Ordered a Slide Topper Yesterday for Our Camping Trailer

I am a little nervous. Yesterday I ordered a slide topper for the camper. I am planning to install it with Beth’s help. Adding something like this to the trailer makes me worry a bit. Drilling or taping holes in the fiberglass isn’t a thing to do lightly. Let’s hope that the instructions are clear!

I will post with details when it arrives and the installation is done.

Photos of Camping Trips and Special Places Visited

It’s a little sad that we don’t have a lot of photos from our travels and camping trips when we were younger. Digital photography is so wonderful. What a difference in just twenty years or so.

Before this millennium our photos were on film, what few we took. We didn’t have the money when raising our family to shoot and develop lots of photographs and only wish we had. The photos that we did take are precious to us. This must be true for almost everyone.

Here are a few old photos with the old tent.

Well as a result,  we don’t have pictures from many of our camping trips. We don’t have photos of vehicles and events that could be shared here either. These few excepted.

I suppose that the next generation will lament not having taken high definition videos as often as they will wish in their older age. What next – holograms? Perhaps. 

Well I got to thinking about this when looking for photos of us tent camping. That wasn’t so long ago.  But we have been camping since the 1970’s. Our old cotton duck Eureka tent was a big part of our recreation. Trucks came only in the 1980’s. At first we camped out of a  Volkswagen beetle.  Later we had a minivan.  I used trucks in my work, but we didn’t camp with them until about 2012 or so. By then it was just Beth and I once again.  Empty nesters. 

Photos from the Smokey Mountains. We were tent camping and had our bikes on a rake at the back of our 2009 F150 STX 4×4.

What I found though was that my old body didn’t still enjoy setup and knockdown of camp. I wasn’t thrilled with sleeping on a cot either. And I didn’t like getting out of the tent and to the campgrounds bathroom in the wee small hours of the night. I didn’t need to when I  was younger. 

So we evolved to trailer camping. Turns out we had a truck for towing. We could afford it, and having a bed, a bathroom, heat, and air conditioning turned out to be necessities not luxuries. Our truck made it possible to keep camping. 

Our first travel trailer. We did a lot to clean it up when we bought it on eBay. A 2008 FB189 Funfinder.

I actually wrote a short book about the experience. Here is a link to it at Amazon. 

And here is a link to a video that I did back then.

So we continue to enjoy the outdoors.  We take lots of digital pictures.  We have a good time. 

The Cost of a Truck

Good Looking Older Truck – A Keeper!

Buying a new truck can be a real challenge. New trucks are really pricy. It has been true for many years. Also, finding a good used truck with low mileage is difficult and has its pitfalls as well. Trucks by their natural are often heavily used and abused.

Recently I have been reading that dealerships are getting backed up with truck inventories. We also see that pricing incentives are becoming generous. It may be that the manufacturers have hit an inflection point and will need to start dumping vehicles to maintain their production. This may be a time to pay close attention if you’re interested in a new pickup.

On the other hand, the high valuations for existing older trucks is likely to start dropping, so if you have a truck that’s three to five years old, and you plan to upgrade, now might make the most sense. Sell high and buy low. Even then it’s a bunch of money to spend.

For me, I am keeping my 2014 F-150 for the long haul. Here in North Florida, on the Panhandle, folks drive trucks forever. I like that. I own my truck outright, and it has less than 40,000 miles on the odometer. It should last me a long time.

Camping Trailer Service Times

I recently wanted to have some service work done on our camping trailer. After calling a few RV dealerships I have found that wait times for service are months rather than days.

In this case I will do the work myself, but what does this tell us about the industry? It seems like there is a lot of opportunity for a new business with a sense for customer needs and wants.

Please post reasonable and respectful comments with your thoughts and service experiences.