theboondork's RV blog

vans

12/15/2019

Sometimes I think I could live full-time in an RV like this, other times I'm not so sure.

I spent some time this morning walking around the RV show, mostly where they had the vans and class B's, and what became quickly obvious was for their small size, their very expensive. But from what I witness as I drive around the West these class B's and other types of vans appear to be the fastest-growing segment of the RV lifestyle, and its easy to see why.

Other than the price there's a lot of good can be said about a class B especially for a solo traveler like myself. There's plenty of room for one person, or two people that get along exceptionally well, as long as you don't need that full-size apartment feeling that you get in a class A or large fifth wheel.

It's small enough that you can drive it to town to go grocery shopping, so you don't need a toad. Although from personal experience I can testify to the fact that having to pack up and break camp to run to the store gets old really quick.

It gets better fuel mileage than a class A or a giant trailer, but not as much as you might think. Their advertised mileage sounds okay, but after you load it up with all of your precious stuff that number goes out the window.

And speaking of precious stuff, I happen to have a little bit too much of it myself and at the moment I'm not sure if I'm mentally prepared to get rid of it all, and I'm pretty sure it all won't fit in a van, but I see there may come a day when a class B makes more sense to me than toting around a lot of things that I don't use very often.

You can Park it almost anywhere, and if you get one of the four-wheel-drive models you can go almost anywhere, and if you end up on a dead end road you can always easily back up and turn around.

One of the things that bothers me about them, and its the same reason why I don't have a class A, is I like to have my home and my means of transportation separate. But with the van, if it needs repairs your transportation and your home ends up in the shop, and you end up in a motel.

But there is good and bad in every RV, none of them are perfect for everyone and that's why there are so many different ones. You just have to decide on what's the most important things in your RVing lifestyle and find the RV that best fits the way YOU want to live.

theboondork

At first glance this looks nice, but picture getting down on your hands and knees every time you want to get something out of the refrigerator. And the gadgetry holding that TV to the wall looks like it came out of an alien spaceship..... Maybe it did.

I like the idea of a pop top for the extra room it gives.

But If I had to climb up this ladder to go to bed every night I'd have to stop drinking.

This looks pretty, but my experience has been the least important thing in choosing an RV is the looks.

4 Comments

Barney Ward link

12/15/2019 03:48:05 pm

That was a well done review of small motorhomes. Thank you. It saved me from having to go find out for myself, again, that they are not a good idea for me.

Tom

12/15/2019 04:32:31 pm

I really want to like them, I've talked to other full-timers that live in vans and they like them, and when I'm sitting and relaxing thinking about them I like them, but every time I'm around one, and especially when I'm in one I see things that I'm quite sure I would find pretty annoying in a very short period of time.

I was looking at some of them this morning that all of the outside storage compartment hatches were down around my knees, I would literally have to lay on the ground to get to what's in the storage compartment.

I also noticed I had to do a lot of ducking to keep from hitting something, especially when coming in the side door entrance I don't remember any that I didn't have to stoop over to get in. I've traveled in a van before and I don't remember that bothering me but I was in my 30s.

I don't know. I would like to get an RV thats smaller and less cumbersome than the Arctic Fox but so far everything I've looked at thats smaller and less cumbersome has other problems that are at least as difficult to deal with as big and cumbersome.

Tom

Linda Sand

12/16/2019 04:03:26 pm

In all the years we lived in Class Bs and Cs without a toad we never had to check into a motel. Most repair facilities have overnight parking on their lots and many have hookups as well. The one time ours had to stay inside a shop overnight we still slept in it--once you close the curtains inside looks the same as outside. Plus, being able to put away groceries while still at the grocery store sure makes running errands easier. But, we never had an under counter fridge in any of our RVs.

12/16/2019 05:22:53 pm

Yeah I think the undercounter refrigerator's were designed by someone under the age of 30 that taught yoga on the weekends.

I agree being able to put your groceries away when you come out of the store is handy but my experiences with a Ford Econoline van that I turned into a camper in the late 70s, a Hallmark pop up slide in camper I used in the early 90s, and the Bronco slide in pop-up camper I'm using when I'm in Colorado, tell me that packing it all up and marking my campsite with something I hope nobody will steal far outweighs the convenience of being able to put everything in the refrigerator at the store.

But then I guess it depends on how complicated your packing and unpacking procedures are, and how many people are driving around and around the state Park where you're at on a holiday weekend with a car full of screaming kids desperately looking for a somewhat empty spot to camp.

Now I have to admit that going through the hassle of all that did make me a better shopper so that I arrived at my campsite prepared to stay for a while without running to the store.

I think that having my transportation and my home able to be separated may be more of a mental thing then reality. In all the years I've been RVing I can only remember once when my truck had a problem that required me to stay in a campground for a couple of nights in my Thor fifth wheel [what a piece of junk] while the truck was being repaired. So It's possible my aversion to having my transportation and home in one vehicle is a solution looking for a problem.

Tom

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