Wow.  It’s been over 10 months since I’ve done a van life post.  I’ll have to get people caught up and post some stories that I have been meaning to get to.  My last post was about our trip to Padre Island.  We lived in Padre for about 3 weeks.  We then went to Big Bend National Park in Texas and then on home to Iowa.

Nic and I spent Spring, Summer, and Fall at home in Centerville, IA.  Nic took up sewing and I worked on an Open Source project called NetNewsWire.  It was very relaxing being home and around family.  Nic and I found a lot of fulfillment in our hobbies and were very content this year.

But eventually it starts to get cold and wet in Iowa and we did begin to ache for a change of scenery.  We did the usual prep to the van.  In addition to the usual maintenance, I put in a new floor.

The old floor was made from the rubber matting you often find in gym’s around the weights.  It was a kind of fuzzy version of the 1/4 rubber matting and was difficult to clean. Nic is a very clean person and hated cleaning it.  And she let me now about it.  Every time she cleaned.  She cleaned a lot.  So,. I put in a laminate floor for her.  It is working out pretty well.  The complaining (about the floor) has stopped.

With the van ready to go, we spent the Thanksgiving with friends and family and then took off for Arizona on December, 2.  Our first stop would be Cottonwood, AZ.  As usual, we wanted some free campling close to a Planet Fitness and Cottonwood delivered.  More about our stay in Cottonwood in the next post.