Author Archives: jo

Day 4 – We’re off to Indiana

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After having camped at Yankee Springs campground for 3 nights we finally decided it was time to leave. I could probably have stayed another week, but we need to get to Texas by early June. 

After a short bush walk, we continued on our way. The garmin headed us on the freeway and we really didn’t like that, so we conveniently turned off and found a Walmart. It seems we never have all the stuff we need. Mike needed some rubber gloves for emptying our waste tank and we needed gas for our cooker. Thankfully this walmart had both of those things.

We changed our Garmin and Google settings to avoid freeways, highways and tolls and that took us on the back roads, which was much nicer.

The scenery was pretty flat today. We crossed from Michigan State into Indianna today. Our campground is next to Mississinewa Lake, but we’re not camping right beside it. 

We were both exhaused that we passed out as soon as we arrived. After dinner, Mike decided to make a plunger coffee and it perked me right up. Only problem was, I couldn’t sleep and read my book until well after midnight!

Tomorrow we are heading towards Red River Gorge.

Day 2 and 3

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We’ve named our van Rodger. We crawled out of bed this morning, feeling refreshed after a good nights sleep.

The lake was calm this morning and I could see some things swimming backwards and forwards across it, but couldn’t tell what they were. Just a little head poking above the water. I thought I’d seen a beaver the previous day, but these were too small for that.

We managed to get Rodger’s water working today, after another jetlag distaster yesterday. There was another switch we didn’t know about. Even though Rodger is a 1992 model, he is very advanced for his age and this is what caught us out. Our van can use water directly from a hose rather than the tank. To do this, you turn the switch one way. If using from the tank, the switch goes the other way. So that was our problem yesterday, the switch was for town water. Problem solved.

We spent another day at the lake in Yankee Springs as we’re still trying to get our van sorted and we needed another dreaded trip to Walmart. As we were shopping, the staff who’d seen us on previous visits, greeted us like long lost friends. It was at this point we realised we’d become regulars.

Mike needed tools for some odd jobs so he picked up a tool box. The louvred blinds at the back of the van had a gap in them, so we picked up some cheap curtains. Mike picked up an extension lead, and I also picked one up and we didn’t notice until we got back to camp. So now we have a spare. We could probably take it back but we daren’t show our faces there again.

Back at camp we sat, sipping on a zero beer, mesmorised by the lake. Then I saw another one of those things, swimming across the lake towards me. Having seen them in Australia for many years, it looked like a snake. Sure enough, as it got closer, it was a little water snake swimming towards me. At this stage I didn’t know if they were poisonous or not, so I took a step away from the bank. Thankfully It didn’t come onto the land. We found out later that they aren’t poisonous, so that’s a relief.

People are so friendly here, stopping to chat with you. Random people in the supermarket even say hello to you.

We’ve spent three days at this wonderful campground, and we still haven’t done any of the walks around the place. Perhaps we’ll get time tomorrow before we leave.

Internet here is really bad, so blogs have been a bit slow.

Day 1 – We Picked up our Campervan!

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Despite going to bed after 2am we were up bright and early after having had a good sleep at the hotel.

Darrin from D&l auto sales picked us up in our campervan and we went back to the dealers to sign the papers and see how the van worked.

Our van is a 1992 Dodge Ram which is kinda ironic as we spent the last 2 weeks of our housesit dodging the ram. 

Super excited, we took our new keys and drove off. The v8 engine roared away, 5.9 litres of power guzzling fuel from the tank, and the money from our wallets. First stop, Walmart! We had to pick up things. A lot of things! BEdding, towels,  cups plates cutlery, the list goes on.

After a few hours of frantic shopping, we found our way to our first camp for the night at Yankee springs state park. The campground is surrounded by trees and our campsite is in a beautiful spot beside the lake. Now the next step, getting our van ready for our first night.

Walmart had regurgitated all over the inside of our camper van. Stuff was everywhere! There is heaps of cupboard space but it’s sectionalised so that nothing actually fits in the cupboards. In my mind, I am  plotting a lot of work for Mike.

We are both terribly jet lagged. You know that feeling where you feel normal, but when you try to think or do something, the simplest tasks take effort. 

First, we plugged in the power to make sure everything worked. Nope, no power. I checked and double checked it was plugged in correctly at the campground socket and the cord was securely plugging into the van. I switched the switches to the off position in case that would help. Nope. 

It was hot and I really wanted to try out the vans air conditioner. Also, we were unable to buy gas canisters for our cooker so we’d be relying on electric kettle for coffee.

Then we tried to get the water working but that failed too. The water was not coming out of the tap. On further investigation Mike found it was pouring out all over the ground. Shit! I thought. We’ve bought a dud!

Then I thought, no, these guys are professionals, they’d make sure everything was working. They’d had it plugged into power when we arrived at the shop, it was working then. I double checked inside the van. What I saw next surprised me.

I looked, I laughed, I FFSaked. Then I set all the fuse switches to on. Suddenly the air conditioning, kettle and microwave all kicked in at once! Stupid jet lag. But at least we can have coffee in the morning

The water is still not working, so we’ll have to take it back to the shop tomorrow. Thankfully it’s only a 25 mins drive.

The next problem was internet. Mike had bought a months worth before we left but it’s next to useless. And we can’t make phone calls because our nz numbers are out of credit and aren’t renewing for some reason. And we really need to ring the car place to find out how to work our water. So back to Walmart we went.

I picked up a cheap sim for $14 which will give me unlimited phone calls and 5 gb data for 3 mths. I doubt the data will last that long.

For dinner we got cooked some microwave Mac n cheese with some salad. It was actually quite nice.

We have to make up our bed every night but it wasn’t too much drama. And it’s really comfy and we had a great nights sleep.

Flying Auckland to Houston to Grand Rapids

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It’s that time of year again where we jet off to new adventures and hopefully better weather. We’ve spent the last 2 weeks looking after sister Jenny’s farm and it’s done nothing but rain.

Our Farm sit went smoothly apart from the black headed ram that terrorised us at every turn. This sheep is an escape artist. He knew all the loopholes between paddocks and made sure to terrorise us every opportunity (Mike, me and Rosa). Not only that, he terrorised the ducks and chickens as well!

But now, it’s time to leave all that behind. We thought we were organised, having packed our backs 2 weeks before starting the housesit. We’d weighed our carry on bags and we both had about 7 kgs each. But as the weeks went by, I’d been adding little bits to my bag. and when I weighed in this morning, it was 9kg! So a mad panic had me unpacking my bag and discarding 2 kg worth of stuff.

As I was loading my bag into Jenny’s car, Mike decided to slam the boot on my head. Okay, it’s not quite as bad as it sounds, just a sore head and neck and a headache for a few hours.

The bus was a direct service to the airport and was easy as. We checked in and nobody even looked twice at our slightly overweight carry-on backpacks.

We had an upgrade pending but they said it was unlikely as the flight was full. About 15 minutes before boarding I decided to ask about our upgrade, and it had come through! so that was a bonus.

It’s a 13 hour and 45 minute flight to Houston, but we left Auckland about an hour late, but still arrived on time, so the flight time was only 12 hours and 30 minutes.

We arrived in Houston, and as we were getting off the plane. there were at least 20 people lined up along the skywalk with wheelchairs. I thought this was odd as everyone had walked onto our flight in Auckland.

We arrived at terminal D, and had a 15 minute walk to terminal C for our next flight to Grand Rapids, Michigan. Our United flight was delayed due to storms in Nashville. Then we had to wait for flight attendants to arrive from another flight which was also delayed. Then they had to wait for wheel chair drivers (yes this is a thing). Apparently family members are not allowed to wheel their family onto the plane and wheel chair drivers were in short supply, which made me wonder why there were so many waiting outside our plane when we arrived.

Our United flight finally took off, and we landed at Grand Rapids at 1am. Our hotel shuttle stopped running at midnight, but thankfully there were a couple of taxi’s lined up. It cost us $28 USD to get a taxi 4.5 miles to our hotel.

Tomorrow we pick up our campervan!

Day 65

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We stayed in a crappy hotel last night in Eastbourne but they did a great breakfast. We were up and off early with plans to catch the train back to Bournemouth.

We arrived at the station and bought our tickets which involved catching a number of trains. First one was Eastbourne to Brighton. Brighton to Southampton, then Southampton to Bournemouth.

I always get a bit nervous when travelling by train with our bikes as a lot of train stations have stairs to push our bikes up when changing platforms, and it’s impossible with our loaded bikes.

The first stretch to Brighton went well, but our train to Southampton was cancelled due to signalling problems. So we caught the train to Barnham and then had to change for Southampton. Thankfully it was all on the same platform so we didn’t have to take the stairs.

Barnham to Southampton was a bit more crowded and it was a struggle to get our bikes on without blocking the aisles. But a bit of mucking around we got them sorted.

Then at Southampton I was pleasantly surprised that the Bournemouth train left from the same platform as well so no steps involved. Although they did say a faster train would leave from the other platform, but the thought of getting our bikes over there was too much. So we stayed put. So rather than a 15 minutes journey to Bournemouth, we stopped every station and it took an hour. But it was no problem. I had a little nap.

We arrived back in Bournemouth about 3.30pm and fell asleep. So that’s it, cycle tour over. Now we just need to get our bikes back to storage

Day 64 We’re still going!

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We had 3 options of getting back to Bournemouth. One was to catch the train to London then scramble across London to catch another train to Bournemouth. We both dismissed this, not wanting to go to London,

The second option was to buy a van. We had a couple lined up to look at. One was a campervan but the speedo didn’t work, a common problem with Renaults, so we dismissed that one. The other van was only available to view in the evening and we didn’t want to hang around Dover.

The third option was to cycle back or at least part of the way. So that’s what we chose.

It was a beautiful day when we left Dover, but first there was a massive hill to climb. We both really struggled only having done flat riding for the last couple of months.

We arrived in Folkestone which is on coast and had a look around. There were a bunch of food trucks on the pier and we chose the Greek bus. It was a beautiful day and we couldn’t figure out where everyone was. In my opinion, Folkestone is so much nicer than any of those high rise Belgium resorts.

We had an amazing ride today with a great tail wind. And the scenery was much nicer than the last few days in Belgium. We cycled through forest paths and even past a wildlife park. We saw antelope, bison and a couple of giraffes! That was the highlight of my day.

Then we zoomed along the narrow country roads at 22 kms/hr loving the tail wind and country scenery.

In the afternoon it got harder. The wind shifted and became a head wind and the scenery not so nice. Then the massive rain clouds over by the coast had us a bit worried. There was no camping on the route today so we headed for the train station at Rye. It was 5.30pm and we’d had enough riding for the day.

We decided to catch the train to Eastbourne but the next one was cancelled so we booked the 6.50pm one. Then we booked a hotel in Eastbourne just to be sure we had a bed.

Day 63 – Back in England

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Today we cycle in three countries!

We had a great sleep last night despite our English neighbours at the campsite only starting to cook their meal at 11pm, and yacking away in loud voices as if other people weren’t trying to sleep in their tents until past midnight. I’ve somehow managed to switch off to noises and sleep through them, possibly due to being so frikken tired after cycling all day.

We were away before 10am this morning and started our ride to Dunkirk. There was a vicious head wind today, the worst we have had, and it was really hard going. Usually we’re doing about 20 kms/hr, today it was as lower than 10 kms/hr in the gustiest of winds.

It was another day of cycling alongside high rises on the beach and through crowds of people. Neither of us enjoyed it very much. We had tossed around the idea of continuing to Cherbourg, but the headwinds have definitely put us off that idea.

We arrived in Dunkirk around 2pm and headed straight for MacDonalds (well, we saw it and decided to stop). It was yuck, nowhere near as good as Germany’s Maccas. So our first meal in France was pizza from a vending machine, and our final meal was MacDonalds. We should be ashamed of ourselves!

After MacDonalds we wondered what we should do. We were both really tired after struggling into the headwind, but the thought of hanging around in a campground for the afternoon didn’t appeal. So we decided to make a run for the ferry and see if we could get on one today.

It was another 20 kms to ride to the ferry and it was a hard slog, that headwind relentless. I had a burst of energy from the MacDonalds, but Mike was struggling. We got lost a couple of times on the cycle paths, and in the end just decided to follow the road. It was a Sunday and hardly any traffic.

We made it to the ferry with plenty of time to spare and they had space! Heaps of space in fact, the ferry was near empty.

I was a bit worried about the wind, but the people on board the boat said it would be a smooth crossing so I didn’t bother with a seasick tablet. It was pretty choppy, but the big boat with its stabilisers made for a smooth crossing.

We are now sat in our hotel, wondering what to do tomorrow. We’ll make that decision in the morning.

Day 62 – so many people!

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We’d camped in the wrong spot last night but thankfully nobody asked us to leave and we slept quite well considering the noise in the campground.

Today we continue down the North Sea cycle route. The path is mainly next to the sea and cycling through dunes.

We stopped for lunch at a cafe sitting on the beach. It was literally seats on the sand. Quite neat.

Today we cycled along promenades with high rises on one side and the beach on the other, masses of people in between. We weaved our way through the crowds treating it like a game of Mario cart and it was quite fun. Made the other days cycling through tree-lined streets seem boring.

One place there were a some cyclists congregating on the track. Mike rang his bell and they all started clucking in a different language, just like chickens do when you’ve scared or upset them.

We crossed into Belgium today and suddenly we’re able to use our credit cards again. Germany and Holland only take cash in a lot of places and we were running low.

After 72 kms we found a campground and it’s really noisy and not from kids. Someone is speaking loudly with what sounds like a Scottish accent but it doesn’t sound like English. Some English people next to us have only just started cooking at 9.45pm and I just heard a champagne bottle pop. Now more people are yelling in strange languages. I think they are very drunk.

We’re heading to Dunkirk tomorrow and we’ll either catch the ferry tomorrow or Monday. After that, we have no idea how we’re getting back to Bournemouth. But we have a couple of ideas.

Day 61 – Back on the Coast

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We’re glad we did that extra 20 kms yesterday with a tail wind as it would have been a headwind today.

We’d done so well, camping right on the route. We left camp and followed the signs, then got distracted by an Aldi. We stopped, grabbed some lunch and continued on. But where are those damn signs?

Mike checked his phone and said we were right on the route. We were cycling along a cycle path next to a busy road but I thought we were to cycle alongside the inlet today. So we stopped and double checked and sure enough, we had gone astray.

So we managed to get back on the inlet track and it was so much nicer cycling alongside the water. The smell of onions was strong in the air today, with fields of them growing beside the track. I saw a couple had spilled onto the road and I was about to pick one up but there was a tractor up my arse so it got splattered.

Today we had a ferry crossing. We thought we were going to Belgium but we are actually still in Holland, but are following to North Sea cycle route south.

It was nice to see the sea again but the beaches are so crowded. We stopped at the first campground we came across not really expecting to get a spot. It was 5.30pm and there were throngs of people heading back from the beach, kids running feral all over the place. Basically my idea of hell, but we needed a place to sleep and they had space.

They showed us on a map where to go, so we put up our tent and went to find the showers. According to the map they were just up on the right. But after walking around for ages trying to find them and asking two people, we found out they were actually on our left.

When I got back to our camp I double checked the map and it was definitely wrong. Either that or we’d camped in the wrong spot. On closer inspection the latter was correct. We were in the wrong spot. I just hope they don’t ask us to move.

We had dinner at a restaurant next door to the camp and had a massive burger each.

Day 60 – Finally a Tail Wind

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Today was an awesome day apart from being bitten by a wasp and almost breaking my arm.

I woke up really groggy in our hotel this morning when Mike’s alarm went off, but after 3 coffees I almost felt normal.

We decided to pick up the lf13b cycle route again to save mucking around trying to navigate to the coast, but we spent ages trying to get out of Breda. Eventually we found the route and it was stress free travel.

We cycled through a lot of forests today and it was really pleasant. We also had an wicked tail wind and we sped along at about 25 kms/hr for a lot of the day. The cyclists going the other way looked really grumpy though.

We stopped in the forest for lunch when a poxy wasp stung me on the leg. It hurt like mother crockery! So I put some antihistamine cream on and hoped for the best. The last time I was stung by a wasp I had to have antibiotics.

The other mishap, I was had stopped for a drink of water and dropped my cap on the ground. As I bent down to get it my bike tried to fall and my arm got caught between the wheel and the frame. Thankfully I managed to stop the bike falling as it probably would have broken my arm if it did with all the weight on it. I’ll probably have a nice bruise tomorrow.

At 4.30pm we’d done 65 kms and there was a campsite nearby, but we were loving the tail wind so much we decided to ride another 25 kms to the next campground. We rang them first to make sure they had space. We’re not going through that again!

After about 10 kms of riding we arrived at a massive inlet that smelled of sea and we cycled along that all the way to the campground. We saw a couple of seals so that was neat.

We arrived at camp after 90 kms for the day. We didn’t have any food to cook so we went to the bar for ‘bar snacks’ which were deep fried thingys and quite delicious. Still hungry though.

Tomorrow we catch a ferry.