Our First Camping Trip!

When:  Saturday, April 6, 2019 (one night)
Where:  Our friends’ farm (north of Columbia, Missouri)
Cost:  Priceless

Our first camping trip to dewinterize our travel trailer, Sally, at our friends’ farm.

In my last blog, I covered some of the basic travel trailer “accoutrement” that we needed to camp (e.g., weight distribution hitch, TPMS, etc.). I ended that blog by noting that after purchasing nearly $2500 in stuff, “we were ready to actually start camping with Sally!”

I lied.

Before we could start camping, we had to dewinterize the RV.  Luckily, our good friend Scott (an experienced RVer who owns a barn with electrical and water hook-ups) offered to help guide us through the process.  There was a catch though.  We had to drive the RV on dirt/gravel country roads 20 minutes north of town (past Hallsville) to his farm and camp there for the night.   Yes, we both lost our RVirginity to Scott.  

In all seriousness, Scott was incredibly generous with his time.   We later learned that is true about most RVers.  The RV community is filled with wonderful folks who want to share what they have learned.   Indeed, once you get someone talking about their RV, it’s pretty hard to shut them up.   Let me say that again: “once you get someone talking about their RV…..”

I don’t have any photos or video of that first dewinterizing process.   We flushed the pink antifreeze out of the tanks, made a small fire, and drank some beer.   It was uneventful, and I never anticipated that just two years later, I would be blogging about the experience.  

It apparently takes at least four dogs to supervise the RV dewintering process.

I do recall that because we did not have a sewer connection (only electric and water), neither Kasie nor I showered.  I also opted to do my morning “business” in a field behind Scott’s barn, rather than go to his house.   This was oddly liberating in some ways.   Yep, there I was, not too far from the dogs in their little pen – each of us doing our business and being super proud of the business we had done.   

Like I said:  classy.