2015 Trip – Summation and Stats

We were out on the road from April 29^th to July 15^th – a total of 78 days.

We drove a total of 5,119 miles in the motorhome and a whopping 2,363 miles in the car! Remember – our car does not accrue towing miles - that was just from driving around (and around!). Plus we shared driving with two other cars and that doesn’t include those miles! I'm guessing adding them all up would at least equal the motorhome miles!

We stayed at 32 different RV parks.  Shortest time at a park was overnight.  Longest was 5 days. Using the ratings like we did last trip (from 1-10, 10 being best) we still found there were no parks we gave a perfect score of 10.  Three parks got a 9, four parks got an 8, five parks got a 7, nine parks got a 6, nine parks got a 5, and two parks got a 4. (for you RVrs I have the file with names and addresses and the ratings for each park so if anyone is interested, let me know and I’ll send it to you.)  The parks we rated a 4 we probably wouldn’t go back to.  Those with a five were good for overnight or just ok for a couple of days. Some were sparse; some were tight for our rig. Those with 6-9 rating we liked very much and will stay there again in a minute. Turns out we enjoyed all but a few of the places we were in. Since the Passport America parks are ½ of the advertised price (with limitations) we always try to base more at those. Turns out we ended up staying in 12 pa parks and three military bases (thanks to Betz and Moore for getting us on base). The others were found mostly in Trailer Life.   Some parks we found were close to the highway and easy in and out. We liked that (unless they were too close!).  Some were extremely hard to get to or were a distance from the things we wanted to go see.  We didn’t like that but that’s part of the adventure.

We made 8 fuel stops for the rig.  This coach has a 150 gallon fuel tank.  Note – I can go a lot farther on a tank of fuel than in the old rig and we did but I still have a policy not to let the fuel go below a ½ tank.  Usually way before it gets to ½ tank I start figuring where the next stop will be.  Rick & Janie and Bill & Treasa have smaller fuel tanks but when they stopped we just hung around so we could still travel together. Turns out on this trip all of our stops were at Flying J.  We have an account so we search out those stops along our route.  Also they turn over their supply very quickly so we are assured of fresh fuel.  Stops were:

(1) Eloy, AZ (Phoenix area) ($2.89 per gal),

(2) Pecos, TX ($2.77 per gal.),
(3) Orange, TX ($2.81 per gal),
(4) Hope Hull, AL ($2.89 per gal.),
(5) Olive Branch, MS ($2.71 per gal.),
(6) Dallas, TX ($2.75 per gal),
(7) Tucumcari, NM ($2.67 per gal.)
(8) Kingman, AZ ($2.63 per gal). 

That made the avg. price $2.74.5 per gallon. I still have over ½ tank so I won’t fill up for the August club outing (probably good till we head out in September). On last year’s trip the avg. price was $3.68 per gal. so we think we did ok.  I got a high of 8.2 mpg on one tank and a low of 6.8 mpg on my worst tank. On the lesser mpg runs we had the generator on so we could run the coach a/c. The generator runs on diesel so that affects the mileage. But even with that, average was 7.6 for the trip (probably would be over 8.0 without air being on).  That’s definitely lower than the last motorhome we had but right at what we expected for this coach given the 400 hp engine, plus the size and weight.  

Highlights on the trip:  for me were the five Presidential Libraries we saw, the Carlsbad Caverns, the boat ride at Riverwalk in San Antonio, the Houston Space Center, the Tabasco tour, all of New Orleans, all of the antebellum/plantation homes, the Carnival Museum in Mobile, the Civil Rights and Hank Williams museums in Montgomery, the laser light show and the tram ride at Stone Mountain, Graceland, Bass Pro Shop, and Beale St. in Memphis, Texas Stadium and the Texas Book Depository in Dallas, the play Texas, the Grand Canyon train trip and Bearizona in Williams.  I think my two favorites were the stadium and the book depository.

Except for the Space Center (not her thing), Lydia enjoyed all of the above and listed her favorites as the Libraries, the SAS Shoes tour, the play Texas, the Riverwalk, the first Confederate White House (Montgomery), the train ride to the Grand Canyon, New Orleans, and the various quilt stores along the way!  

Now expenses!  This trip was comparable to the 3 month 2012 trip where we crossed a little more of the country (as far east as Pennsylvania).  But we still tried not to buy everything in sight and other than a few things we didn’t expect to buy (like the RV gps and the Sirius Radio docking station I ordered and had delivered while traveling, and the $100. deductible I paid to replace the car’s windshield) I think we did pretty well. I was especially glad not to have any major mechanical issues on the trip.  Our seven week trip to Oregon in 2013 was the first long trip in this new-to-us motorhome so we now halfway knew what to expect.  I was pleasantly surprised that we only had minor issues and nothing major mechanical with the coach. I’ve got a water pump to replace, the windshield needs to be re-sealed, the toilet needs to be fixed, the dash air needs to be addressed, the bathroom fan needs to be checked out, the material on two awnings (one slide out plus the Girard main awning) needs to be tightened up, and the microwave timer needs to be fixed. Plus I had a leak over the shower that I thought I fixed but it did leak for a while. It seems to be ok now but I’ll check that out later. 

Dumb stuff!   I looked at my last summation from the maiden trip in this rig to Oregon in 2013 and reread all my dumb stuff so I just had to put it in writing again for this trip!  Among other things – even though we had just recently installed the HD satellite on the roof and knew it had to be stowed I pulled the power cord and stopped the process and actually tried to pull out of the campground before it was completely stowed!.... A couple of times we failed to turn on the hot water tank between trips and didn’t discover it until the next morning when we showered…  More than once we left the locking drawers unlocked and drove off.  I guess these are all minor things so I’m, good with that.

Traveling with Friends.  We left California with Bill & Treasa and with Rick & Janie.  Treasa already had a trip plan as a base and had a lot of the campgrounds tracked to take us to New Orleans but the six of us did sit down and plot out the details and the nights and the places we wanted to see. Each of us had things to suggest.  We also had to set up the second half of the trip after B&T left us after New Orleans. It’s not easy when six people with opinions (and attitudes!) get together for any length of time on the road.  I think each of us had our moments when something went awry during our days together, but we always got through them and didn’t kill each other so I think it was successful.  I would travel with either of these couples again. We had many, many fun times that will remain in our memories forever.

So, what’s next?  We did our Caribbean Cruise back in 2013 but would like to plan another one in the near future to another location….  We are definitely going back to Hawaii.  We were there for our 25^th anniversary and want to celebrate our 50^th there in 2018 so that’s being worked on…. We do still want to travel to the New England states so maybe that will be on our list for next year…. The balloon festival in Oct 2016 is also something we will be looking at…. Of course I always want to go fishing and June Lake and Branson are on MY radar.  We’ll see. Hopefully, the good Lord will keep us healthy enough to do all of the above.

Almost done…..  just wanted to say thanks to all of you who followed my blog.  Even though only a few of you made comments it was nice to know they were being read!  I am funny about capturing our adventures in writing and in pictures.  It’s not for you that I do this – but rather for us to look back on later in life (or have our kids read to us in the home!). Thanks to my sister, Penny (and her helpers grandkids Jeremy, Cassandra, and Lauren, and husband Ron) for taking care of the house. Thanks to Bill & Treasa and Rick & Janie and especially to Lydia for putting up with me on this 2015 trip!  See you all on the next adventure……..!