I can’t remember exactly when, but Rennie and I got our first RV probably in 1981. Our kids were really young then. I was in the sign business, and a local RV dealer needed a sign. I started looking at his campers, and found one I liked. I told him, “I will trade you a billboard for that camper.”
He agreed. I finished up the sign, and drove the RV home. It was a 1970 Nomad. I think it was 19 feet long with a bunk over the table booth which also made a bed. My wife and I slept on the table-bed, and our kids slept on the top bunk. I think we camped in that one maybe twice; then found that it had a lot of problems… like a rotting floor. I stepped through it one time, and sold it… with a hole in the floor!
Our next RV was one we just loved. It was a 1993 Prowler – 35 feet long! We towed it with a Suburban that had 160,000 miles on it, and never had a problem. We kept that Prowler at least 10 years – probably more.
We camped in state parks, and traveled to so many places with our kids. Those were memorable times! I had sold my sign business, and launched a magazine for the sign industry, which required a lot of travel. We went to Amish Country in Pennsylvania, Gettysburg, Washington, DC, Toronto, Ontario. We saw Niagra Falls, the beauty of Upstate New York, Williamsburg, and many, many more.
We sold our sign magazine in 1994 (Sign Builder Illustrated – still being published worldwide today). The publisher hired me as a consultant for a few years; then in 1998, we entered the real estate business, selling waterfront developments. We had a couple more travel trailers during that time – one was a park model that we kept where we worked. We sold that one and bought a new Coachman. Rennie was not crazy about that one, so we traded it in on a new AX6 fifth wheel in 2004.
Our next one was our dream coach. With resort property booming from 2001 to 2008, we bought a new 2005 Fleetwood Providence motor home! Keep in mind that when I was a young boy growing up on a farm in West Virginia, I never had an indoor bathroom until I was 13. Most of my shirts were sewn by my grandma from chicken feed sacks .
Boondocking? Oh yeah, I think I can handle that! When I was a kid, we never called a repairman for anything. We didn’t have that kind of money laying around. We either fixed it or it didn’t get fixed! To this day, my wife jokingly calls me McGiver!
Well, the real estate business was doing pretty well, but it was quite a distance from our home, so we began using our motor home as a portable office. It worked really well… for a while, until the recession hit – hard! Resort property sales fell off completely, and we had to reinvent our business plan! We didn’t need the motor home any more, so we sold it.
Almost 10 years passed, and after the recession and a bout with bladder cancer, we started getting the “itch” for an RV again. I think I covered why in a previous post, so I’ll not go into that. We figured we’d start small, and work our way up again. So, we bought this cute, new Palomino Real Lite Mini from a dealer in Iowa (they beat everyone else’s price by a mile). It was really nice. It had everything we needed… bathroom, shower, kitchen sink, microwave, queen bed, awning, and a slide out. Yes, it had everything except size, and I’m not a small person.
We put a small ad on the cover of a local “bargain trader,” and sold it to the first person that called. I had over 60 calls on that little camper!
So, we are looking for a bigger RV. After tons of research, we have narrowed it down to a Reflection 297rsts. We are going to use it for business purposes for both real estate and reviewing RV parks, campsites, state and national parks and boondocking.
We’re calling it RV Site 2 Sight. I am in the process of setting up a YouTube site, a Amazon Affiliate Store, a Patreon Account, and this blog. Later, I will set up a Instagram and Twitter account. Oh, and by the way, I am an author. I have published two books, and they are available on Amazon.
We’ll call it a day on this post. I appreciate you taking the time to read it. Another post will come shortly… and I hope sooner than later.
Steve and Rennie
