Although we’ve truly enjoyed ourselves traveling around and touring the country, there is nothing like reuniting with family and friends after being away for almost a year. We began our visit “home” by spending time with some of our family and enjoying a great BBQ and fire at my sister Linda’s home in Uxbridge Massachusetts. There we were given a piece of prime real estate for our campsite with easy access to the showers and bathroom. We quickly realized this was strange for us because this became more like a vacation than a return home. The following day we spent some quality time with my daughter Melissa and her family at their house. We arrived before the kids got up from their naps so we were able to spend some time with Melissa and Josh before they woke up. Once the kids woke up we made an attempt at keeping up with our grandson Jon. LOL... It'll never happen. We also slowly but surely began bonding with our beautiful granddaughter Grace who hadn't seen us since she was 2 weeks old. Next we took a ride to Salem, NH to see Claudia's dad. We enjoyed a great lunch out where her daughter Laura and our granddaughter Mari joined us. It was amazing to see how much Mari has grown in a year and it was so great to see them all. We had a long list of things that needed to be done while we were back so we got things started while everyone else was working for a living. The following weekend my son Billy returned to our campsite at my sister's house to camp out with us for the weekend and this time he brought our 3 other granddaughters. Words can’t describe how great it was to see them all again. They were the ones we had the least amount of contact with while we were on the road so this visit was a real pleasure for us. Sunday was Grace's first birthday party at Melissa's house and we once again enjoyed the company of everyone. All 3 of our kids and all 6 grandkids were there. The following week we headed to our old campground in Connecticut to begin a weeklong visit with our camp family. It was so great seeing everyone again. We spent lots of time socializing and then partied with everyone over Labor Day weekend before returning to Uxbridge. There we spent the next 5 weeks enjoying our stay back at my sister’s which we nicknamed “Camp Sawash”. As planned, we took care of all the errands that we would normally spread out throughout the year if we had a stationary home. We took care of maintenance and inspections on our vehicles and received clean bills of health from our doctors letting us know that we were free to return to the road. We were able to meet our beautiful grandniece for the first time since her birth this past July 3rd. Claudia was able to spend a weekend in New Hampshire visiting her sister as well as an overnight stay with Laura and Mari. We also spent a couple of days down on the cape visiting my Mom who enjoys being the number one fan of our web site. Her input over the past year gave us lots of ideas that we added to the site. During our visit home we were fortunate enough to witness the marriage of Claudia’s only nephew Harry to his bride Cara. Another highlight of our visit was the day we spent with Melissa, Josh, Jon & Grace at the Southwick Zoo. It was Jon’s idea and he was the perfect host as he showed us around. Both he and Grace were great all day and we just laughed and played during our entire visit. We had a chance to visit with our kids and grandkids a number of times and we saw them as well as a few of the remaining family members during a farewell party that was held on Saturday and Sunday of our final weekend. Over the past year, each of the grandkids have grown so much but none more than Grace who was born 10 days before we hit the road. That shy little girl we met when we first returned and didn’t have a clue who we were now gets excited to see us just like the others. It’s a great feeling. Claudia and I are so lucky to have such a wonderful family and group of friends which ends up being the only hard part of returning to the road. The great part is that everyone supports us so that we can enjoy all those places we still have left to see. Linda and her family have been such great hosts. We became part of her family during our stay in Uxbridge with shared meals and activities and we already miss them all. Stella is also feeling the separation as well since she no longer has Tank and Minnie to play with every day. We’ll be staying in touch with our kids through video chat again this year and hopefully Grace will remember us when we return next year just like Jon, Kaylie, Erica, Julie & Mari do. We’ll do our best to keep this web site updated so that you can enjoy the journey with us. We hope you all stay healthy and happy. Love to you all!! Ed and Claudia
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