North Padre Island in Pictures

So this is my addition to the pictures galore of the North Padre Island, beautiful and peaceful location at least in December. I loved every day of it, even the one day the cold front blew in and scared us off from the waterfront. With no further words, here is my favorite boondocking so far ;) North Padre Island National Seashore.

Snook, Solitude, and Solar

So this last week I took the Beast down to Snook, Texas to do the Solar work at my Uncle's farm. Since he was away on vacation, it was pretty much The Beast, some donkeys, a dog named Fritz, and myself.

First things first, I needed water. I didn't feel like driving the 200 miles with the extra 800 lbs of aqua in my tank.

Filling the 100 gallon tank up water

The front yard.

Since this was taking forever, I took some pictures of where I would be doing my working and sleeping the next few days.

Pretty sure I'm the first one to ever sleep in the workshop

Nestled in among the tractors and tools

Had to unfurl this mighty satellite one more time before removing it to make room.  As well as the HD antenna behind it and the fan vent to the back right.

Over the next few days, my cousin Jason and I got to work on the solar install. We managed to get most of the panels installed before the weekend hit and he had to run off to some fairs and such showing some old tractors. But we did finish the seven hardest to place ones, leaving just a few for me to finish.

First 4 panels on front glued and screwed on

Framework for 2 of the panels in the back right

I took to the road back to Plano Texas early Saturday morning and subjected the build to a 80 mph wind test on I-45. Happy to report that none of the panels blew off! I stopped and checked at a couple rest areas along the way to make sure nothing was amiss as well.

This Sunday I completed the Solar install, building a platform for one panel in which the cords all connect and go down into the electronics cabinet below. I also hooked up five of the panels to test out the supply to the batteries. They were putting in about 5 amps at 95+ volts.  Once I connect the second set, it should be up to about 10 amps. I may have to juggle this around a bit to optimize my amps to the batteries.
The OCD among you might want to just ignore the panel in the lower left...there was just no other way.

Late today some MC4 connectors I had ordered arrived which allowed me to create the cables I needed to connect the 2nd set of five panels. Unfortunately the sun had gone down so I had no way of testing if they were working as I planned or not. I have to wait until tomorrow. Once the test is complete I'll do the wire management and secure some of the hanging wires.

In other news, the interior of the RV got a bit of an upgrade. The uncomfortable leather got replaced, though we did save the old covers. Here's the transformation:

Finland

Couple months ago we started to go through our belongings and packing some of it away to be saved and leaving the rest unpacked for an estate sale. We divided our clothes in two walk-in closets between keepers and get rid of's. The progress has been slow, but we started it!

Couple weeks into our organization came a day that I rushed to the airport and flew home to Finland to see my family and to attend my sister's wedding. Unfortunately I made my trip alone, Lee stayed behind to take care of the house and 3 hounds. I spent two and half wonderful weeks in Finland, eating mom's cooking and enjoying the cooler weather and peace and quiet. Well, some might think the weather was not cool, it was probably at low 90's, but coming from Texas, oh yeah, that's nice and cool! 

It was so wonderful to see the family and the friends after a long time. The sad thing is that there is always less people to meet than there was the time before and being on the other side of the globe doesn't always make it easy to accept. However, that is the life for people who live thousands miles away from their family. Another thing that made it a little bitter was that Lee and our pups were back home in Texas. Well, that resulted in lots of Skype action between Scandinavia and The Republic of Texas.

My timing in Finland was perfect, the weather was nice; blueberries, raspberries and strawberries were in season, even the mushrooms were forcing me into a daily game of hide and seek. Oh, and did I mention, it is so green in Finland, GREEN!!! Hardly anyone has sprinklers for their lawns and it is not even needed, the rain will come sooner or later and make everything lush and clean and first of all, green. The laundry gets dried on the lines outside and it smells like forest. The birds are chirping through the night, since in the end of July the dark doesn't come until after midnight. And how I missed the quiet and peace by the lake, the only ones making any noise were the numerous birds, like swans and loons.

My sister's wedding was fun and relaxed and everybody had fun and soon after the life returned back to somehow normal. I was so excited that my brother who is serving in UN Peace Corp was able to come for a short vacation and I got to see him. The time always flies by really fast, though all my siblings had arranged time off to spend with me, which was wonderful. 

Like always, the time comes to an end way too soon. And my trip back home started. I had a hectic layover in Chicago, where I walked forever, waited forever for customs, security and finding and dragging my 2 huge bags without the cart for re-checking. After that was all done, the run to the right terminal and gate started, I just got to my plane before they closed the gate and sat down and started the last stretch to home. I knew the layover would be really crazy, so I was ready to run out the plane as soon as I was able to and in a process forgot that I had split one of my carry on bags since it didn't fit in overhead cabby in one piece. Well, the yummy Finnish chocolates and some other candy, some souvenirs and a pair of earrings are greatly missed. It wasn't a huge financial loss, but I was so mad at myself for forgetting such a thing.

It was nice to be back home in Texas. There is a Finnish proverb that says something like: Being home is strawberry, being elsewhere blueberry, it doesn't really translate well, but you might get the idea. And if you ever have a chance to taste Finnish strawberries, their sweetness and juiciness, you will understand what it means. Though the wild blueberries are pretty darn awesome too. The difficult part is that for me, there will always be 2 homes.

Struck of Luck and Some Tears Too

Today was a day that we had an engineer that is specialized on foundations come here and check on the house. We were expecting a really expensive fix, since about a year and a half ago we got an estimate for the foundation repair and that estimate was a hefty 5 digit number. As it happens, that estimate was for work that we did not need. We got a report stating that the foundation is not in a need of a repair at all. However we do have some cracked mortar that needs to be fixed but our bill will be about $10 K less than we thought. I wish you could hear the screaming and hollering from here, we are so happy! This means we can either spend longer on the road, or we have a bit more money that we can put to work. Ok, in reality it just means that we don't have to come up with non-existing $10 K.

So right now it looks like we need to kick in the purge gear and get rid of the stuff. Some will be saved for later use, once we are done with our RV'ing. I am being realistic thinking that the day will come that I will have a need to settle down somewhere where I can plant a garden and herd some critters. But I might be fine for several years to come, you never know. I think tomorrow I will start going trough my clothes (once again), pack away what I want to save but not take for the road. Rest will go to some local animal shelter. Looks like the packrat in a bathroom is gonna have to get rid of a bucketful of make up and other stuff that doesn't seem to get used. It is in need of some serious overhaul as well.

My weak spot will be kitchen. I used to work in a factory outlet for a glass factory while studying glass blowing. The company sold silver ware, pots and pans, table ware and glass and most these were high end and collectible and of course I bought bunch of it for a good employee discount. The problem came to be when we got married and we combined our kitchens, so we have lots of my modern stuff and lots of Lee's retro, hand me downs that came down from his parents and has been around the world with him and of course holds a bunch of personal value. None of that stuff is really great in the RV, but I think we are going to have to avoid buying more stuff, so we are either gonna take a risk of getting something broken on the road. I think I would like the retro stuff in the RV. Even a thought of  an old pyrex and stone ware makes me smile. The problem with that stuff is that it is quite heavy, which is a concern when the weight is a matter of an interest.

Today is not full of only happiness and good news, it is also a little bitter sweet. Our beloved cat Zubov will be spending his last night here before getting re-homed. We dearly love our big goofy cat but the relationship between the cat and the dogs has not been all rosy and we can not expect good outcomes if we all cram into the RV. We found him a home with couple other cats where he will not be tormented and where he can live a regular life in a center of attention, without having to worry about being out of the reach when the dogs come around. I am so heart broken about how lonely our cat has become in a house that is full of life. So sad that he feels like he can not take part on anything. It has gotten to a point where we allowed him to hang out on our dining table, just so that he can be closer to us a little more often.

I will be spending tonight with Zubov in a guest room behind the closed doors, so he can have all the attention he ever wants for the last time. Tomorrow he will meet his new buddies and we will sadly say good buy. I am happy for him for finally getting enough attention and a place where he doesn't need to run, but sad for having to make this hard decision of giving up on what I would consider a family member. It will be happier life for him and a little easier for us too, though I wish we never needed to make this decision. It will be weird not having a cat around. I will miss the headbutts and the talks with him, I so love talkative cats. Good luck Zubie, we will dearly miss you!

                                   

New Faucets

Well, this was a post I was supposed to write a couple weeks ago and it was supposed to have complete story about how to change the faucets and pictures pronto and all those shenanigans. Guess what, it isn't.

We have tried for couple of weeks to change the fancy golden faucets from the 80's TV series Dynasty, I can not stand the gold, black and white interior we have, it is so outdated looking that nobody believes the RV is really from 2002. All that is cosmetic after all and we are not in huge rush to change everything but I believe once we hit the road I will be spending most of my days trying to get the RV to look like fairly modern couple lives there.

Still thinking we have it done in next 5 mins. Not so much.

We bought the new faucets, and were kind of limited to one hole models or to those that allow you to choose 3 or 1 hole option. The pickings were slim but we made a purchase. We are not raving about the faucets, they are not exactly what I really would wanted but considering that what I really wanted is not going to ever work where we need it to go, nor would I have money to pay for such a piece of art. So all in all we are quite happy with our non-golden choices. We are replacing both kitchen and bathroom fixtures and were first bummed that we couldn't find them with the same kind of finishings but since we aren't most likely staring at them at the same time, it will most likely be forgotten issue as soon as we figure out how to connect the new ones.

Whaaaat????

It took a bit of time and a degree in magic to get the old kitchen tap out. The space is really tight and the visibility is very poor. After shoving your hands through the hole in a wall, the visibility was non existing. But after all, that was the easy part. We thought we are just going to re-attach the new one and move on to the bathroom to do the same. We ran into the problems as soon as we got the new faucet to where it was supposed to be, re-attaching the water was not as easy as we thought, the piping for cold water was for some reason too short, so we needed to find an attachment that will make it a bit longer and as we became to notice, also deliver the water to the faucet and not leak under the sink. Finding the right piece has been a case of trial and so far only error. Lee has already gotten tired of driving back and fort to the Home Depot and made the decision to drive the rig over there so he can fix it close to where he can just go to exchange the parts that more than likely weren't right. The size of a piping is not standard, so getting those the faucet and pipe to connect might take some adjusting. It doesn't help that Lee works 14 hour days, not much is left of a day to work on other projects once he is done and on his days off, hockey rules our lives. Ok, hockey rules his life.

This should be the after picture, but it is just
the meanwhile  picture.

So hopefully I will have something to report soon about our fantastic new fixtures, other than we are still working on them. We are glad we didn't decide to do this while on the road. We aren't used to doing the handy stuff ourselves but this is going to change right now. We are going to have to do it ourselves once we hit the road, so we have to start rather sooner than later.


                               

Bugging Out And Bootlegging

It has been one busy and long Christmas for us. We celebrated 4 days in a row and now we are exhausted. Though I had a chance to go to work to get a little bit of "rest". We took the Revcon for the first trip hoping that all the issues with the fridge and what ever else would have been resolved. We were pleased to notice that indeed they were. As expected the dogs were all fine, excluding Pixie, who always freaks out if we go somewhere. Just a matter of getting used to that sort of thing, or so we hope. The drive itself down to South of Texas to meet the family was uneventful, though once we had a deer run in front of a rig. That was not entirely unexpected, there are lots of deer around, but what surprised us was that it was in the middle of the day.

We arrived to our destination and camped out at Lee's cousins house, where they have repeatedly provided us with their RV hook up and this time we almost blew up their Christmas lights. They have a nice level driveway that we were allowed to use. This might not sound like anything special, but I can tell you that it felt luxurious compared to our driveway which is not level nor is it long enough for our rig. We have done some creative parking blocking the use of our garage, but let's get back to the story.  We spent the first night thinking that only the greyhounds would be able to climb up to the bed above the cabin and we were right. We did not expect though that the old girl Nelli would decide that she wants her place between our pillows, but as soon as we decided to hit the hay, there she was staring up at us and making noise and we knew that there would be no end to that if we didn't give in (14 years of training us has paid out). Plus she is surprisingly easy to ignore, since she doesn't really take a space that we would use anyways. We slept our night tightly and warm despite of the close to freezing temperatures. We also came to a realization that we need to add a rail and a step to our bed to keep the dogs from hopping down to the floor from that high. All of them did jump down at some point without requiring any broken bones, but it will be just a matter of time if they keep doing it.

The next day the weather warmed up nicely and we went for a Christmas dinner with Lee's mothers side of the family. I only wish I had taken pictures there, the house and the few acres of a lot is simply amazingly beautiful, it is surrounded by the fence and cattle guard, and they usually have cattle too, but due to last two years of drought the cattle has been sold and the donkeys are claiming it as their territory. The old crooked oaks shade the lot nicely and every time we visit I dream of finding as lovely place for us. I would never even consider moving again! Oh yes, the dinner... The dinner was like usually nothing short of delicious and it fed tens of people. The dishes were beyond the drooliest dreams and we stuffed ourselves silly and drove back to our dream spot on our cousin's driveway.

How lucky do you have to be to have views like this every day
 from your porch?

Before going to bed, the cousin's husband, Lee's sister and her husband plus we two hang outside talking and the discussion for some reason geared towards zombie apocalypse, prepping and they decided that the Revcon should be the bug out vehicle when the crap hits the fan. The plans to mount some heavy artillery and  to use dry erase board as lining inside was brought up and of course nobody would take us seriously without run flat tires. This conversation pointed out the direction for days to come too and this Christmas will go into the history as Zombie Christmas. Alas, the time goes fast and soon it was the time to crawl back into our cave to sleep. The night was hot, and the dogs were restless, making our sleep a bit sporadic.

The next day we drove to the city to Lee's grandmother's house to meet the father's side of the family. We were greeted as soon as we walked in with a cold beer, of course Shiner, since we are in Texas. The cousins and aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews, boyfriends and girlfriends and what not all filled up tummies with another amazing setting of holiday foods and all kinds of appetizers and deserts. If anyone left hungry, it was their own fault, food was delicious and there was plenty of it. We also took a yearly family picture, this year being special, since we are pretty sure everyone made it, not one person was missing of the fun. The next part of the day was the high light of the year. The big bootlegging: liquor exchange, there is no better fun that it is. We do the Chinese Christmas where we either open a concealed present or steal someone else's present. And each present is available for stealing three times. And the liquor is high quality and there is plenty of it, the stealing goes on for quite a while. The plotting and planning is so fun. I left with a keg of my favorite beer Newcastle and Lee got two bottles of Texas wine with a stack of scratch offs.

Soon we had to head out to Dallas. The dogs slept most of the way home, they were too tired of all the excitement and about worrying when ever we left them into the RV alone. Next time they will know better what to expect.

Louie, pretty perfect travel dog

The next day would be Christmas Eve, the day Finnish people celebrate their Christmas. We have now for few years had the tradition that I make the Finnish Christmas meal and Lee's sisters family and mother will come over and we will eat all together. So we did this year too, except that it is becoming more of a tradition and we actually sat down almost till midnight talking and having fun. At least I really enjoyed it. The three kids are all old enough to be able to take a part in our conversations and we really enjoy their sense of humor. They are all really great kids, so much fun to be around them. The clean up was really easy too, we had dogs to do the dishes ;o)

The weather turned back to really cold again in the wee hours of Christmas Day and it started hailing and raining and the aluminum roof was very loud keeping us awake. We also realized that getting the greyhounds to potty outside became a serious chore. So the next morning we headed to Lee's mother's house for the actual Christmas celebration. We were hours late, since the weather kept us awake the night before and getting the dogs settled took longer. I am sure that the kids were just about to go bonkers waiting for us to come over so that they can open the presents. First we ate breakfast, which is traditionally corn beef gravy with some toast. I remember thinking it was strange food when I first ate it, now I am expecting it as a breakfast every Christmas.

We told everyone not to buy us any presents this year, but that of course didn't happen. But we really can't complain, we received some really amazing present, like a table top grill for the RV from my sister in laws family, some LED lanterns and lights and the cutest flip flops ever, just to mention some. All in all, Christmas was lots of fun and for a very long time. It remains as my favorite holiday and next time it might be very different if we get our plan in action. We shall see! For now I am happy this Christmas is over. I enjoyed it a lot, but considering all our dinners around Christmas they just all happened one after another and it can be kind of tiring. Still I wouldn't miss any of those days!

                                

RV Cooking So Easy Even Caveman Could Do It

Lee and I started this series of experiments on food and how to make things RV friendly. The biggest challenges are that we do not have counter space, at all! The table will have to work, no matter how small, as prepping area for our cooking. We also need to simplify our recipes. I like to every now and then try new things and sometimes the recipes are complicated. Well, complicated is not gonna cut it in the RV. I don't mind cooking complicated stuff, what gets me is the chopping and prepping. If I can't have a sous chef, I will have stuff that has been sous cheffed for me ahead of time. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a perfect solution: easy cooking and easy storing (does not mean it doesn't take any room, just no special requirements) and prepping all done for you. The solutions is freeze dried ingredients!!!

As I am typing this I just have my RV soup simmering and it was so easy to make. I was going to make just a traditional soup with veggies and meat in it, until I realized that we were out of potatoes, or had just couple that looked kinda suspicious. And the meat was still frozen. Since I needed to cook for my poor hard working hubby, I decided that I will go with what my conscious has always rebelled against, easy route. So I took all our freeze dried veggies, a can of diced tomatoes, freeze dried meat and tossed a bit of this and a bit of that into the pot with some water, those tomatoes, and some salt, pepper, paprika, all spice, chili sauce and oregano and let it simmer for an hour. Now we have healthy, delicious and most of all super easy soup. Nothing to clean except the bowls we eat from, the pot and spoons. I love this!

When you are snuggled up by a rock or a tree out in the boonies, with as small of a fridge as we do, and you don't have an option to go grocery shopping daily, this is the way to go. The simplicity makes it so effortless too, that even someone who has started to lean towards the take out pizza versus home cooking just for its easiness can not complain at all. All it took was couple of minutes to throw things into the pot and add some spices. Once it started to boil, I just put the lid on it and let it simmer for another hour and by the time all has stopped floating on the surface, was well re-hydrated and cooked. I just sprinkled a bit of cheese on my soup  bowl and gobbled it all up. How much easier can it get? And all the ingredients are high quality, dry stored and we don't even have to go to the grocery store to buy them, they can all be ordered online. Hah, I can see how people get extreme on all kinds of things, I am ready to see how far I can go. 

To our surprise this soup was yummy!

No refrigerator needed

No tears

No peeling and chopping

                                

Beast, Monster, Cave, Bat Mobile, Zeus, Mad Max???

So we are still on a quest to name our rig, though it looks like the original name is sticking to it pretty tightly. So far she has been called Beast by almost anyone who sees her. I tend to like Monster better, and we got some amazingly good suggestions on Facebook and private emails from people, but so far nothing has gotten stuck enough to replace the Beast. Our friends borrowed it for a tiny road trip and returned it the next day, they were all chuckled about the fact that anywhere they made even a short pit stop, they were surrounded by people asking about it, taking pictures and just generally being really curious about it. I have to say that it is much bigger in person than what it looks in pictures, and when it rolls down towards you, it makes you take couple looks as if your eyes were lying. The first words out of your mouth would likely be: " What the heck?". It truly is a Beast rolling down. But before we close the files on the name search we will be still accepting suggestions. It is not time yet to let this case go cold.

Talking about the cold... We have been battling with her refrigerator for few weeks now. After  fixing the power drainage, it refused to stay on with propane. We take it to the shop to get it fixed, and it comes back with the same problem. We might have to buy a new fridge  but if the problem is not the fridge itself, then that would not do any good either. It is getting rather frustrating. We struggled with this earlier with our Chinook too, but finally that one got resolved. What ever it is, it needs immediate attention. Fridge that doesn't stay on is not a fridge, it is a closet with poor air circulation.

My plans for the interior are very simple: total overhaul. I can't stand the black and white, it is very 80's looking, especially for a rig that was built 2002. Some of the black is going to have to be replaced along with the black and white carpet. I want hardwood floors for easy cleaning and also the golden faucet will need replacing. Lots of the black is in big items like leather couches and counter top. Most items could possibly be changed but would be ridiculously expensive, like the solid black marble counter top. Given that it is probably cast marble, it is still expensive, and I think we just have to make the rest of the changes to work with it. I am trying to make it look a bit less masculine from the inside, since right now it is so "dude". I think that crochet granny square stuff will be boho enough, and make even my husband to feel warm and fuzzy... though I am sure that nothing warm and fuzzy made him to get the Beast in a first place. The leather will be easy to replace in some places and in some not so much but I think it can be also partially a project for the road, something we can get done while already in motion. The flooring needs to be changed first and rest will follow.

We have considered even some constructional changes with our rig, nothing major that could not be changed later, but since we do have the fold down table on the back and our kitchen is pretty much non existing we were thinking of just converting the dinette into one big counter space with storage underneath. would be fairly simple to do, and could be easily removed later on. Not sure yet if we want to do that really, time will show I guess, if we can figure out a way to get one done and stored inside the rig without it being on the way, we could just do it and then use it on as needed basis. I just don't think we could really use the underneath for any storing in that case.