Not All RV Toilet Chemical Is Made The Same

I always remember back in 1998 when we bought our first camper which was a 1995 Jayco popup.   We did 3 trips in and all three it rained hard!  I also realized with my crew (my wife Michelle, daughter Kaileigh (5) and son Chase (4)) if we where going to be mobile we needed an on-board bathroom.  So we went hunting for a motorhome and found a super cool 1989 23' Winnebago Chieftain.  It needed a little TLC, butin no time I had...

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The Last Day Of Vacation

Day 15 - Wednesday:  Although not technically the last day of the vacation (we still had 2 long days of driving home to go) this was theOur Campsite at Gulf Shoreslast chance to relax.  To be totally honest I really had not relaxed much the whole time we where gone.  I monitored work by email and online software, as well as doing a number of work related tasks each day.  It's hard to break away entirely from running two businesses...

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Gulf Shores State Park

Day 14 - Tuesday: With a short 3 hour run to Gulf Shores State Park we did not have to leave until A cemetery on the bike pathabout 11 a.m. This gave me a chance to jump on the big and ride the rails to trails that runs through the park. Not my favorite type of riding, but better than not at all. I rode into the town of Mandeville and stopped at the local cemetery.  Kind of strange to see everything above ground.  Headed back and then...

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A Day In The Swamp

Day 13 - Monday:  Today we where up at the crack of dawn getting ready for a swamp tour.  I needed to give The Honey Island Swamp Tour company a call to book an 9:00 a.m. tour.  Unfortunately, everyone wanted to take that tour so we had to settle for the 11:30 tour.  Although it would be hotter, it did give us extra time to get ready.  Honey Island Swamp is about 30 minutes away from the state park and they...

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A Drive Across The Worlds Longest Bridge

Day 12 - Sunday:  Today we had a short run of just 50 miles to Fontainebleau State Park across Lake Bayou Signette CampsitePontchartrain and on the longest bridge in the world.   Since check in wasn't until after 2 we could move a little slower and take our time getting ready to pull out.  This gave me a chance to get the bike down off the carrier and do a small ride.  One of the levees runs through the park and they...

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The French Quarter

Decatur StDay 11 - Saturday:  We woke up to more hot and muggy weather, I can't imagine what it's like down in these parts in July & August.  When we checked in at the campground the attendant mentioned that we should plan to take the ferry over to the city instead of trying to find a parking spot downtown.  So when we left at 9 am we headed for the little town of Algiers on the banks of the Mississippi to take the ferry over...

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Sugar Plantation Tour

Day 10 - Friday:  Todays drive was 377 miles, we where half temped to take the RV's on the ferry across Galveston inlet, but saw comments on wait times and decided to drive around.  With a stop for fuel and a visit to the Houmas House Plantation and Gardens it was a long day.  The highlights on the drive where the causeway bridges you go over on I-10 in Louisiana as you close in on New Orleans.   Just real pretty scenery with...

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A Day On A Drilling Rig

Day 9 Thursday: Each morning I get up, check my phone for the latest emails, look at the orders that came in for RVupgrades and review Basecamp our inter company software for the latest issues, accomplishments and schedule of meetings and reviews.  Both dogs look at me intently while I do this, just waiting for me to declare it is walk time.  Cali enjoys the walk and usually does not want to come back, but Wiley only gets excited because...

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Jamaican Beach RV Resort

Day 8 - Wednesday:  Today was a 280 mile run down to Galveston, Tx and the Jamaican Beach RV Resort.  Of course it had to rain for about 30 seconds just enough to kick up spray and negate my wash job from the previous day.  As we closed in on Houston we got onto the Toll road that bypasses the city.  Little did we know that we would hit 3 toll booths in about the distance of 20 miles.  I hadn't planned on there being...

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A Day In Bourne Texas

Day 7 - Tuesday: We where pretty slow to get up today, all I had on my mind was to was the RV.  We had run through a bunch of rain heading into Memphis and I was dyeing to get it clean again.  I definitely got that bug from my father, he is a boater and spit shines that thing just about every day.  I had installed the smaller CR Spotless deionizing system in one of my storage bays in the spring.  I then found...

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A Long, Long Day Of Driving

Day 6 - Monday: Today was a long day of driving, 730 miles and about 13 hours. We left Memphis at about 7 a.m. and got through town in pretty light traffic. It wasn't long before I could see in my side mirror that my electric cord was popping out of the door that holds it in. I figured I better pull into a rest stop sooner than later to fix that before Austin Tx Traffic @ 7:30 p.m.the cord was reaching the road and grinding the plug away. Our...

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Elvis Is In The House

Day 5 - Sunday: I was up at 5:30 a.m. to take the dogs for their morning walk.  Cali our 9 year old Shitzu started to have problems climbing the RV stairs yesterday, so we where somewhat concerned with that.  We decided to carrier her in and out from now on, an on our walk she seemed to do pretty good.  I started to hear thunder in the distance and hurried back to the RV to dump the tanks and disconnect the water.  Since it didn't...

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When to Replace Your RV Carbon Monoxide Detector

Keeping your RV carbon monoxide detector working properly is no joke. Carbon monoxide is a byproduct of malfunctioning engines or appliances, so you can see why having a working carbon monoxide detector is especially important in an RV. Though high levels of carbon monoxide poisoning aren’t always fatal, it can result in permanent damage to your body, including your heart and central nervous system. Since carbon monoxide is colorless, odorless, and...

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A Day Of Hiking & Biking

Day 4 - Saturday:  I decided early in the morning that I couldn't let an opportunity to ride some really great mountain bike trails go to waste.  This time I drove over to the trailhead and I was not disappointed.  It was two hours of sheer bliss and I carved through the woods on some pretty awesome single track.  If we only had a few more days here I would have been in total heaven.  It was a great work...

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Montgomery Bell State Park

Day 3: Today was a short travel day (just 2 hours) from Cave City, Ky to Montgomery Bell State Park in Burns, Tn.  Check-In at the state park is at 4 p.m., but lucky for us no one was on our site so you can check-in at anytime. This state park uses Reserve America for reservations and has nice photos of each campsite along with a lot of the details about each campsite. We picked a site that we thought would fit our RV well but you never can...

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Mammoth Cave

Day 2: Today we took the short drive from the campground to Mammoth Cave passing DinosaurWorld, and various other tourist traps.  We have visited a lot of caves & caverns over the years, a couple of small caves in Put-in-Bay, Oh, Hocking Hills, Oh, a number in Pa, Luray Cavern in Virginia and a few others that I can't even remember.  We are not cave experts nor do we particularly like caving, but it just seems like the thing to...

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Summer 2013 RV Trip

Day1:  Today was an 8 hour run down to Cave City, Ky and a 2 night stay at Cave Country RV Campground.  This morning I fired up the RV at about 8 a.m. and right off the bat there was a check engine light staring me right in the eyes.  I quickly checked my ScanGuage and found that it was a code that had come up last year.  Knowing it was not to severe I was not that worried although with any check engine light the engine would...

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Getting Ready For An RV Trip Is A Lot Of Work!

Entrance to Mammoth CaveFor the past 10 years or so we have planned a 1 or 2 week trip usually in early June.  The weather is usually dry, temps are cooler and schools are still in session so crowds are not as bad.  This years itinerary is to head to Mammoth Cave in Ky, Graceland & Downtown Memphis, San Antonio, Galveston, New Orleans, Gulf Shores in Al and finish up in Nashville.  As you can tell we like to move around....

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Stop Dragging Your Trailers Safety Chains

Fastway Trailer Products has come up with another great RV product innovation with the Chain Up.  This simple device is a heavy duty rubber sling that you run your chains through and then hang it over the ball of your hitch.  This is much safer than twisting or looping chains improperly and possibly causing safety issues.   The Chain-Up comes in two styles, one for ball mount and the other for weight distribution hitches.  Once...

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Excel 5th Wheel RV with Rhino Lining RV Roof

I love seeing real innovation in RV design and manufacture.  To many times you see one company come up with something new and all of the rest just copy the idea instead of coming up with their own innovations. Recently I read that Peterson Industries unveiled two new RV innovations with the first production Rhino lining RV roof and an entry door in a slide-out.  How awesome would it be to have a roof coated in that virtually indestructible...

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