Workamping or Work Camping?

I saw a comment on a forum the other day about work camping...that is, staying at a campground in your RV, and putting in a few hours of work at the campground in order to get your site and services for free. And a big discussion ensued about the various forms of work camping and the remuneration involved, if any.

The term "Workamping" was actually coined by Workamper News, which (before the internet came along) was the go to monthly publication  for those wanting to find a job work camping.

The benefit goes directly to the park

Every weekend when the park is busy during the summer, campers drink a lot of liquids. Soft drinks, juice, water, and of course lots of beer, wine, and liquor.

In Saskatchewan, all of the containers that these liquids come in require you to pay a deposit when you purchase them. That means that every single empty container has some value. Some people don't care about that value, and even though we have recycling containers throughout the park, they toss their empties into the garbage. Others simply take their empties home with them. But, a lot of people donate the empties to the proper bins, and the benefit goes directly to the park.

Out for a ride in our new kayak!

Our new kayak arrived on Friday.

Ever since we got the motorhome, we've wanted some kind of a boat to go relax and explore on the water. We thought about a canoe, but it wouldn't be convenient trying to attach it to Sherman's roof. And we knew that we could get an inflatable kayak but the ones that other RV'ers talk about on the forums cost upwards of $500, and we didn't want to spend that much without knowing how much we'd use it.

So when I spotted this one on sale for $100, we both looked at each other and said "buy it"!

Another thought on our motorhome windshield dilemma

Just to give you some background, the passenger side windshield of our motorhome has a crack about 18" long. The driver's side windshield  has a huge stone chip right in the center, and two smaller ones a little lower down.

We don't have glass insurance, and the cost to replace the windshields is minimum $650 USD per side.

But for $90 USD on Amazon.com, or $114 here in Canada on Amazon.ca, I'm thinking this crack and chip repair kit might be worth a try.

Where were you thirty years ago today?

Well we were at the hospital. But it was for a good thing!

Because today is our daughter Lindsey's 30th birthday. And she says she's having a bit of a tough time getting used to that fact that she's now starting her 30's. And I have to admit, it does sound a bit strange that our daughter is 30. But then again, none of us are getting any younger, are we??

The first day we met Sherman...

It was nine years ago today on August 19, 2007, that we did the five hour drive down from Ottawa, Ontario to the outskirts of Albany, New York.

We went there to look at a motorhome!

It was also the very first motorhome we had looked at. But, I knew what we were looking for and had scanned a lot of advertisements over the three weeks prior to that.

Good news, and bad news...

We own two vehicles...Sherman the motorhome, and the little blue car. And they both have windshield problems! Not bad, but enough to be annoying. The motorhome windshield is two pieces...there is a left side and a right side. The left side has two small stone chips, and one large one. The right side has a crack about a foot and a half long

So yesterday I made some phone calls.

Better to repair than to replace

In some situations. In other situations, it's better to replace than to repair!

But I had to come to some kind of decision about these lower door latches on the motorhome, because if I was going to order new ones I had to give them enough lead time so that they would arrive here before we leave towards the end of next month.

It's just the two of us now...

Our seasonal employee Valine had her last day of work on Sunday. Things start to quiet down here around this time of year and so she was scheduled to be finished now.

We also had two different gate staff helping through the busier period, but neither one of them lasted very long. Let's just say they didn't need the money very badly. At $12.60 an hour, you'd think it would be easy to find a teenager committed to the job, but apparently that's not the case.

And so it's just the two of us now to run the park for the rest of the season. That's what we've done the last two years, so we know that it's not a problem.

We want our money back!

Very often when you buy fruit in the grocery store, you don't know what you're getting. Oranges, cantaloupe, watermelon, and pineapple are all fruits that we have bought where you don't know until you get it home to eat it if it's any good on the inside.

And we're not putting up with it any more.

We bought a kayak!

Ever since we started RV'ing, we've always wanted a kayak. But we didn't want one of the hard sided ones because it would be too difficult to carry around. And the good quality blow up ones are like $400 or $500 and because we weren't sure how much we would use it, it was hard to justify spending that kind of money.

But yesterday, I spotted a deal. And when I showed it to Ruth, we both looked at each other and said "buy it"!!

Finally got the mosquitoes under control

Because of all the rain we've been having here at the park, the mosquitoes have been really bad. There was one week in July where you pretty much couldn't go outside without slathering on the bug spray. But I think we've finally got them under control with our new heavy duty mosquito fogging machine.

It took me a while to figure out the proper formulation to use for the chemicals, and the right settings on the machine. But now, it seems to work perfectly and is very effective at doing the job.

A few minor things going bad

Got into the motorhome yesterday to check out some of the problems our motorhome exchange guests had. They had very few problems actually. Sherman behaved himself while he was in their care! The major things were the inverters. The big one had gone bad a couple of weeks ago, and then the small one stopped working the day before they brought him back to us.

But yesterday, the small one turned on right away. As soon as I pressed the "On" button!

That is a lot of firewood!

We go through a lot of firewood here at the park. Of course it's not really camping if you don't have a campfire going, is it? At least that's what the majority of our campers seem to think.

And so we order a tractor trailer load of firewood once per year. It works out to 22 full cords. And no, you don't get much of a discount for ordering in bulk. $225 per cord, delivered all the way from Prince Albert, about 400 kms (245 miles) north of here.

Things are starting to wind down

It's hard to believe that things are starting to wind down already here at the park. I've got a simple little app on my phone called Dreamdays that counts down the number of days to important events. I don't look at it every day, but it's kind of fun to know that there are only 46 days (give or take a day or two either way) until we leave here.

Oh, and only 83 days until we fly to Romania...and 137 days until Christmas!