theboondork's RV blog

the national forest beckons

6/2/2019

An Iris after the rain.

I've been giving some thought to taking a mini-vacation but I can't come up with a place I would like to go that would be easy to get to, not too far away and have relatively warm weather.

Anywhere in the high country is out, too snowy and too cold. Going east out onto the plains is kind of boring there's just not that much to see out there, but if there were you could see it from a looong way off.

One option I'm considering is just going out into the national forest somewhere and boondocking. I think maybe this won't be so much a mini vacation as a shakedown cruise. About the best way to tell what your RV needs to be comfortable and to suit your lifestyle is to spend a few nights in it, far enough away to be on your own, but close enough to civilization to buy repair parts.

So maybe that's what I need, a lazy, relaxing, stress free three day loop through the Pike national forest down towards Colorado Springs and then circle back up towards Denver boondocking in the forest wherever I happen to find myself in the afternoon.

theboondork

A red flower.

6 Comments

Tim link

6/3/2019 08:50:29 am

Hi Tom,

I've been keeping up with your journey of getting the truck camper and am really interested in seeing your adventures over the summer with it. A truck camper was an RV type that I had considered at one point - it never crossed my mind that it would be possible to have a fifth wheel and a truck camper; that's opened my eyes to future possibilities.

Last week, I was working on my solar system on the RV almost every day, with a couple of exceptions because of weather or other commitments. I have all eight solar panels mounted now, the wire ran from the roof to the solar charger in the front compartment, the batteries installed, the inverter hung, and some of the additional wiring done. I think it will take one more weekend to finish things up (which translates to it will take me 3-4 weekends, since everything seems to take 3-4 times as long as I think it will). At this point, it sure would be nice if the RV were sitting in my yard (if I had one now) and I could work on it a couple of hours a night.

I had a lot of fun working on the system, but I'm really tired right now and didn't have much time to do anything else, so I'm glad for the break of going back to work for awhile. Anyway, it's getting closer to being complete everyday, although it will probably take me a week to clean the RV up after all this activity.

Tom

6/3/2019 12:28:10 pm

I'm very lucky to have a summer home in a winter home, and even luckier to have a place to park both.

It sounds like you've made great progress towards getting your solar system working. Designing the system, and installing the system yourself will pay great dividends if something goes wrong down the road and you can fix it yourself or at least know what it's going to take to fix it. That little bit of peace of mind is worth a lot to a full timer and even more to a boondocker.

All my DIY projects take a lot longer to finish than I anticipate, and usually cost several times as much.

Since there's not much room in an RV, and a DIY project seems to spread all over the trailer, it's always a mess before anything gets accomplished. I always make sure my easy chair is empty just so I'll have a place to sit while I'm wondering why this project is taking so long and costing so much.

Tom

6/3/2019 01:46:39 pm

I agree about learning about my electrical system. I'm also learning a lot about the RV other than the electrical system by crawling around inside of it. It's been a great education for me and I've learned a lot. Plus, it's been fun.

It's surprised me that the things I thought were going to be hard were easy; for example, getting the panels up on the roof seemed like it was going to be a hard job, but was quick and easy. Same with getting the wire from the roof to the basement - that went fast as well (there is a space in the wall between the bathroom and living room for utilities and I ran the wire down through there). It was all the little things that added up and took a lot of time, as well as many trips to Home Depot (I luckily discovered there is a Home Depot about 15 minutes from the RV). I'm slowly whittling down all those little tasks that need to be done; but, I'm not in a hurry, so just enjoying it as I go.

I really like your idea of the mini-vacations with the truck camper. That seems like an idea why to go about it. As you mentioned in one of your posts, one of the things I hate about tent camping is unpacking everything and packing it back up. With the truck camper, that shouldn't be much of a concern and make it a lot more enjoyable.

6/3/2019 03:48:18 pm

Looking back on my worries and concerns about full timing, boondocking, Pulling a fifth wheel, and a 100 other things, I've always found the things that I was most concerned about ended up being the least of my worries and usually not a concern at all. I'm not sure why it works that way but that's the norm for me.

I'm glad I took those mini-vacations in the tent last summer, it taught me a lot about what was important to me at this point in my life and what wasn't. I thought there might be a teeny tiny itsy-bitsy vestige of macho man left in me that would be proud I could still camp in a tent.... But there wasn't.

The most important thing to me is being comfortable, if that need is not met then nothing else seems to fall into place. I need a semi-comfortable bed that remains dry throughout the night despite the rain. Something at least resembling a bathroom that doesn't expose my nether regions to the neighbors. And a way to have some control over the ambient temperature. Those are my bare minimums, and if those three needs aren't met then I'm not a happy camper.

Tom

Linda

6/3/2019 02:59:01 pm

That sounds like an excellent travel plan. We went to a park just 10 minutes from home for our shakedown cruise and were glad to be so close when we realized we forgot...

6/3/2019 04:01:47 pm

I enjoy taking a new to me RV out on a shakedown cruise. It's kind of like a first date, you have high hopes but you know you're going to be disappointed.

I always come back with a lengthy list of things that needs to be fixed or changed but I'm very appreciative of my date taking the time to make such a detailed list.

Tom

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