April Fool's Day, 2023 will live forever in the highlight reel of our travel life.

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It was a day like most others, and we were in the midst of an ongoing casual conversation about what to do this summer. When we left Vermont last year, we set up a seasonal lot for this year, with the expectation that <a href="/articles/blog-posts/2023-looking-forward/">we would buy land</a> and start the process of working our way out of full time travel life and transition into our own house on some land and have a mini homestead. Since then we have been watching the real estate market, watching for land, watching the interest rates and aggressively saving money. About a week ago we tried to buy a piece of land that came up that was actually ideal for our purposes and we were outbid by someone with more cash on hand. And that was that. In the area we think we want to live there's been very little land for sale and most of it has been very pricey. We did find a parcel in a different area to consider, but not being familiar with the region we were hesitant to proceed with inquiries about that parcel.

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We are headed to a campground we already have spent two months at, we paid for a full season, and we were expecting to be working on our own land that we are no longer going to have... And to top it off, <a href="/articles/essays/our-camping-rig-coming-into-2023/">our fifth-wheel</a> "Ricardo" is difficult to travel with in the east and generally only really good when parked for longer stays.

After traveling with Ricardo for a year, we have grown very tired of the process involved in preparing to travel with it, and the elaborate set up and tear down process and some of it's quirks- like the oven that doesn't work and the fridge that needs to be turned off while we are traveling lest the propane cooling implement get damaged and cause it to stop functioning correctly. Additionally, because it has four slides, every time we move it we have to deep clean it: pack away a bunch of stuff, take things off of walls, move everything off the counter tops, tie down our bookshelves and tables, stow blankets and pillows... It's a very involved process. Then if we want to be stable and comfortable when we park we need to add seven different stabilizers to add support to the slides and the fifth wheel end so that things aren't bouncing and bobbing when we walk around or the kids inevitably start bouncing around. Given all of that work, it's a major pain to travel more than once every week or two, and sometimes we just need to travel a few days in a row to get where we want to be. And the cherry on top of it all is that because of its size, almost 40 feet long, it is almost impossible for us to use gas stations that aren't truck stops- which in the northeast can be really hard to find, and when we stop for gas, we have to try to find whatever fast food happens to be there or eat gas station food because we can't access our kitchen when we stop for such breaks.

Big picture these are very privileged problems to have, but this is the reality of the world we live in: full time RV-ing. We have had several times when we've reflected on Ricardo and compared the experience of traveling with a fifth wheel to our first rig, "Maria". Maria was a 30 ft travel trailer with no slides. Maria could fit almost anywhere, sometimes she was a little too long for some of the more remote campgrounds, but she was much easier than Ricardo in terms of size. We also had many fond memories of <a href="/articles/blog-posts/stories/my-frighting-experience-in-taos/">simple boondocking stays</a> (non-electric, no water or sewer hookups), roadside lunch stops, and very simple preparation for travel. The trade-off of course is less interior camper space.

One of the other observations I made last summer was that because Ricardo was much bigger, so much more comfortable, almost like a house, that we spent a lot less time outside both casually everyday around the campgrounds and intentionally in outdoor activities. I didn't like that. Alex wasn't convinced at the time, but now that we have wintered in Ricardo in Texas and gotten back on the road again now. It became clear that the huge rig is much less fun to travel with than the smaller one.

We started to explore the idea of getting a smaller rig for traveling while keeping Ricardo for slower seasons of travel life. Originally we conceptualized doing this when we had a house, or at least when <a href="/articles/travelogue/second-summer-here-i-come/">we got back to Texas</a> in the late fall of this year... But when we realized this was not going to be the right year to buy land in Vermont, we were about to be stuck... Parked for a season in our big rig in an area of Vermont we have gotten very familiar with. We had talked about taking road trips, and leaving Ricardo parked at the campground, to stay in hotels or cabins or something when we wanted to go do things in summer. We even considered getting tent camping supplies. But we knew we needed a strategy to be able to really enjoy this summer or we were going to feel trapped and miserable, like we were squandering all the possibilities of this lifestyle and not doing the things we really wanted to be doing.

I started looking at small campers. We figured, we aren't all the way up to Vermont yet, so it's not *too late* to try something inventive. Initially we figured we could find a smaller camper to buy with cash in Texas close to our winter spot, then drive Ricardo down, move out, put him in storage and drive the new, smaller camper up to Vermont. Obviously we weren't in love with that idea because we would have to completely abandon our current travel plans and the good time we were having in the OBX and add thousands more miles to our driving this year. But we decided we would do it if we could find a good camper, because this brief discomfort and inconvenience would make for more potential adventure and fun this summer.

I found a camper and Alex made a call at 2:30 pm. The seller said we could do a face time walk-through at 3pm. As Alex and the seller were making this plan, a stroke of brilliance hit me...  I searched for and found a camper for sale in North Carolina... The same make, model, year, and price as the one in Texas.

Alex hung up the call, and I told him what had struck me...

We don't need to drive all the way to Texas. We can buy a camper in this state, put Ricardo in storage in Georgia near where we get together with his siblings in February, and bring the new camper back to the OBX and stick to our travel plans. It would take less time and less miles than going all the way to Texas. Alex said, "That's the play! do that!" and called the North Carolina RV shop and arranged to come in Monday morning to buy the camper. While he was making that one phone call I found a campground to stay at while during the swap and booked it, found a storage place for Ricardo and booked it, and found a pet resort in the OBX to keep the pets while we made this change so we would have less stress. (Unfortunately, the dog' but her 's rabies vaccine expired last month, ugh. But, she was a trooper!)

When 3 pm came, Alex looked at me and said, "I'm supposed to call that guy back..."

20 minutes. In 20 minutes I shaved off 2000 miles, some expense, and 4 days off of our initial plan and we had booked everything. Just 20 minutes and the largest personal check Alex has ever written in his life.

We left the next morning for the campground, started packing up Ricardo and prepared for what we needed to do next.

The only unexpected wrench in the plan that ended up kind of being a blessing was the several hours of time it took for the RV place to prep the rig we bought. So we had extra time to organize our things, clean up Ricardo, and get settled into the new camper, "Leela". We added one extra night to our stay at the campground. Apart from that, everything went exactly as planned.

So, what did we start with and what did we get?

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Maria 2012 Forest river grey wolf 26bh Travel Trailer 30 ft long, 11 ft high Dry weight 4,541 lbs

Ricardo 2021 Prime time crusader 330 mbh Fifth wheel 39 ft long, 13 ft high Dry weight 10,783 lbs

Leela 2022 Keystone Passport SL 219 BH Travel Trailer 25 ft long, 11 ft high Dry weight 4,672 lbs

Stacked up, you can really see the difference in size between the three.

What made us choose THIS specific rig? Why did we go smaller than the first rig? Why didn't we get one with a slide? Why did we leave Ricardo in Georgia and when will we use him again?

We chose this travel trailer because it's as small as we can go with a bunkhouse and a reasonably sized kitchen space. We went small so we can fit pretty much anywhere we want to fit when we are traveling the country, including simple boondocking stays. We also went small because, honestly, we can! We spent 2 years with reasonable comfort in a 30 ft camper with two small children and three pets. Small doesn't really scare us as long as the space is used smartly. And, we won't be in Leela for two straight years, we will have Ricardo too, so if we need some space or a break from a more active travel life, Ricardo is always waiting for us. We didn't get a camper with any slides because we want to be able to travel with ease again, pull over and use our space at rest stops along the way, similarly to our first rig. Oftentimes travel trailers with slides can't be used when they are parked because the slides block the floor space when they are tucked in for travel.

Ricardo is waiting for us in Georgia because of logistics on our end. We have the season in Vermont. Leela will take side journeys with us this summer. This fall when we begin to journey south again we are going down through Virginia, and will be able to continue south from there to get Ricardo in Georgia. We will swap out the essentials back from Leela to Ricardo, leave Leela in Georgia and head back to Texas for our winter season in Ricardo. That way we can get parked, spread out, and have our "rest season" as we normally do. Then, in February when we see Alex's siblings we won't need to bring Ricardo with us. He can stay in Texas and we can return with Leela after our visit and put her in storage in Texas. Then, if we want to make trips while in Texas we can take Leela out, otherwise we will just let her chill in storage until spring when our next travel season starts up. Then Ricardo will have a warm sleeping season in Texas and Leela will hit the road again until we head back to Texas in the fall. Rinse and repeat until we are entirely done traveling. Some version of this tango of swapping campers depending on which one makes the most sense for what we want to be doing is capable of carrying us through years of full timing.

Alex is giddy with excitement. Leela came with a basic solar setup built in, so he's going to get to trick it out. And because she is the "fun rig" we can focus on optimizing the truck and camper for adventure- kayaks, gear racks... Whatever sounds fun and works.

I'm excited because we have a fraction of the stuff we normally carry in Ricardo. Less stuff means less to clean up, less to tidy before driving, more time spent outdoors enjoying ourselves instead of inside in more of a "house" situation.

We are both excited to explore the new camper's outdoor kitchen, the possibility of keeping the microwave for once, and the fact that the refrigerator is a DC powered unit, NO PROPANE, so we don't have to worry about the fridge breaking when it's running while we travel. The solar panel actually helps to keep it running! (If you don't know, Maria's fridge broke and we had to install a residential one when we were in Taos, New Mexico, and then Ricardo's fridge was finicky when we traveled).

In general, moving into Leela was a really shockingly simple process. Her layout is very similar to Maria's and many of the things we had to take the time to modify in Maria is just standard in Leela, so we have very little to do to get set up and we basically already know where our stuff needs to go. It's actually been so eerily similar that when I walked out of the bathroom this morning I reached out to move the curtain we'd installed in Maria. And Alex told me he went to open the overhead storage compartment and reached for the handle where Maria's handles were. So that's pretty hilarious.

The kids are already pretty happy with their setups. Devin can't get in Ben's bed, so Ben is happy. They both have their own windows, outlets, and lights in their private space. The cat litter box fits perfectly into a storage area that we didn't have to cut through walls to access as we had with Maria and there is so much space in that area that Phoebe has room for a doggy bed. And probably best of all (besides the fridge)... Alex and I have a PROPER Murphy bed and sofa situation, not one that we had to rig in our own way.

All in all, despite the fact that this looks crazy at face value, it's actually going to be fantastic for us. It offers us the best of both worlds and it just took 20 minutes to plan and 4 days to make reality.

Third travel-versary, A side quest

Summer Approaches

Problem Solving

Side Quest

Looking Forward