Stop 18, Saint Johnsbury, VT

 After packing up in the rain, tossing wet, dirty gear into the cabin of the teardrop, I began to realize that I needed to do something about my condition.  The idea was to stop in St J (the local lingo) and pick up a COVID test.  Frances found a Walgreen's drug store using Google, we we drove into town to pick one up.  When we got to the building, it was clearly closed.  Although it was a new building, it had closed its doors.  There was a market across the street, so Frances walked over to see if that had a test.  No luck.  they did tell Frances that there was a walk-in clinic. about 1/4 mile away.  So, we decided to go see if we could get seen.

The small waiting room was empty when we arrived.  I gave my insurance card to the receptionist.  I filled out one short form that took about 5 minutes.  During all this, the EMTs showed up and took a woman out on a stretcher, presumably off to a hospital.  I was then called back after about a 15 minute wait.  I got a COVID test, a flu test, and a strep test.  All came back negative.  I saw a really skilled nurse practitioner who was really targeted with her questioning.  I really liked the way she drilled down and asked for information.  Her most prevalent theory was a tic born infection.  I told her that we had looked at symptoms for Lyme's disease, and that my symptoms didn't clearly match up.  The NP was concerned about other tic born illnesses, some of which could lead to some pretty bad places.  She suggested that we take blood and have testing done.  Unfortunately, the full panel of test would take about a week.  As a precaution, she prescribed doxycycline which I started immediately. 

We drove on toward Waterville, ME in some pretty heavy rain, hauling a trailer full of wet, dirty wheels, tables, solar panels, etc.  We had decided that finding a camping spot and setting up in the rain was just too much given everything.  We got a spot at a Hampton Inn.  It is amazing how expensive hotel rooms have gotten.  The place is half empty.  It's not peak tourist season.  As far as I know, this isn't a tourist spot.  Still, a basic room with breakfast was $300 after taxes/fees.  Outrageous.  Still it was good to be dry and warm.   We'd been in the rainy, cool weather for almost 3 weeks, having seen only 1 day of sun since arriving in Caroga Lake.  

I got a call from the NP last night saying that the quick result from the blood test was inconclusive, but did not rule out the tic born disease that she was concerned about.  She suggested that I continue the antibiotics.  

This morning, I woke up feeling pretty good, at least by comparison.  I did feel a bit of an itch on my inner thigh. I took a look at the spot and voila, I spotted the classic bullseye rash of Lyme's disease.  Fortunately, doxycycline is the preferred treatment for Lyme's, so I'm already one the correct treatment.  

Tonight, we were supposed to be camping in Acadia National Park for 3 nights.  The forecast is for rain for the next 10 days.  Hopefully this is helping with the wildfires in Canada, but it's getting a bit old for us considering I'm still sick and we've got a trailer full of we gear.  Frances is doing laundry here at the hotel, but we've good a room in Bar Harbor for the next 3 nights.  By then, I hope I'll be improved enough to be able to do my share of the work to get the train back on the tracks with our trip.

Thanks to Frances, for all she did to care for me over the last 4 days.