There are many definitions for full time RV travelers. This was ours. We both retired young (early 60s). Linda retired from the Florida real estate industry and me from the USN & then DOD. We sold everything we had, house, automotive vehicles, bass boat household furnishing, and all sorts of personal things, even collectables. What we couldn’t part with was placed in a secure, environmentally controlled storage unit. Our sons both lived in town and would maintain it for us. We established a mail forwarding address (UPS store). They would hold our mail until we asked for it to be forwarded. That meant we would have to stop once every 5-6 weeks for about 10 days or until our requested mail arrived at our location. The address allowed us to keep our Florida residence. Linda’s brother lived there and we used his address for voting.
The decision between a class A and 5th wheel was major. We finally decided that having to service a motor home periodically at a servicing dealership would not be as easy as just having a tow vehicle serviced.
Because of weight, we opted for a midrange fiver from Keystone, a 38’ Everest with three slides and washer dryer. After completely loading and getting scaled weights we had about 700# in reserve. We would need that because one of our hobbies was to buy goods at yard sales and resell them on eBay. We did small things like 1st edition books, old postcards, Zippo lighters, pocket knives, military things and anything light that caught our eye. The monthly sales profit normally paid for our fuel consumption and servicing. When we got heavy things we sent them to our storage unit in FL. My personal best was an old Cattaraugus pocket knife I paid $5 for. It sold for #152.00. Linda’s best was a hard cover three book 1st edition trilogy. She got them at a yard sale for $6. They sold at eBay auction for $175.00.
We traveled the country for nearly 5 years. We stopped when our youngest son got terminal pancreatic cancer. We purchased a manufactured home in a 55+ retirement community here in the SC foothills (Taylors) and took care of our son. Our following part time years saw us going south for about three of the coldest months.
In this thread I’ll show pictorials of some of the more interesting things we did along the way and answer any questions I might have an answer for. Our Everest was very durable and efficient. Modifications were mostly for comfort, like replacing that awful mattress.
Our very first RV Park was Naval Air Station, Jacksonville, FL. We got our dish and learned how to point it. We also got Verizon for our cell phones and internet connections. After about two weeks we said goodbye to everyone and headed north for the summer.
NOTE: My forum name CWtheMan. When I joined this forum it was a name I was using when I played interactive internet cribbage and I just keep it. I’ve played all my life and my win percentage is between 55-57%. That’s quite high and the longer I played on the net the more difficult it was for me to get games, so I quit. One of uncles win percentage is about the same as mine; we really butt heads when we play.
