RANDOM THOUGHTS ABOUT RV'ING

Since our first RV purchase 3 months ago after 5-6 years of racking my brain on various classes, gas versus diesel, length, etc. etc. we have come to the conclusion that we made the best combined decision.

RV'ing has been a pleasurable experience:
- family bonding time, playing corn hole, grilling, roasting marshmallows, etc. etc.
- off the grid, with no facebook, computer, data coverage, etc. etc.
- traveling to see the beautiful sceneries between here and there.
- enjoying nature trails and walks in the wilderness.
- meeting tons of nice people.

There has been some anxiety for me about RV'ing. Each trip I am afraid something will go wrong or I forget to do something. This anxiety made me extremely OCD'ish with check list. This week my wife witnessed an RV'er get underway with his antenna up (hope noting happened).

Hands down this has been the best purchase I have made. I am happy to be apart of this community and looking forward to the future.

I had to chuckle when I read your comment about forgetting to do something or afraid something will go wrong. There is not a person on this forum that has not had that happen to them. Read these and get a chuckle; years ago hubby drove our class A into our barn with the antenna up and yep needed a new one. Another time we were on a trip to Branson as a matter of fact and remembered about 20 miles away from home we left the garbage in the kitchen, yep turned around and went back home and got it, when we were ready to leave the campground our one slide would not come in, now that is a biggie and at some point it will happen. You deal with each thing as it happens and someone is always there to lend a hand or someone working at the campground can lead you to the right place to get it fixed. Okay the rest of you on this forum share some of your oopsies with JCSme2008 and the rest of us.

I use check lists all the time. I use one to get the house locked up when we leave. I have a 3 to 5 day pre-departure list, a day of departure list. I've used one for hooking up the toad, etc. Yes, I am probably OCD.

My confessions.... I drove off from an RV site and the electric was still connected. :whistle: It just pulled the connections loose in the RV. Stripped the wires again and screwed them back - all was fine. I also drove off with the roof-mounted satellite dish still up. I got about 2 miles down the road and saw my RV shadow - with the dish up!! Whew! Glad there was no low overhangs for those few miles.

Now, we have made it a habit for my wife to make a safety walk-around before I move the RV. She did catch us with the door awning still out. Guess those walk arounds help.

There's always something (hopefully only minor) that needs tightened or repaired. But when we had a "sticks and bricks" house, it also always had something that needed repaired.

Enjoy your travels! Don't worry about the small stuff, and everything is small stuff.

floridakamper wrote: I use check lists all the time. I use one to get the house locked up when we leave. I have a 3 to 5 day pre-departure list, a day of departure list. I've used one for hooking up the toad, etc. Yes, I am probably OCD.

floridakamper, good idea, I think I need to spread my pre-departure out across 3 days, because 1 day is wearing me out as the list keeps growing.

First, let me say that I am so happy to see you and yours enjoying your RV! Yes, it IS a great lifestyle.

Second, to sum up what has already been said, no one is immune to forgetfulness, or the RV demons that somehow cause things to go awry when we least expect it (or worse, can afford it!) :S

One way I keep my act together is as we prepare to leave a campground each morning, I try not to talk to anyone, or at least keep conversations to a minimum. Why, you ask? Well on at least three occasions my lack of attention to what I was doing cost me $$$ - the most expensive being I damaged the rear of my MH because I forgot to lock the hitch, and the trailer tongue released and rammed the rear of the MH when I braked for a stop sign.

Safe Travels - John