Roadtrekingmike

One of the places that has a special hold on me is the Everglades area of Florida, a wild, huge place filled with birds and wildlife as diverse as the flooded cypress and sawgrass prairies that make up the largest subtropical wilderness in the United States. Every time I’m in south Florida, I budget time for the glades. I’ve ridden my bicycle along an eight mile paved loop at Shark Valley, cruising yards past snoozing gators with their huge tooth filled mouths open to cool off. There are air boat rides, nature walks where you can actually get wet and wade in the swamp and fishing not to be believed. The winter dry season, which lasts from December to April, is the best time for wildlife viewing in the park. Weather conditions are generally pleasant during the winter and standing water levels are low, causing wildlife to congregate at central water locations. Shark Valley, the Anhinga Trail at Royal Palm, and Eco Pond in the Flamingo area are popular areas for viewing alligators, wading birds, and other wildlife. Boaters have additional access to wildlife viewing opportunities in Florida Bay and along the Gulf Coast. This trip, I devoted an afternoon to the Big Cypress National Preserve, a 729,000 acre part of the Everglades whose crystal clean freshwater plays a vital roe in the health of the entire ecosystem of south Florida. We drove a 24 mile loop road that runs south and east off Highway 41 at about mile marker 59. It’s a dirt and gravel road, well maintained but meant for slow travel. Bounded on both sides by trees, there are frequent drainage ditches and small open spots all along the route. It’s fine for Class B and Class C RVs. Too rough for a Class A. And once you commit, there are limited spots to turn around. Found here are dozens of species of mammals, birds, and reptiles unique to Florida’s climate. It is easy to view and appreciate Florida’s largest reptile, the American alligator, living here in its natural environment. They are in almost every water hole, all along the banks, even sunning themselves on the shoulder of the road. The birds are something else: Anhingas, egrets, wood storks and herons are found in plentiful numbers feeding, displaying courtship feathers, and nesting in and among the cypress trees. There’s a reason the speed limit is 25 miles an hour. Herons often launch from the trees and fly right across and over the road. Because of their bulk, it takes them some considerable wing power to get to altitude and if we had been traveling faster, we would have hit one several times. Occasionally, one can witness river otter, bobcats, black bear, and the endangered Florida panther on the Preserve’s back roads and trails. We didn’t see any panthers, but Route 41 is peppered with warning signs noting that panthers frequently cross the road. Not all the animals are native. In recent years, snakes from around the world have been turning up in and around Everglades National Park. Burmese pythons, one of the largest snake species on earth, are now known to be breeding in the park and spreading throughout south Florida. Over 2,000 pythons have been removed from the park and surrounding areas since 2002-likely representing only a fraction of the total population. The population of Burmese pythons presently established in the park is the result of accidental and/or intentional releases by pet owners. These introductions can have devastating consequences to our ecosystem. Burmese pythons have been found to feed on a wide variety of mammals and birds in the Everglades-even the occasional alligator! By preying on native wildlife, and competing with other native predators, pythons are seriously impacting the natural order of south Florida’s ecological communities. The continued proliferation of Burmese pythons-and the continued introduction of new foreign species-can further threaten many of the endangered plants and animals we’re working diligently to protect. These creatures reach 15-20 feet in length. We didn’t see one. Jennifer considers that good. Me, I would have liked to get my own photo instead of the Florida wildlife one used above. The trip we took on the scenic loop road makes for a delightful afternoon There’s a large visitors center for the Big Cypress National Preserve on US 41 that is well worth seeing. And there are numerous federal campgrounds right off 41 up and down 41 from Naples to Miami. Most have openings every day. yet! Love this place!!

The Gulf Coast is now recovered from the ravages of Katrina and the BP oil spill and is now celebrating Mardi Gras in communities large and small. From Mobile to New Orleans and all in between, the fun starts as early as two weeks before the Fat Tuesday final day before Lent and if you time a visit right down here, you can take in Mardi Gras parades every day and many a night. RV parks are all along the coast in Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana and this time of year, when the weather can still be slightly unpredictable, there are lots of vacancies. We made our way to the town of Gautier, Miss., and Shepard State Park, part of a group of two dozen plus Roadtrekers from all across the country invited down here for fun and food and Mardi Gras festivities at an event called “Pogo’s Smokin’ on the Bayou.” Pogo – real name Paul Konowalchuk Pogorzelski (see why we just call him Pogo?) – really lives on a Bayou that connects to the Gulf of Mexico. He timed the event for the town of Gautier’s big Mardi Gras night parade. Not that we needed an excuse. Pogo and his wife Vicki opened their hearts and home to us – even finding a way to squeeze a dozen Roadtreks in a vacant lot two doors down. Of course it didn’t hurt that his next door neighbor Gordon Gollott, just happens to be the mayor of Gautier (pronounced Go-shea), a town of 18,000. The mayor even invited me to ride on the official town float at the night Mardi Gras parade. The local industry here is shipbuilding (that’s what Pogo does) and the local passtime is hospitality. The weather was typical for this time of year. Temperatures reached the low seventies a couple of times but we had lots of rain one day. And lots of fun all the time. We had so much fun we convinced Pogo to make this an annual event. And next year, we’re thinking about getting our own float for the parade. Towed by a Roadtrek, of course. Click the video above for a look at the night parade. To make plans to join us for next yearbe sure to visit our Facebook Group.

So far this year, Tai has had his hackles raised by a wolf in northeastern Minnesota, been terrorized by a Chihuahua and yesterday in Alabama, he came snout to snout with a horse. But when we arrived at Pogo’s pre Mardi Gras “Smokin’ on the Bayou” Roadtrek gathering in Gautier, MS, he seemed rather indifferent to all the excitement of a dozen plus Roadtrekers coming together. Instead, he opted to just hang out on the rug outside his Roadtrek. Alone, if you don’t mind. His breed is known for its independence, the breeeders we have met over the years have told us. Tai is our Third Norwegian Elkhound and I think they use independent as a euphemism for stubborn. Tai definitely saunters to the beat of his own drum. In fact, that’s just what he did yesterday when a large group of us, along with four dogs had congregated on Laura Robinson’s campsite around the corner from our spot here at Shepard State Park: Tai snubbed them all and sauntered home, choosing to park his double-coated, curly-tailed butt outside our eTrek. He did stop along the way to visit Ellie and Phil and Kathy and Les, where he was the only dog and got some serious pets. Maybe he just needed a rest. Later, after we all caravanned over to a local restaurant and came back to start a bonfire at Laura’s, I tried to take Tai down there. He refused to go, stopping in the middle of the road at the end of his leash. I could have forced him of corse. But why bother. He wanted to go back to his own Roadtrek, where he promptly went inside and to sleep. I’d say he was exhausted from the 1,050 mile trip down here from Michigan. But he slept the entire way, so that can’t be it. And I know he’s healthy. He had his annual checkup at the Vet just this past Monday. We often wonder how much he enjoys our Roadtreking adventures and debate whether it would be best to leave him with relatives. That is, in fact, what we will do after this weekend. We’ll leave him at my son’s home in Georgia as Jen and I head down to Florida for a couple of stories. The temperature down towards Naples where we are headed will be in the 80′s and Tai is still in full winter coat. That, we think, is too warm for him. Dog experts I’ve talked to tell me dogs like routine and familiarity and assure me he’d rather be with us, his own people. Tai seems to have bonded well with the Roadtrek and indeed, perks up his ears when I ask him, “wanna go in the Roadtrek?” So I guess we should count our blessings that Tai is a low maintenance dog. Tai at our Shepard State Park site in Gautier, Miss.

It’s not just the snow and ice that have been setting records in northern states and provinces this winter: So have potholes. Before setting off on a long trip south yesterday, I stopped by my local tire shop to check the air in my Roadtrek eTrek’s tires. While doing so, I noted how busy the place was. The guy behind the counter beckoned me to take a peek in the garage, where a huge pile of rims were taking up a corner of the workspace. “Potholes,” he said. “We’ve never seen so much damage,” he said. What may be good business for tire repair places is bad news for motorists. As we made our way out of southeast Michigan down I-75, I lost track of how many vehicles I saw pulled over on a shoulder, fixing a flat. Michigan, which generally has the worst roads I’ve seen in the entire country, is out doing itself this year. Expansion joints are buckled, there are crater-sized potholes on the sides, shoulders and middle of literally every paved road you travel. As soon as we hit Ohio, the road conditions markedly improved. But then we hit a massive traffic jam. For two-and-a-half hours we sat on I-75 in Toledo. Both sides of interstate were jammed. It wasn’t for an accident. They were fixing the roads. Three lanes funneled down to two on the southbound side. I’m not sure what the construction project was for, but it was a real mess. The roads were better, though, in Ohio and Kentucky, where we ended up spending the night. Way more potholes than I’ve seen in normal years but still better than Michigan. We made about 400 miles. Best news, though, is for the first time since November, the temperatures didn’t get below freezing. I’m hoping to de-winterize wherever we stop tonight. Mississippi ... here we come.

Our latest interview is with …ta da … my wife, Jennifer, as suggested by various readers when I asked for ideas on who they’d next like me to interview. And in this one, Jennifer opens up and tells it like it is when she is asked not what her greatest joys are while traveling, but what bugs her the most. I asked the questions you sent me. Her chief frustrations: Finding good food on the road. A refrigerator that is too small and what to do with dirty laundry. We’re using Google Hangouts On Air to do these interviews. Let me know who you’d like me to interview next and Ill see if they’ll agree. You can be alerted when our next Hangout will be and even join in live by through my Google + page at plus.google.com/+MikeWendlandontheroad Add me to your circles. Meantime, how about you? What are your greatest RV frustrations?

Ever wondered how Campskunk got his name? Or how it is possible for he and his wife and their cat to life full-time in a 20-foot camper van? Then click on the Campskunk interview below. It's the latest in our series of live chats via Google Hangouts. We chat for an extended period about full-timing, life on the road and how to manage grocery shopping, doctor and dentist appointments and bill paying without a permanent address. I also ask Campskunk why he chose a Roadtrek for his home. I’ll be doing these videos from the road myself, and also interviewing some of our regular Roadtreking Reporters as well as other interesting people who can enlighten and entertain us about life on the road. It’s all done through Google + and it’s Hangout service. To be alerted to them and follow them, get a Google + account and add me to your circles. The account I use is ocsmike@gmail.com.

As part of our blogging, we now have the ability to do live videos and interviews with folks of interest to the Roadtreking world. With that, we can answer questions, too. The videos are broadcast as live events on the Net, but also available for later playback on demand from You Tube. The first one I did was this week with my friends Jim and Chris Guld of Geeks on Tour fame. Many of you have met the Gulds as they’ve taught technoogy at various RV gatherings around the country. Today, while the Gulds were attending and teaching at a rally in Kissimmee, FL for about 200 members of the Roadtrek International chapter of the Family Motor Coach Association, they got me online from my Michigan home and we did a Q&A session with the audience. It was pretty funny, really. The first eight and a half minutes or so were spent trying to figure out how to broadcast my audio to the group without feedback loops. They had the image projected up on a screen but the echo and feedback loops that they were getting looked like they’d scuttle it all for a few minutes. After the event was recorded, Chris went in and edited out most of the sound issues. For Jim eventually got it going as as Chris walked the floor, we took some questions and answers from the audience. It ended up going 36 minutes. I’m very excited about Google’s Hangout On Air technology and will be using it regularly on the blog from now on. In fact, an hour after finishing with Chris and Jim, I set up my own Hangout On Air event and got our buddy Campskunk on to talk about fulltiming in a Class B van. Look for that video report tomorrow. And to get notice of these, you might want to get a Google + account. I use the email ocsmike@gmail on Google +. Add me to your circle and then you will know when we’re doing these. You;ll have the ability to ask questions during live events. And everything we do will archive so they can be embedded into blog posts like this. Hope you enjoy this!

Like a lot of RVers, I’ve been reviewing memories and photographs this winter. That’s what we do during the down time: Go back and look at our photos and thus get excited by the places we’ll be going once the weather arms up. If you’re like me, I bet you have a lot of photos of your RV. We take pictures of them in the places they take us. That got me thinking about pulling a bunch of them and putting them together in a slide show. So, here’s about 100 of them, taken all over North America over the past year – a year which had us drive close to 40,000 miles. I tried to make sure each photo shows the eTrek. Some have scenic backgrounds. Other not so much. But the eTrek is the star – front and center of every photo. Putting this montage together got me excited. I cant wait to see what 2014 has in store. Hope you enjoy this, too.

Dennis George couldn’t believe his eyes. It was the morning of Tuesday Jan. 28, and he was staying at a Hampton Inn in Lakeland, FL He looked out his hotel room window and saw an empty parking spot where he had parked the brand new Roadtrek CS Adventurous the night before. “I thought maybe the hotel had towed it for some reason,” he said. “So I ran down to the desk and asked them. The clerk said no. Then one of their workers came in and said there was all sorts of broken glass out on the asphalt.” The glass was where he had parked. His beautiful new motorhome, bought just last October, had been stolen. Thieves had smashed the passenger window, found a spare set of keys he had hidden inside and taken off. Surveillance cameras from the hotel showed the two thieves in action. They smashed the window at 4:56 AM. They drove out at 5:05 AM The Dalkeith, Ontario, Canada native was traveling alone, living his retirement dream. He had been enjoying the weather in Florida after a 5,000 mile shakedown trip that took him through the western United States. He was in Lakeland to get some service done on his Roadtrek and took a hotel room because he couldn’t find a nearby RV park. He called the police as soon as he discovered the theft. An alert was sent throughout the south to law enforcement agencies. Roadtrek user groups and social media pages posted the picture of George’s CS. No one held out much hope. Many thought it would go straight to a chop shop. Fortunately, it didn’t. The thieves drove it around about 200 miles and abandoned it in Lakeland. It was recovered Friday, four days after it was stolen. Police never did find the thieves, though the investigation is continuing. The inside was left a mess of black fingerprint powder put down as part of the police investigation. “They took everything except my underwear, socks and dress clothes,” said the 67-year-old George, a divorced father of a 40-year-old son and a grandfather of two young girls, 15 and 11. “They cleaned it out. They got my computer, my iPad, my golf shirts, the bicycle on the front, pretty much everything. I read your blog and got the same GPS you recommend and even the same mattress topper you and your wife suggested from Bed, Bath and Beyond. They got that, too.” The theft was not the only setback George has had with his new RV. In December, at the Grand Canyon, he pulled into a ranger’s station to get an annual pass. “It’s a good thing I did because when I put my foot to the brake, it went all the way down to the floor. Thank God I found it out there at the ranger station. I was able to use the parking brake to stop. But if I had gone a couple more miles, there was a six percent downhill grade. No way would I have stopped.” George says his right front brake line became unseated from the brake line holder. That allowed the line to contact the exhaust has recirculation (EGR) tube and resulted in a hole in the brake line. Roadtrek has issued a recall for the problem, which involves an estimated 61 vehicles built on the Sprinter platform from February 14, 2013 through December 20, 2013. “That brake deal turned out to be a mess,”said George. “I had to be towed more than 200 miles to Phoenix to get that fixed at a Mercedes dealer.” Road service has handled the cost. George is currently in Sarasota, FL. His CS Adventurous is at a Mercedes dealer there, waiting for the broken passenger window to be replaced. He is using the down time to sort out his insurance claim for the items stolen from his motorhome. Despite the hassles, he is still upbeat about his Roadtrek and his new life on the road. He retired last fall, selling two businesses involved in commercial and industrial natural gas service back in Ontario. He plans to travel North America for four and five months at a time. He still has a fruit farm back in Dalkeith, a small town located about halfway between Ottawa and Montreal and he will return there each summer and early fall. “I know I’ve had a spell of bad luck,” he concedes. “But I’m just being as patient as I can be. I just want to get back out on the road. I’ve been looking forward to this stage of my life for a long time.” Dennis George and his new CS Adventurous – before the theft The police didn’t bother to clean up after themselves, either. Part of the broken glass caused by thieves who smashed in the passenger window

We just came back from our latest trip, a 1,000 mile journey that took us to northeastern Pennsylvania and back. We had spent exactly one day at our Michigan home before leaving for that trip, returning from a 2,000 mile journey up to the north shore of Lake Superior the week before. We leave in about 10 days for Mississippi, the Gulf Coast and Florida. In fact, since the so-called RV season ended in October, we’re averaging two long trips a month. That’s about what we do during the summer. I’m thinking that at least for Jennifer and I, there has is no off season. We are about to turn 40,000 miles on the Roadtrek eTrek we took possession of in December 2012. We’ve averaged over 3,300 miles each month. Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall. The only real changes over warm weather RVing for us is that we have no water in the tanks – it would freeze; We use antifreeze to flush the toilet and, instead of the air conditioner, we are running the heater. Oh yeah, on many mornings we’ve had to brush snow off the windshield and the solar panels up off the roof. I wonder how many are like us, RVing all year round. No matter the weather. Have you been traveling this winter? If so, share below in comments.

Okay. Do not panic. So the groundhog saw his shadow here atop Gobblers Knob in Punxsutawney, Pa. The rodent, if you check the history books, has been right just 39 percent of the time since this little community in the foothills of the Allegheny Mountains . But that didn’t stop tens of thousands of people from all across the U.S. from traveling here, many in RVs, like us. While the campgrounds are closed, the local Walmart welcomed them. For us in our Roadtrek eTrek Class B, wherever we stopped was home and we used it here all weekend. But the night before Groundhog Day, using our media parking pass, we drove it atop Gobbler’s Knob, turned on the heater and caught a few hours of sleep. That is until about 3 AM when the public started making their way here, bussed up from Walmart and other parking areas in town. A band kept playing “Ring of Fire” in front of a huge bonfire as a cold rain turned the entire nob into a muddy mess. No one seemed to mind. Jennifer was able to sleep through the noise. Me, sensing there was a party going on, couldn’t resist getting up and venturing out. Before you get the wrong idea, this party is pretty tame. There is no alcohol allowed. Folks can’t bring in backpacks or chairs. But this has become such a huge spectacle of an event that it just seems to have a bizarre energy of its own. That’s the only way I can describe a gathering outdoors at 3 AM in the middle of a February rainstorm. Very bizarre. But strangely fun. The star, of course, is the groundhog, officially known as “Punxsutawney Phil, Seer of Seers, Sage of Sages, Prognosticator of Prognosticators and Weather Prophet Extraordinary,” according to the Inner Circle, the board of directors of the Groundhog Club, the local group that manages all things related to Feb. 2 and the care and handling of the 20-pound groundhog. Bill Cooper, a former president of the club, said Phil is normally good-natured and glad to see his handlers, though he “has bad hair days from time to time.” The Inner Circle guys, in their dark coats and top hats, are the town’s ambassadors and walked up and down downtown streets all weekend, greeting the tourists. And tourists there were, We were surprised how many people came here because it was on their bucket list. A young married couple from Fort Myers, Fla., came the farthest of those we met. There was a guy from Atlanta wearing a muskrat coat and a top hat who came because Feb. 2 is his birthday and he always wanted to spend it in the place where Feb. 2 is the most important day of the year. A school teacher from New Jersey left her husband home to watch the Super Bowl. She came with some girlfriends because, like apparently so many, coming here for the events of Groundhog Day was always on her bucket list, too. Those events include craft shows, chain saw carving demonstrations and live broadcasts all weekend from the Weather Channel, which endorses the town’s official motto as “the weather capital of the nation.” There were hayrides downtown. Hat decorating contests. And at midnight, in front of the community center, a countdown in which people cheered in Groundhog Day at midnight. At 6:30 AM, there was a pre-sunrise fireworks display on Gobbler’s Nob. In the rain. Oh, yeah. At the community center in town, there were repeated showings of the Bill Murray movie, Groundhog Day. Indeed, that 1993 movie, more than anything else, went to transform Feb. 2 of each year from a quaint event to a mega happening. Before the movie, maybe 3,000 people came here for the annual prognostication. Since the movie, the number of tourists who come here for the big day swell the normal 6,000 population to as many as 30,000. Because of the rain, the 2014 event drew an estimated 25,000 to the nob. I find that very ironic because the movie wasn’t even shot here. It was shot in Illinois, which the producers somehow felt was more photogenic. No problem. Punxsutawney loved the movie, even though it was Woodstock, Illinois, that is shown on the screen. Go figure. Punxsutawney is a town built around a rodent. Souvenirs like Groundhog day hats, mugs, T-shirts, mittens, trinkets and chain saw carvings seem to be the leading industry. The Chamber of Commerce here says $1 million is pumped into the local economy from Groundhog Day alone. The actual prognostication event happens at sunrise every Feb. 2. There’s a little wooden podium built in the shape of a stump on a stage and Phil is brought from his downtown burrow to a box built into the podium. One of the members of the Inner Circle brings him out, “consults” with Phil and determines whether or not he saw his shadow. This whole tradition stared around 1860 as a result of a superstition from the German immigrants who settled this area that says if a hibernating animal casts a shadow on Feb. 2, the holiday of Candlemas, winter will last six more weeks. Well, this year, Phil saw his shadow. It’s been a long winter. Phil says it’s going to get even longer. I think I’ll trudge back to the Roadtrek in the parking lot and make some coffee and breakfast and dry out. Then we’ll head back into town for some more of the festivities. Punxsutawney really is a charming place. Locals tell me that people come year around. Phil, when not on the Nob for Groundhog Day, is in a see-through burrow in a downtown square and can be seen anytime. During the summer, RVers come to two nearby commercial parks and several state parks in the area. But, as we found during our visit, folks are delighted to see visitors and we were welcome to park our RV anywhere.