Show me KC

Hey, it’s Analise. We’re in Kansas City, Missouri for a while to see family and eat gob-loads of saucy meats on our way south for the winter.

Last days in the Wolverine State

We got to explore the west Michigan area a little before we left. I touched Lake Michigan and got sand in my snowboots. Some new friends took us to a lovely dinner at Hearthstone in Muskegon — the perch was excellent. We stayed in Michigan an extra day, so journeyed to Missouri on Sunday. It was the end of daylight savings and a trip that took us into a different time zone, so we traveled two hours back in time!

Share the road

Since we were coming from the north, we cut across Illinois and into Missouri via Hannibal rather than St. Louis. This put us on US 36, a seemingly simple highway that was chock full of action. On our travels, we’ve encountered roadwork and traffic revisions in every state. But our Sunday drive showed us a new kind of road caution: Harvest season, farm vehicles on the road. Sure enough, we crossed paths with all sorts of heavy machinery vehicles I couldn’t begin to name. In the fields alongside the road, combine harvesters mowed down acres of different crops. I grew up in the suburbs, so the farming lifestyle is pretty foreign to me. But I really enjoyed seeing (and could in my own small way appreciate) the work that goes into the harvest.

RV checkup

Rexy is holding up where it counts as we put another 660 miles on her.

• A spring that helps retract one of our auto-leveling jacks busted. The jack still works but it takes a trick with a shovel to get it to retract fully. We’re pretty sure we can fix it ourselves (and a second jack that’s slow to retract might get the same treatment).
• As if we needed more motivation to head south, it turns out that our electric heater won’t always work if it’s too cold out. The result: a faster drain on the propane heater as the electric cuts out. It’s not so much a flaw as one more thing to monitor as it gets cold outside. At least the fix is straightforward: fill up on propane.
• Strings broke in two of the blinds. Luckily we’ve dealt with that issue before. The Camping World outside of town should have the repair kit we need.

Lilly watch

What’s next?

Family and food! I don’t get to see my KC relatives often, so I’m very excited to be able to spend some time with them over the next couple weeks. Mark and I might also get to do some sightseeing since he’s been to Missouri just once before. It’s easily one of the coolest perks of our road-bound lifestyle — seeing our family and friends who are spread out across the country.

If you have any questions about RV life and our travels, let us know in the comments.