Our version of 24, albeit missing Jack Bauer, or a recap of 24 hours of vanlife during a travel day crossing the southern US:
10 PM – Arrive at our overnight parking spot, a Cracker Barrel in Baton Rouge, LA. The restaurant is closed, but a few other RVs are parked in the lot, and online reviews indicate the restaurant welcomes overnight parkers. On travel days, we prefer not to pay for a campsite when we know we’ll only be stationary for less than 12 hours. Our primary overnight parking spots consist of Cracker Barrel restaurants, Cabelas/Bass Pro Sports, or highway rest areas.
10:30 PM – After eating a small slice of pie (we know, you shouldn’t eat immediately before sleep), and checking email, we climb into bed to read on our kindles. Both of us are asleep about 15 minutes later.
4:30 AM – We awake to a loud BANG as we hear a garbage truck emptying nearby trash dumpsters. This is the first time we’ve woken to a pre-dawn garbage pickup during an overnight stay in a private parking lot. Betsy falls back to sleep relatively quickly. Rob does not.
6:30 AM – Rob slips out of bed and sits down at the dinette to scan a few online newspapers.
7:00 AM – Betsy rustles and enjoys stretching out alone in bed. The Winnebago Travato G layout works well for us as we enjoy different sleep patterns.
7:30 AM – After trying multiple times to make an online breakfast order at Cracker Barrel, the order finally goes through. When staying in a private parking lot, we try to be good guests and purchase a meal or other item to express our thanks.
8:15 AM – Rob picks up breakfast items from Cracker Barrel and we eat in the van. The pandemic is raging on, so no indoor restaurant dining for us. During breakfast, Rob looks for possible places to go for an extended walk/hike along today’s travel route. He discovers the Riverwalk on the nearby Mississippi River.
8:45 AM – We pull out of the parking lot and head west on I-12.
9:00 AM – Rob pulls the van into a nearly empty parking lot in downtown Baton Rouge. Betsy raises her eyebrows, thinks the area looks sketchy. We sit in the van and scan the area for a few minutes. Seems okay, so we lock the van and walk two blocks west to the Mississippi River. Betsy is reminded of Cleveland – gray sky, gritty, hard-working waterfront interspersed with development and public art to make the waterfront more accessible and interesting for the community.
10:30 AM – We return to the van after walking a few miles, taking photos of the riverfront, and watching the tugboats stream up and down the rich brown colored waters. It is the Big Muddy.
11:00 AM – As we drive west though Louisiana, we stream WGBH radio (an NPR station in Boston) and listen to our favorite radio program – Boston Public Radio with Jim Braude and Margery Egan. One of today’s guests is Art Caplan, a medical ethicist, who always has interesting insights.
12:45 PM – We drive through Lake Charles, LA on I-10 and are shocked by the amount of hurricane damage we see – multi-story buildings with their windows boarded up, trees down and twisted, debris along the roadway and many, many blue tarps covering roofs. It looks like a war zone. Lake Charles was hit by both Hurricane Laura, a category 4, and Hurricane Delta in September/October 2020. Living in New England, we’ve been spared the wind damage inflicted by 100+ mph winds (but not the rain – Vermonters will not forget Irene in 2011 – hard to believe that was ten years ago).
1:30 PM – We stop at the Welcome to Texas rest area to have lunch and change drivers. On long travel days, we split driving duties evenly. On other days, Rob does most of the driving.
2:15 PM – We get stuck in five-mile traffic backup due to an accident. We slowly pass “Gator Country” outside Beaumont, Texas. Rob gets tired looking at the rear of a semi-truck. We’re listening to an audio book “The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the making of the Oxford English Dictionary”, by Simon Winchester. Rob likes Simon Winchester books, but finds it difficult listening to an audiobook while speeding down the highway. Betsy enjoys listening as she drives.
4:00 PM – Betsy reminiscences about her brief stays in Houston as she drives the van through the City. We’re lucky rush hour traffic is limited due to the pandemic. Rob is amazed by the amount of suburban sprawl we see as we travel west out of Houston. The crazy multi-level highway interchanges are fascinating to view as traffic is not bad.
5:00 PM – We stop to get gas and change drivers in Sealy, Texas. The van has a 24 gallon gasoline tank, so our gasoline fill-ups are not that dissimilar from our former SUVs. We typically get about 15 mpg; we know the kayaks on the roof lower our mileage by about 5%. We decide to eat dinner – leftovers – and discuss how far to travel today. There is one other RV already parked for the night at this truck stop. We consider overnight parking here, but opt to make more miles.
6:00 PM – Back on the road, we watch the sun set on the Texas prairie east of San Antonio.
7:00 PM – Now in darkness, Rob maneuvers the van around and through San Antonio, trusting our Garmin GPS to take us the best way. We have Garmin’s model 770 RV in which we can insert our van’s height and weight. The GPS is supposed to take us on routes with no low bridges (with kayaks, the van is about 12 feet tall) or weight restrictions (the fully loaded van is a little less than five tons). So far, so good.
8:15 PM – The van’s radio is tuned to the Boston Celtics-Dallas Mavericks game, though we’re listening to the Dallas play-by-play announcers. We have Sirius XM radio, which has lots of music, talk, and sports options. We’re both frustrated as the C’s lose again. Betsy is also frustrated by her lace shawl knitting project and sets it aside.
8:30 PM – The van’s radio is now tuned to music to carry us the rest of today’s drive (and hopefully forget about the C’s loss).
8:45 PM – Now west of San Antonio, we can tell we’ve entered the Texas Hill Country – the first significant topography we’ve encountered in a long time.
9:30 PM – We pull into Kerrville, Texas to fuel up and track down the Cracker Barrel for another overnight parking location.
10:00 PM – Parked for the night with about five other RVs, our shades drawn. No pie tonight because we ate the last few pieces last night. We climb into bed hoping that garbage pickup was earlier today.
The days stats: Miles driven: 542.8, MPG: 15.9, Driving Time: 9 hours, 48 minutes, Number of Steps (walking): 8,930, Number of Naps: Betsy 0, Rob 1 (I got tired looking at that semi-truck…)
This was a long travel day, but it sets us up for upcoming adventures at White Sands National Park, Chiricahua National Monument, and then Tucson, so the effort was worth it.
