The maiden voyage

My tiny house on her first adventure on the road

Instead of hooking up the trailer to a vehicle and pulling it out of the backyard, we decided to use our houseguests and a little elbow grease. First we removed the heavy stuff at the hitch-end: spare tire and battery. Then, with John steering at the helm, Michael, Tom and I pushed from behind toward the back “barn door” of the garage. It was surprisingly easy and refreshing to know that, if need be, this could be a human-powered vehicle. Once on the flat cement in the garage it could be easily moved by one person.

There in the driveway little Christopher (Michael’s nephew) discovered the joys of trailer life. He was immediately drawn to the small space and seemed to feel that this was a playhouse just for him.

Two days later we said goodbye to family and friends and were off to San Francisco. Driving 55 (the speed limit when towing a trailer) makes the northward journey much longer. It was as if we were observing the I-5 traffic rather than being in it.

Night time came around. Exhausted, we rolled into a state park and were pleased to find a great pull-through camping spot. We put the bed together, crawled in our sleeping bags, and crashed.

The next few days were a blur. Since we were moving to a shared house in San Francisco, we didn’t have space to park the trailer, nor did we want to navigate the steep hills of the city with her. Amazingly, I found a towing company that offers self-service outdoor storage for only $40 per month. The sadness of leaving the her in storage would have been worse had we not felt confident about the safety of the storage lot. The owner of the company was extremely nice and I am happy to do business with him.

So here in row 2 is where our little trailer lives, for now, until we can figure out the next chapter of this story.

Our new backyard - no space for a trailer!