Plot twist! Suddenly the electric isn't our biggest obstacle

Continued from 4 nights on 30amp

Tuesday evening, July 21. Anthony was hunkered down at the local library once again for meetings, while I held down the fort in the RV, totally disconnected from the world. We had no internet or cell service, except for the sporadic bar of 5G when I held my phone up to the window. I tried opening it to see if contact with outside air would help, but I couldn't keep it open long. Storms were brewing outside and I could hear the rumbling of thunder overhead.

Soon, the skies opened. We were on the outskirts of a severe weather system that brought strong winds and tornadoes further west. Fortunately, we didn't need to worry about anything more than thunderstorms. I wasn't even sure I had enough connectivity to get weather alerts, which was scary considering I was alone with the pets. Downpours and thunder I could handle...though the downpours brought other issues.

It was official: our roof's integrity was compromised. One too many branches had fallen on it, and it had been through one too many temperature fluctuations. We checked the roof a few days after the last branch hit, mostly to make sure our solar panel was still intact, which it was. The roof had no obvious holes or cracks that we could seal. We resigned ourselves to the situation. We already had plans to get our roof replaced, and until then, we just hoped for as few downpours as possible. This downpour was rough, though. It lasted hours, turned our campsite to mud, and caused flash flooding all over the state park and surrounding areas. What's zen about this? Nothing...but then again, our RV life hasn't brought the zen in a while.

We had a lot of discussions earlier that day. We couldn't keep running to the library whenever we needed to do work. That WIFI wasn't great, anyway. We also had a major question mark hanging over our heads: Where could Anthony take a call at 10pm the next night? He has frequent meetings with people on the other side of the world, and this particular meeting involved presenting to a client. He needed good connectivity, but nowhere with public WIFI would be open, nor could we trust the WIFI to be reliable. Beyond that call, it was a meeting-heavy week in general, and constantly scrounging around to find public WIFI wasn't productive.

I talked to my mom and we weighed the pros and cons. When we booked our Wompatuck stay, our circumstances were completely different. Our top priority was to get on 50amp so we could keep the rig cool. We still had our Starlink, which had worked at Wompatuck many times in the past. We also don't remember cell service ever being this bad here. Now, suddenly our electric issues weren't our biggest obstacle. We needed internet. Running our ACs is nice, but the weather has been mild enough that not having them isn't detrimental to our health or safety. The weather forecast for the next few days was looking surprisingly promising. Not weather we'd expect from late July. One more possibly stormy day with highs in the low 80s, but then a welcome reprieve: 70s, sunny, and low-to-moderate humidity every day. Nature seemed to be giving us a sign.

The only downside besides the limited electric was that we already paid for this campsite through Sunday, but eating the cost of the site was much smarter than Anthony causing job stress for himself and his colleagues. Plus, we get resident rates at MA state parks, which are much less expensive than out-of-state. The pros outweighed the cons exponentially. Quiet time in our home-base parking spot. Proximity to family. Access to fast WIFI whenever we need it. And, a big one: much easier to clear items out of storage. By staying at Wompatuck, we'd need to make room in our truck bed, drive to the house, pile things into the truck, come back, and unload whatever needs to go inside the trailer. Now we can streamline the process by carrying things directly into the rig.

That was enough to convince us to move, but we couldn't do it right away. We made the decision Tuesday afternoon, but we still had things to do, like take the pets to their vet appointment. Then Anthony had to grit through his remaining calls, while I gritted through the storms. We planned to move on Wednesday afternoon, after the day's peak temperatures. More storms were predicted, though, so we had to time it right.

Wednesday morning, July 22. Anthony sought public WIFI in a nearby shopping plaza for his morning calls, while I stayed back and tested the hotspot. It was working again! Not well enough, though. It continued to have interruptions, and uploading files was a no-go. Storms were supposed to roll in around 4pm, and as a result, the day grew hot and muggy, with humidity so high that our sunglasses fogged up whenever we stepped outside. This would make our home-base stay very uncomfortable, but we had to keep our eyes on the prize. If we could get through the rest of the day, the remaining days of our stay were looking to be much better.

Around 3pm, we packed up the trailer, hitched up, and left the park. The previous night's rainstorm had left our site a mess. We're struggling to think of any other site in all our years of travels that left our chocks and blocks this caked in dirt – especially after only a few days. We felt gross and tired. Inside, the ceiling was still leaking, and the leaks got worse as soon as we unleveled, and all the remaining pooling water dumped towards the front of the trailer. Outside, mud was sticking to our skin because we were so sweaty. Then to top it all off, we needed to use our walkie talkies to communicate while hitching up/maneuvering out of the site. Typically, we call on our cell phones so we have constant two-way lines of communication. We've found that, when speaking through the walkies, we often miscommunicate because we can't hear the other person when our talk button is pressed. This causes added frustration, and we already had enough frustration.

We settled into our spot and adjusted our grid current limit so we could get enough power from the house to run a small appliance. We don't draw a full 15amp from the outlet because my parents have a fridge on the same circuit. We always play it safe and draw less, usually 8amp, but this time we increased our limit just a smidge, so we could partially function. Then we waited for the rain.

The sky got very dark, but the rainstorm could have been much worse. We had a short downpour, but otherwise, the storms skirted us. This helped keep the roof leaks minimal, but it meant the humidity stuck around longer than we would've liked. Despite setting up 3 dehumidifiers, we struggled to get below 80% humidity in the main part of the trailer and high 70s in the bedroom.

The house wasn't an option for a reprieve. My parents are continuing renovations and were getting the windows replaced, so they've been operating with limited air conditioning, too. Most of the furniture was covered for window trim staining. We knew that if we parked in the driveway, we'd mostly need to stay contained in our RV. Anthony took his 10pm call from the house to ensure he had the fastest internet possible, but the trade-off was that the most optimal room to take the call was even hotter than the RV! The rest of the time, we used our internet. Our hotspot liked the home-base better than the state park. It wasn't the fastest, but we had fewer interruptions, and we could finally upload files again. Strange, since in both places, the signal read 2 bars of Verizon 5G, so technically there shouldn't have been a difference. The good news was, though, that our new hotspot wasn't defective. It was just incompatible with Wompatuck State Park.

One of the silver linings about being at our home-base without Starlink is, we've been without Starlink here before and know we can function. Sometimes my parents' fiberoptic internet can reach as far as our trailer, but in a pinch, we can go inside the house if we need faster internet or want to upload large files. Cellular hotspots have always worked reasonably well here, despite cell service not being super strong. Last year, our Starlink dish got buried in the snow and we didn't even bother digging it out until we lost all other internet due to the blizzard. In retrospect, we probably should have dug it out sooner, because it likely would have been our best internet source. But that was in winter, when the trees were bare. In summer, we always get Starlink interruptions because our parking spot is heavily tree-covered. With the increasing number of satellites, the dishes don't need to face a specific cardinal direction anymore, so we imagine Starlink would perform better than years past, but we don't need to rely on it to get decent internet.

We had officially solved the internet problem, but what about the weather? We woke up the next morning to an absolutely beautiful morning. The forecast was right. Temperatures stayed in the 70s and the humidity stayed moderate. With the windows open, letting the natural air in, both inside temperature and humidity stayed in a comfortable range. The trailer felt extra cozy and smelled great from the fresh airflow. And even though the tree cover here isn't good for Starlink or avoiding falling branches, it is good for shading us from the sun.

If this weather kept up, we'd be in great shape to finish off our week at our home-base. We had a lot to get done over the next few days to finish our New England to-do list before finally making our way back to our cottage. Nice weather could be the very boost we need to end our New England visit in better spirits.