I have learned through my brief time on the road as an RV traveler that not all the people you meet at the park are staying there for pleasure or a vacation trip. They are there to work, using their motorhome or travel trailer as a temporary home base that is close to an area that has been ravaged by hurricanes and needs their clean-up efforts, or are on short-term work assignments at oil pipelines or other industries working in a given area for a brief period of time.
While I visited the New Bern NC area last week I encountered this; the aftermath of Hurricane Florence was seen and felt everywhere I looked and drove. The initial landfall and then the lingering rains while Florence parked itself on the coast for 2 days left major devastation. I was really amazed driving in to town to see abandoned buildings and just massive piles of wood and roof and furniture debris piled on the curbs. This went on for miles and miles even after I left New Bern and made my way in-land.
Most of us hear about these type of storms, watch them work their way to coastlines, see if they stop at Category 4 or scale to Category 5 heights. In the comfort of a non-hurricane area it’s time to tune-in the Weather Channel to see the reporters fighting to stay in place while being battered by raging winds and rains. But my trip reinforced the fact that the storm’s true impact is not just when it reaches landfall, but in the weeks and months and years afterward where local people and the work campers I met are putting all the pieces back together.
As I watched the roofers putting the RV camp office (that had been halfway underwater a few weeks ago) back together, and the overloaded FEMA trucks clearing away the curbside refuse, I felt a bit guilty. I am fortunate to have the ability to get my motorhome on the road and plot my maps to determine the best places to visit. I decided to donate a few items that I no longer needed to the campground which may help the efforts of those who are working long hours daily to make the hurricane a distant memory.
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