This coincided with all our closest friends and family wanting one last chance to see us before the off. We were social butterflies with at least one, but many days two, commitments every day. We ate very well! It was lovely to spend time with people in smaller groups and many were very generous and even made financial contributions towards the unemployed bums we had recently become!
I had started feeling more confident in the healing process of my right foot. I put a shoe on for the first time in 6 weeks (slow news day…) and started putting weight equally on both feet, giving me confidence as my hospital appointment approached.
Returning to my failure to sell anything at all, this was sadly the case with the Audi. No interest at all on Autotrader, gum tree, Facebook, what on earth were we going to do with our beautiful machine?! A couple of friends offered to take over the selling process on our behalf, a very generous suggestion that I hoped to avoid if at all possible, but time was running out.
I managed to download the latest maps for the whole of North America (including Canada) to my SatNav, after managing on the second occasion to buy the correct extra SD storage card!
We had to sort out our mobile phone accounts and get our handsets unlocked to have the potential to use them abroad with new SIM cards. Every day was a logistical nightmare, I was extremely stressed and hoped that this was just temporary and not a panicked reaction to having turned our lives upside down! Despite very cosy accommodation at Simon’s parents’ house, sleep was not my friend again, there was just too much to do!!
Friday 7th October, two days to departure, was critical 'foot' day, the return to hospital. Thankfully everything went to plan, the consultant couldn't get rid of me quickly enough so that they could concentrate on 'proper' patients. The boot went in the bin right there and then, and good riddance! On my return from Southend it was time to make a decision on the Audi. Thankfully, Simon used his contacts to agree a 'sale or return' with a local garage for them to sell the car on our behalf, enabling us to get a decent amount for the car as long as we were not in a mad rush. We took the car straight there and completed the paperwork. It was such a last-minute relief, having had to consider selling it for far below its value to one of those 'we'll buy anything' websites, you know the ones!
Another relief that day was the fact that we had no evening plans... at all. Just to get ahead with some packing and relax, it was heavenly.
Saturday 8th October was Christmas. Seriously. We sorted the packing, actually Simon sorted the vast majority of the packing if I'm honest! We had to reached the conclusion that paying for an extra suitcase in the hold was a necessary evil at an extra financial splurge of 65 quid. This part of the trip was definitely not travelling light, we were taking as much as we could to be able to set up our new mobile home when we arrived. Later some of the Newman clan arrived at the house for Christmas dinner and games. I even wore my Christmas jumper; these things must be taken seriously.
Last minute set back of the day was down to our friends at Apple again! Simon had only just got the text confirming his phone was ready to be unlocked. In my role again as slightly less clueless with technology, it fell to me to sort this out via the wonder of iTunes. Starting with the fact that I had to install iTunes onto the computer at Simon's parents' house. Simple enough you'd think. With basic instructions to hand I had to back up the phone to iTunes before deleting it all and re-installing the relevant backup. You'll recall how we'd managed, with assistance, to get half of our entire music library loaded onto Simon's phone with the other half on his iPad. Well, how was I supposed to know that a back up to iTunes wouldn't include the music library as standard?! Apple, what the hell?! Why wouldn't I want to keep my music library from my phone?! Half of the iTunes alphabet disappeared before my eyes, importantly the half from M to Z. They'd deleted Pearl Jam, Oasis, Stone Roses.... unbearable to think of a road trip without these. Thankfully we were heading out for more games and drinks at the Dawson’s, home of Chris who is technologically far more able than Simon and I put together. We wouldn't be able to get back everything, but Chris helped us rescue as much as possible to minimise the damage, phew, we didn’t have to cancel the whole trip!
Sunday 9th October, departure day! Everything went smoothly - from leaving the house having somewhat tearfully said farewell to Ralph to meeting with Simon's Sister and family for an 'all you can eat' breakfast and getting to Heathrow for 1030am. Having said an emotional goodbye to Simon's parents the realisation sank in that it was just the two of us and we were really doing this. The below image basically shows the majority of our Worldly goods, ready to go:
We reacted by going for a large coffee and a social media frenzy whilst we still had the chance, and reliable wi-fi!
Our flight departed on time with plenty of spare seating available. It was a bumpy flight but we arrived in good time at Boston Logan international airport.
The last hurdle that could prevent our plans lay ahead - US immigration. Despite having obtained our visitors visas it had been stressed that the final decision on whether we could gain access to the US was down to the immigration officer at point of entry, I felt butterflies in my stomach. But our immigration officer couldn't have been nicer. Apart from expressing his surprise that we planned to live in such close quarters together in an RV for the next 6 months, another person to add to the list who thinks we're a little nuts!
We found our way to the hire car emporium and successfully acquired our hire car. We picked a bright white SUV, a Hyundai Sante Fe, as we felt we needed to practise with a LARGE car before moving on to our potentially LARGER mobile home! We then tested the directions on the freshly loaded SatNav to make the roughly 45-minute journey to Tasha and David’s' house in Westford in torrential rain. In the interest of fairness, I let Simon test the American roads out first. The road conditions were appalling, not a great start to escaping the British weather! Arriving at Tash's house was impressive - they have invested in a huge character home and though it does need a quantity of work doing, the scope is amazing. The rooms are huge with high ceilings and the building goes on in all directions, even before you take the grounds into consideration. Tasha and David have two little girls and a third baby on the way in the New Year. They are very busy people so we were so grateful for them to make time and space for us in their home. Due to the time difference, we'd had a very long day so elected for an early night in the knowledge that we should then wake up in good time on Monday 10th in order to start RV shopping.
I feel bad for you, reader, that to this point has taken so long and been so 'wordy'. If I've had enough of it, I find it hard to imagine you're still with me so let's move on. The American adventure... much fewer words and with more pictures, guaranteed!
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