What I Didn’t Know Eight Years Ago

Recently, I had lunch in Gainesville, Florida, with a new Alto owner who had a list of questions to ask me about full-timing. It made me think back to when I first started this adventure in May, 2016, and what I wish I’d known way back then.

Maybe I went into this whole thing  a bit on the naive side. I’d never camped in an RV, towed anything at all, or had any experience with extended road trips, or maintaining a trailer that had electrical and plumbing systems and a lot of little things that could break over time. I was optimistic that I could figure things out, either with YouTube videos or advice from my new friends on the Altoistes Facebook group.

Backing into Sites

I didn’t know how to back up a trailer, and as it turned out, that was a skill I needed to learn. Not right away, because I’d bought a caravan mover, which I used a lot the first several months to get my Alto into campsites. But, I knew sooner or later, I’d have to master this skill, a challenge for someone with severe left-right confusion (a part of having dyscalculia).

I did figure out how to do it, over a period of months, taking very small steps each time, until I finally backed myself into a site at Cherry Creek State Park. It wasn’t pretty, but I did it. I can’t really explain how it works for me but a few things I can share:

• Backing a single-axle trailer means it can take a few feet before a change in direction shows up in where the trailer is going. Be patient another few seconds before thinking you got it wrong.
• Go slowly, and don’t be afraid to get out of your tow vehicle and look at the site. I have literally never had anyone honk or yell or even look annoyed when it takes me 10 minutes to get into a site. People wait patiently, because they know next time it could be them. I’ve sometimes gotten out 7 or 8 times on a difficult site. Just do what works for you.
• If someone is spotting me into the site, I ask them to use “driver side” and “passenger side” as that seems to bypass the whole left/right brain freeze.

Back Roads vs. Highways

It’s a big continent out there, and towing a trailer really drove that point home. For someone used to criss-crossing the country in a jet plane on business trips, it was a revelation to drive state by state by state, from Washington to Florida and all points in between. I quickly learned that I didn’t enjoy going fast or having big rigs blow by me on interstate highways and so I started exploring how to get to places on the blue highways of America.

I usually try to stay on back roads for a few reasons: less big truck, slower speeds, and nicer scenery. Making my way through a small town shows me a part of the country I wouldn’t otherwise see, from vibrant downtown streets to hollowed out towns where the Dollar General is the only store. Smelling a good BBQ stand, watching a family cross the street to the local park — there are everyday scenes and peeks into everyday lives that you miss whizzing by on the highway. Yes, sometimes you get stuck behind a slow tractor, but it’s all good.

Sometimes, though, I do choose the highway because I just want to get somewhere faster or there’s not really a good back road routing. When I’m on the highway, I stay in the right lane most of the time and I go 55-60 max speed.

Tips for traffic

• When it comes to merging traffic, I do try to anticipate drivers speeding up to “beat out the trailer” so they get ahead of me. Whatever, dudes…
• If you’re in a strange city with a lot of freeways and interchanges, pay attention to what lane the truckers choose. They usually know the area and they usually know that right lane is going to disappear in a half-mile or so.
• Truckers will let you in if you need to move over to avoid a lane disappearing or an accident, etc. They know what it’s like to be driving something bigger than a sedan. In turn, I let truckers in, figuring I get good future karma for it.

Tow Vehicles Matter

When I was getting ready to be a vagabond, I read up on tow vehicles, tongue weight, and all that stuff. I picked a Subaru Outback 3.6L with a tow capacity of 3000 pounds, figuring my Alto would weigh about 2500 with all my things in it, and all the options I was getting. And it was great. Until it wasn’t, on that west Texas road, when a wind gust from the mountains above me shoved me around like I was a kid’s toy.

I bought a Ridgeline, longer wheelbase, about a thousand pounds heavier, and a 5000 pound tow capacity. Now, I sometimes forget I have the Alto behind me, it tows that easily. I never, EVER forgot I was towing with the Outback, it was always working to pull that trailer behind it. If I had one do-over in my vagabond life, I’d have bought the Ridgeline at the start. It tows easier, gets about the same gas mileage, and I can carry more stuff in the bed and truck.

My Camping Style

As a solo woman traveling around the continent, I tend to listen to my gut when it comes to places to stay. Over time, I’ve done way less boondocking in the middle of nowhere and instead gravitated to state parks, US Army Corps of Engineers parks, and national parks/forests. All of those tend to have campground hosts, rangers, and well-spaced, nicely maintained sites. Less risk is where it’s at for my peace of mind.

While I boondocked out west some when I started out, I did much less of that the last several years hanging out in the Southeast. I learned to love my air conditioning, not being a fan of super-humid weather. In the South, that A/C also acts as a dehumidifer, which is awesome when it’s so damp that that bedsheets are clammy at nightfall.

I tend to plan ahead and make reservations, partly because I can’t just turn to someone in the passenger seat and have them look up places and call ahead. I have gotten a lot more flexible about changing reservations or routes, veering off to visit a friend or stay a night longer because of a weather forecast. I try not to tow when there are high winds or heavy rain – it’s just not fun and I don’t feel as safe, so waiting a day longer to go or leaving a day earlier has been my choice the last few years. It sometimes costs me an unused night but I figure that’s way better than driving through a rainstorm or risking an accident.

For the record, only twice in 8 and a half years have I moved on because I felt in my gut that things were a little off.

Jill-of-All-Trades

Eight years ago, I did not know how to

• Replace a sink and faucet, and clean out and replace a sink trap
• Deal with electrical issues, from lights to batteries to heaters to the seven-pin plug on my tow vehicle
• Measure my solar output and my battery storage so I had power when I needed it
• Check the torque on my tires on a regular basis

YouTube videos are great, and so are Google searches. And the Altoistes and Alto Owners Facebook groups. And friends. I’ve had friends show me how to replace my solar controller, my battery, outside lights, and more. I figured out on my own (well, sort of, with a few phone calls involved) how to do that sink and faucet replacement and deal with battery issues.

I have an extensive toolbox, but the things I use the most are screwdrivers (including the ever-handy Robertson bits) and small wrenches. Zip ties, spare fuses, and bungee balls are also handy for many, many uses. A small can of WD-40, a small tube of dielectric grease, and single-use packs of crazy glue have also saved me in a pinch. I carry a drill with a battery pack, but have rarely found a use for it (I hand-crank my stabilizers, although some people use a drill for that).

I carry an assortment of spray cans, from silicone for the hitch and ball, cleaners for the foam padding around my windows, and degreasers for my stabilizers. It’s amazing how dirty those stabilizers can get, hanging out under the trailer all the time.

Dealing with Problems

Honestly, if I don’t know what’s gone wrong with my heater or my water pump or whatever, I find the model number and google the heck out of it. If I need to fix something and a YouTube videos come up on the search, I start there because it’s amazing how much good information other RVers have posted to YouTube over the years. Manuals for equipment also show up in search results, and I have all my manuals online (downloaded to my laptop) now rather than carry around the paper versions.

The Need for Backup Plans

Sometimes, it’s just not going to work out to get to a new place on the day you wanted. You can find a hospitable Walmart or Cracker Barrel parking lot or hope there’s some kind of RV park where you can find a spot. Or, you can splash out on a hotel room for the night. There are advantages to this, especially if you’re a full-timer or on an extended camping trip: fresh sheets and towels, free internet, a big-screen TV, and — my favorite feature — endless hot water in a big shower. There’s probably also an onsite laundromat, and that’s handy too. I’ve never had an issue leaving my trailer in the parking lot (hitched or unhitched).

Sometimes, it’s the weather that has broken me. Twice in the summer of 2022, when the heat dome across the Midwestern and Plains states seemed endless, I retreated to hotels.

Once, it was me that broke myself. When I broke my hand back in 2017, I stayed a week at a hotel letting the hand heal enough I could keep going in my Alto. Sleeping in a big bed where I didn’t have to worry about my hand cast hitting a wall was really nice. So was the big shower, where it was much easier to keep the cast dry (and not hit a wall).

Having friends with guest rooms or nice non-HOA-ruled driveways has been great. I have appreciated all of them. Thanks, Peg on Cape Cod, Peg and Larry in PA, Karen and Steve in DE, Susan and Gary in ID, Deidre in IN, Kevin and Ashley in CA, Edward and Linda in WA, and Bill and Mary in VA.

And it’s nice to have a home base. In 2018, I was fortunate to have good friends offer their Florida home as my legal residence, and I’ve since enjoyed both the world’s smallest RV park (their backyard) and their guest room at regular intervals. And, during the pandemic, which I could never have foreseen in my craziest dreams, it was a safe haven for months. I’m very lucky this situation has worked out well for me over the last several years. Thanks, Mary, Mike, and Rory the Dog.

(Thanks, Lilianne, for the lunch, the conversation, and the inspiration to write this post.)

Other Posts

• Trip Planning – how I figure out where and how to go
• Picking Campsites – my tips on finding good campsites and campgrounds
• Internet Connectivity – Plans and availability change a lot, but the search for connectivity never does. Campground wifi can’t be depended on, Starlink prices keep rising, it’s a jungle out there. I recommend Mobile Internet Research Center for updated and solid information.
• Worried about leaving stuff at your campsite? Don’t be… read this blog post to find out why.

---

All genuine learning comes through experience.

John Dewey