We left Johnson City yesterday with a general plan to try and find somewhere in another National Forest to stay. Unfortunately, the National Forests over here are far more populated than those in the West. We just cannot seem to find roads that just go into the forest! They all are privately owned and have houses on them. Those that don't, don't have any side roads, or anywhere to pull off. Seeing some of the garbage and mess in that last forest spot we were at, I think we see why. It appears that people around here don't know how to not make a mess of the forest... In that last spot, we actually found 3 containers filled with old fluorescent lights.. . . That's pretty bad.
So, we climbed the mountain (it was dark, so we couldn't really see the view) and there was an overlook off the interstate. We stopped for who knows what reason. When we went to start it up again, it clicked and then no more electricity. We decided to just stay there the night and figure it out in the morning.
Oh my gosh it was so windy! Joe barely slept because the wind kept rocking the RV. Once morning came, Joe started poking around. He checked all the fuses he could find and did a lot of wire wiggling. Eventually it just started working again. We have no idea why, so unfortunately, it will probably happen again. We're thinking it's a lose connection or wire somewhere.
Anyway, we're now staying in yet another Walmart in Spartanburg, SC. We'll be able to get a bunch of work done since the internet is good, then keep heading towards the coast tomorrow.
-Miranda
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After leaving Daniel Boone National Forest, we just headed straight for Pikeville. We stayed in the Walmart parking lot that night. It was cold. It was down to the mid 30s. On Monday, we went to the YMCA to work out. The little one in Winchester was much better, I think. This one was larger, but the showers were annoying and painful, the machines seemed more warn and not as nice, and the track surface majorly produced static electricity. Oh well, we still got our exercise and showers.
Then I went to my concert (which was super fun!) and we stayed in the Walmart parking lot again, since it was already 11 by that time.
We left this morning to head towards the nearest national forest to see if there would be anywhere to stay. The first one (right on the state line of Kentucky and Virginia) was a bust. Apparently a ton of the land in their national is privately owned. We ended up moving on to the another section and finally found a road that actually is a National Forest road. We are now parked there, pretty much on the side of the road for the night. No traffic has gone by though, so we think it's very seldom traveled.
-Miranda
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We left Winchester after running a couple errands and stopping for lunch again at that yummy sandwich shop and headed towards Daniel Boone National Forest. Our hope was to be able to park somewhere off the road and stay for a couple days. Unfortunately, it looked pretty controlled. You must buy a pass if you are staying overnight. It's not expensive, so that wasn't a big deal, but there was really no good place to pull off. We ended up going down a side road that ended at a couple nice, short hikes. There was a little pull off from that road, so we ended up staying there the night.
Oh my gosh it was cold. Not freezing, luckily, but we aren't staying another night because apparently it is supposed to get down to 30 there and we can't be having stuff in the RV freeze. We are on our way to Pikeville now.
-Miranda
EDIT: Here are a couple photos from there.
Joe in front of the Red River Gorge
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We were between Lexington and Winchester when the RV started to sound like it was grinding and it gradually got louder. Then the temperature started to spike. Since Joe has had the engine seize from it getting too hot before he pulled over and shut it off. When he opened the hood there was oil, or something, sprayed all over the hood.
Long story not quite so long, eventually a cop pulled up behind us. By this time we knew it was a leak dealing with the transmission, but Joe couldn't find the leak. The officer drove me to a gas station to get more fluid. We put that in and tried to make it to Winchester (we were 10 miles from the exit). It went fine to start but started sounding awful again, so we made it to the next exit which had nothing at it and parked in a pull off near the interstate to stay the night.
This morning Joe found the leak, removed the hose and I was able to call a taxi to come pick us up, bring us to Winchester and bring us back. So, all fixed. The engine doesn't sound great, but it's definitely better than it was. So, we'll see how it goes.
For the happier part of the day, we stopped at a cute sandwich place for dinner and had the best veggie wraps, cheesy potato soup and chai ever. We then found a YMCA, worked out and took showers. We'll probably do that when we can now. Tonight we're staying in a Walmart parking lot and hope to be in National Forest tomorrow.
-Miranda
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We drove basically all day yesterday. We stopped at a Walmart in southern Indianapolis and stayed there the night. We started out this morning and decided to stop for lunch in Louisville, KY if there was a good vegetarian place. We ended up finding a restaurant called the Zen Garden that was completely vegetarian. The food was amazing! Joe had an orange tofu dish, I had a vegetable fried rice and we both shared a Zen Garden Roll, which was a type of sushi. We'll have to remember that if we ever pass through this area again.
We're currently sitting outside "Sweet Surrender", which is a dessert cafe. They serve a vegetarian lunch also, but we aimed for the Vietnamese place instead. The dessert should be good though. We'll see. :D
-Miranda
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