I’m often asked about the favorite things we’ve done in our Roadtrek eTrek. At the top of my list is mountain climbing.
We used it to drive to the top of Pikes Peak, some 14,114 feet high.
It’s a long haul up and when we entered the road that would take us to the top off Highway 24 west of Colorado Springs, we had to have the ranger help us drive around a barrier meant to keep larger vehicles from attempting the climb. At first, they tried to wave us off. Then they saw that our Roadtrek RV was
Roadtrek Motorhome’s new e-Trek is now showing up in dealer showrooms across North America and I just may be the very first consumer to take possession.
Or so Chad Neff of American RV in Grand Rapids told me as he handed over the keys to Jennifer and I. Tai, our Norwegian Elkhound, had already ensconced himself inside.
My trek for the eTrek began in September when I went to the Roadtrek factory in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada to do a video news story on the new model, built on the Mercedes Spr
I’ve been an amateur (ham) radio operator for decades, My call is K8ZRH and there was a time when I was obsessed with the hobby, so caught up in making contacts with every state in the nation, every country in the world, that I stayed up all hours of the night tracking DX (distant) stations, Eventually, to keep peace in my marriage, I backed off and, for the past ten years or so, have been pretty much inactive.
Today, there’s an amateur radio transceiver installed in my RV. Not a CB radio, thou
We have discovered he one all important guiding principle that more than anything determines the success or failure of an RV trip: There needs to be a place for everything and everything should be in its place.
When we first began our RV travels, we took everything. Sometimes two of everything. Both Jennifer and I were so paranoid that we left something behind that we overcompensated. Our little 24 foot Class B RV looked like a scene out of that Hoarders reality TV show, you know, the one where
We just hit the road after a long weekend boondocking in our Roadtrek eTrek in the wilderness of northeast Minnesota, spending the weekend in it miles from civilization when the overnight temperature dropped to -21F/-29C.
Call us Ice Station eTrek.
Those frigid temperatures in the woods were the ambient, real temperature. But we had a very stiff northwestern wind that not only swirled up snow drifts all around s but made for wind chill readings of -50F/-45C.
We could not have been more comfor
Episode 4 of the Roadtreking Podcast – How and when to winterize
This is a jam-packed podcast with lots of very practical news and information. In it we talk about another anti-RV town… how and when to winterize along with lots of...
Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome
Source
I love kayaking. Except for occasional rental places I find in our travels, though, it’s pretty hard to do while Roadtreking.
I’ve been tempted to get an inflatable kayak but, well, I want a real one, with a composite body. The problem, though, is how do I carry it?
My friend Gary Hennes from Minnesota has solved that problem with a roof mount and a Hullavator mechanism that effortlessly lifts the kayak up to the roof of his 2006 Roadtrek RS-Adventurous.
He got his from a local outfitter nea
Roadtrek Motorhomes has released a new all-season, solar-powered 40th Anniversary edition of it’s 190 Popular coach that features a redesigned, higher interior and a stunning Mocha Steel tri-coat paint job that looks like diamonds have been embedded into the finish.
Roadtrek President Jim Hammill says the new model, revealed to attendees at the corporate anniversary rally in Branson, MO, continues a trend towards green energy use and extended dry camping through solar power. Pricing information
I came across this interesting You Tube video from a guy who calls himself “Master Luke.” It shows a 24-foot cargo trailer that he made into a totally solar-powered RV.
The entire roof of the trailer is covered with solar panels - 3,130 watts worth of them.
The Roadtrek eTrek we drive has a 5,000-watt inverter, a diesel generator and about 250 watts of solar power. But I reckon that we can get more practical RVing use out of our rig than he can with his. That diesel generator charges those ba
As we’ve traveled across North America, visiting wilderness areas and National Parks, one park consistently came up at the top of the list of must-visit places suggested by fellow RVers: Glacier National Park in far northwestern Montana.
Now that we’ve been there and spent most of a week exploring this dramatic and spectacular park, we know why.
But our adventure here didn’t start out well. We visited in mid-August, after school had started in much of the country. We thought the crowds would
I’ve spent much of the past two months using my spare time to study photography, though online courses, books and some classroom work. I also, gulp, bought a professional grade camera and have been learning its ins and out, too. All this in preparation for our RV visits to various National Parks across the country.
This year, I’m going to concentrate even more out there on photography, spurred on by the annual photo contest sponsored by the National Park Foundation.
The photo accompanying this
Actually, amend that headline. Pickleball is everywhere. In fact, its leading proponents claim it is the fastest-growing sport in North America,.though verifying that is not easy to do.
But there is no doubt that the sport, invented in 1965, is now hugely popular, particularly among retirees and in campgrounds, RV resorts, retirement communities and the like across Florida and the Sunbelt. Further, many snowbrird return to their northern homes each spring and bring their love of the game back w
The RV life is so much fun because you don’t know what adventure is around the next bend. But the people you meet along the way are equally enjoyable.
I don’t think Jennifer and I have yet to return from a Roadtreking trip without making some new friends. On our most recent trip to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, we met interesting people at each stop.
Up at the Historic Fort Wilkins State Park in Copper Harbor Michigan, we found ourselves sharing a campground with husband and wife Roadtrekers Dav
We’ve been traveling about two weeks out of every month and a nagging worry that doesn’t go away is the safety and protection of our sticks-and-bricks house.
So this past week, I just installed an alarm system on every door, every window, as well as motion detectors, water detectors, freeze monitors and carbon monoxide and fire alarms on both levels of our two-story home. All of the alarms are monitored 24 x 7 and I have a remote app for my smartphone and computer that lets me check in on what’
Jennifer and I went to the local office supply store over the weekend and picked up a new planning calendar for 2014. It’s one of those big, poster-sized ones with the entire year laid out in neat little blocks for each day of each month. It’s erasable – a good thing with our propensity for last minute trips and change of plans – and right now, it’s blank.
But we’re about to start filling it in. We’ve gone through and listed all the places we want to go, the things we want to see, the people we
Scratch another place off my bucket list: Bois Blanc Island, in the middle of Michigan’s Straits of Mackinac, half way between the Upper Peninsula and the Lower.
As we were rounding the Lake Huron shoreline of the Michigan Mitt and driving through the northeastern town of Cheboygan on our Verizon Great Lakes Shoreline Tour, we saw a sign that directed us to the ferry dock.
The Straits of Mackinac were right off our righthand side as we made our way north on US 23 but this ferry was not for
Happy New Year!
Like many we’ve been reflecting a lot on the places we’ve been and the people we met in 2013. We’ve even drawn up a tentative travel schedule of our planned travel destinations for the new year.
But I’ve also come up with some new goals, above and beyond the specifics of where and when we’ll go. I call it my Roadtreking self improvement list.
Here are the things I want to learn or do better with in 2014:
1) Stop, look and listen more – Last year was a crazy year, travel wise
The annual Recreation Vehicle Industry Association trade show in Louisville is the big one for the RV industry, providing a sneak peek at what’s new aimed at dealers and industry insiders to help them get ready for the next year. Held at the Massive Kentucky Exposition Center, this year’s 51st edition of the show opens Tuesday. But Jennifer and I got in early for a sneak peek of our own.
The RVIA expects more than 8,000 attendees this week. Over 300 acres of display space will be filled by 61
John and Terry O’Brien love old travel trailers.
From their Silver Springs, FL home, the New York transplants did one up in the style of the Fifties a couple of years ago. It was so unique that the Travel Channel saw it at an RV show they were covering, did a feature on it and as a result, John received an offer he couldn’t refuse.
So when they saw an old beat up old 1987 16-foot Casita travel trailer in a junkyard not long afterwards, they knew it was time for another restoration project.
Th
Dolly Towing With Our Roadtrek
We had no problems driving our 2015 Roadtrek CS Adventurous E-Trek while towing our Prius 1,900 miles to Arizona. End of story, right? Well, not exactly. Getting to that decision...
Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome
Source
The budgeting mess and political wrangling in Congress over Obamacare has ruined the vacation plans of tens of thousands of RVers who had planned to camp in a national park this week.
The closure of the national parks is also hitting hard the bordering communities whose economic livelihood is closely tied to a steady stream of national park visitors.
At midnight, all activities at the parks, except for necessary emergency services, were immediately suspended and the parks closed indefinitely.
We’ve been in Redmond, Ore., most of the week attending the Family Motor Coach Association 90th Family Reunion and Motorhome Showcase (a rally). The aerial photo above, taken by the FMCA, shows the 1,500 coaches parked here at the Deschutes County Fair & Expo Center.
There’s about 3,000 people here and, like all such big gatherings, there are lots of folks to visit with, motorhomes to tour, evening entertainment programs and vendors to haggle with.
We spent a great night socializing with t
One of the great things about having a Class B RV like our Roadtrek eTrek is that it also can function as a second vehicle.
I’ve used it to run errands, drive to and from meetings and work-related activities, church and – while Jennifer is shopping – a comfortable place to chill out while in the parking lot of the mall.
I’ve also used it for what I call mini-vacations, short day trip respites of a few hours to parks, lakeshores and the like. Sometimes, I’ve put the bike rack on, drove to a big
One of the great joys of traveling North America in an RV is the way it connects you to history and the people and places that have shaped us. So it was for us when we came to a historic site along the famed Natchez Trace where American explorer, soldier, and public administrator Meriwether Lewis – best known for his role as the leader of the Lewis and Clark Expedition with William Clark – met his death on October 11, 1809 under highly suspicious circumstances.
He was 35 years old at the time,
We visit Southwest Georgia about every two months, and have been for about ten years now. The big attraction for us is that thus is where our son and his family live but besides that, we have found lots to recommend here to RVers looking for a great place to get away from the RV travel routine and connect with the true deep south.
In the winter, the sun shines most of the time and daytime temps in the 60s are pretty normal. Sometimes even in the 70s. They have to start cutting the grass in Marc
