Was the University of Pennsylvania Junior Gold squash tournament. Philly is perhaps an unconventional destination for an RV road trip. There’s the obvious issue of maneuvering through city streets towing a 25’ house on wheels. And the East Coast in general has far less public land than the West Coast, so it’s challenging to find places to legally park a travel trailer overnight. This is a topic I’ve done hours of internet research on, because RV park reservations with full hookups (water, sewer, and electricity) can be a significant expense. One very cool new solution to this problem is a subscription-based app called Harvest Hosts. Private landowners (farmers, vintners, breweries, gyms, even museums) sign up to be hosts, and RVers use a location-based search tool to find hosts. The deal is that the RVer can stay for free for one night as long as they’re “self-contained” (the rig is completely equipped with indoor plumbing and cooking facilities) and they patronize the business, for example by buying a bottle of wine or some produce. Harvest Hosts are a superb solution for periods of time when you’re making your way over a long distance and need a place to spend a night. Harvest Hosts also turned out to be a great solution when we needed a place to park our Airstream in Philadelphia during a squash match. We spent Friday evening in the parking lot of Elite Climbing, a rock climbing gym and Harvest Host just across the river from Philadelphia in South Jersey. While Tim raced against Friday afternoon traffic to get Graham to the Penn Squash Center on time for a 4pm match, Emma and I took care of patronizing the Harvest Host by strapping ourselves into harnesses and rock climbing shoes for a little exercise with our Airstream parked cozily outside.
Because we needed to be in Philly for the whole weekend, we did get an RV park reservation so that we could drop the Airstream and drive the truck, sans trailer, into town for matches. Unfortunately, the only reservation I could get was an hour outside Philadelphia. When we rolled in late Friday night, already physically and mentally exhausted from a day of towing and an evening of squash matches, Tim and I faced down our second-ever opportunity to back up the Airstream — this time in the dark, on a narrow campground road lined with trees, parked cars, and families circled around campfires who, to our surprise and dismay, did not hesitate to stroll over to us, flashlights and beers in hand, to casually spectate (and offer unsolicited advice!) as we nervously attempted to back the trailer into our assigned spot. Backing up a trailer, especially in the dark, is a two-person job, with one person driving and the other taking up a position outside the vehicle, kind of like the people with orange sticks that help airplanes align with gates. Tim and I were sweating bullets by the time the trailer was backed into place. Four wheel drive was required at one point, and four dudes had to move a picnic table and a fire ring out of our way. After what felt like an hour of maneuvering we ended up about 6” from a tree on one side and in the dark we couldn’t locate the water and sewer connections. It was stressful. To further raise the stakes, we couldn’t detach the coupler (part of our hitch) for reasons we never could identify, so the truck remained partially attached to the trailer overnight. With an 8am match for Emma the next morning, Tim and I would sleep restlessly, knowing that if we didn’t figure out how to free the truck from the hitch in the morning so we could drive into the city, she could be forced to default.
When Tim stepped into the Airstream that night after giving up on the hitch, we exchanged a glance that silently (so as not to scare the children) questioned whether maybe we were in over our heads. This would not be the last time we exchanged such a glance. Exhausted, we tucked the kids in and fell into a restless sleep in the main cabin on our converted couch-bed (which is actually pretty comfortable, not that it mattered; I would have slept on a bed of rocks as tired as I was).
Tim and I awoke before the sun to work on the hitch and make breakfast and prepare for a long day of squash matches. As we’d soon discover would become a pattern, each truly difficult moment of this odyssey would be followed by some of the most profoundly beautiful and unforgettable moments of our lives, giving us just enough forward momentum to keep going. For now: the hitch coupler was smooth as butter by the light of day, the kids not only played terrific squash but really coalesced in a positive way as siblings and teammates, having a blast at the tournament, AND, Tim smoothly accomplished our very first tank dump (a process which had mystified and terrified all of us, especially after we watched Robin Williams in that RV movie).
By Sunday afternoon, as the tournament concluded, we felt some relief at leaving the East Coast behind us and heading west…
The Peace of Wild Things 