I am a huge fan of totes. Everything is loaded except meds and personal items (shampoo, etc), food, and clothing. The small basket for each of us that contains our personal items is unpacked and loaded into a tote. Meds are added, clothing put into another tote a day or two before, non perishable foods into a third tote, fresh foods bought a day or two before, kept on one shelf in house fridge, frozen foods in a separate area in the freezer. With less than 1 hour pre-prep, we can load and leave in 20 minutes, including our dog and cat. Just takes a little practice...so hang in there
Me, 1 Great hubby (Tim), Cole the Standard Poodle,
Magic the tiny Bengal Cat
2012 Skyline Koala 21CS
2007 Ford Explorer
My trailer stays packed most of the year-but in the winter when I pull almost everything out I've found that putting together a few rubbermaid totes of stuff to pack up the trailer works well.
I don't unpack the totes basically just bring them in to not attract rodents and so that nothing freezes.
Stuff that I use up (like dry kitchen goods or toiletries) I replace or drop a note in the tote so I know what's missing.
Keeping basic supplies in the RV helps a ton to get out quick-and honestly I've gotten to the point that the fiver has it's own stock of clothes/towels/kitchen gadgets so that I'm never without!
Lots of duplicate comments about keeping the TT stocked already. We just load up clothes and food. DW get that prepped while everybody is at school/work. The loading itself goes quick with our two runners...
DW has everything prepped in bags or totes and our two boys do all the shuttling between the house and TT. Just reverse the process when we get home with the laundry & leftovers.
2012 Koala 25DS
2011 F150 Ecoboost SuperCrew with Max Tow Package
The trick I've found is to have clear plastic tubs for everything. Bedding goes into one, toiletries into another, dry food goods into a third, etc. I also use Ziploc bags for bottles and such, so if something leaks, damage will be minimized. This not just keeps the dust out of stuff, but it makes it easy to get things in and out.
Food that requires refrigeration, I try to get my refrigerator turned on the night before. If I can't, I'll have a few freeze packs and a bottle of ice, which will do a decent job of keeping things cold until the refrigerator is up to speed.
It doesn't take me long to get going -- hook up the battery, flip the refer on and load it, hitch vehicle up, unchock, run through a final checklist, and I'm on the road.
The trick is to treat the RV as a second (or third) home, with full linens, bedding, towels, toiletries, toolkits, and other things.
afob3 wrote: Lots of duplicate comments about keeping the TT stocked already. We just load up clothes and food. DW get that prepped while everybody is at school/work. The loading itself goes quick with our two runners...
DW has everything prepped in bags or totes and our two boys do all the shuttling between the house and TT. Just reverse the process when we get home with the laundry & leftovers.
2 days before: I put the coats, clothes, shoes, books, CD's and DVD's in the TT. Turn on the fridge and get it cold.
Day before: Load up the food pantry and fridge. Put the slide-out in.
Day of: We already have an outfit picked out the night before...get dressed, grab the coffee and breakfast and get on the road. 45 minutes we are out the door and on the road.
We each have one shoebox size bin to toss in the meds and misc. bathroom stuff not stocked in the RV. That is all that goes in before we take off.
Works out pretty good, no more messing around 2-3 hrs trying to hit the road.
2010 Tundra TRD 4x4 Dbl Cab 5.7L V8 4.30 Max Tow 10,300 Payload 1,640 Class IV Hitch 1,030
Prodigy P2 - Blue Ox Sway Pro 10K/1K lbs
2012 Evergreen Ever-lite 29FK
Do they make a tote large enough for the kitchen sink?
Try as we may it takes a couple hours to get everything in and most put away.
We have duplicate toiletries already on board and some clothes.
Duplicates would seem to be in order but....
It seem that we are never in a rush to "get going". The longest time, is the first trip. We have to load everything that we take out for the winter. Mainly all the food. But I do unload the complete storage area, all in binds, to clean it for the winter. So, everything needs to go in.
The start of the season, we load all food and clothing. Fill the storage with the binds. It usally take one good day to complete. The night before we take off I take the 5er out of the shop and keep it plugged in. Bright and early the next day we leave.
Believe me, you will find what works for you!! Find the joy of getting ready for the trip...it will make the experience a lot funner!!
'12 Keystone Cougar 297RKSWE
'03 Dodge 3500 QC 4X4 Long bed Dually
DW-Lynn
BigDog-Kelley
LittleDog-Kroozer
Nope, packing hasn't gotten any easier for us. The MH is packed with its own essentials but it takes forever to get everything else packed because all of our trips are months long. If we were going for just a few days, we could jump in and roll with a couple of bags of clothes and our RX's. So far we have not done any short trips.
One thing I changed which made things much easier on me is we pack meat in the freezer and at our first overnight stop (WM) I finish the grocery shopping rather than buy it all ahead of time, haul it into the house, then back out into the MH.
I also just pile everything on the bed, sofas, floor etc. and then put it away after we stop for the night. This saves a LOT of time in the driveway.
If we think we are going to leave on Tuesday, we don't get out until Friday. I dunno why.
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