Last night was our first night sleeping in our new little Alto trailer. (Apparently everyone names their trailers…not sure that’s really our thing, but any suggestions welcome!) We drove out to see some friends who live in the country towards Ottawa and they let us park it in their yard and feed off their electricity for the night. This is known in the biz as “Moochdocking”, by the way. We had a lovely visit with Colin and Kathy, and a fairly successful night in the trailer. No matter what, sleeping away from your own bed is challenging. I’m not a good sleeper, as regular readers know, so I was a little worried about how this would go. I turned the space heater on in the camper for an hour before we headed to bed so it would warm up a bit, and, after a pleasant evening with our friends, we went to bed. Despite taking a bit more than my usual quota of weed oil, it took me quite a while to fall asleep. It was ages before I warmed up and got comfortable, but eventually I got a few hours of shuteye. Maybe it was the country air, but I woke up at 6 a.m. and somehow felt pretty rested.
But the adventure began before that, because when we arrived at Colin and Kathy’s I had to back up the trailer to manoeuvre it into a good spot where we’d have easy access to electricity. In her youth, Kathy drove a tractor with a trailer full of hay at her grandparents’ farm so she was able to give me pretty good directions about how to get the Alto backed up. So helpful to have someone there with experience! I was feeling pretty chuffed once I got it parked.
This morning we headed back to Montreal and I was able to back the Alto into our laneway, something I had been having night sweats over ever since we bought the trailer. It didn’t even take that long with Dave doing the spotting. It was great good luck that there was no parking allowed on our side of the street this afternoon. It gave me plenty of room and I didn’t hold up traffic (much). There was only one crotchety guy who got impatient and gave us the universal hand signal for “What the hell???”.
All in all, our first experimental camping trip was a moderate success. As I was lying there before falling asleep, though, I had my doubts about the wisdom of embarking on a lengthy trip in such a tiny space. Here we are, getting into our old age, and doing this adventurous trip! What are we thinking? Are we mad? I keep wondering if we are. I guess we’ll find out. We’re going to have to find a way to be more organized. We’re used to spreading out because we have the room to do so, but in the camper, every nook and cranny will have to be well used and everything will have to have a place. That’ll take some getting used to. Also, Buster will be with us, whereas last night I left him at home with our friend, Maureen. He’ll add a bit of “Je ne said quoi|”, I guess. It’ll all be a great learning experience- learning about ourselves and each other. I’m not nervous, you’re nervous!
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