Roadtrekingmike

Happy Holidays Any Time! Earlier this summer, Olga, my RT Adventurous, went to the RV spa for some revitalizing treatments and beautifying. She got 2 new uber batteries. The retractable step was repaired... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

Mini Office for Your Class B At times on the road we need more than a laptop computer – we need an entire office. The need arises to scan something or print something or even just... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

One question we get a lot when we talk about our love of being off the beaten path and away from everyone is, “Why? What do you do there.” This is as good a time as ever to try and answer that because, as I type, we are very deep in the woods, in the middle of the Pigeon River Country State Forest Area at the very top of the Michigan Lower Peninsula mitt, a 105,049-acre area so vast it rambles across Otsego, Cheboygan, and Montmorency Counties. This is one of our top five favorite places to get away from it all and while I can’t technically say we are boondocking – we are in the tiny 10-site Round Lake Campground – it’s pretty much the same thing as there are no hookups here. There is no one else here. Just us, in our Roadtrek Etrek. So what do we do here? Sit outside and listen to the sound of silence – Yes, silence has a sound. No motors, no highway noise. It’s the sound of wind sighing through 100 foot white pines. A string of 50 or so Canadian geese, far overhead, honking their way south as the great fall migration begins. Go hiking with a camera – There’s a great fern-lined hiking trail that makes its way around the tiny little lake, The only other tracks I see are from an elk that took the same route, not long ago judging by their impressions in the sand. I tread as quietly as I can, stopping often, hoping to see the elk. I never catch up with him. But around me, the oaks and birch leaves are just starting to turn red and yellow. The blue sky and big fluffy clouds reflect off the water. The air has a slight chill to it, and it deliciously smells of pine. We prepare dinner in the Roadtrek - There may be no electricity here but we have our own in the Etrek. Jennifer made a fresh salad and warmed up her world-famous crock pot turkey stew on the inductive stovetop. We butter some fresh bread we picked up at a bakery on the way up. For dessert, we had home grown Michigan watermelon. Then, as darkness came, she sits up front to read and I do some computer work in the back. There is no cell coverage here. But as I’m writing this post, my computer trills with a FaceTime call. The Wilson cell booster and the external antenna I have mounted on the roof has given me a great Internet connection. On the other end of the FaceTime call is my friend Chis Guld, of the Geeks on Tour team. With husband, Jim, she’s at the Roadtrek Rally in Pismo Beach California, teaching the 120 or so Roadtrekers at the rally their most excellent tech classes. Out in California where Chris is, it’s that golden time of day. As she walks around the campground with her smartphone, it’s clearly Happy Hour out there. Somebody puts a bottle of red California wine in front of the camera and offers me a virtual glass. I exchange greetings with many. John from Canada is there. Pat and Pat, a couple I met last summer in Nebraska, come over to say Hi. Roadtrek International President Sherry Targum tells me I’m missing a great rally. They see me, seated in the back of the Etrek, with pitch black outside my windows. I see them, with Palm trees and parked Roadtreks in the California sunset. Technology connects us. Them, at a close-together, very social and fun gathering, Jennifer and me boondocking alone in the peace and quiet of the Michigan woods. The best of both RV world camping styles, brought together. How cool is that? We will make the bed and turn in early. It’s hard to describe how restful it is sleeping when all about you is nothing but wilderness. Sometimes, late at night, we have awakened to hear deer moving past. At least I think it is deer. Besides elk, there are coyotes, black bear and, some say, wolves in this vast wilderness tract. Jen and I are missing Tai, our Norwegian Elkhound. He’s back home with a dogsitter. Tomorrow we head to Mackinac Island for a couple of days and, alas, dogs are not allowed at the place we are staying. We would have stayed with my daughter and her family. But our granddaughters recently got Guinea Pigs as pets and as far as Tai is concerned, they’re nothing but rodents. And he’s the exterminator. Last time we were there, we caught him standing on a sofa, wagging his tail in anticipation as he stared down into their cage. So this trip, he’s at the dogsitter. Tai loves the Roadtrek and eagerly jumped in this morning as I drove him to the dogsitter. I’m sure he thought it was another adventure, after traveling coast to coast with us this year for weeks on end. Words can’t describe the look of betrayal on his face as I dropped him off. I felt so guilty leaving him behind for this trip. He’ll be glad to see us when we pick us up Sunday night. Then, he’ll sulk for a couple of days. We’ll promise to take him on the next trip. Maybe back here in a couple of weeks, when the color peaks. So that’s why we like off-the-grid RVing. As I re-read this, I worry that it will sound boring to some. It doesn’t sound very exciting. Yet to us, it is. And it has become so much a part of our lifestyle now that we need regular doses of this special away-from-it-all time or we start to go a little stir-crazy. It’s not for everyone. But it sure is for us. Round Lake in northern Michigan’s Pigeon River Country Stare Forest. An elk went down this trail not long before I did. The leaves are just starting to turn their fall colors. The wind signs through these pines producing a delightfully soothing sound. Chris Guld at the Roadtrek rally in California FaceTime called me in the Michigan woods.

Why we like boondocking deep in the woods One question we get a lot when we talk about our love of being off the beaten path and away from everyone is, “Why? What do you do there.” This... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

How We Roll in our RV: Tech use while on the road Every week we get at least one question about how we use technology while traveling. In this edition of How We Roll in our RV, you get to see the... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

Hot Topic: Carrying firearms in an RV It’s certainly one of the most controversial topics there is among RVers. I’m talking about guns and carrying them in your RV. I get reader questions on this all the... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

Since I released the post on the 10 lessons we’ve learned in our 75,000 miles of RV travel, several readers have asked for another installment. So here it is. This one, though, has 12 things we’ve learned from the road. 1) GPS units are all unreliable – If you rely totally on GPS to get you somewhere, sooner or later you’re going to miss your mark and be lost. In my role as a tech reporter for NBC affiliates, I’ve tried them all – Garmin, Magellan, TomTom, Rand McNally, the GPS apps, Google, Verizon, the GPS apps offered on Android and Apple devices and, of course, the built-in Clarion system that came with our Roadtrek Etrek. They all fail. They all are incomplete. Maps differ between them and there are GPS dead spots. A GPS transceiver needs at least four satellites to get any kind of a fix. Even on flat ground with a clear line of sight there can be dead spots. In order for your GPS transceiver to detect a satellite, the signal from the given satellite must be strong enough for the transceiver to pick it out of all the background noise. According to the website Richard’s Mobile Blog, the way the GPS transceiver detects a signal is by detecting phase shifts in the satellite signals. Too many satellite signals canceling out or distorting or too similar to each other will make it hard for the transceiver to know what satellite is what. So, the transceiver just gives up as if there were no satellites were there. The solution: Carry paper maps. We have a shoebox full of state maps. We now use them more and more. 2) You really can overnight in a rest area – Well, at least you can if you don’t set up camp early in the afternoon, put out the lawn chairs and string those obnoxious twinkle lights that some RVers insist on using outside their rigs. Rest areas are to rest. Pulling in after dark and leaving in the morning after a night’s sleep is not going to get you in trouble, unless you make it look like you are spending the weekend. It helps being in a Class B. 3) Stay away from trucks when overnighting – Whether a Wal-Mart or a rest area, steer clear of trucks. They run their engines all night long. They pollute everything around them. They are noisy. On a lonely stretch of US Route 212 in Montana, we looked in vain for a national or state campground one night this summer. There were none. Most of the area belonged to the Crow and then the Cheyenne Indian Reservations. Finally, about 11 PM near the town of Broadus, we found a state rest area and turned in. We even saw another Roadtrek parked there, along with a handful of trucks. We awoke at 1:30 AM to the sound of rumbling engines and the smell of diesel fumes. The place was bathed in light. Besides running their engines, many trucks keep their lights on. Every inch of space was taken up by trucks. There was no more sleep. We left and drove all the way through into South Dakota, finally finding a KOA near Spearfish a little after 3 AM. It was not a good night. We’ve had variations of that experience at many a Wal-Mart and now know… stay away from trucks. 4) We do not need campground electricity – In fact, with our Roadtrek Etrek and those eight coach batteries, the 250-watt solar panels that keep them topped off and the 5,000-watt inverter, we actually have more power in the unit than we do from plugging into a campground’s 30-amp service. So unless I will be running the power-hungry air conditioner for 12 hours straight, we seldom plug in these days. There’s no need to. 5) Campground Wi-Fi is a joke – Don’t even bother. Unless you are the only campers around. Otherwise, the guy three units down streaming Netflix videos has gobbled up all the bandwidth. Campground Wi-Fi is shared. That means s-l-o-w. We carry our own Verizon Mi-Fi data card to create our own network. But maybe I should quit talking about that. Because we noticed this year that in many a campground, so many other people are now doing the same thing, that often even the cell service is so maxed out it is almost as slow as campground Wi-Fi. See why we like boondocking? 6) Fall is the best time to hit the road – The RV boom has its down side. This was a very busy summer. Crowds at campgrounds and national parks were overwhelming. The absolute best time to hit the road is mid-September. Just about everywhere has great weather this time of year. In the north, fall colors are starting. In the south, the sniffling heat of the summer months has eased and the snowbirds have yet to arrive. Nights are cool and comfortable. Next year, we will plan our long trip from September through November. 7) Winter is also a great time to RV – I am always amazed at how many people reject winter camping. I’m not talking about heading to Florida or Arizona. I’m talking abut Northern Minnesota or Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Winter wonderland comping. We always do a winter trip. This year, it will be to Michigan’s UP and Tahquamenon Falls State Park, where the DNR always keeps a few spots plowed. The only thing different about winter camping s that you keep your heater running all the time and you flush the toilet with antifreeze. You take bottled water because the pipes in your RV are winterized. But the scenery is spectacular. If you dress warm, hiking or snow shoeing or cross country skiing are great. And sitting around a blazing fire with two feet of snow on the ground is awesome. Oh yeah, the stars are brighter in the winter, too. 8) Pay your bills online – We have now enrolled for automatic and/or online bill paying for all our credit cards, our sticks and bricks house utilities and are able to handle our personal and household finances from the road as easily as when we were at home. We’ve learned that every bank will let you draw cash on a credit card. We use one designated credit card for all food, fuel, campgrounds and traveling expenses. This gives us a detailed record of our spending that we can use for budgeting and planning and we don’t have to worry about carrying lots of cash. 9) Join a national health club chain – You need to work out. You really do. Walking around the campground is not working out. We picked a national chain – Anytime Fitness. We have found places all across the country and really love this chain because they have very nice, clean and private bathrooms and showers. We also belong to the YMCA, which has branches across the country. Every other day, we try to plan our overnight stops in cities that have places to work out. This is Jennifer’s hard and fast rule. She gets very cranky when she misses more than a couple days of working out and I have learned, well… happy wife, happy life. 10) The RV lifestyle can be very unhealthy – Related to the above is something I hate to say but I think it needs saying. So I will. Food and drink consumption need to be controlled. We spent a week this past year on a very nice campground (I won’t say where) in which every day was themed to some event that involved alcohol. It started with Sippin’ Sunday, Margarita Mondays, Tipsy Tuesdays, Wild and Wet Wednesdays and so on and on. There were parties and happy hours every night and the place, made up mostly of seasonal RV residents, seemed to be stuck in the Sixties. The music around the pool played non-stop oldies and it was like these seniors were on perpetual spring breaks. It would have been amusing if it were not so sad. There were people whizzing by in golf carts that should have been pulled over for DUI. The only good thing was these were, after all, seniors, and by 9 PM, they had all gone to bed. We’ve seen this in different degrees at other places and have had other RVers tell us they have noticed the same thing, too. So there. I said it. Lets move on. 11) Staying connected online with RVing friends – I am amazed at the friends we have made from the road and online and how easy it is to stay in touch with them and feel connected through our Facebook Roadtreking Group. Many of us have met in person across the country on various trips. We communicate daily through this group. We have planned our own very low-keyed rallies and have asked questions and received help and we kid each other, encourage each other and are inspired by each other – just as friends do. When we travel, we share photos and its like we’re all traveling together. W e are all very different people individually, but we’re bound together by our love of RV travel and have created a community that is simply amazing. Who’d think such friendships could develop online? 12) Re-Read the RV manual – When we first got our RV, we devoured everything we could about it. I remember staying up all one night, like till 3:30 AM reading every manual back to back. Then I put them away. Early this summer, I sat around under the Etrek’s awning on glorious June day overlooking a Cape Cod beach and re-read the manual and learned stuff that either didn’t register the first time or that I totally missed. If your RV is a Roadtrek, you can download the latest manuals here. If it’s not, dig out whatever you got when you purchased it and keep it handy. I have downloaded our manual, printed it out and keep another copy electronically on my laptop. I may never be a mechanical expert like Campskunk but the manual at least gives me the confidence to know what I should be doing. If not, I can always ask Campskunk and other on the Facebook Group. Wow. That’s 12 more lessons. Added to the first 10, that’s 22 lessons. I think there’s still more I could do. Later. Maybe.

More RV Lessons from the Road Since I released the post on the 10 lessons we’ve learned in our 75,000 miles of RV travel, several readers have asked for another installment. So here it is. This... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

If you like gambling, you’ll probably love Deadwood. If not, probably not so much. After years of passing by on the way to the Badlands or Yellowstone and seeing the signs, Jennifer and I made a recent RV sidetrip to this town on the edge of the Black Hills of South Dakota. The entire city is listed on the National Historic Register. The city aggressively promotes itself as having done a careful, accurate restoration of a historically significant western city so we figured it was worth checking out. The Victorian architecture is indeed attractive. And the turnaround of the town itself is a a great come back story. Deadwood was truly a wild west boom town, thanks to the God Rush of 1876 that brought the likes of Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane. Gambling places lined the main street. There were real gun battles and many of the west’s most colorful characters passed through. And then it was passed by and a long, slow decline took place. According to the town’s official website, by the mid-1980’s, many of the city’s historic buildings were dilapidated. In 1986, Deadwood citizens formed the “Deadwood U Bet” organization and advocated legalized limited stakes gaming to increase tourism and generate historic preservation funds. Legalized gaming in Deadwood began on November 1, 1989. Gaming over the past fifteen years has revitalized Deadwood’s tourism industry and provided lots of revenue for city government activities and historic preservation. Today Deadwood, with a year round population of about 1,300, is the largest historic restoration project in the United States. Which takes us back to gambling. I counted no less than 25 casinos and gambling halls, some open 24/7. We’re not talking Vegas glitz, we’re talking penny slots, $1,000 limits, lots of Blackjack and, on the sidewalks outside, lots of seniors puffing cigarettes. The town’s most famous resident, Wild Bill Hickok, was not a long-time Deadwood citizen. Just a few short weeks after arriving, he was gunned down while holding a poker hand of aces and eights – forever after known as the Dead Man’s Hand.. He is buried in Deadwood’s Mount Moriah Cemetery, along with such notables as Calamity Jane and Potato Creek Johnny, Seth Bullock and Al Swearengen. The cemetery offers a a self-guided tour. A couple of times a day, traffic is stopped and there are staged gunfights downtown, with a local actress dressed up like Calamity Jane entertaining the camera toting tourists before the bad guys and the Marshall take the streets. We spent a couple of hours walking around Deadwood. If we were gamblers, maybe we would have enjoyed it more. As it was, I think we can say we probably won’t be back. The town is very friendly to RVers. While there’s little or no parking along main street, parallel streets offer lots of lots where, for $5, you can park all day. Great Victorian restoration Deadwood had its share of “fancy ladies,” as they were called, and these mannequins along a downtown building depict. I counted 25 casinos and gambling halls. Calamity Jane entertains the tourists. The town Marshall deputizes the kids. Several times a day, staged gunfights depict the town's Wild West Days.

RV Sidetrip: Deadwood, SD If you like gambling, you’ll probably love Deadwood. If not, probably not so much. After years of passing by on the way to the Badlands or Yellowstone and seeing the... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

The story of the American bison is one of the most sad and captivating episodes in U.S. history. Once thought to be limitless in number – an estimated 50 million ranged across North America before European settlement – they were hunted to near extinction in the late 1800’s. Greed by hunters and a calculated political effort to eliminate the food and main staple of the American Indian tribes were the reasons. From 50 million, the senseless slaughter left about 100 animals in the wild in the late 1800s. What happened to the bison is truly one of America’s most shameful stories. For non-native buffalo hunters they were the equivalent of a gold mine on four legs. This group hunted bison from trains and horseback for their tongues, hides, bones and little else. The tongue was, and still is considered a delicacy. Hides were prepared and shipped to the east and Europe for processing into leather. Remaining carcasses were, for the most part, left to rot. By the time nothing but bones remained, they too were gathered and shipped via rail to eastern destinations for processing into industrial carbon and fertilizer. By the 1890s with numbers nearing extinction, the bison "gold rush" was over. At the same time, the American government openly encouraged elimination of the Plains Indians’ primary food source, the bison. In so doing, the Indians would be forced into relatively small areas, or north into Canada. In either situation, food sources were either scarce or non-existent. The results were starvation, and high infant mortality amongst the Indian populations. In the end the west was open to European settlement and the start of the western beef industry. The past can’t be undone. Today, though nowhere near the nubers of the 19th century, the bison is no longer in danger of extinction. the total herd size is in the 500,000 range, about 250,000 of which are based in Canada. And in west central Montana, the National Bison Range has played an important role in the successful recovery of these magnificent animals. The fact that we can still see bison on the landscape is one of the finest accomplishments in the history of the National Wildlife Refuge System. President Theodore Roosevelt established the National Bison Range on May 23, 1908 when he signed legislation authorizing funds to purchase suitable land for the conservation of bison. It was the first time that Congress appropriated tax dollars to buy land specifically to conserve wildlife. The overall mission of the National Bison Range is to maintain a representative herd of bison, under reasonably natural conditions, to ensure the preservation of the species for continued public enjoyment. The original herd of bison released in 1909 was purchased with private money raised by the American Bison Society and then donated to the Refuge. Today, 350-500 bison call this refuge home. It is a great lace to visit. There are two loops that you can drive and see these magnificent animals, often also spotting the black bear, pronghorn antelope, mule deer and elk that share the 18,700 acre range. One loop, only five miles, is a flat gravel road that larger RVs could handle that goes by a bison display pasture. It takes abut a half hour. The best loop, though, is only for automobiles or Class B RVs under 30-feet in length. It is a hilly 19-mile, one-way gravel road with lots of switchbacks and 10% grades that gains 2,000 feet in altitude. There are two hiking trails along this route. The half-mile Bitterroot Trail and the one-mile High Point Trail provide spectacular overlooks of the prairie. Dogs, on a leash, are allowed. But the rest of this great preserve is off limits to hiking. Visitors must stay in their vehicles.Allow two to three hours for this route. And make sure you have your camera, as evidenced by the photos Jennifer and I took on our visit. The Range is one of the last intact publicly-owned inter-mountain native grasslands in the United States. The visitor’s center has a great display and lots of information. In general, the longer and steeper Red Sleep Mountain Drive is open from mid-May to early October with the shorter Winter Drive open the remainder of the season. The Visitor Center, with displays, restrooms and bookstore, is typically open daily from mid-May to early October but has limited hours during the winter season. The range is strategically located about mid-way between Glacier National Park and Yellowstone National Park, not far from Flathead Lake and a half hour or so north of Missoula in the southern tier of Montana’s Glacier Country. It overlooks one of the longest valleys in the region: the Bitterroot, nearly 100 miles long and 25 miles wide, bordered by the jagged peaks of the Bitterroot Mountains on the west and the rolling terrain of the Sapphire Mountains to the east, There’s no camping at the National Bison Range and the preserve closes at dark. Camping can be found around Missoula to the south and in some of the smaller communities near the range. Drive slow. They walk right out in front of you and often like to hold staring contest with nice looking RVs. Pronghorn antelope The Bitterroot Trail leads to a spectacular overlook. Educational display outside the visitors center The deer and the antelope do indeed play on the range with the buffalo. This young pronghorn found some sweet grass. Elk are also common throughout the range. Elk drop their impressive antlers each year to grow new ones. This display of a bunch of dropped antlers is at the visitor center and is a common decorative piece you’ll see throughout the west.

National Bison Range is perfect for a Class B RV visit The story of the American bison is one of the most sad and captivating episodes in U.S. history. Once thought to be limitless in number – an estimated 50 million... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

Well, at least it’s not going to erupt anytime soon. Probably. This has been a strange year at Yellowstone National Park, which indeed sits atop a supervolcano. Two months ago, extreme heat from the thermal features below caused oil to bubble on a road surface and damage a 3.3-mile loop road that takes visitors past White Dome Geyser, Great Fountain Geyser and Firehole Lake. A couple months before that, some yahoo posted a video on YouTube purportedly showing bison in the park supposedly evacuating themselves in anticipation of an eruption at the park. Park officials patiently explained that it was not unusual to see bison running – indeed, everytime we go we see lots of running bison – and that the bison in the video were actually heading deeper into the park, not away. But that video went viral. Over 1.5 million people have watched it and there are dozens of copycat re-posted clips. It really appealed to the conspiracy nut jobs. Add to that the fact that the park experiences frequent earthquakes including one that measured 4.8 in March – the biggest in more than 20 years – and you can see why its been a very busy year for park officials who have finally posted a whole web page debunking the hoaxes and foolishness. Here’s the official statement: “There is no evidence that a catastrophic eruption at Yellowstone National Park is imminent. Current geologic activity at Yellowstone has remained relatively constant since earth scientists first started monitoring some 30 years ago. Though another caldera-forming eruption is theoretically possible, it is very unlikely to occur in the next thousand or even 10,000 years.” So there you go. For Jennifer and me, the thermal activity at Yellowstone is as big of a draw as the wildlife. We keep going back year after year and visiting thermal features. “Yellowstone holds the planet’s most diverse and intact collection of geysers, hot springs, mud pots, and fumaroles,” according to the National Park Service. “Its more than 300 geysers make up two-thirds of all those found on earth. Combine this with more than 10,000 thermal features comprised of brilliantly colored hot springs, bubbling mud pots and steaming fumaroles, and you have a place like no other…Yellowstone’s vast collection of thermal features provides a constant reminder of the park’s recent volcanic past. Indeed, the caldera provides the setting that allows such features as Old Faithful to exist and to exist in such great concentrations.” If you go, be sure to pick up the newspaper that the park service gives you. Or download the free Yellowstone trip planner. Pets are not allowed anywhere near the thermal activity. There have been incidents where they have broken away and plunged into what they thought was just a pretty pool of water. The outcome is too gory to print. And I shouldn’t have to say this but do resist the urge to touch the water. You will be scalded. I say all this because the park service makes it very easy to get very close to the geysers and boiling pools. And it should go without saying that you should not go over one of the barricades. The signs about unstable ground are accurate. Fortunately, most of the spectators are respectful and cautious. And come away absolutely delighted by this awesome park. We always do the lower loop first, past Old Faithful and Biscuit Basin. We budget a full a day for visiting the thermal features, camping overnight in one of the park campgrounds. Then we head out the second day for the northern and eastern loops, saving at least half a day to see the travertine terraces at Mammoth Hot Springs. Here are some of our favorite pictures of Yellostone’s thermal features. Maybe I’ll do a post in the future about our favorite hikes and our favorite places to see animals at Yellowstone. But after our third visit in three years, we continue to love the place. I really want to visit the park in the winter. Hope you enjoy these photos. Look at the boiling mud. It looks like an artist’s paint pot. This beautiful sapphire pool is about 200 degrees F. Small geysers like this one erupt by the hundreds every day. The color at Biscuit Basin in Yellowstone’s far northwestern Upper Geyser Basin is a photographer’s delight. There are numerous geysers that have dramatic daily, even hourly eruptions, besides Old Faithful. The landscape is like nowhere else on earth. Boiling. bubbling mud that emits a strong sulfur smell.

Yellowstone supervolcano is not about to blow, says park service Well, at least it’s not going to erupt anytime soon. Probably. This has been a strange year at Yellowstone National Park, which indeed sits atop a supervolcano. Two months ago,... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

RV Side Trip: UP Michigan’s Palm Book State Park I had traveled throughout Michigan’s Upper Peninsula over recent years but had never heard of Palm Book State Park. Now that I know about it, who would want to travel... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

We just turned 60,000 miles on our Roadtrek Etrek as we pulled into our Michigan driveway after our latest trip, which essentially was four months on the road through 21 states, taking us from Cape Cod on the Atlantic to the far Pacific Northwest. When you add the 15,000 miles we drove in our first RV – a 2006 RS Adventurous – that now gives us 75,000 miles under our collective wheels. We are no longer rookies. Indeed, we’ve learned a few things. And I’ve made some mistakes. But you’ll have to read to the end of this for my confessions. Granted, these are our own RV lessons. They’re personal, related to our style of travel. They may not be what you want. 1) There is No Hurry – Okay, sometimes you really do have to be somewhere at a certain time but, in general, RV travel needs to be flexible. To enjoy it to the max, you need to be able to stop when you want, where you want. Setting an agenda, over-planning and plotting out stop-by-stop overnights is way too organized for us and causes us to miss the things you can’t find in a book or through online research, the things that just happen, like taking a road far off the interstate just because it looks interesting. It almost always is, unless it’s US 20 in Iowa. But hey, even that was worth driving because it gave me an example to cite as the word’s most boring drive. 2) Don’t believe interstate exit signs – Pet peeve time. I owe US20 as the inspiration for this, too. A sign along the interstate says there is gas, in my case diesel, at the next exit. You take it. At the top of the exit ramp the sign again says diesel and points to the left. Great. Uh huh. That diesel is 5.4 miles away in town. Meaning a more than 10 mile time-wasting roundtrip. I have found the RoadNinja app the best tool for finding reliable fuel at exits. Interstate signs are a scam. I’m convinced the various state highway departments get kickbacks from local merchants to lure unsuspecting travelers off the road. Probably not true. But it helps to have someone to blame. Which directly leads me to the next lesson 3) Stay off the Interstates – They are boring. You’re in a tunnel. Trapped on the concrete. Buffeted by trucks. Surrounded by eye-pollution in the form of roadside signs. Forced to drive at ridiculously fast speeds. Everything around you blurs by. The only food available at the exits is fast food which is invariably bad food. Sometimes, there is no choice. Around big cities, interstates help get you out of the congestion. But, generally, two-lane roads – the so-called blue highways – are always more interesting and get you closer to the places and people that make the RV life so enjoyable. 4) Take less clothes – We use eBags. Jennifer has three pink ones. Girls always need more clothes. I take two blue ones. I dare not peek in hers. But for me, one bag is for underwear, socks and T-shirts – I pack five of each. The other is for an extra pair of shorts, a pair of jeans and three shirts. In our wardrobe I have on a hangar a dress pair of slacks, one dress shirt, one sweater, plus a rain jacket and a fleeced sweatshirt. Jennifer has the female equivalent in the wardrobe. Plus her three pink bags. We hit a laundrymat or pick a campground that has a washer and dryer about every five or six days. 5) Good camp chairs are a must – When we first started, we used two collapsible and telescoping Pico chairs. They’re okay. Chief benefit was they break down small enough to fit in the rear storage under the rear sofa. But they really aren’t very comfortable. This year, we bought two of the gravity chairs that let you lie back and look at the sky. That’s what we call them. Our look-at-the-sky-chairs. They are inconvenient when it comes to traveling with them but so worth it when we want to relax somewhere. We store them folded up in the back, in the space between the rear sofa and the passenger side bench. These gravity chairs take up a lot of room but are worth it. 6) Follow the 230 rule – I had a fulltimer explain this to be early on. The 230 rule is “you stop when you have driven 230 miles or it’s 2:30 in the afternoon.” A variation is the 300 rule. No more than 300 miles or stop by 3:00PM. Regardless, the idea is get somewhere while it is still early enough to explore, chill, enjoy the place when you’re not wasted from driving mega miles. We are trying to adhere to that rule. In our early days, I looked at the daily driving mileage as a challenge. The more the better. I kept trying to set anther personal best. It’s 735 miles, by the way. Silly. Stupid, really. Is there anything worse than pulling into a campsite after dark? Less mileage and stopping early is our new mantra. 7) Put away the bed – Granted, this is a personal preference. I know many Roadtrekers use the two single beds and leave them made as a bed everyday. We tried that but we prefer to sleep with the bed made up as a king. And every morning, we put it and the bedding away and make the back into a sofa again. It’s neater, gives us more space a place to eat, work on the computer and not feel cramped. The few times we’ve left it as a bed has made the coach feel way too small. 8) Eat out often – Okay, here’s where we are way, way different than most Roadtrekers. But, again, this has worked best for us. For our style, not yours. I refuse to feel guilty about this: Most of the time, we eat in restaurants. We do fix breakfast in the Roadtrek, usually something simple like cereal and a banana. I carry a Keurig coffee maker and make two cups every morning. We usually pick up lunch at a restaurant and, about every other day, find a local place for dinner. When we do fix dinner in the Roadtrek, it’s simple and light, like grilled chicken strips over a salad. We use the Cuisinart Griddler for grilling and most of the cooking we do, instead of a charcoal or propane grill. The local restaurants really give you a feel for the people and place. It’s as much cultural as convenient. So we don’t fight it or feel shamed because we’re not carrying lots of frozen dishes and cooking every meal in the motorhome. We’re not full-timers, though the last four months have sure seemed like it at time. If we were, it would be different, I’m sure. But for now, we eat out. A lot. We cook on the Cuisinart Griddler. 9) Winter is just as much fun as summer – We camp out in our Roadtrek all year round. Alas, we do have to winterize, living in Michigan as we do. But other than having to drink from bottled water and flush the toilet with antifreeze, it’s just as easy to RV in the winter as it is in the summer. Winter RVing is awesome. The crowds are gone, the snow makes everything beautiful and it is really, really fun. If you want to try it, drop me a note. We’re planning a winter camping trip to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in February and will invite a few winter camping newbies next year. 10) Don’t make impulsive purchases – Here’s my confession time, where I mess up all the time. Case in point: Two folding bikes. I shelled out over $1200 to buy two Bike Friday folding bikes this summer when I saw them at a rally in Oregon. Big mistake. Yes, they are cool bikes. But, really, we didn’t need them. We have two full-sized bikes at home. If we will be using a bike a lot, I just need to put them on a bike rack attached to the rear hitch. I’m going to list the bikes on Craig’s List and make a promise to Jennifer to never again buy on impulse. I may also be listing the StowAway2 cargo box I bought this year (another $700 impulse buy.) Yes, it holds a lot of stuff. But we really don’t need a lot of stuff. The more we RV, the less we find we need to pack. Oh yeah, then there’s my drone. Another impulsive purchase. I’ve used the camera-equipped quadricopter fewer than a half dozen times on our trips. Maybe that will go on Craigs List, too. Wanna buy a cargo box, two folding bikes and a drone? Impulsive purchases all. So there you go ... my top 10 lessons learned. There were a lot of other things we’ve learned. But they tell me blog posts that have the phrase “top 10″ in them are read a lot more. Nobody would read “the 37 things we’ve learned…” So maybe I’ll do another list of my “top 10″ other lessons down the road. And another one after that. How about you? Use comments below to pass along the things unique to your RV style.

Have you seen the new TS Adventurous? It was last December at the big RVIA industry show in Louisville, KY that Jim Hammill and his Roadtrek team showed off a prototype vehicle called the TS Adventurous, a... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

Apps. There are so many apps that empower our smartphones and tablets to do new and creative things that it’s almost impossible to keep up with them. This week, I have three new apps that you may have missed that you will surely want to add to your RVing collection. The coolest photo enhancing app I’ve seen in a long time is Instagram’s new Hyperlapse, a very nifty little download that lets you create very smooth and fun time lapse videos. It takes a clip you shot on your iPhone, stabilizes it and stiches together a polished time lapse video that you can share. No need for a tripod. Handhold your shots and watch the app make it look like it was shot by a pro. You can play it back at up to 12 times the speed it was captured in, the time lapse video I made from a recent trip to the old western town of Deadwood, South Dakota. Sorry folks, right now this app is only for Apple devices. Cost is 99-cents. Free for Apple and Android mobile gizmos is another cool app called Cabin. This app sets up a private mobile network for families and friends that lets you assign reminders, track locations, and chat with your loved ones. This would be great for keeping in touch with family as you're on the road. It’s a closed group, available to only those you invite. You can share photos, audio, and notes; keep a running list of To-Do’s, tasks and important dates; and even pinpoint exactly where everyone is, in real time. Once more new app for Apple users: Wandering Weather. Enter in your starting location and your destination and it will help pick the route and the best time to leave to have the best traveling weather. Very cool.

Top 10 RV Lessons learned after 75,000 miles We just turned 60,000 miles on our Roadtrek Etrek as we pulled into our Michigan driveway after our latest trip, which essentially was four months on the road through 21... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

RV Photo Shoot: The animals of the West I’ve spent much of the weekend editing and distilling down the 1,386 photos I took on our recent trip west and thought I’d share my top 12 favorite photos of ... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

Joy of RV Upsizing and Downsizing We arrived around 4:30 PM at a pleasant ocean view campground in Maine. Shortly after we pulled into the assigned site and plugged into shore power, a beautiful new Class... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

New Apps that RVers Will Enjoy Apps. There are so many apps that empower our smartphones and tablets to do new and creative things that it’s almost impossible to keep up with them. This week, I... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

So, what’s your worse nightmare about an RV trip? Having a mechanical breakdown in the middle of, say, Montana, at the start of a weekend? Trust me, it’s not so bad. I can say this because it happened to us last weekend, just as we were leaving Glacier National Park and the Many Glacier area, about as remote a place as you can find, where even the cell phones don’t reach. This was the culprit … the sensor (black) at the right of the fuel rail. There is one inescapable thing about RV travel. Stuff happens. Things break. No matter how well something is engineered and how well it is maintained. Truth is, that’s part of the adventure. And it’s how that breakdown is handled that determines the end of the story. And in our case, it was handled very well. So well, I want to share it with you. Our breakdown led us to some of the most fun we’ve had on this long four month trip we’ve been on. We learned first hand there’s a great network of Sprinter dealers out there who really do go the extra mile to make sure Sprinter owners can put on those miles. What broke in our Sprinter-based Roadtrek Etrek was the fuel rail sensor. I’m not a mechanical guy but it has something to do with the way the engine gets fuel. Our unit failed and led to a stalling engine. The engine would start, but as you pressed the accelerator, it would be unresponsive for a couple of seconds and then just die. The check engine light has come on several times during this trip but would usually go off after a short drive. At Glacier, as it kept stalling in the middle of a cold rain on the side of a gravel road, it would start with increasing difficulty and cranking, but then cough and stall. I was about to hike out and get to a place where I had cell phone coverage so I could call for a tow, which would be covered under my Coach-Net road insurance. But eventually, I got the engine started by revving it up and keeping my foot on the accelerator as I dropped it into gear. There was one hairy moment. Literally hairy. As we started to drive out of Many Glacier, a car in front came to a sudden stop as a black bear dashed across the road. The people in that car naturally stopped and started taking photos as the bear nibbled on some roadside berries. I could not risk a stop so, keeping the engine going with one foot on the brake and one on the accelerator, I swerved around them and kept going. I’m sure they thought I was very rude. Wish I could have explained. After a half hour or so of driving at 70 mph on the main highway outside of the park, the engine seemed to be running just fine. We made it all 250 miles south and west to Missoula, Montana and Demarois Buick – GMC Truck, an official Mercedes-Benz Sprinter dealer. Travis Cook, the Sprinter Service manager, got us in before the shop closed down for the weekend, put a computer on the engine and verified the fuel rail issue. The soonest the replacement sensor would arrive would be Tuesday. So, rather than take the chance of driving on and another breakdown, we opted to stay in Missoula until the part arrived and could be installed. To make it easy for us, Travis supplied us with a loaner – a Mercedes-Benz ML350 SUV, a very nice ride. Downtown Missoula music festival I could have done some Christmas shopping for Campskunk at the music festival. We drove the Roadtrek to a campground about six miles northwest of town, where we kept it parked for the next four days. We used the little SUV loaner to take us sightseeing throughout the area, attending a music concert downtown, checking out a local museum, visiting the Rattlesnake Recreation and Wilderness area and even venturing out into nearby mountain communities for wildlife viewing and hiking. Downtown river surfers in Missoula Perhaps the most unexpected amusement we found was watching young people surf on the Clark Fork River at a place called Brennan’s Wave, where white water in the in the river in downtown Missoula underneath the Higgins St. Bridge draws wet-suit wearing adventurers. Here, kayakers and surfers alike frequent the natural wave machine, and give spectators a good show. We’ll share some of those Missoula-area attractions in separate reports. The point of all this is to say what we thought would be disaster turned out to be a blessing in disguise. We fell in love with this part of Montana and, thanks to the network of Sprinter service dealers around the country and our fall-back road towing insurance coverage, it’s all good. We need not worry. As we picked up our Roadtrek Tuesday morning, Travis, the service manager, remarked how well built Mercedes is. He told us how the Sprinters used by the Federal Express delivery service routinely get 350,000 miles. “They’d get more but the bodies start to fall apart after all that intense use,” he said. Our Sprinter has now racked up 60,000 miles in the almost two years we’ve been driving it. I can honestly say, it has been amazingly reliable and the best vehicle I have ever owned. We’ve taken it coast to coast, up and down the Rocky Mountains, camped in every weather condition imaginable from two feet of snow at 21 below zero in Northern Minnesota to 105 humid degrees in the Deep South, and it has brought is more fun and adventures than we can imagine. But there’s even another benefit from our extended stay in Missoula. After putting in the new part, they even washed the Roadtrek for me, something Jennifer has been after me to do this entire trip. My cost for the repair: Nothing. All covered under the Sprinter-Mercedes five-year, 100,000 mile warranty. It really was all good.

RV Destination: The Fundy Trail A big draw here on the Roadtreking blog are posts about RV travels -places to visit and things to see. Since other reporters were already writing super travel articles we... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source

Stranded in Montana: It’s all good So, what’s your worse nightmare about an RV trip? Having a mechanical breakdown in the middle of, say, Montana, at the start of a weekend? Trust me, it’s not so... Roadtreking : The RV Lifestyle Blog - Traveling North America in a small motorhome Source