Do we ever do things a “normal” way?

So, y’all recall the challenges we had with getting the Camper back up to the river, right? (you can relive it here). We decided to go an alternate route and find a truck that would pull the camper no problem, but that didn’t cost an arm and a leg. So Austin got the wild hair idea to start looking at Semi Trucks on Facebook Marketplace.

This man surprises me at almost every turn – and I should be used to it by now, but I’m still in awe of him. With some of his previous work experience, he had a CDL. While growing up driving tractors was also a thing in his wheelhouse, a semi was just “another vehicle” in his mind. In my mind, I’m thrown back into the driving course I had to take after my first speeding ticket, sitting next to a truck driver who said out loud… with his whole face… that he’d just SET THE CRUISE CONTROL TO 55MPH AND GET OUT OF HIS SEAT TO BRUSH HIS TEETH ON THE HIGHWAY.

Meanwhile, A just shrugs his shoulders and gets to shopping….

Our time at the river seemed to go by incredibly quickly this year but it was jam packed full of family, river time, and oh yeah… we bought a little Lowe fishing boat too 🙂 (hooray for Facebook marketplace again!)

Because she’s a Lowe, we’ve named her “Expectations” and will be purchasing the name stickers in time for next year’s drop in. Here’s the lookbook of our summer:

Not only did we get quite a bit of fishing in (I caught 2 Walleye this year!) so that makes me 3-1 against Austin and won me a “Walleye Whisperer” t-shirt, we also did quite a bit of traveling.

Locations checked off this Summer for fun

• Disney Springs/Disneyland (I have a pin problem)
• Clayton, NY
• Chittenango, NY – Mitchell Tenpenny Concert
• Leesburg, VA
• Mexico
• Chicago (YAY an O’Hara Baby is due in November!)
• Niagara Falls/Canada side
• Toronto, Canada
• Orlando
• Miami
• St. John
• Curacao

Locations checked off for Work

• Jamaica
• Los Angeles
• Miami
• Atlantic City
• Dallas
• Grenada

This year my role at work has had some updates, I’m still the National Manager of Dive Sales, but I’m also taking on some of the video and event elements. Which means I was a co-host on our Jamaica Independence Day Live event, the content collector during the Travel Advisor Golf Tournament, and of course attending Dive Week!

But back to that semi thing… Austin found a gentleman in Tampa selling a 2012 Volvo 670 with almost a brand new engine in it. He was in FL for work already so he was able to go take a look at it, and for the price – it was checking all the boxes, including the APU unit which allows it to run on a smaller engine instead of keeping the big engine going if you wanted to overnight in it. Now, there are a few loophole ideas that take a bit of work to get this thing “normal person” ready – meaning, registering it as an RV so it’s no longer a commercial vehicle. A found a way to do so by starting his LLC back up (in Montana), registering the Semi as an RV under the LLC, and then us going back and forth to get the correct elements into it to receive the tags/title, etc. It already had 2 bunks, a fridge & inverter, so it just needed a cooking element, and toilet really.

We added a camper toilet, microwave, and coffeemaker. Now the back & forth with the company helping A do the paperwork was annoying, but we finally got the permanent tags (due to the truck’s age) and the title. So all we had to do was fly to Tampa and drive it back to New York… 23 hours.

We took a weekend to do this together and start the adventure. As we made our way from Tampa through Jacksonville, and up I-95 – we stopped for an upgraded mattress for Austin’s bunk (my top bunk is smaller), we fueled up, and made a few stops. First in Leesburg to show the family the new RV, then in MD to see Brother & sister in law, then we overnighted about 15 minutes from Nana in PA. I will have to say, some of these truck stops are NIIIIIICEEE.

They’ve got 24 hour buildings/bathrooms, showers, hot food, and of course the convenience side of things. If it’s a true trucker stop, it’ll also have some of the little things a trucker might need – equipment wise, etc.

We figured out that this thing is easiest to drive at night when theres almost no traffic and you can just set the cruise control. It is a 10-speed manual, so I’m just the passenger princess here. But it’s short lived as I’ll have to drive the Tacoma down to NC while A pulls the camper.

It did take us 2.5 days to get up from FL to NY with our stops & overnights, and we still had to get a hitch installed (because it was originally a 5th wheel puck). I swear, nobody has more confidence in their wife than a blue collar man with no other help. A and I maneuvered that puck from the ground back onto the semi to take it to his friends at a steel company for scrap.

BUUUUT by the time we did get back to the River, the hitch hadn’t arrived yet and we were heading out on vacation! We’ll plan it better next year because, while we had an amazing vacation, we were RUNNING when we got back to get everything packed up and done to head down to NC. We were on our last days and the water at the marina had been shut off (I didn’t fill the freshwater tanks before I left either).

Our first vacation stop was Miami where A would fly in from work and pick me up for a night before our flight to the Caribbean. BUT he was already in Orlando for work so I packed up early, joined a work training in Syracuse and stayed at Hotel Grandma for a night before hopping a flight there. That meant we got a day at Disney Springs Orlando for me to get my Disney Pin fix (and a seafood boil)!

From there, A’s suitcase had a broken zipper so we headed off to TJ Max to find a new one – then we had to ship his old one full of work clothes & his 70lb toolbox back to the river so we weren’t traveling with it for the next 2 weeks.

Our flight Saturday Oct 3rd was out of Miami, we headed that way in the rental car for a night in an airport hotel. The next morning we were off to St. John to meet Mom & Dad and Chris & Becky for some Island Time! The 4 of them had arrived a few days earlier, and it was Uncle Chris’ first opportunity to scuba dive in the ocean! (I took him to sinkholes in FL last year… he won’t let me forget it). So we loaded up our 2 hard case suitcases, our regs box, and our backpacks for the first flight to St. Thomas (St. John doesn’t have an airport).

Upon arrival in St. Thomas, we found our way to a taxi to the marina, then the marina onto a ferry to St. John, and then St. John marina to the Westin where home base would be for the next few nights. It was a lovely 2 bedroom condo and Becky has been to this island many times so she had all the hotspots noted.

We especially loved the Maho Bay Beach and spent most days there snorkeling and enjoying the Vanilla Chilla beverages at the local bar. Each night had a new restaurant for the tasting and we even tried Triggerfish for the first time! YUM.

Our dive excursion took us to Lowkey Watersports right in town and we almost had a private charter! It was the 4 of us divers, our 2 snorkel companions (Mom & Becky) and ONE other dude that booked last minute.

The water was beautiful, clear and warm and we got a turtle sighting! Had we known we could have been lionfish hunting here, we would have pulled our spears out – but USVI have some permit requirements for hunting that we had been researching online.

We thoroughly enjoyed the first vacation stop and weren’t done yet! We hopped a flight back to Miami for a couple nights before heading off to Curacao. But you know we can’t sit still… We did some boat shopping (still on the hunt for our perfect liveaboard) and then in my all-knowing-Google-Machine-Research…. I found out that the Lionfish ZooKeeper company is actually headquartered just north of Miami! So we took a drive up, unannounced, un-appointment-ed… and knocked on the door.

Tim, the Owner, was in for the afternoon and was so welcoming. We told him we were looking to purchase a ZooKeeper for our upcoming trip, and figured we’d come straight to the source vs. waiting for it online or searching through different dive shops. He brought us in, asked us what color we wanted (told us if he didn’t have it he could make it in about 5 minutes) and then ended up GIVING us a brand new Mini in the military partnership green. I had remembered seeing the Sandals Branded one he made for us at DEMA last year, and he mentioned he’d been trying to nail down some conversations with our ops team. I’m setting that up for DEMA Show in November – we’ll see if we can’t get the ball rolling there. Our divers LOVE the conservation aspect of lionfish hunting, and ZooKeeper sponsors SO many events.

After our warehouse tour and chatting with Tim about all his partnerships, sponsorships, and events – we left with a brand new Mini ZooKeeper, a brand new travel size spear, a couple stickers and registration for their Winter Challenge Lionfish competition…. (Guess that means we’ll be taking another dive trip before New Years!)

After collecting all our Amazon packages from the hotels, and waiting hours for other packages that never arrived…. We were packing back up for our next flight to Curacao for A’s Birthday!

We arrived on Oct 10th which is of course Austin’s actual Birthday AND Curacao’s Independence Day! Indulge we did on the Sushi, birthday cake, and evening fireworks! I think besides the scuba diving and constant breeze, the resort bikes were Austin’s favorite part of this resort. He’s been busting me for not taking him to Sandals Curacao since it opened – I’ve been almost once a year since it’s opening for work and we were finally able to get this time booked for him – we also had friends traveling at the same time so it was a win-win!

We got right to work Scuba Diving & Lionfish Hunting. I had emailed & whatsapped the team ahead of our arrival to let them know we were coming, A was finally coming with me, and we were bringing our own lionfish gear. We had pretty full boats each day, and didn’t hear any complaints about the hunting (some guests don’t like to see it/don’t understand that Lionfish are invasive and are killing the reefs). We made out with 7 fish on the first day (and missed about 5 others) which almost filled our Mini, thank goodness they make a packable extender!! We’ll be ordering that ASAP. Austin prepared/cleaned the fish right there on the floating dock when we returned and we brought it to the beachside restaurant to be prepared for supper. Our friends were arriving that day as well so we were able to share with everyone!

That first day of diving had some pretty rough swells, and we decided it was probably due to the hurricane that has just passed through the Gulf. While Curacao is outside of the hurricane belt, that doesn’t stop the connected Caribbean Sea from getting churned up when weather is on this side of the world. We slept in and had breakfast with the crew Monday morning and then did some pool time.

The remainder of the week was spent diving in the mornings, and finding the group after lunch. We also took one afternoon to grab a taxi into downtown Willemstad and wandered around a bit! I finally got my ChiChi too!

As we walked across the floating bridge, the first spot we found was of course a Brewery! We actually spent most of the day there, The Swinging Old Lady. Beers were tasty, snacks were delicious, and they had a breezy outdoor patio for us to enjoy some Country music!

As Curacao’s time came to an end, we weren’t yet finished with vacation – we still had a wedding in Charlotte, NC to get to! The rest of the group was staying another day, but we arrived a day early to accommodate the Friday wedding date and headed back through Miami, then into Charlotte on a late night flight. We hopped an uber to our hotel and got a good night’s rest before the wedding.

Totally normal to walk into a Lowes at 10pm in formal wear… They didn’t have enough of the bolts that we thought we needed for the hitch, so we collapsed into the hotel bed around midnight.

The following morning had us up early and back on a flight to Syracuse. Grandma kindly picked us up and took us back to her house where the Taco has been parked since October 2nd (THANK YOU!).

BUUUUT We still had some stops to make along the way before we could get back to the river; pick up the amazon deliveries, and install the semi’s hitch… yeah, remember that’s still a project to complete before we leave MONDAY.

We also still had to return that second mattress we bought from Costco for the Semi… the one that was too big for my bunk. So a stop at Costco ON A SATURDAY, ARE WE INSANE. yes. Then stops at 3 different Lowes stores to collect (6) 3/4″ Grade 8 bolts. We finally made it back to the river around 5pm, hauled the Lowe out onto her trailer and after a couple snafu’s… Austin finished the hitch install close to midnight.

Up early Sunday morning (for A… I got to stay in bed an extra hour) and we were cleaning/packing/organizing as best as possible for a lunchtime departure….

We found out that the light connections from the semi to the camper were juuuuust a bit too short, so off on a 45 minute trip I went to the Tractor Supply in Governur, NY that had the right part.

At least it was a pretty drive! Upon returning we continued to pack the camper, the semi, and the Taco along with getting the Kayak over to 4 for the winter… sadly the wheels on the kayak carrier got brittle and broke in half. We sat there looking at it for way too long before we both went “it’s a boat…. we’re on a marina… why don’t we just kayak it over to the boat house?!” and so I did… against the wind… in 4.5 minutes. I definitely started that on my Garmin Watch for workout credit – HA!

C&B were up to take their big boat to Keewaydin State Park for haul out and we hooked Lowe Expectations to C’s truck for winter storage at his house. Then it was just us to hook up and haul out… closer to 6pm that evening, so we only went as far as a truck stop in McGraw, NY which was about 2.5 hours from the river, but South of Syracuse traffic for Monday morning.

Monday morning about 6:30am we were on the move again and this was my view for the next 16 hours.

What’s life without a few challenges right? Everything was fine on Sunday evening’s pull – the hitch of the trailer sits a little too high on the semi but Austin can fix that with some upgrades once he gets to a place that has all his tools. We went VERY slowly down the highway and kept to a max speed of 65mph regardless of the posted signs. The hitch carrying our eBikes sparked on a few bumps but until Monday morning everything was smooth. As we hauled onto the I-81 on-ramp in McGraw… I started to smell and see smoke coming from a driver’s side camper wheel. We immediately pulled over and assessed that the rotor on one of the tires was RED hot…. glowing.

*not our actual wheel*

Our fix was…. disconnect the lights. It was daytime so we were very visible but as we crept into the afternoon, we decided our next best option was to figure out which wire controls the electric brakes and “modify” the connector so we have running lights, turn signals, etc. still.

I’ll tell you what…. I have learned SO many things in my 8 years with this man. He found the connector’s diagram, and we modified that thing perfectly. All lit up for the remaining hours to Flat Rock, NC and we were almost HOME!

The RV Park called me as we were still about 5 hours away – I let them know we probably wouldn’t make it there that night, and that we’d see them in the morning. We’re booked into our spot Mid-October 2026 through Mid-May 2027 so our spot is OUR SPOT for the winter. We rolled into the QT parking lot down the road from the RV Park around 10:30 that night and backed everything into a truck spot to go to sleep. The next morning we were up at 7:30a, in the RV Park by 8 and setting up.

About 9 people stopped to talk to us in that first 30 minutes that we were there. We were rushing through the basic setups as I had a hair appointment that’s been booked since April, but we got electric, water, and sewer lines ready to go and the heat on. Gremlin is certainly happy to be home again (he’s not really a car-ride cat).

We then hopped back into the Taco and headed up to Papaw’s house for a little time with him and our pitiful pup Charlie. Austin also decided it was the perfect time to teach me how to shoot a crossbow… he was pleasantly surprised with my aiming skills as I went 4 for 4 shots on target! The final one I actually accidentally managed to put through the first bolt… so we’ll have to replace that one for Papaw. Whoops!

This also means we’re going on my first deer hunting trip this weekend, so OBVIOUSLY I needed super warm camo coveralls. I’m way more excited than I should be about cold-weather clothing. I do be loving my sweats, blankets, electric hand warmers, etc. though.

Austin was off on a 6am flight to Indiana for work Wednesday, and I’m back in office catching up until the first week of November when I head to New Orleans for the big DEMA dive show.

It’s been a rush of a month and we had an amazing vacation, but I think we’ve decided that we need to be SEMI-sane and give ourselves that lead-up time to pack up and be ready to transport. We’re learning each trip what we need/don’t need and how to make the transitions smoother.

Here’s to Blue Mountain Fall/Winter, hikes, hunts, and hot chocolates.