First Week as Nomads

February 20-28, 2021
Buckeye, AZ | Leaf Verde RV Park | Week 1

Our first week as nomads…and what a week it was! From getting settled in, situated with work, a couple fun adventures…. to almost burning down our home & losing electricity. It’s already an adventure and we’re enjoying all the little moments!

This first week was a good test of how prepared we really are for our new lifestyle on the road as a minimalist…and I have to say, I think we did pretty good! Leaving our apartment on Thursday, February 18, 2021, already feels like so long ago. After staying the night at our friends beautiful home (thank you, Moya’s) we hit the road Friday morning and we were off on our first adventure in our new home, Giget! Woohoo! Our first night boon-docking was perfect before settling into what is now home for 29 days!

We pulled into Leaf Verde RV Resort in Buckeye, Arizona on Saturday February 20, 2021 around noon for an early check in. They had one of the guys, Walter, help guide us into a spot. I’m hearing the spots here are a bit smaller than what other RV parks offer, so they like to help guide folks in. We followed him in his golf cart as he guided us in to our space #324. Home Sweet Home.

We spent the weekend running errands and settling into our new home. Lots of unpacking and organizing. We definitely realize that we have too much stuff on board. After already purging so much for months, and putting it all in storage, we still need to let more things go. It’s really hard to purge! Will work on that and see how that goes…but it’s also going to be hard not to shop, since its so easy to get Amazon deliveries here!

First Mini Adventure in Buckeye:

We went to check out Gillespie Dam Bridge on Sunday.
This bridge was built in 1927, to allow for cars to travel across the Gila River. The bridge became one of the longest highway structures in the state of Arizona and was at first, the longest steel bridge.
It’s a beautiful bridge. We drove underneath and parked. Got out and walked around a bit.

First work week!

Gotta admit, it wasn’t easy to stay focused and work the first couple days. Even though Mike is in the garage and I’m in the living area and we are separated by a sound proof door… it can still become a bit distracting with being able to hear and see everything going on around you. Not everyone at the RV park is working, in fact, most people are not, so you definitely get a lot of outside noises throughout the day. This was easily resolved by using noise canceling Air Pods! Yay! Internet wasn’t working at its best the first day. Mike has been working on getting our antenna set up to pick up better service, hopefully. He also paid for the Resort Wifi and used that for a day or so, which free’d me up for my zoom calls. By Friday he got us both working on the same internet set up and things seemed to go just fine. Woohoo! We still need to get the Antenna set up on the roof, but we are waiting on some parts to be delivered before we can get that all set up. Better internet ahead! I hope… But our office areas are set up and we both are happy with our space!

Staying Active on the Road

We found a Crossfit box near by and joined for the month! Crossfit Fury in Goodyear, Az. We’re enjoying our time there. The coaches are great and the people are all nice. So far we’ve gone 3x this week, I’d like to see if we can do 4x/week. I also did a live, virtual Yoga class 1 evening in the RV. Space is a bit tight, but I made it work. We definitely want to continue to stay active so I’m hopeful to find Crossfit boxes anywhere we travel to. But if not, we each have a set of dumbbells, and we have 1 KB and some bands! (thanks Alex) Determined to stay active while on the road!

Daily morning walks are a must! Covid is still a thing while you’re living on the road, so it’s important to still get out, and get some fresh air! There’s some land just across the street from the RV park that I walk out to each morning. First couple mornings I would just stay up and down, near the main street, then eventually I got a bit more brave and wander a bit. Some mornings, if I’m lucky I’ll see some Bunny’s hopping around.

Went on a hike Saturday, Verrado Petroglyphs Hiking Trail. We started off our hike, 1 mile off route haha! I’m not very good with directions… so our 4 mile hike turned into 6 miles! Luckily for us, the weather was perfect. 71 degrees with a small breeze. We saw the big rock that had the petroglyphs. They secured it with a fence around it so that it can remain protected. The images looked pretty interesting. The cacti on this hike are huge! So beautiful! Really loving these desert vibes! We love to go hiking so this will definitely be a huge part of our adventures! Excited to see all the different trails ahead!

What’s going on while we’re at home?

Dinner is being made almost daily now, that’s a new thing for us. We were spoiled by so many good eats around us that we didn’t always have to cook. Cooking in this tiny space definitely has its challenges, but I also appreciate how everything is within arms reach. Cleaning is happening non-stop it feels like since the space is so small and is used for multiple purposes, it must always remain clean.

I almost burned down our home! Okay, maybe I’m being a bit dramatic…. but I did manage to cause a fire while pre-heating the oven. In a rush when moving in, I temporarily put a mini cheesecake pan with parchment paper inside the oven. It was at the very bottom and all the way in the back, so it was out of sight when taking out all the stored pans from the oven. While pre-heating the oven for dinner, I could smell something burning… next thing I know, I look over at the oven and there’s a mini fire in there! I completely froze of course and Mike came over with a cup of water to put it out. Haha, thanks Husband. The cheesecake pan with parchment paper was in there the previous night as well, when we baked a pizza, but didn’t catch fire…lesson learned. Do NOT put parchment paper in the oven, not even temporarily!

The electricity stopped working!! Oh no…what happened?!? And what is this $42 bill for electricity after only being here a couple days?! Mike was using his hand saw working on the cabinet outside for the grill/drawers and the electricity stopped working! He checked the breakers and the fuses, everything seemed to be in its place…we didn’t know what happened and how to get the electricity back up and running. We started calling around for a mobile service repair guy to come out and help us figure out the issue. The cost for an emergency call is a min of $500 for a technician to come out same day. We had to work, our internet wasn’t working since the electricity was out, so we kept on calling around trying to find someone who was available. Mike continued to troubleshoot and tried to figure out what we needed to do. Eventually we realized we just need to reset the GFI, thankfully a quick click of the reset button got us back up and running and saved us $500!! Oh, and the electricity bill of $42 for just 2 days, turned out to be a mistake, thankfully a quick chat with the people up front resolved the issue. Phew…that was a close one… Silly little things can end up costing a lot, so glad we got through all our little troubles on the rig.

That sums up most of our 1st weeks adventures as nomads! We’re definitely still learning a lot. The people around have been really nice. We also made friends with our neighbor, Jerry. He taught us how to play Pickleball! They have courts almost at all the RV parks for this sport. I can see us getting into it, super fun! I wonder what kinds of other silly things we’ll run into… but mostly, I’m looking forward to all the new fun things that will be coming our way!

And lastly, I’d like to share some interior photos of our new home for family & friends who have asked. We upgraded the cabinet handles, added some wallpaper, covered the sofas and added memory foam and covers to the stools!

Still soaking it all in, enjoying all the little moments that will one day be our best memories. It’s been a great start to our adventure! Enjoying this honeymoon stage. We are happy glampers!