally ready to go by about 9pm Saturday night, so we decided to leave first thing Sunday morning. Well, we woke up to a small electrical issue on Sunday morning that had fried a few circuits. The kids had accidentally plugged into a 120 outlet rather than the 50 amp the night before. Oops!! So that took a few hours to fix.
-We finally pulled out of the driveway around noon on Sunday, March 21. By that point it had almost become comical between our family and friends as to when we were actually leaving on this trip- if ever!! But we did it. We finally had everything done enough to go. So we pulled out around noon. We made it about 2 miles before we realized we needed to stop to fix some things. So we pulled into Menards to grab a couple things. 2 hours later we finally FINALLY left town. Sheesh, this trip was a beast to get ready for!
We didn't get too far before Jared just wasn't comfortable with the straps we were using on the tow dolly. Safety first. At that point we had made it about an hour to Indy. But at least we were on the road!! So we spent the night in a Flying J parking lot south of Indianapolis, just a few minutes away from Camping World where Jared was sure he could find what he needed the next morning.
There are a few places you can stay for free overnight in an RV- Sam's Club parking lots, Cracker Barrel parking lots, Walmart parking lots, and Flying J's. Flying J's will even let you dump your sewage tanks. And of course fill your gas tanks :) First night out, let's throw caution to the wind (as if we weren’t doing that already by setting out on a 2 week trip with our whole family, without a final destination in an untested school bus converted into an RV- haha!!!) and let's just stop at a Flying J. Lesson learned. It wasn't until we were literally pulling into the Flying J parking lot that we thought about the semis joining us there too. Big semi rigs pulling in and out of the parking lot right next to us, most of them leaving their engine running all night long, coming and going at all hours of the night made for a pretty rough night. There was supposed to be specific RV parking spots on an opposite side of the parking lot, but the semis just took over that area too. So, lesson learned- Flying J to dump and fill the tanks, but not to spend the night. Jared was exhausted from days of no sleep and long hours preparing to get the bus ready to leave, so he and the kids went to bed and I stayed up into the wee morning hours trying to figure out where the hay we were going on this big trip. Weather and covid had changed our destination 4 times already. So when we left that day the only place we knew for sure we were going was south for warmer weather.