Week 19 – Vehicle related trouble. Quelle surprise!

​Just to recap, last week we had our new solar panels installed, which seemed to be fine, but we were having a little trouble installing the inverter (the device that enables us to use our plugs, microwave, etc via our batteries rather than having to plug into a mains).
 
Late on a Friday, of a public holiday weekend, we believed we were fixed and ready to go (on top of some other ‘necessary work that would only take 1-1.5 hours’, but took nearer 8 – but that is another story, for another day). We just wanted to get out of the garage and as far as we believed, all issues had been resolved.
 
Oh, how we wished!
 
Nope. We parked up on the Friday evening, 2 hours outside of New Orleans, to see our battery charge plummet at the 5% a minute rate again. Grrrr. Time to just unplug everything & worry about the inverter at a later stage.
 
But, on to more interesting things, and this travelling around the US of ours.
 
We needed a beach. We needed to just relax for a few days (oh, cos life is so tough travelling around. A few days in a garage, and suddenly we’re all soooo stressed. How have we lost perspective on reality so quickly?!). Pensacola, Florida was our first stop. Not sure why it is so recognisable a name, but I had definitely heard of it. As it was a long weekend, it was pretty rammed, but for a couple of nights we managed to park up pretty much next to the beach, and get ourselves a holiday sunburn (always happens, yet a few days later, always mildly satisfying). We then followed the Gulf Coast and drove past some amazing little tourist towns – proper picture postcard in which both of us were like, ‘this is proper Truman Show type town’, and lo & behold, a google informs us that it was. It really was something out of the movies. Everyone all smiles, chatting, cycling, perfectly manicured parks & lawns, etc, etc. (a little freaky if I’m honest!)
 
We then holed up in Panama Beach for another couple of nights, generally just chilling (& yes, me constantly checking the State of Charge on our solar panels), before a final little jaunt to Savannah & Charleston – our next stops up the coast.
 
So, not a bad little week all in all. This is what we were meant to be doing, just slowing down and taking our time with things. Long may it last I say…