Wekiwa or Wekiva

    Recently, we enjoyed a beautiful stay at Wekiwa Springs State Park and Campground in Wekiwa Springs, Florida. We arrived on a beautiful Sunday and the springs were busy as families enjoyed swimming, kayaking, biking, and the mid 80ºs weather. We had initially planned on swimming in the springs which are always at a cool 72º year-round but felt that there were a few too many people to enjoy swimming safely and maintaining a proper social distance. 

Martha in our campsite

Some Kayakers at Wekiwa Springs

Swimming in Wekiwa Springs
You can see the freshwater springs flowing.

    After enjoying the beautiful weather and being outdoors on a short hike, we decided to go find some campfire wood. The ranger station was all out and suggested that we go into town to the local Publix. That's when the confusion began! We noticed many of the area stores, roads, and business signs were spelled Wekiwa and some Wekiva! What? The discussion and research began. Oh... By the way. We didn't find any firewood. There was none to be found and the wood in the state park is protected so no fire on this stay. 

    So was it Wekiwa or was it Wekiva or did they mean something different? We knew from our previous study of the area that the Seminole Indians spoke Creek and Miccosukee. Wekiwa was a Creek word meaning spring of water. 

    Time for some hiking - Boy did the weather change. Some storms came in overnight and the weather turned cold. Thankfully we have our house with us and we just pulled out our winter coats for the 30º morning weather. After it warmed up into the low 60ºs we went for a hike. The trails were well marked, flat, and easy. They were a bit muddy in spots but we were able to get around easily. Here are some photos:

Before I finish up the debate I have to tell you that as the afternoon rolled in and finishing our successful hike we did a bit of sightseeing in the area. We also went in search of a donut shop that recently became famous on social media in the Orlando Area. DG Donuts. WOW! Not only were the donuts fantastical but they tasted equally as amazing as they looked. If you're ever in the Orlando area, you have to stop in. But get there early because they often sell out! The apple fritter is my favorite and they have a rotating selection of specialty donuts that change each week. Note* We didn't get a good photo of the delicious pecan roll but photos couldn't do it justice. It took us more than 3 days to eat the fritter. No lie.

Blueberry Poptart - Blueberry filled with blueberry pop tart topping 

Apple Fritter bigger than your head!

Unicorn Horn

 

So here we are. We spent January 31-Feb 2, 2021 having a great time camping, hiking, sightseeing, and discussing the area of Wekiwa / Wekiva. This article by Jim Toner in the Orlando Sentinel seemed to explain it the best. The developers of the area heard the Creek word for Spring of Water Wekiwa and thought it was Wekiva (both with the long I) The Seminole Indians don't have a "V" sound in the Creek language but the developers preferred the "va" sound over the "wa" sound. And it became a mix of the two. 

We, of course, prefer the original Wekiwa. Either way. we sure did enjoy our time there!

Map - Wekiwa Springs State Park Campground

 Jim Toner, Orlando Sentinel, You Say 'Wekiva,' I Say 'Wekiwa', July 20, 1999

Trip Planning

Navigation

One of the first questions many fellow RVers ask each other is “How do you plan your travels?” We know that there are many ways to do this, and many websites and apps to assist with this task. Your traveling purpose will also steer you towards certain tools. As full time RVers we have developed a planning method that works for our purposes.

Our base tool for planning is RV Trip Wizard. The first thing we do is choose our final destination and arrival date; basically, where do we want to stay for a relatively long period of time and in what time frame do we want to arrive. Then we look for places along the way that we want to visit. Those are usually major stops where we want to stay for a few days and see the area. We use those as waypoints to determine our general route. 

Once we have our major stops and destination planned then we can plan each day. We try to limit our travel days to be about 5 hours of driving time. We use RV Trip Wizard along with Campendium to find parks for multi night stays. Campendium does a nice job of showing national, state and county parks that are generally more scenic and cheaper than private parks. 

Harvest Host and Boondockers Welcome are where we look to fill in between major stops. We use these options for one night stays. Although some Boondockers locations will let you stay multiple nights while visiting the area. Most Harvest Hosts are not near major highways but are certainly worth the drive. We have had some amazing experiences at Harvest Hosts and they become great memories of our journey. 

Once you have the stops planned RV Trip Wizard plans your route based on the data that you enter. You input your rig size and driving preferences. On driving days our routes are then triple checked using a truckers atlas, our Garmin GPS (Garmin RV 770) and usually the maps app on our phone. In metropolitan areas we will also use Waze for current traffic updates. We try to stop every 2 hours to give the driver a break. We try to make them easy on and off spots like rest areas. If we need fuel that requires more research. To choose a fuel stop I will use the Gas Buddy app, our Garmin and then the satellite views on the maps app. 

None of these tools or methods are foolproof. And we try to use all four of our eyes to look out for unanticipated problems. We are always looking for ways to improve our planning and keep updated on new tools.  

If you have specific questions about any of these tools that we mentioned please ask. This was just an overview of the process. Be safe and enjoy the journey!

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Our Harvest Host referral link for 15% off is here. 

Our affiliate link for Boondockers Welcome is here. You'll love it!

One more note from Kunio... Michelle is our expert tour guide and planner. She does all of this with meticulous detail and we've never been steered wrong. She is an amazing planner and guide. 

Downsizing... again

 The constant battle of weight vs convenience vs wants vs necessity is REAL. I always feel like we're reinventing ourselves. I also love to find new ways to make things better. I love the adventure of diving into the unknown on a project or repair. I've always liked figuring out how things work. For instance, this past week I tackled tearing apart our furnace, doing a tuneup and replacing the burner, igniter, thermostat and sail switch along with the gaskets. First time to dive into a Suburban furnace and I didn't end up with any extra parts. Well... sort of... Any time I tear into a project and open something up, I always find screws or parts that were dropped along the assembly line at Tiffin. I figure we've been able to reclaim a couple of pounds for storage by cleaning out these areas. LOL

We constantly go through our clothing and we are happy to donate articles that we don't use as frequently. We also decided to downsize the Instant Pot. Yup. We're going to put the 8 qt. into storage along with the Crisp Lid and try our hand at the 3 qt. IP. We also have an amazing rice maker (Zojirushi) that I totally love and I'll deal with the IP rice. (You may not believe it but it's vastly different between the two. Rice is not the same in the Instant Pot but to save room, I'll put it into storage and deal with it. My Japanese mother has spoiled me. She is a great cook and Japanese food is my favorite.)

We have also decided to give up the water softener and continue with some good filters and we installed an Acuva Water Purification System. (Acuva Eco NX-Silver UV-LED Water Purifier) We also purchased their smart faucet to go with the system. While we were traveling, we found that we could deal with the hard water that we had in some areas but I found that while boondocking we filled up with only the filter anyway. I didn't want to get the water softener out while people were waiting in line for water, etc... The water in the freshwater take was often times well water and we felt that a purification system would definitely ease our minds about the water we were drinking and using for cooking. So... getting rid of the softener for our winter travel months will be another 50+ lbs that we will free up.

Reinventing ourselves, changing for the better, always looking for ways to downsize and enjoy our fulltime RVing adventure is a good thing! 

Travel Days - Not What They Used To Be

Kimmel Orchard & Vineyard

Kimmel Orchard & Vineyard

We felt like we could do it. We left of our spot in Mesa, Arizona after being there for almost 2 months, the longest time that we've stayed in one spot during the whole travel season. We hunkered down and made the best of the situation. We shopped for groceries once every 2 weeks, got what we needed and came directly to our spot. We did do some swimming, until that was closed down, biking and walking but we didn't venture out to the hiking trails like we wanted because some of them were so crowded and we wanted to do our part.

The weather in Mesa did us in. Normally we love the heat but when our exposed camp was sitting out in the 100+ degree heat and we were locked inside trying to put anything we could to cover the windows including 2 layers of reflectix and listening to both air conditioners run all day and struggle to keep up, we decided to hit the road. 

We packed up with plenty of groceries to last us more than two weeks and we are making our way to Michigan to be with our family. We only get out of the RV to pump gas. We don our masks, gloves and carry our hand sanitizer to get our gas. We've worked out quite a system. One that allows us to get gas without ever touching anything or coming into contact with anyone.

We made contact via phone and email for one overnight Boondockers Welcome spot, one Harvest Host spot, one Cracker Barrel parking lot, one non reservable pull through spot and one BLM Spot. None of which have required us to talk to anyone in person. We are so thankful for these spots as we traveled through states that closed campgrounds. We were hesitant to get camping spots anyway. 

This has been such a change for us. We love people and enjoy the journey and adventure that we all share together on the road. It's why we were so drawn to the fulltime RV lifestyle. 

Longing for this new normal to be over with and getting back to seeing people as friends and neighbors wherever we go. I don't want to get used to this. 

Narrowing Down the Problem

2RT Blog Post #2
Date: 4.21.2020

 Living in an RV fulltime and having your backyard and your picture window anywhere you want it to be has some beautiful benefits. As we share on social media mostly through our Instagram and Facebook posts people always look at the beautiful pictures and comment on history or architecture. We tend to put the things out there that people would be happiest about.

Well... there are tons of bad. When you drive your house down the road it's like having an earthquake every time you move. Travel days are fun. I love to drive. Especially when the picture window is so large. The views can be amazing. But we are only one quick stop away from having the cupboard pop open or one rattle in the cupboard away from driving you crazy.  Believe me, when you can't find that rattle or clicking glass, it can be stressful. Michelle does an amazing job in wrapping the glasses or putting the plastic between so that there is little movement, breakage and clinking.

One stressful event came when we were in New Mexico in February and we woke in the middle of the night in freezing temperatures to no heat. The electric fireplace wasn't cutting it and the scrabble for extra blankets in the middle of the night was on. I fiddled with the thermostat, which I just replaced in the fall seemed to be working well and calling for heat but the heater won't stay lit.

Now what? We have to find out what the problem is. The small Suburban heater is under our refrigerator. Now mind you. I'm not great at these things but I can pull it out, clean everything, dust everything off, use the internet and YouTube for possible solutions, etc.

That's what I did. Pulled out the heater, hoping that I can get it back together and praying that Michelle doesn't figure out that I am kind of worried that I may not. And then what?

There doesn't seem to be anything wrong. Everything checks out. So I thought maybe it was just a fluke... Put everything back together and guess what? It worked. We were able to use the heat and it ran all day perfectly.

That night, feeling very proud and comfortable, we put away the extra blankets and fell quickly asleep only to wake at 4 in the morning to freezing cold temperatures. UGH! What did I miss? What could it be?

Take the unit back out, tear it down a bit more and find nothing wrong. Maybe this is a computer issue and we need a new board. We would have to wait to see if I can just order parts until we finally get it working. I put it back together and everything worked great! Until the middle of the night when the temperatures fell below 40ºf.

Ok... It has to be something else. I made a run into town and purchased a work light. Do you know how hard it is to find an incandescent light bulb that will heat up? It was indeed quite difficult. But I found one as the store was closing, drove all the way back and put the light directly under the regulator on the propane tank. Guess what? That worked! There is NOTHING wrong with the heater.

I had a new regulator sent ahead to our next spot. (Another subject for a blog post - How does one gete mail or packages while being on the road fulltime) We lived with the light under the regulator for a few more days. (Wouldn't you know it? It started to warm up and we didn't need it as much.) We got to our next spot and I changed out the regulator. See the photo? The flow was quite restricted!

Here to narrowing down the problem, problem solving and a little bit of mechanical ability. Guess what? It's warm. We haven't used the heat at all since I put the new regulator in.