Perry, FL
Since leaving Pittsburgh in late November, we’ve put $1,265.59 into trailer maintenance and repairs. This averages out to $253.12 per month. Water heaters on campers last, at most, five years. We don’t know how old ours is, but we’ve had the trailer for two years now. A new unit costs $500, without installation and we both agree we’d have to let a repair service do the swap. It costs about $700 to have a holding tank replaced. We lucked out on the last one – we could repair the hole ourselves – but what about the next one? This seems like a lot of money to us.
Our new tire, currently playing the role of “spare” is rated for 1300 pounds. The trailer, dry, weighs about 3100 pounds. Regardless of how carefully we pack, or how slowly we drive, we’re looking at a lot of blowouts in our future. We’ve had only one so far (knock wood) and it occurred soon after we bought the TrailManor. It happened at night, on a blind curve, on the Pennsylvania Turnpike near Somerset. Blowouts are to be expected, but they are a potentially dangerous event and there is no way to predict one.
The next stage of cutting back on objects would involve changing the face of this trip. On one hand, I would welcome having nothing in the trailer that was not directly related to the trip. On the other hand, we need to maintain a certain quality of life. A year without games, puzzles, laptops (i.e. this blog and a website), knitting, drawing, or guitar (Kelly would add TV to this list) might not be much of a year.
The living space within the trailer is becoming confining and overwhelming. Only one person can be in the living space of the trailer at one time. So, if I’m cooking and Kelly needs to move to the back bedroom or bathroom, I stop what I’m doing and sit at the dinette so she can pass. We have to climb a step-stool and crawl over one another to get in and out of the back bed. The other day, I slept in and Kelly inadvertently moved the step stool. That first step was a real doozie! Nearly all of our belongings are stored in plastic boxes on the front bed area, next to the dinette. They seem to loom over us, like Snoopy in his tree. To reach the first row of boxes, we must stand on the dinette seats. To reach the back rows, we must climb up into the front bed area.
Our little box on wheels gets pretty warm and toasty on a sunny day. We have no air conditioning. We’ve thought up many solutions to this problem, but none is really viable.
So, what to do? On the issue of creature comforts, we could just suck it up. We could let go of everything not directly related to hiking, biking, or kayaking to cut back drastically on the weight. While this is appealing to me, it is not acceptable to Kelly. She’s probably right about that. Either way, I respect her needs.
On the issue of maintenance costs, there’s no way to avoid it. Just hope it stays at a manageable level.
The issue of safety is a show-stopper for me. I’m pretty sure our tires are over their weight limit right now and cutting back more on our stuff would not make enough of a difference. We’re going to have to come up with a solution.
Since leaving Pittsburgh in late November, we’ve put $1,265.59 into trailer maintenance and repairs. This averages out to $253.12 per month. Water heaters on campers last, at most, five years. We don’t know how old ours is, but we’ve had the trailer for two years now. A new unit costs $500, without installation and we both agree we’d have to let a repair service do the swap. It costs about $700 to have a holding tank replaced. We lucked out on the last one – we could repair the hole ourselves – but what about the next one? This seems like a lot of money to us.
Our new tire, currently playing the role of “spare” is rated for 1300 pounds. The trailer, dry, weighs about 3100 pounds. Regardless of how carefully we pack, or how slowly we drive, we’re looking at a lot of blowouts in our future. We’ve had only one so far (knock wood) and it occurred soon after we bought the TrailManor. It happened at night, on a blind curve, on the Pennsylvania Turnpike near Somerset. Blowouts are to be expected, but they are a potentially dangerous event and there is no way to predict one.
The next stage of cutting back on objects would involve changing the face of this trip. On one hand, I would welcome having nothing in the trailer that was not directly related to the trip. On the other hand, we need to maintain a certain quality of life. A year without games, puzzles, laptops (i.e. this blog and a website), knitting, drawing, or guitar (Kelly would add TV to this list) might not be much of a year.
The living space within the trailer is becoming confining and overwhelming. Only one person can be in the living space of the trailer at one time. So, if I’m cooking and Kelly needs to move to the back bedroom or bathroom, I stop what I’m doing and sit at the dinette so she can pass. We have to climb a step-stool and crawl over one another to get in and out of the back bed. The other day, I slept in and Kelly inadvertently moved the step stool. That first step was a real doozie! Nearly all of our belongings are stored in plastic boxes on the front bed area, next to the dinette. They seem to loom over us, like Snoopy in his tree. To reach the first row of boxes, we must stand on the dinette seats. To reach the back rows, we must climb up into the front bed area.
Our little box on wheels gets pretty warm and toasty on a sunny day. We have no air conditioning. We’ve thought up many solutions to this problem, but none is really viable.
So, what to do? On the issue of creature comforts, we could just suck it up. We could let go of everything not directly related to hiking, biking, or kayaking to cut back drastically on the weight. While this is appealing to me, it is not acceptable to Kelly. She’s probably right about that. Either way, I respect her needs.
On the issue of maintenance costs, there’s no way to avoid it. Just hope it stays at a manageable level.
The issue of safety is a show-stopper for me. I’m pretty sure our tires are over their weight limit right now and cutting back more on our stuff would not make enough of a difference. We’re going to have to come up with a solution.
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