In about 18 months we hope to sell the house and buy a M/H to live in F/T. What kind of driving or not driving do you do? What is mean is; Do you park your unit for 6 months in the summer near your original home and then drive to a warm climate for the winter and again park it for 6 months? Or do many of you spend a couple of months in one spot and keep moving around? I guess it would be cheaper to get a Seasonal (Snowbird) rate for the summer and stay put. Then I wonder if most people just drive from home base to warm base, then a Motorhome would not be the best means of transport. ( A TT or FW might be best). Then I think, if you have a MH and toad a small car, then you would save alot of money instead of driving a 1 ton truck all the time, (which you would have to, if you had a TT or a FW). Alot of questions here and I am not sure which method of FTiming is best for us. I am leaning towards a MH, as I believe they are easier to set up ( for us older folks, with artificial knees and arthritis)
Please give me your general thoughts on this.
Cheers for now
Well we just went full time on May 15th, moved into our 5'er with truck and took'em to Texas. The house is for sale in Arkansas and we still have to deal with that from time to time, but we are fortunate to be able to leave now. However, that being said, we are stationary at a cg in south Texas. 1 reason is because our daughters and 6 grandchildren are 2 hrs. away and we have been seeing them quite a bit. But I was just thinking about this yesterday actually. Starting the 1st week in Sept. I thin we're going to start 'vacationing' West. We still feel like we're on vacation here though and it's fun being stationary and exploring the area. It's new, different and fun, and it saves diesel. But we want to travel and since DH had a stroke a little over a year ago, we must do it NOW. I want no regrets. My attitude is: Screw the cost of diesel - if anything ever happened to him and we DIDN'T get moving I'd regret it the rest of my life. We have this wonderul set up just to SIT? Even though sitting is what we want for now. So when YOU full time - do what YOU want to do - sit or not, it's all fun.
Set up: Definately MH - We have a fiver and everything's great while stationary, but with your physical problems sounds like a MH is your best bet.
Bill & Linda
Ladymc & Shuttlebird
2008 Silver Dodge Diesel Dually 3500 - "The Silver Bullet"
Towing 1998 35 ft. Newmar 5th wheel
20K Husky Hitch & Blue Ox Bedsaver
Handheld Garmin Nuvi 350 GPS AND Sat. in dash mounted GPS in the truck
READY TO ROLL!
No one does full timing the same way. You'll find a huge variety of lifestyles and traveling styles and they do affect the choice of a RV. If you don't have any experience with the different types of RVs you should probably try renting each kind and see which works best. And think about what you a want to do as full timers - relaxing in a good climate or seeing the country , resort RV parks or national parks - lots of decisions!
Take a look at some of these blogs to see what everyone else is doing- http://www.hitchitch.com/links.html
As the other posters have said it is different for everyone. Our traveling style has changed in just the 2 years we have been full timing. We starterd out touring all the time. Summer we did the northern plains, winter we did Florida, never staying in one place for more than a week. We would swing by home to visit grand kids, NY to visit relatives and Ohio for the annual family reunion. Then, we took up camp hosting. Another adventure, met lots of nice people and stayed around long enough to get to know them.
A motor home is the best for us. A 5er is more roomy but we like the convenience of getting up and walking around, getting a drink or sandwich while rolling down the road (isn't cruise control great? - hehe). We have a toad that gets 25 - 27 MPG so we don't have to ride around in a 10 - 12 MPG pickup while we're parked. Some others don't see it that way.
I'm sure there will be many posts to follow, some very passionate ones about their way being the ONLY way to do it. Bottom line is: you have to do what's best for YOU. We had a motor home for more than 10 years before we retired so were pretty sure we knew what we wanted to retire in (we haven't regretted that decision, yet). Since you don't have that much time, maybe you could do some rentals as another poster suggested and do some shorter trips. Stay in campgrounds, try the state and national parks in your area and talk to anybody who will listen (and you will find that will be MOST RVers). Hopefully you will have enough info by the time you are ready to hit the road that you can make an informed decision.
Good luck and keep posting. You will get lots of advice on here (some of it even agreeable - LOL).
Tom & Jan
Fulltimers since April '06 with 3 fur kids (George - mini Aussie, Archie - mini Poodle, Kitty - 20 yo blind cat)
1991 Beaver Contessa towing 2006 Subaru (4 down)
Started workamping Sept '07 - This isn't too bad. Think we'll do it some more.
Heck if everyone did it the same way, there would be only parks in the good weather sites.
After all these years, we just follow the good weather and change states yearly or semiyearly. Az for couple years, Tx for a couple and Fla for a couple, mix in some stops and the year is gone. But then again, we fulltime for the lifestyle, not necessarily for the traveling. Done all that I want.
As indicated by the link below, we park or snowbird for @5 months +/- in the winter and then pull stakes and wander the rest of the year averaging, during the travel months, 2 moves per week - usually 150-200 miles from each other.
Well, let me see.... artificial knee, no... artificial hip? Yes, done twice now in four years!! Arthritis? Yes, every last cotton pickin' joint in my body!! Including my toes! BUT, the farm is sold, our auction is in three weeks and the kids are coming to get what they want. After that, everything will go into the truck/trailer... or to the dump!
And, just like Willie sings...."on the road again!!!" If we wait for medical concerns to subsist, at our age?? They never will!! Travel or sit?? We've asked ourselves that many times! Especially with the cost of fuel increasing as it has. But, we're still going, and expect we'll wind up doing as much traveling as we can afford? If we run out of money and con't afford to fill the truck ($1000 buck a pop!!) as often as we'd like, then we'll sit for a bit until the next pension checks come in. But at the same time, we expect we'll travel more for the first couple of years of this fulltime adventure. After that? Who know? Maybe fuel will go go down and we CAN travel as much as we like? (Ok, Ok, get up off the floor before your stomach hurts too much and you get all dusty!)
For the time being, we'll go wherever the urge says to go, stop when the urge says to stop and just enjoy what happens in between!!
Just our humble opinion....
2002 Volvo 770, Cummins ISX 450, 10 Speed Autoshift, 3:58
33' Alpenlite & 5 decades of happy RV'ing
"I tried a lot of different things in my life, before I found my true vocation: RETIREMENT!!
Looks like some good responses to your questions. I've had TT, 5th wheels and am on our 2nd mh. I like the 5th wheel, but the DW loves the MH. It is true that the mh is a much quicker and more convenient set up. On first trip in a mh we pulled into Mesquite NV and the cg's were full, it was raining, I pulled into a parking lot next to others and leveled the mh, fired up the generator turned on the tv and asked DW to get me a drink, all from the drivers seat. I sipped my drink watching other rv'ers unscrew their jacks in the rain while their families ran from the truck to the trailer. It was then that I knew the DW was a lot smarter then me. Momma didn't raise a fool, we will always be in a mh.
Like a few others said rent a unit before you buy and see what's good for you.
Did I mention that I don't need to make potty stops for the DW?
Thanks for the replies. Sorry if I gave the impression that I have not done the RV thing. We have owned a 24 ft Class, a 33ft A Class (Damon Ultrasport) and a 40 ft Jayco TT which we bought and kept in Myrtle Beach (sold it for a profit too). We currently tow a 25ft Ultralight with a GMC Envoy XL. It's a great set up for a week or weekend but no longer. I do think we will return to a MH, now I have to decide on Gas or Diesel. I think with full time living the diesel is probably the best way to go, however the newer gas engines seem to give pretty good mileage. But the diesel gives you more room for all the junk we will accumulate. I'll be looking for something about 4 years old.
Cheers for all the replies
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