So Glad It’s 2021

I was going to make a post about “A Year In Review” for 2020, but… there’s not much to talk about, is there? I mean, we did get to go to Anza-Borrego State Park in January, which I have written about. And after that….

Well, we had plans to go to Thailand in May. Had plane tickets and everything. And then, Covid. The good thing was that United Airlines gave us all our money back without even a tiny fight. In fact, they offered.

We spent 2020 in lockdown, just like everyone else. We had a couple of day trips up to Big Sur, but that was about it. No real travel.

Our big twist, though, involved moving halfway across the country at the end of July – right when Covid cases were spiking.

It’s a long story why but the short version is that:

1. it’s very expensive to live in California, particularly on the Central Coast
2. Michael is originally from Northwest Arkansas, and his parents still live there.

We decided that moving to NWA would allow us to live cheaper and keep an eye on Michael’s parents. Michael was able to easily continue teaching, thanks to online classes, and my employer agreed to let me 100% work from home – and was okay with home being out-of-state. We both breathed a huge sigh of relief over that one, but honestly? Even if we’d both ended up unemployed we would have moved anyway. We figured it would be cheaper to be unemployed in Arkansas than in California.

We spent a lot of time planning this move. It wasn’t cheap, either. Now, when we stopped traveling full-time and settled in California back in 2017, we packed both vehicles and rented the biggest U-Haul trailer we could. We didn’t have that much stuff, having gotten rid of so much of it when we sold our house to live on the road full-time. Still, that U-Haul was packed solid.

We moved to Arkansas in late July 2020. In three years we’d acquired a bit more … stuff, shall we say. Mostly furniture. But we were not so sure all our stuff would fit in a U-Haul trailer and two vehicles.

Plus, we were going to drive through Southern California and central Arizona during what is essentially the hottest part of the year – and that was just on the first day! We really did not want to put too much stress on Taco Negro. It’s not that old of a truck (it’s a 2007) but we want it to last for much, much longer, so towing anything heavy during extreme heat was not an option we wanted to explore.

The first option we did consider was renting a U-Haul type truck (a 16-footer, which is the smallest truck that has a tow hitch) and then tow one of the cars (probably my little Honda) behind it on a dolly.

We went back and forth on this one quite a bit. It was the cheaper option, although that’s a relative term. But we joked about drawing straws for who would not have to drive the U-Haul! Because, really: a 16-foot truck, towing another vehicle? Just getting gas sounded like a nightmare. Then a helpful friend let us know another fun fact: those rental trucks have a governor installed, something that limits how fast the truck will go. And that limit is 55 mph.

Once we learned that, drawing straws was no longer a joke. Renting a truck sounded like a terrible option.

Another friend suggested we rent a POD. This is a company that rents out shipping containers and delivers them to your door. They were no-contact even before Covid. Also, PODs will ship the container anywhere in the continental US. A call to the company convinced us that this was our best option. It wasn’t the cheapest, although it was only a few hundred dollars more than the truck-and-dolly option. No, what sold us on the POD was the ease of use.

See, that shipping container arrived at our door about 10 days before we left California, giving us plenty of time to load. It got picked up the day before we left and was shipped directly to our new house in Bentonville. After it arrived we had another week to unload it (POD rentals are by the month). If we’d rented the truck, the longest we could have it would be 7 days. The drive alone take at least 4 days (considering that whole 55 mph speed limit), so we’d be under the gun to load and unload.

Financially the POD route was more painful, but the peace of mind and ease of use was incredibly worth it.

We could both drive the speed limit in our own vehicles, so we made the drive in 4 days. Each day meant somewhere between 8-10 hours behind the wheel:

Arroyo Grande -> Kingman, AZ -> Santa Rosa, NM -> Tulsa, OK -> Bentonville, AR.

Have I mentioned yet that on the first day, the high temperature (in Lake Havasu) was 117 degrees? By the time we reached Kingman that evening the temperature had dropped to a pleasant 99. The air conditioning in both vehicles worked great and since nobody was towing anything, stress on them was minimal. We spent some time along the old Route 66 and then finally got off I-40 at Oklahoma City. Our last driving day (by design, also the shortest driving day) involved seeing our friend Eric and his wonderful Tulsa restaurant/game cafe called Shuffles before heading across the border to our newest state.

I have to admit that I quoted Rey from The Force Awakens as I drove into Northwest Arkansas: I didn’t know there was so much green in the whole universe. Does that mean I’ve been out west for too long? Colorado is a high plains desert and California is a desert desert, so there’s just not a lot of green there. I guess I got used to it.

I’m happy to be getting used to all the green here.

Now we’re settled in Bentonville, a town of about 30,000 people and home to the Wal-Mart world headquarters. There are nine Wal-Marts in Bentonville alone! Okay, so that part was to be expected. But here’s the part I did not expect:

Bentonville is a bike town.

Our very first night here, we took a walk from our house to a place nearby called the 8th Street Market. It’s literally 5 minutes away and it’s home to restaurants, a brewpub, a yoga studio, a cheese shop and a chocolatier.

We sat outside at Yeyo’s and ate their fabulous tacos, watching people and enjoying the evening. And you know what? Everyone was on bikes. The 8th Street Market is right on the Razorback Greenway, a 35-mile paved bike path that goes all the way to Fayetteville.

The 8th Street Market is also about a mile from downtown Bentonville, which is the location of one of the trailheads for the world-class Slaughter Pen mountain bike trails.

Let me say this again: Bentonville is a bike town. This has made me so happy.

Now it’s January 2021 and I can’t believe how lucky I feel to have landed in Bentonville. We can ride our bikes to mountain bike trails at Slaughter Pen (and there are so many more than just Slaughter Pen!) as well as to the downtown Farmer’s Market. We can walk to the closest coffee shop. There are sidewalks and side streets for me and Bailey to walk on (and believe me, Bailey gets at least one walk per day). There are food trucks. There are local restaurants that we look forward to trying when it’s safe for us to do so (Arkansas is a red state, so there are no real lockdowns here. There have been no restaurant or gym closure mandates since we’ve arrived.)

I’m looking forward to exploring my new home!