Today is moving day for us. We are leaving the Orlando Thousand Trails preserve this morning, headed for Paradise Island RV Resort in Fort Lauderdale, about 220 miles south.

The “quicker” route is to get over to Interstate 95 and take the superslab south, but what fun is that? If you’ve been on one interstate highway, you’ve been on all of them. We prefer the “blue highways” that show us small town America, and where we can travel at a slower pace.

So instead, we are going to take U.S. 27 south, through Sebring and around Lake Okeechobee, hook up with Interstate 595, and take it to 95. Then it’s just a hop, skip, and a jump north to the campground.

Our friends Jim and Chris Guld, from Geeks on Tour, are staying at Paradise Island this winter, and we’re looking forward to spending some time with them, away from all of the hectic activity of an RV rally, which is usually where we cross paths.

We have had a very good time here at the Thousand Trails, and this is one campground we’ll be returning to again. Now that we have used up our allotted 50 nights per year that we get “free” under our Thousand Trails membership, any other stays are $5/night, which is a darned good price on a full hookup RV site! We do have to come back to this area in the next few weeks to have the nice folks at Camping Connection do our latest Norcold refrigerator recall, but during the winter the Thousand Trails keeps pretty full, so I don’t know if they will have an opening for us.

A while back, a gentleman named Ladd Lougee, an outdoor and fitness enthusiast, wrote me that he came up with the idea for a better travel chair when he was camping in the Mammoth Lakes area of the California Sierra Nevada Mountains. Ladd said that after squirming around in his chair in discomfort for the hundredth time, he asked if anyone else had a sore back from using the typical camping chairs. He was very surprised to hear that nearly everyone else in his group did as well. So Ladd said he set out to build a better chair, the result being the Strongback Chair.

Okay, a lot of companies and people contact me, telling me that they have come up with the newest and best whatever, from computers to books to widgets, and I have to admit that usually I’m a skeptic. Most of these outfits simply send me an e-mail press release and expect me to publish it, but I don’t do things that way.

I write back and tell them that if they want to send me one of their products to review I’ll look at it. But, they must be willing to accept the fact that if it is good I’ll say so, and if I think it’s crap, I’ll say that too. I seldom hear back from them after that. I’m never sure if they are just looking for free publicity, or if they don’t have enough faith in their product to let me try it. But Ladd offered to send me a chair to evaluate in his first e-mail. That’s always a good sign.

The chair arrived a couple of days ago, and after sitting in it a while, folding it up and stowing it in its nylon carry bag, and pulling it out to sit on again on different types of terrain, from grass and gravel to blacktop, it is absolutely the most comfortable camp chair I have ever sat in.

The chair is big and roomy, it has solid padded arm rests, a drink holder, and can hold up to 300 pounds, and best of all, its design incorporates a frame-integrated lumbar support that gives my lower back excellent support. Strongback Chairs come in two models, the Zen for smaller people, and the big, roomy Elite model that Ladd sent me.

My only problem with the chair is that Miss Terry likes it just as much as I do, so now we have to fight over it! Or maybe there’s going to be a new chair in her Christmas stocking this year?

Thought For The Day – Stop global whining!

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I try to be a nice guy, and I think most of the time I come pretty close. But there are times when I just have to be a jerk. Or at least some people think that I’m being a jerk.

It has happened a couple of times in the last few days.

I got an e-mail from a lady who purchased our RVers Guide To Fairgrounds Camping a while back, and was upset because one of the fairgrounds had raised their rates and we didn’t have the new rate listed. She wanted to know what kind of satisfaction I was going to offer her.

I replied that while we are constantly updating our guides, it would be impossible for us visit each and every place on a repeated basis to check on any changes. But we do send out inquiries twice a year asking for any changes. If they don’t give us updated information, we can’t reflect those changes.  We have a disclaimer in the first page of the guide that we are not responsible for changes in site fees, availability, or access. I also asked her what “satisfaction “ she expected on a $7.50 guide that still lists fairgrounds with RV camping sites in states from border to border.  

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I got a second complaint on the same fairgrounds guide, this time because a gentleman stopped at a fairgrounds in Wisconsin to spend the night, and they told him that their RV sites were closed for the season and the water was turned off. He told me he expected us to not only refund his money, but also to pay him for his night at a campground he did eventually find open. Well, that’s just not going to happen. I did mention that it was Wisconsin, in December, right?

Back in August, just before our rally in Elkhart, Indiana, a vendor came by Elkhart Campground while Terry and I were laying out the vendor sales area, and demanded that we move him because he was too close to another vendor selling a similar product. We agreed to do so, and spent some time shuffling vendor spaces to make him happy.

A few minutes later I got a call from the campground’s owner because he was in the office making demands on who would be parked near him. So I had to stop what I was doing to go put that fire out, and to apologize to the campground’s owner for his rude behavior.

Then, a day before the rally started, he called me to say that he could not attend the rally because his wife had a medical emergency that required a trip back to California. He also said that his expected merchandise had not arrived, and asked for a refund, even though we don’t give refunds on last minute booth cancellations. But because of the emergency, I told him that we would refund his vendor fees, to help cover the cost of their unexpected trip back to California. Even though we had been turning away vendors because we were full, which meant we would lose money.

However, once the rally had started, this same vendor came through the campground, putting fliers on all of the RVs, advertising his products, which of course ticked off the dealers who had paid for their vendor sites. So obviously, he did not have to go back to California for a medical emergency, and he did have merchandise if he was distributing fliers trying to sell it.

I called him about it, and told him I didn’t appreciate that, and that if he wanted to sell his stuff at our rally, he needed to come and set up the booth he had reserved. He hemmed and hawed, but never came back.

So he didn’t get his refund, and yesterday he e-mailed me wanting to know why. I told him why, and that he would not be attending any of our future rallies either. I’m a pretty easygoing guy, and I believe in doing what I can to accommodate my customers.

But sometimes I have to draw a line. I don’t like being lied to, and I don’t like being taken for a fool. That’s when the jerk in me comes out.

Thought For The Day – You never really learn to swear until you learn to drive.

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I’ve been working on the new issue of the Gypsy Journal, which I will be sending off to the printer early next week, and we still had a few bundles of the November-December issue left. We needed to get them distributed so we’d have room for the new issue after it’s printed.

So yesterday, we spent the day dropping off sample bundles at RV parks along Interstate 4 between the Kissimmee area and Interstate 75, on the west side of the state.

It was interesting see how folks were bundled up, due to the cold snap that has hit the South. Everywhere we went, we saw people in jackets, scarves, hats, and even gloves! And they thought they were coming to Florida to spend the winter basking in the sunshine!

I was surprised by how many Carefree RV resorts we stopped at! They have a lot of RV parks in Florida! All of them were very nice, and I really appreciate the fact that Carefree Resorts also gives veterans a 50% discount on RV sites. That’s very nice, and I made it a point of telling their managers that, at the resorts where we stopped.

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One of the campgrounds where we stopped, Tampa East RV Resort in Dover, has a special weekly rate that is good until the end of December, so we may pop in there for a week between Christmas and New Years. It’s about a half hour away from my nephew Steve’s place in Pinellas Park, and might make a good place to stay while we visit Steve and the rest of the family in that area.

One place where we won’t be staying, or doing any business at all, is at Lazy Days, the mega-dealer just off Interstate 4 that has an RV dealership, campground, Camping World, and Cracker Barrel on the premises.

We stopped there to drop off a bundle of papers, and the manager on duty said no, because we had two ads for RVs for sale in the paper. One is a tiny little 1984 Mirage camper with an asking price of $4,000 up in northern Indiana, and the other is an eight year old Class A gas rig a couple have for sale in Texas.

The manager never actually gave me the courtesy of talking to me, the message relayed by the young lady at the counter was that since Lazy Days is a dealership, they don’t want to “encourage the competition.” Yeah, that sixteen year old $4,000 Mirage is sure some competition for the land yachts that Lazy Days sells!

I find it interesting that Lazy Days has contacted us in the past suggesting that we consider holding one of our Gypsy Gathering rallies there, and they have sent me press releases in the past when they want free publicity for something. But I guess that’s a one way street.

But that’s okay, we found another campground just down the road that was happy to get the papers, and whenever anybody is RV shopping and asks me my opinion of Lazy Days (and I get a lot of people asking for advice), I’ll be happy to share it. Did you ever notice that the little mom and pop places are so much nicer to deal with, and that the biggest outfits are the most chickensh..?

By the time we were done, we only had two or three bundles left, and I’ll get rid of them at a couple of places we’ll be stopping in the next few days. It was twilight by the time we were headed home, and I don’t see well after dark, so Miss Terry took the wheel. We stopped for dinner at the Sonny’s Barbecue in Clermont, and by the time we got back to the Thousand Trails, it was downright cold again! It sure felt good to get inside, turn up the thermostat, put on our Teepee Creepers slippers, and warm back up!

Bad Nick is no fool. He stayed inside where it was warm all day, pounding out another Bad Nick Blog titled I’m Sorry, I Just Don’t Get It. Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – When you are dissatisfied and would like to go back to youth, think of Algebra.

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As I wrote in yesterday’s blog, I think Pennsylvania is one of our prettiest states. And yesterday we got to see some exceptionally picturesque parts of the Keystone State.

We were in bed early Wednesday night, but as tired as I was after our 420 mile day, I just couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned all night long, finally dropping off to sleep about 5 a.m., and waking up about 9.

We hit the road and traveled 41 miles east on Interstate 80, and then took the brand new Interstate 99 cutoff (which shows as U.S. Highway 220 on my Streets and Trips mapping program) south a few miles to pick up U.S. Highway 322 at State College.

Most of the 90 miles between State College and Harrisburg was nice divided four lane expressway, except for a 12 mile section between Tusseyviille and Milroy, which was two lane road, but was some of the most scenic of the trip. We passed small towns, pastoral scenes, and homes that must date back two hundred years or more.

This wasn’t a fast route, but it sure was a pretty drive. We climbed up several steep grades, and wound our way down the other side. Much of the route paralleled the Juniata River, and at one point, near Arch Rock, we admired the striations in the rock face where it had been cut away to make room for the highway.

I think it’s going to be an early and cold winter in this part of the country. In several places, the leaves are already starting to change.

At one point, after we topped a particularly steep grade, the speed limit for trucks on the downhill side was 20 miles per hour for about four miles. Of course, that didn’t slow down the cowboys in the big rigs, who sped downhill at 50 miles an hour or more. Where’s a cop when you need him?

Eventually we crossed to the wide Susquehanna River, which is spanned by several neat old bridges.

Then we came under this strange overpass, or bridge or whatever it is. There was no road across it, and no reason for it to be there that we could figure out.

As we got into the Harrisburg area, traffic became pretty hectic, and the drivers were pretty aggressive, pushing their way into any space where they thought they could fit. We snaked our way through it all, and eventually the highway turned into a two lane road as it passed through Hershey. About six miles east of Hershey, we turned down a narrow country lane for a couple of miles and came to the Thousand Trails campground, with 160 miles behind us for the day.

The place was pretty crowded, and all of the good RV sites were gone. Those that were left were all pretty uneven, and in the first three we tried, the only way we could get level was to raise our front tires completely off the ground. That’s not a good thing. Finally, after over two hours of trying, we got into a site where we couldn’t get completely level, but we’re close enough that we’ll live with it.

This is our second visit to this Thousand Trails preserve, and I had forgotten how many Canadian geese inhabit the campground. They are everywhere, and they are apparently very well fed, because there is goose poop in abundance. This is not a place to go barefoot!

By the time we we were finally settled in, we were famished.  We drove four miles back to Campbelltown. On our last visit to this area, several years ago, we discovered a great place called A&M Pizza, and it was just as delicious as we remembered. Yummy!

Back at the motorhome, we took a little nap, and then spent the rest of the evening watching TV, catching up on e-mail, and just relaxing. There has been far too little relaxing in our lives the last few weeks!

Bad Nick, on the other hand, has been loafing a lot lately. But he’s back with a new Bad Nick Blog titled A White Al Sharpton? Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – I used to be schizophrenic, but we’re okay now.

I had a conversation with some friends the other day about the benefits of towing a car behind their motorhome, and if they were to do so, what type of car to buy, as well as whether or not to use a tow dolly, as opposed to towing all four wheels down.

I don’t see how any fulltimer, or even an extended time RVer, can handle not having a tow car, sometimes called a dinghy, especially if they have a very large motorhome. I have known several that tried it, and all of them have eventually decided that the hassles of renting a car wherever they stop are just too much to deal with.

Several years ago, one of our students at Life on Wheels was convinced that he could save money by not towing a car, while his wife couldn’t understand why they should leave their perfectly good car behind and rely on rental companies. This man is a retired accountant, who by his own admission is “anal” when it comes to keeping track of every penny spent.

They are subscribers to the Gypsy Journal, and we have kept in touch over the years. They towed their Saturn during their first year on the road, and the second year the wife gave in, and they left their car with their son, so their granddaughter could use it to go to college. Bill told me that at the end of their second year, they had traveled 274 miles more than the first year, and they had saved $300 by not towing. This included fuel mileage, the difference in tolls between their two axle motorhome and the two extra axles on a tow car, insurance and registration on the car (which the son paid while his daughter used it), and two annual oil changes on the car. They decided that for less than $1 a day, it just made sense to tow their car.

We have known some fulltimers who used tow dollies, and again, after a year or so, most of them have switched to towing all four wheels on the ground, with a tow bar instead of the dolly. At a big RV park like Elkhart Campground, it’s no problem finding a place to stash a dolly during your stay. But at a lot of the smaller places we frequent, such as Tra-Tel RV Park in Tucson, it’s pretty tight, and most RV sites will not accommodate a tow dolly.

As to what kind of car to tow, the choices are wide, and a lot of personal preference comes into play. For years we towed a Toyota 4×4 extended cab pickup with a five speed manual transmission and a camper shell, and it was a great vehicle. A couple of years ago we switched to an extended length cargo van with an automatic transmission, to carry our toys, and to make loading the papers easier when we get a new issue printed.

We use a Remco driveshaft disconnect, which can be a real problem occasionally. You have to lubricate the linkage three or four times a year, and if you forget, it will lock up and you can’t get it to engage. This necessitates crawling under the van, disconnecting the locking pin on the driveshaft disconnect, manually rotating it into place, and then putting the locking pin back in. We’ve also had the driveshaft disconnect get fouled and lock up after towing the van down dirt or gravel roads. It was a lot easier to simply put the Toyota’s gearshift and transfer case in neutral and take off.

We know fulltimers who pull  fifth wheel trailers with huge medium or heavy duty trucks, who also tow a car behind the trailer. They look like a freight train going down the road, and I would probably run over a mailbox or a fire hydrant the first time I tried to turn a corner in a rig that big. But the folks who have them seem to be able to handle them just fine.

We’ve also seen RVers who carry small cars, or Smart cars, on the bed of their trucks, between the cab and the front of their trailer. I just know I could do thousands of dollars worth of damage trying to load a combination like that up before I hit the road! But again, the people who have them seem to have it down to a science.

I’m curious, what do you tow, and how? Have you tried RVing without a tow car?

Thought For The Day – If you worry about what might be, and wonder what might have been, you will ignore what is.

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