Hailing from Elk Country in Northern Humboldt County, California I always drive cautiously on forested highways and back country roads. Nonetheless, I was amused to see my first Vermont road sign that simply had the word “MOOSE” in big black letters. With these signs getting larger and more explicit as we pulled into Maine, my amusement quickly turned to a heightened sense of awareness.
The first sign that Moose meant business in these parts was a huge yellow and red one complete with flashing lights clearly proclaiming the high rate of moose auto crashes in the area. After later reading of moose auto horror stories, we felt fortunate to have not seen any, as much as we were hoping to.
Have you had a close encounter of the moose kind? If so, where? How bad was the damage? Share your story for others by posting your comments below. If not, please continue to drive safely.
When we embarked on this trip, I often imagined kicking back in my hammock with my Powerbook and enjoying my new office. Well, the first couple times that I have actually strung up the thing I ended up not spending any time in it at all. If my hammock time wasn’t called on account of rain, there was either too much on my RV honey do list or simply too much of the outdoors to go enjoy.
I am now happy to say that my vision has finally come true. The view from my new office is well worth the wait. The only thing missing is our internet connection.
We’ve traveled many miles searching for our ideal community. A few times, we thought we might have found it. But . . .
The thought of moving into a small town is nice, but few have the diversity that we feel makes life more interesting.
We crave the solitude of 40 acres in the sticks, but fear we might go nuts being so isolated.
And in places where we love both the land and the people, it might a lot of effort to fit in.
So where does that leave us? At the other end of the country, completely enamored with one state in particular, which is now the benchmark to compare all future areas against. That state is Vermont.
In an effort to jump on the vlog (video blog) bandwagon, we are proud to present the first installment of hopefully many video interviews with fellow full-time RVers, travel enthusiasts, campground hosts, workcampers, and others enjoying their own live/work dream.
So without further ado, we introduce to you Mr. John Diegel of Middlebury, VT (AKA YouTube Director Creekracer). This future RVer talks about the restoration of his 1981 Scamp 16′ travel trailer, and his experience with such an undertaking, or lack thereof.
If it appears that John has a long way to go with his Scamp, give the guy some credit. When he’s not directing, filming and producing videos of Princess Heidi, he’s single-handedly running the family bakery – making great cookies for local markets – and driving by the skin of his teeth along the the back roads of Vermont.
When Jim and I first considered changing gears and starting a new business, running a Bed and Breakfast or lodge was high on our list. So I did some research, and read two books that helped us narrow down our focus, if we decide to make the leap. The books, “So You Want to Be an Innkeeper” and “I’m Living Your Dream Life,” dive into the gory details about the daily demands of catering to tourists. I highly recommend them if you’ve ever considered running a tourism business.
What’s It Like Running a Bed and Breakfast?
We’re still considering this type of business as an option, so when we checked into Melfort Cottage in Toronto, we were on a mission to learn more about that line of work. Melfort Cottage is a small three room Bed and Breakfast, run by Heather Donaldson, a retired schoolteacher. Located in the middle of the posh Oakville area, Melfort Cottage is perfectly situated in an historic neighborhood, within walking distance to restaurants and shopping.
Let’s get one thing straight: I am not a pinko communist! But you’d have to be blind not to notice the scandalous events of our government over the last few years, and any thinking person has had to ask themself; what is wrong with this picture? Personally, I’m fed up, and sadly, I’m not so sure that anything can change the mess that big money and nepotism has created in the U.S. Thus, my tirade about living in the U.S. . . .
René asked me if I felt any more Candian now. Truth is, I have always felt part Canuck – though my home team would be the Maple Leafs – since I learned my mother was from Toronto and I went to the Snow Festival in Quebec as a child. After all, I am supposedly half French Canadian and half Scottish Irish. And one of my closest, dearest friends hails from Winnipeg eh. But I have to admit it felt good being Canadian at least for a day. Especially since that day happened to be September 11th.
It was actually nice to not be bombarded by the regular American media suspects forcing us to remember in vivid detail the tragic events of 2001, as they have every year for the past six. The only sign whatsoever that it was in fact 9/11 was a group of peaceful demonstrators in downtown Toronto proposing that the World Trade Center tragedy was an inside job. And personally, I was glad the morning paper didn’t carry a full page image of the burning towers that has been burned into my psyche the very day it happened.
Coverage of events at Ground Zero made it to page eighteen of Canada’s national newspaper. The front page was reserved for a 30th anniversary tribute to the beating death of Steven Biko by South African police. I found the story educational, enlightening, and touching. Perhaps it was buried deep in U.S. papers, I don’t know. But I doubt this important reminder of apartheid in the world made the front pages.
I just had to play Peter Gabriel’s “Biko” from Shaking the Tree on the iPod as we crossed the border back into the U.S. after being questioned by a stern guy playing the role of a Nazi officer. So do I feel a bit more Canadian? You bet eh. And it feels good.
We haven’t blogged in a few days because we took some time to trace my roots with a brief trip into Toronto. While we accomplished our mission of finding the church where my parents were married and the cemetery where my grandparents are buried, we also discovered that the trip was far too brief to discover everything we wanted to know about living in Ontario, Canada.
Although we have budgeted for a few hotel nights each month on this trip, our stay at Melford Cottage Bed and Breakfast in Oakville Ontario was the first time we have left the comfort of our trailer since selling our stick house and putting our bedroom furniture in storage over three months ago. While it did feel a bit weird leaving all our possessions in the trailer at Four Mile Creek NY State Park campground to take a little vacation from our “vacation”, Heather Donaldson’s home served as a great base to search for my Mom’s roots around Toronto and gave us a chance to reconsider what the future holds for us once again.
Even when a fulltimer hits the road, the drudgery of paying bills doesn’t stop. My paperwork got a lot lighter since we sold our business, but I still have to push some around. Especially when we receive a package of mail from Jim’s fabulous sister, who’s handling our PO Box for us.
Readers who have chosen not to register for this blog and receive notification of posts and comments will be happy to know that we have just activated the Subscribe To Comments Wordpress plug-in.
Beneath the comments form at the bottom of every blog post, there is now a convenient check box that will enable you to receive follow-up comments via email. This is just one of the various plug-ins we have installed to make the LiveWorkDream blog better.
Hailing from Elk Country in Northern Humboldt County, California I always drive cautiously on forested highways and back country roads. Nonetheless, I was amused to see my first Vermont road sign that simply had the word “MOOSE” in big black letters. With these signs getting larger and more explicit as we pulled into Maine, my amusement quickly turned to a heightened sense of awareness.
on the iPod as we crossed the border back into the U.S. after being questioned by a stern guy playing the role of a Nazi officer. So do I feel a bit more Canadian? You bet eh. And it feels good.
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