Fishermen’s
Memorial State Campground
Friday,
26 October 2018
I have decided to trust the weather
reports that tomorrow’s storm will be a serious one and intend to
stay hunkered down in one spot all day (except short dog walks). That being the case, I had a lot of chores to get done today.
I went to the campground office at
8:30 as instructed and got checked into my new site but, for some
reason, their equipment kept saying my VISA card was a gift card and
it was refused. After they tried several times on 2 different
machines, they finally told me to stop back by later in the day when
the manager would be available.
I went to the laundromat I’ve used
before and ended up needing 2 machines because I decided it was time
to switch from my summer bedsheets to my winter ones, which meant a
lot of extra washing.
I called the repair place about fixing
the mud flap and, after they checked out the situation, they called me back and said
rather than fabricate a part what they should do is just order a new
one. Which made sense because of course Thor wasn’t going to
fabricate one of those things for each individual RV it was making
but would have a standard part for it. But they guy said it’d take
a week for the part to arrive and suggested I just go to a truck
repair place in Connecticut to get it ordered and fixed. He said all
the dealers were in the western part of the state (making it sound
like that was a long distance away) so I wouldn’t want to bother
with those.
In
the meantime, I was learning from calling around and checking online
that there are only 2 RV camps open in Conn. during November, and
both are expensive: $45/night. The difference is that the KOA in
eastern Conn. doesn’t offer a special rate for weekly stays while
the private campground in western Conn. does. The private place had
told me last week he thought he was already full for the month but I should
call him back when I had firm dates.
Now
that I knew I had only the 2 to choose from, I called and asked him
for any 2 weeks he could fit me in. So now I have a reservation
there from Nov. 1-11, with the possibility of the rest of that 2nd
week if he gets a cancellation he thought he was going to get. He
told me his place has only 15 sites, which explains how he can get so
filled up this time of year. At least I have a sure place to go. Without having a weather reading, I don’t want to commit myself to
sleeping in a parking lot and wind up in freezing weather with no
services.
I also stopped by the East Greenwich
post office: David told me he would send my mail to me this past
Tuesday or Wednesday, and I knew it might not be in yet but figured
I’d try, since I was sure not going to try tomorrow with the
weather forecasted. The woman at the post office acted like I didn’t
know what I was doing and bizarrely kept telling me they didn’t
keep any general delivery mail longer than 15 days, and when I told
her my brother had just sent it this week, she looked at me like I
was speaking Russian. Weird. I’ll go back Monday.
All day long I was seeing very large
flocks of geese flying south. In fact, I’m seeing large flocks of
them all over, feeding on lawns at schools and places. Winter’s
coming.
We
got back to the campground and I stopped at the office to pay and,
once again, the machines said my card was a gift card that it refused
to accept. So the nice young woman at the counter called her boss
and he said mine was by no means the only one that had happened to. He said that equipment was owned by ReserveAmerica, the private
company that seems to have a stranglehold on state campgrounds all
over the country. I’ve hated them almost since I first encountered
them.
So the campground manager got on the
phone to them and waited a long time to find somebody who was willing
to help, including waiting for a callback. The obvious solution was
for me to just go online because my card was accepted that way, but I
kept pointing out they’d charge me $8.70 if I went online but
nothing if I did it in the office. Which the manager pointed out to
the person on the phone and asked him to waive the fee, which the guy
said he couldn’t do. I’m telling you ReserveAmerica is not doing
a public service; they’re making only money.
While
I was waiting in the office I got a call from a private campground
here in Rhode Island because I’d been trying
to find someplace to spend the night of October 31st,
besides going back to the hotel parking lot. It wouldn’t otherwise
matter much but it’s Halloween
and I was very much afraid of being a sitting duck all alone in a
corner of a parking lot. But it seemed like every campground in
Rhode Island was going to be closed just like the one I’m in now. Even the ones who up until this year stayed open later were closing. So I was very happy to get this call.
The
woman said her campground’s over in Plymouth, north of Newport,
which would mean driving clean across Rhode Island and
Connecticut on November 1st,
because my first campground’s in the western half. And she’s
charging double what I’m paying here. But I need a place and I was
glad she called and I took my CREDIT card back from the campground
desk and gave it to her over the phone.
Turned out to be a lucky thing because
then this campground manager could tell the ReserveAmerica person
that he was sure my card was good because I’d just used it to make
another reservation right in front of them.
So not getting anything sensible from ReserveAmerica, finally this campground manager
told me forget all that, he just wouldn’t charge me for anything
tonight, and then I could make an online reservation for tomorrow
night and pay the $8.70 which would be easier to afford since I’m
getting tonight free. Nice guy. Name’s Mike Mahoney. But who
would have thought there’d be such a hassle. I was really ready
for a drink after all that but couldn’t say so because alcoholic
beverages are totally banned here. (Technically, though I found a
6-pack of beer bottles in the dumpster this morning. Should have
been recycled, actually, but they don’t offer recycling here.)
This
morning I gave Dexter a separate training walk as Courtney had showed
me, and when we went back and added Gracie I found Dexter was much
more controllable. But there’s not much room to walk them around
the laundromat or post office, and by the time we got back to the
campground and into our new spot I was too tired to try a separate
walk again. But this meant the joint walks were as out of control as
ever – it’s absolutely not all Dexter’s fault but when I have
both
of them tugging and pulling and running around at the same time it’s
a great deal worse than when I just have Gracie doing it. I know I
won’t be able to do training tomorrow if the weather’s as
predicted, but I absolutely will begin on Sunday.
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