Our maiden voyage, or shakedown cruise, is a 1200-or-so-mile trip bringing the coach home from New Jersey. We decided to take our time on this, learning as we go and spending two nights at each stop. That will give us time to learn all the new systems that we need to use and know about and not be rushed in travel. It is, after all, our first time driving something this large. Our route will take us across Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana, with a bit of a detour into Michigan to visit friends.

The first day is really short, about 115 miles--just a couple of hours. We stop at French Creek State Park in Pennsylvania. This is a nice state park that has 50-amp service and full hookups for RVs, so we'll be able to use all our electrics, including heat and a/c, and practice emptying our holding tanks!  Oh, joy.  Turns out that while it's only 6 miles off the interstate, those are mostly very narrow twisting roads.....  Learning as we go.  We meet a couple Australians who have the same model coach that we have.  They come to the US 3 times a year and travel extensively.

Next on to Ohio. This is a bit of a long travel day, and we are staying fairly near where a friend and colleague of Jane's now lives after retiring a couple years ago. This will give them a chance to visit and catch up, and it's about halfway between our previous stop and Ludington, Michigan, where we go next.  We stayed at a KOA, mainly because it was close and it had gravel sites.  When you weigh 24,000 pounds, you don't want to sink into wet grass.  Here's our site in Ohio:

These guys were really helpful - they guide you to your site in a golf cart.  We have just pulled into the site and have not unhooked the toad yet.  When we do, it will park in front of the Motorhome.

Ludington State Park in Michigan is a popular park in the summer. It's right on Lake Michigan, and people book their sites well in advance. But in mid-May, you can still get a site, which we were able to do, so this will give us a couple days with friends of ours that now live in Ludington.  Here's a pic of our site, and the view out our bedroom window.