Sold my vintage travel trailer

My beloved travel trailer has entered the realm of pictures and memories tonight. The above pictures are a combination of Kansas and Iowa, years ago. It was in much the same shape, but with a much dirtier exterior when I sold it tonight. 

I listed it for $650 on Thursday. A really amazing price for what it was. But I was aiming for a quick sale and it's December. Not an ideal time to be selling these things. I wanted to get it out of the yard before any snow came back. It has all melted for the time being. Had a lot of out-of-state interest, but I didn't want to mess with that. I showed it to two groups yesterday. The first group I didn't think I'd hear from again. The second group pretty much said they'd buy it, but needed to see if they could borrow someone's truck to tow it home. They backed out hours later. Surprisingly the first group emailed back last night asking for some measurements and came to look at it again this morning. Again, left and said they'd call me later. They actually did though, and hauled it out this evening! 

Pretty happy, really. Now I can shift focus back to the motorhome. Figuring out what can stay inside of it, and what needs to go. 

I am officially a week ahead of schedule on the sale of the trailer. I was going to sell it by the 14th, no matter what.

I am not to be believed

If you've learned anything from my writing, I hope you know that I am fickle, and change my mind often.

The snow is finally coming. 15 miles away from me got 10 inches the other day, while we got just a dusting. Tonight my area is looking at 3-10" it sounds like. Right on the line between 3-6" and 6-10".


Anyway, I allotted myself $2500 to get a different vehicle. Even took it out of the bank and was ready to take the plunge. I looked at one minivan and of course it wasn't quite as described. I continued my search, had a couple leads.. But then I started to ask myself what I was doing.

I still don't know what I'm doing, and the snow that arrives tonight complicates things a little more. I've been working on trying to find places for things in the motorhome. At the same time I've been trying to get my mind right enough to make the final push to get rid of things.

Everything that used to be in my storage now fits in my old travel trailer. Which is amazing, and I need to recognize that. At one time I had reached a point where I was 'okay' with leaving it just at that. The trailer would be parked here at my parents and I could travel and feel 'okay' about it. Not so much anymore. I really want to get rid of everything left in there and then sell the trailer for cheap to get rid of it. That trailer is going to be stuck in the snow pretty soon, and nobody is going to want to mess with it.


So am I hitting the road?

Answer still unknown. I'm leaving the option open. Another realization I've made is that if I don't trust it enough to travel in, after ALL of the time and money I've put into it.. then why do I have it? At this point there's nothing that's going to make it better. I've already put a new engine in it. Eventually I just have to take that leap of faith.

I would say that currently I'm leaning towards hitting the road.

Fall and Winter

I feel like a bit of a failure once again. For how long I've had this blog going and making videos for YouTube it seems like I would have gotten my crap together and been on the road at this point. 

To be honest I'm incredibly close. There's really no reason I couldn't be on the road this winter. There are a handful of things I would feel a lot more comfortable doing/fixing before I hit the road, but I could squeeze by without addressing them. 

Mostly I'm just not 'feeling' it. I feel like I'd be forced into doing something I'm not 100% ready for just because winter is coming and the evil white stuff (snow) will be making all of my decisions for me. I'm concerned about money, about breaking down, or about getting out there and after a couple weeks wondering what the hell I'm doing. 

I've been feeling a different direction lately. I've been feeling really good, and more like 'me' than I have in probably the last 8 years. I have no intention of getting rid of the motorhome, but it'll  most likely be sitting through another winter. 

My life, while there is still work to be done, is more organized than it has been for years. I'm finally down to two vehicles, the motorhome and my van. Junked out my other old vehicle a few weeks ago. My storage unit is gone, but I'm still dealing with some of that stuff.. at least I'm not paying $100/month anymore. I've been working on web development lately, which is what I used to do. Things more or less seem to be falling into place in the big picture again. 

I'm seriously considering getting rid of my big 1 ton van. Practically every system on it needs repair in one way or another, and it will be terrifying driving it this winter. I'm looking at minivans, because I still like the space. It'd be nice to have something with a lot less rust and a little better gas mileage. 

This change is probably going to force me into getting a job again. I'm not opposed to it. I'd be looking for part time though, or else 3 possibly 4 day work weeks. I want to have time to do something with my life, and also to keep focusing on the web development stuff so hopefully I can get back into my own independent income stream enough to support my life. 

At this point I envision having a minivan for short trips this winter, and then getting out and about more often in the motorhome next year after the snow melts. 

So.. anyway. The above picture is from washing the motorhome. The roof still needed to be cleaned at the time of the picture, but I washed it on Monday. I'm also putting the bars across the top back on because my roof seems to be sagging. Unfortunately I'm cutting down the sides that go under the solar panels and it's weakening them quite a bit. Better than nothing, is my mindset. This is also requiring me to take the solar panels off, just to put them back on again. I've done the front bar, I still need to do the rear bar. I also put the spare tire back on the front now that I'm done doing all my engine work. I might try to do the rear without taking the panel off, but it's a good idea to clean under there anyway.

Silver!

I got into metal detecting this year, but after a lot of digging and finding nothing very good I took a month or two off recently. I bought a cheap metal detector off of craigslist during winter and actually was out digging in the snow and frozen ground. My first dig was a 1920 wheat penny only 40 ft from the house. Since that first dig, nothing of any real note. Not even more wheat pennies.

Until last Thursday! I finally decided to break out of the metal detector and drove the motorhome to one of the closest parks. I wasn't getting much of anything, and then tucked into an isolated corner of one section of the park I dug up a 1948 wheat penny. That by itself was enough to make me excited after so many digs and nothing but modern coins or plain junk. Then just a few feet away I dug up a 1949 wheat penny! Imagine that. Nothing all year and then two notable (for me) finds in such a short time.

Saturday I went back to the same park again. Also once again in the motorhome. A wedding party was just starting to assemble at the pavilion but I decided I was going to park and detect anyway. I usually would have left, as I have a problem with feeling I have a 'right' to be somewhere. They were on one side, and I planned to be on the other side so I parked and soon the motorhome was surrounded by cars on all sides. Haha.

Anyway, I was hunting the same overall area as Thursday but I was finding pennies from the 90's like crazy. Complete shock when I pulled a 1937 mercury dime out of one of the holes! My first silver coin while metal detecting. Couldn't be happier that it was a mercury dime. I love that design for some reason. I went over that area for a long time hoping to find something else good. Nothing.

Then tonight I went to the store to cash in some bottles (10 cent deposit in Michigan) and got some Pringles and a 2 liter too. I still got money back from the bottles and as I was walking out I was looking through my change. A 1964 silver quarter. 2 silvers in 3 days. Can't beat that!

Oil Pressure and Water Leaks

Earlier this week I was driving the motorhome around on some errands and when I looked down the oil pressure was completely gone. The gauge wasn't registering anything. This freaked me out, but up at the next stop light the pressure went back up and stayed there to my next destination. On the way home it started to dip low again. I installed a new pressure switch and changed the oil. It was a quart low, but I don't think that would have caused it. Just running it in the driveway has the pressure where it's always been since the new engine. Fluctuating between 40psi and 20psi. Doesn't seem great, but I never paid attention to where the gauge was before I changed the engine. Soon I'll have to take it for some more drives to see if the problem was fixed with the new switch and oil change, or if I'm going to have bigger problems.

Originally I was feeling like if it's a bigger problem (i.e. bad oil pump or pick up) that it  would pretty much mean I'd be sitting through another season for sure. Now that I've put some thought into it, it wouldn't be too bad. A pain in the butt, and a decent amount of work, but not impossible. I would have to pull the exhaust, transmission, starter, and raise the entire engine again so that I could take the oil pan off. I'm practically a pro at all of that now. 

It's been cold and rainy. We got a couple inches in 24 hours yesterday. I noticed water in the motorhome again. Yuck. It seems to just be coming from the window. I don't know if it's just old weatherstripping or poor design or something else I haven't figured out yet but definitely the channel on the bottom that the window slides along seems to get very wet, and I think it's just overflowing to the interior.

I took that window out last year and redid all the "monkey poop". Maybe I'll run a bead of caulk around the edge anyway. My other thoughts are to drill some more drainage holes in the bottom of the channel, and possibly make a metal guard along the top of the windows. Both the motorhome and my old travel trailer have that sort of thing above the doors. 

Either way it's better than it used to be. I used to have a small pool of water along the bottom of the wall after it rained. Of course, it could just depend on which way the vehicle is leaning and maybe I have a pool collecting somewhere else I haven't found yet.

Bunch of Stuff

I ended up behind this old bus conversion a couple days ago. I was hoping they'd stop somewhere but they ended up getting on the expressway. Michigan doesn't issue that style license plate anymore so it's expired by at least 10 years. They must have just bought it or something. 

I've been starting to get the inside 'finished up'. I finally got the new wood cut and in place for the little corner spot there. Where the TV mounts to and the part next to the door. I also mounted the TV, which I really like. I still need to tie up the wires so they're neatly routed, and figure out where I want to keep the Roku.

You blog readers finally scared me enough to swap out the old steering gear. I don't think it would have ever completely failed but still it was pretty loose. It was an easier job than I expected. I figured getting the pitman arm off would be the hardest part but I rented the puller from AutoZone for $15 and after spraying the threads with PB Blaster it came right off. The new one is very noticeably tighter. My only complaint is I miscalculated and the steering wheel is a little off center now but I'm already used to it.

I've been driving the motorhome around more as my daily driver lately. The van's brakes are grinding again and I'm afraid that eventually the rotor is going to get so thin it'll just break in half. A sticky caliper is the issue, but I'm hesitant to put more money into the van because it's got a lot of issues and I plan to retire it soon. Also, there's a lot of extra weight in the van right now because I cleared out my storage unit. I'm still trying to find new places for everything.

I'll finish up by leaving you with some pictures of the motorhome at the park I hung out at for a while the other day. I didn't even notice while I was there, but you can see the leaves are starting to change. 

I'm Still Scared

There's a lot of things to be afraid of when you tell yourself you want to move into a motorhome.

For me, something that has been very difficult for me has been getting rid of my stuff. Forcing myself to go through stuff that has been in boxes for years. Being faced with things from my past that I've either really tried to ignore, or that have brought up memories that are more painful than I thought. That has been a scary process, that is still ongoing.

The fear of needing something down the road is big for me. Not trusting in the future to provide. There already have been a few instances of wishing I hadn't gotten rid of something because I suddenly had a use for it. Truth is, in the mess of boxes in storage I wouldn't have known where it was, if I even knew I still had it to begin with.

The constant nagging in the back of my head that knows I'm somewhat more talk than action keeps putting that little seed of doubt in my mind. Am I really going to do this thing? Or am I just forcing myself to deal with all of my STUFF for no reason? Wouldn't it be a lot easier to just sit on the couch, or go work at a job you hate? Stuff has value in my family. To throw stuff away kind of feels like I'm shunning my parents, or betraying them in some way. Weird.

I'm definitely afraid of failure since I'm trying to do this "all in". When I hit the road I don't want to have a storage unit. The unfortunate reality is that I won't be able to get rid of everything. I will have some boxes hanging out at my parents house, I'm sure. But I also want to get rid of the van, and my old travel trailer. When I hit the road, I want the only form of transportation I own to be the motorhome and a bicycle. That's a bit of commitment.  It'd make it that much more difficult to throw in the towel after a month and return to normal life.

(You might be aware that I've hit the road twice before with my travel trailer and returned after my temporary jobs ended. Both times I had a full storage unit and a ton of mental/emotional weight. I want to do it differently this time)

My absolute biggest fear is that I hit the road and have catastrophic engine failure. I don't know why. The options, should that happen, are limited. If possible, fix it. Worst case, tow it and sell it on the spot. Not much to it. Finances used to be a big part of this fear. Lately I have felt much better about it because (as I've mentioned earlier this year) I've been working on rebuilding my credit. I finally got approved for a credit card with a credit limit greater than a couple hundred dollars. So, should a worst case scenario happen I could use the credit card and limp along until I could figure out a new situation.

I've been working on the motorhome slowly but surely. I'll have an update about what I've been doing coming soon. It's getting pretty home-like in there.