Leaving, Returning, Packing, Leaving, Returning, Packing, Leaving...

We left Montreal right before Thanksgiving, in the first real snow fall of the season.  As we were packing up the car for the drive out of Montreal, we marveled at how the first flakes came on so thick and heavy right outside our living room window (pictured above).

By the time we were on the highway right outside Montreal, it was fast becoming a winter wonderland.  Watching the alternately bleak and gloriously snow-blanketed Quebec landscape (pictured right below), we were simultaneously relieved that we were leaving Montreal "just in the nick of time" (before really hitting the blizzard season) and a bit sad that we wouldn't be able to experience (just briefly!) what real winter weather would be like.  After all, if we are seriously contemplating returning here to live, it seems to us necessary to know just how much worse Montreal winters are over the Chicago winters we were already familiar with.

It didn't take us long to miss not hearing French being spoken.  Just a few hours into the first day of the drive, we were already in Ontario, so the highway OnRoute vendors (like those working at the omnipresent Tim Horton's) were all speaking English.  We were wistful and sad, wanting to return to Quebec because we were longing to hear French again.

But then I had a somewhat different reaction when I had to call down to our (very "budget," pet-friendly) hotel reception in London, Ontario, to let them know that there was a lot of moisture in the carpet in our room.  I found myself uttering words like "precipitation," "anticipate," "direction of travel," "suspect," etc. and realized--with something akin to shock--that I was able to communicate and be understood!  I got off the phone feeling like someone stranded on a remote island who finds herself able to talk to another human being for the first time in years.

We made it back to Chicago just a few days before Thanksgiving, and we briefly reveled in the slightly warmer weather, our own space, and pretty sunsets outside our balcony window (pictured at the bottom of the post).  Home, sweet home!

But, of course, we had only about 36 hours in our condo before we were heading down to southern Illinois for Thanksgiving holidays.  In fact, we have been spending a LOT of time packing and unpacking, driving to and fro.  The month between November 19 and December 17 will have seen us leaving Montreal to return to Chicago, then drive from Chicago to the St. Louis area for Thanksgiving, and then back to Chicago, and then starting again from Chicago to head to Los Angeles.

All these long road-trips require a lot of planning, especially for those trips of over a week at various VRBO or Airbnb properties we stay at.  Thankfully--or unfortunately, depending on how you feel about car travel--Will and I are getting somewhat expert at the art of packing for extended trips away from home.  We have spent two weeks or longer at rental homes in Keystone (Colorado), Park City (Utah), Pasadena (CA), and two different apartments in Montreal (Quebec).

We are now about to start packing for another month in Los Angeles, and it occurs to us that a post about packing for rental properties might be helpful--mostly for our own future reference.  So, some comments and reminders:

If the rental property provides a list, do make sure that you check to see what kitchen items or other appliances you need or want are actually available to you.  Especially in rentals with outdoor spaces, we like to be able to grill.  With this last Montreal property, we were sold on the place in part because of lovely pictures of a nice and spacious deck with a propane grill.  Since there was already a grill, we decided not to bring our Coleman portable grill-stove.  Once we got to our property, we still found the lovely deck (pictured below) but no grill.  It turned out the pictures were from when the owner was living in the unit--and there was no grill actually listed as being available for tenants.  We spent many temperate evenings dining out on the patio, pining for our portable grill...

Do bring along kitchen items you cannot cook without.  In the kitchen of our first VRBO property, we found about a half-dozen frying pans, NONE of them useful.  Their bottoms were bent or handles partially melted or had unidentifiable food particles permanently etched into them.  All of them!  From then on, we bring along a heavy-duty non-stick 12-inch frying pan with us everywhere we rent.  Sadly, we forgot to bring a pan back with us when we left our Park City, Utah, property, so it's important to remember not to bring something you really cherish.  Which reminds me...

Make of list of and take pictures of what you do pack so that you remember to bring them back with you.  After we left behind our first pan, we got a replacement, but we have also been more vigilant about making a list of what we pack.  Especially once we decided that we need to carry decent knives with us, it's very important for us that we create an inventory of what we bring--and check against the list when leaving a property.  For instance, we bring a Brita water filter and pitcher, small Krups coffee grinder, a portable Bodum French press, Shun santoku knife, a Wusthof paring knife, a 1 1/2-qt sauce pan, and a 12-inch frying pan (both non-stick for versatility).  If we lost the others, we'd be sad, but losing the Shun santoku knife might actually bring on tears (which is why I convinced Will to bring only one of the two Shuns we have).

Bring along your spices.  We cook ALL THE TIME when we are at a rental, and we've quickly tired of the limited types of spices many places have on hand.  Sometimes, we are lucky if we can find decent salt and pepper!  Since we happen to cook a lot with cumin, persaillotte, cajun spices, etc., we just bring small bags of the spices we are not likely to find in typical rentals and which would be prohibitively expensive (or wasteful) to purchase elsewhere.  We also always refill and bring with us cheap Trader Joe's salt and pepper grinders, our favorite Yorkshire Gold English Breakfast Tea, at least a starter bag of coffee, etc.

There is a lot more to remember and to take account of, but this should get us started as we pack next week to head west!