The Dreaded Campground Bath House

There is a LOT that concerns me when we talk about camping. I can think of about 3,000 reasons just off the top of my head why I don't like it, and don't ever want to do it.

1. Bugs.
2. Dirt.
3. Mess.
4. Hot.
5. Sweaty.
6. The Great Outdoors.

Yeah, I could go on and on, but you get it. Anyway, one of my TOP reasons for a total avoidance of camping is having to do all my necessaries OUTDOORS. By necessaries, of course I mean things like brushing my teeth. Showering. Peeing. And that is just the really necessary stuff. There's a whole lot of other things that I consider totally necessary, but I realize that others may not. This includes applying full make up, shaving my legs daily and straightening my hair with a good flat iron. Either way, it all gets done outdoors. Or in the RV, whatever, same difference.

Now when we took off on this little adventure, we hadn't yet de-winterized the RV. We hadn't filled up the water tanks, etc., because in Michigan, it was still falling below freezing at night, and we couldn't take the chance that the pipes might burst. So we took off, waterless, in our camper. Which really means that we were just in a huge freaking car. (As you'll remember, there was no heat and no electricity, so with no water either--I'm really not getting the point here. But I digress.) The long and the short of this is that I couldn't brush my teeth or shower in the RV...I'd have to hike down to the campground bath house and do those things there. Shall I tell you what this is like, in all its gory details? Yes, I shall.

Picture this. It's about 7:00 a.m. in the campground. Sun is pouring through the windows, the birds are chirping, fresh air abounds...so of course, even though it's vacation--you're awake. You peek bleary-eyed out of the top of your sleeping bag, and realize that you're in a sleeping bag. You shift around uncomfortably...man, do you have to pee! Your tongue is glued to the top of your mouth, and you realize that you could really use a glass of water, and to brush your teeth. But oh no! You can't just stumble over to the bathroom. There is no bathroom. You'll have to: put on clothes. Put on shoes. Go outside. Walk past about 23 other camp sites to the bath house. Oh wait, you have to get all of your toiletries to take with you. And your clothes. Oh yeah, and a towel. Shit. Is it worth it? Maybe you should just stay in bed. Nope! Gotta pee. Up you go. You get the picture.

So that's me. I get up, grab my suitcase full of toiletries (yes, I brought my CHI flat iron and salon-worth hairdryer, among other things), find some clothes, find my flip flops, and I'm on my way. I'm out the door, all is peaceful....nature....maybe this isn't that bad! Walking, walking. Crap! I forgot my towel! Back I go. Back to the camper, back to find a towel without waking everyone up. By the way--I haven't gotten dressed, so I'm walking around in public in my pajamas, that's how far I've sunk. Just giving you the visual here. Towel in hand, I stomp back down the path to the bath house.

The bath house. The dreaded bath house.

I approach and can hear showers running. So I guess I'll have company for my morning routine. That's grand! I open the door and peer to my left. What I see is a row of shower doors, all closed, all occupied. Crap again. I'll have to wait. I look down. I'm standing in about half an inch of muddy water that is coming from the general shower area. You've got to be kidding me. Aren't I here to clean myself? This is disgusting! Ew. With what I am sure is a totally snotty look on my face, I look to the right. A row of toilet stalls. I've gotta go, so I head in that direction. I open the first stall door. Yep, this one hasn't been cleaned since about 2012. Not happening. Stall 2 is closed. Stall 3: golden water, but no floaters. A possibility. Stall 4? Closed. We've got a winner! I tiptoe through the muddy water into Stall 3, grab handfuls of toilet paper and clean everything in sight. Business done, I return to the shower area in time to see one open up. I hurriedly rush to it, set down my bag on the little bench they provide, and then realize that the bench was covered in soapy water. And now, so is my bag. I look at the shower. It's wet everywhere, and there are gobs of  hairballs all over it. Seriously?? Christ, it's 7 am. Don't they ever clean these things?

Leaving my bag to hold the shower, I return to Toilet Stall 3 and retrieve gobs more toilet paper. Returning to my shower, I clean the whole. damn. thing. all the hair, dead bugs, and god knows what else. How can I get clean if the shower's not clean?? Sheesh! That done, I return to the task of actually taking a shower. I quickly strip down and take a look at the faucet. There is no handle, just a push button. Ohhhh Kaaaayyy. I push it. Water comes out, hard, like sharp needles, but it's at least hot--which is good, because there appears to be no way to make the water hotter or colder! I step in, and the water promptly shuts off. Huh. I push the button again. Water returns. OK, no problem. I stand under it, wetting down my hair. Water shuts off. Damn it! It must be on a timer. I push it again, step under, and count. 1-2-3-4....about 20 seconds. 20 SECONDS OF WATER, PEOPLE? I get wanting to save water, but 20 SECONDS? WTF. Fine. I will continue to soap and push.

After playing this game for about 15 more minutes (do you know how hard it is to try to shave your legs while pausing to turn the water back on??), I'm done. I towel off, and pull my clothes out of my bag, Promptly, my nice clean underwear fall out of the bag, and into the muddy water all over the floor. Nice. Commando it is! I'm able to get dressed the rest of the way without dropping any more clothing on the disgusting floor, and make my way over to the sinks for the rest of the beautification.

The sink area is happily only occupied by one other camper, leaving me with ample space to plug in all my electronics, and spread out my toiletries. I go to the farthest sink, and set down my now wet and soapy bag. Want to hazard a guess as to the general cleanliness? Yep, you're right. Back to my favorite Toilet Stall for more of that useful toilet paper. I proceed to fully clean the dead bugs and hair out of my sink area. I swear I'm doing more cleaning of the bath house than of myself! They should be paying me. I plug in my flat iron and hair dryer, which elicits some strange glances from Ms. Granola down the way, but I ignore her. Instead, I begin applying several layers of face lotion, foundation, powder, blush, eye shadow, eyeliner, mascara, lipstick...you know--only the essentials. Granola-lover keeps sneaking strange looks at me, but she doesn't scare me. In fact, why is she still here, if she has no hairdryer or make up to apply? Anyway, I block her out by turning my hairdryer on full blast and proceeding to spend another 20 minutes getting my hair into place.

By the time I'm done, about an hour has passed, and I'm so hot and sweaty from cleaning the bath house, cleaning myself, and blow-drying with no air conditioning that I think I need another shower! But they're all full again, so I guess I'll skip that.

On to another day of camping!

Little to Report....Part Two.

Now where was I?

Oh yes. Fire.

So we set up camp, got the RV leveled and hooked up, and next our thoughts turned to food! It was about 7:00, and we were pretty hungry. Two days before, after much agonizing on Amazon over whether a propane or charcoal grill would be the way to go, I bought a small, $49 portable grill, that I figured could feed us.

Which way did I go? Charcoal of course. Why? Because I've never, ever used one. Neither has Marco. So of course, it seemed like the stupid wise decision. I ordered the grill, and even ordered some charcoal briquettes and some fancy-schmancy fire starters. We'd be fine, right? No need to practice. No need to buy anything else useful, like....say....lighter fluid. Oh no! I'm skilled at rubbing sticks together and causing charcoal to ignite. Yeah.

I decided that the 20 minutes of reading about making charcoal fires on Amazon through reviewers' advice made me the expert, so I set about to light up the grill. In the meantime, I sent Marco to build a bonfire. Since he'd made me steal all the wood, he should have to light it up. I opened up the top of the grill, and studiously read the directions that came with the grill. I also read the directions on my fancy fire starters. No problem! I can read. I can follow directions. We're good. First, I am supposed to lay the fire starters in the bottom of the grill, under the first grate, and light them.
Done and done. Easy-peasy.
Next, I am supposed to lay the charcoal over the grate, so that the fire starters ignite the coal, and get it hot. No problem. Laying down charcoal. Third, I am supposed to replace the top with the vents open, so that the charcoal gets hot, but the fire doesn't go out. Done. I peer through the vent holes. I see fire. We're good. I walk away, pretty pleased with myself, and go to check out how Marco is doing with the campfire.

I walk over to where I see a huge cloud of smoke, figuring that this must be our campfire. In the middle of the cloud, I find Marco, who is poking at the logs that he has built into a beautiful teepee. "We need more branches for kindling," he says. "Did you bring any lighter fluid?"
Oh yeah, lighter fluid. "We don't need it," I say. " I bought these fire starters" I trot back to my picnic table and grab one of them. He throws it in the fire. "No," I say. "You have to light it around the edges, see?" I kneel down and use my lighter on it. It flares up for a moment, produces a beautiful flame for about 20 seconds, and dies away. "No," Marco says. "This will never work. These logs will never get hot enough. Even your dad, who is the king of fires, has lighter fluid." I shrug and leave him to it. I trot back over to my grill, lift up the lid, it seems warmish. I decide to put the hamburgers on. I shovel them onto the grate, replace the top, and go in search of a beer. That will help! I grab a PBR from the cooler--which sounded good, by the way, when I picked up a case back in Michigan--but honestly doesn't taste all that great. Either way, it's cold and alcoholic.

I head back over to Marco. A small fire is trying to gain life, but it's less smokey, so we've got that going for us. Marco is still cursing under his breath and collecting branches. Niccolo is blowing with all his might on the fire. More fire starters, that's what it needs. I go back to the grill and grab two more. I place them each strategically under the fire, light them up, and place the driest branches I can find in the flames. Slowly, slowly, the fire builds up, and now the logs are blazing. I have made fire. I HAVE MADE FIRE! Marco drops his sticks. "Let's check the burgers," he says.

We go back to the table and lift the top off the grill. Raw burgers. No heat. Charcoal has died. Marco looks at me.  "What?" I say. "It was lit!!" Thankfully, we have remembered to buy hot pads. I carefully lift the grate with the raw burgers off. "Well," I say. "We can just use more fire starters." "Fire starters!" Marco scoffs. "They don't do anything!!" Huh. Says he. I squeeze two more under the charcoal and light them up. "Let me do it," Marco says. "You go watch the bonfire." Ha. I  am the one that got the bonfire going. Fine. He can cook. I strut back to sit by my fire with my beer, leaving Marco and his mom to the burgers. It doesn't really matter if they ever get cooked. Sophie is speed-eating marshmallows that she's already roasting over the bonfire, and Niccolo's had about a pound of Swedish Fish in the past hour, so I don't suppose the kids will starve.

Sooner or later, though, we're called over to have some well-cooked burgers. Lesson learned. Marco = cook. Angie = fire. When we try for a Take Two tonight, we'll see if that formula sticks.

Actually, Little to Report. Part One.

I received an email from my mother last night, which said: "why do you have a blog if you're not going to update it?"

She's right, of course. But the truth is....this trip has been so far quite lacking in drama.

Now in fairness, I am currently staying in a sweet condo, which has running water, electricity, internet, several televisions, several bedrooms....you get the gist. Oh...I hadn't mentioned that I'd be cheating and staying in a condo? Well it's true. I bartered 3 nights for myself in a condo in Williamsburg, Virginia, as a salve to my sanity. So the long and the short of it is that I've only actually spent one night in the camper so far. But, for my loyal fans (I think just myself and my mother), I will recount the experience of that one night.

4:52 p.m., Friday, April 3.
We finally, after 8 long hours driving through the drearier parts of Ohio and Pennsylvania, arrive at the Friendly Village Campground. As my good friend Brion likes to quote from their website: "it's where lasting friendships begin." Not really sure I'm ready to make lasting friendships with the RV crowd, but whatever. We pull in to the registration office, and I hop out to announce our arrival. Doors closed. Doors locked. Lights out. Ohhhhh Kkkkkkk....nobody here. I return to the RV. "It's all locked up," I announce to Marco. He sighs, and gets out of the RV. We head back to the registration building. We walk around the building. We read all the signs. Then, after several minutes of hunting, we see a "Night Registration" box, with some little golf pencils and forms next to it. "I guess we can fill this out" I say. "But how do we know which site is ours?" Marco counters. Good point. Maybe it's in my email confirmation. Back to the RV. Get the phone. Search for the confirmation. Now it's been about 20 minutes, we're tired, rain is threatening, things are not looking good. Doom and gloom. When all of a sudden.....there it is!! I look up, see a map and a note thumbtacked to their bulletin board: CUCCO FAMILY. Boom! Saved.

We grab it, hop back into the RV, open up the map, and start following the purple highlighter to our RV site. On the way, we pass a large shed full of firewood. A large sign says that "FIREWOOD IS AVAILABLE FOR SALE AT MAIN OFFICE." Marco screeches The Beast to a halt. "We need firewood," he says. "You can't take that wood," I say. "You have to buy it at the office." (I'm always the well-behaved one) "The office is closed," he replies. "Come help me put some of this in the car."
Holy hell. NOW he's reducing me to thievery!! We hop down and I half-heartedly grab a small chunk of wood. "More," Marco says. Shit. I'm going to be in trouble I'm going to be in trouble I'm going to be in trouble. When Marco's done making me steal wood, we climb back in and head to our site.

It's the beginning of April in Pennsylvania, so the campground is nearly empty. An RV sits kitty corner from us, campfire already blazing. 2 sites down, an older couper in another camper are walking their golden retrievers (which elicits cries of dismay from my children, who are upset that we left our dog at home). We park, and I notice with some delight that we are RIGHT NEXT TO THE BATHROOMS. Now some people might think that's gross, but I'm thinking of having to walk out to it half-dressed in the middle of the night. My heart lifts a centimeter or two.

Now we've never actually set up an RV before, and we have to hook it up to the electric and level the thing. There are 2 electrical boxes next to us, each with several outlets. "I don't think this is 50 amp" Marco says. "They're ALL 50 amp," I counter. (Don't we sound professional?? I don't even know what 50 amp means.) He shrugs, drags the enormous orange hook up cord out of the back of the RV, and plugs it in. "Niccolo! Plug in your phone! Does it work???" we yell.  (insert Jeopardy music)...
....
....
"Yes!" we hear back.

Success!

I'm so happy. And here's why. I don't know the first thing about electricity. I'm no electrician. I don't know my voltage from my wattage. I can barely screw in a lightbulb. So imagine my dismay when early Friday morning when we were taking off, I discovered we had no electricity working in the RV (apart from the vehicle dashboard). In my mind--what the heck? Isn't the point of driving this big camper somewhere so that you can have all of the conveniences in the back while you're driving? Apparently not. Unless you are plugged in, there isn't enough power in the back to run anything other than some of the lights. So you have to plug inverters into the dash, and run extension cords to the back so that people back there can plug in.

Now in 2000, when my dear Beast was built, this was probably not much of a problem. But now, even my 75-year-old mother-in-law has her ipad, and they all want to run their devices non-stop.
So it was a bit painful for 8 hours making sure everyone had enough juice not to die of boredom on the road.

So now we have power!! Yay.

I can see that this is going to get long-winded, and I need to sign off for the moment...the natives are stirring around here, so I will post more later, and you can hear all about how we made fire.

....and We're Off!

As I write this, we are barreling down the road somewhere along the Ohio turnpike. Marco's about 3 hours into driving. Sophie's watching Harry Potter. Niccolo's playing Geometry Dash. Carlo's ranting about politics on Facebook. Anna's just sitting there watching the scenery. Pretty much as if we were back in Lathrup Village, sitting in our living room. So smooth sailing for now! But I promise it didn't start out that way.

Overheard by various parties in the past 12 hours:

"I hate this vacation. I really do. I hate this vacation."

"I'm just exhausted, Marco."

"I don't know why it's taking you so long to pack."

"We don't have any flashlights! We need flashlights! I'm not leaving without flashlights!"

"Fine. We're just turning around and staying at home, then."

"Are you telling  me we  have no heat or electricity in the RV for this whole trip?"

Yeah. So a rocky start, but we are now, as I say, happily barreling down the expressway. The sun is actually shining, despite the forecast of rain, and we do have heat in the camper, if not electric. However, some extension cords and invertors picked up at Rite Aid this morning are solving that problem, although the dash area now looks like this:

So while there have been tears (I've already cried twice) and meltdowns (it wasn't pretty in the driveway this morning), I can actually say I'm enjoying this for the moment.

Who knew?