In a lengthy e-mail I received yesterday, a couple wanted to share their great desire to escape the rut they are living in and experience the joys of fulltime RV travel, but they also admitted that they have some serious misgivings, and asked a lot of “what if” questions.

What if our RV breaks down someplace where we don’t know a good mechanic? What if one of us gets sick? What if one of our parents gets sick or dies while we’re hundreds of miles away?

I know that to these folks all of their concerns are unique, but in truth, every fulltime RVer has asked themselves all of the same what if questions. In fact, when we were teaching at Life on Wheels, I developed an entire seminar called The Reluctant RVer to address these questions and others that wannabe fulltimers ask.

Some common concerns that new fulltimers face include separation from family and friends; serious illness or death on the road; accidents or mechanical breakdowns; leaving our comfort zone and stepping into the unknown; losing our financial cushion; adapting to the RV lifestyle; and never being able to afford another home.

Yes, people do get sick on the road, RVs do break down in strange towns, and unfortunately, sometimes family members get sick and even die when we’re not there with them. Life happens. We have faced each and every one of these problems at one time or another. We got through them, and trust me, you can too. We cannot spend our lives worrying about what if, or we’ll never get anywhere.

What happens if we break down in a strange town? That’s why we have our Coach-Net road service. They will send out a qualified repair person or a tow truck capable of getting us to a garage that can fix whatever is wrong and get us back on the road. That’s also why we created our RV Good Guys guide to honest and dependable RV repair shops coast to coast. Nobody can purchase an ad in the guide, the only way a repair shop gets listed is if we have had personal experience with them, or someone we know and trust recommends them. You can order this guide from our RV Bookstore.

What happens if we get sick while traveling? Any RV park manager should be able to point you toward the nearest hospital or walk in clinic in their area. In our case, when Terry was diagnosed with cancer nine years ago, having wheels under our house allowed us to be where she could get the best treatment, and to return for follow-up examinations as needed. Companies like Sky Med will also fly you and your spouse or partner home, or to wherever you designate, and then provide a professional driver to transport your RV to a designated place.

A few years ago we were in Ohio when Terry’s father was diagnosed with cancer. Again, because we have wheels under our house, we were free to travel back to Arizona to be with her family during her father’s treatment and recovery.

Everything in life has a certain amount of risk associated with it, whether we are driving to the grocery store, having a Sunday picnic with the family, or watching a baseball game. I don’t know what calamities may befall you as you enjoy the fulltime RV lifestyle, but you can rest assured that sooner or later something will go wrong. Just as it would if you stayed in your sticks and bricks house.    

But I’d much rather deal with whatever problems fate sends my direction while I’m living my dream instead of being back in my old workaholic lifestyle.

I’ll always remember that when her doctors first told us that Terry had Stage Four cancer, and the outcome looked grim, she said “No matter what happens, at least we had eighteen months to live our dream.”

A lot of people never get the chance to follow their dreams. Don’t let the fear of “what if” keep you from making yours come true.

Thought For The Day – Growing old is inevitable. Growing up is optional.

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My gosh, I think we are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel in our move from our bus conversion to our new to us Winnebago Ultimate Advantage motorhome!

In spite of all of the rain we have had this past week, Miss Terry has been hard at work emptying closets, drawers, and everywhere else we had stuff stashed away in the bus. Yesterday I managed to empty out the cavernous bays on the bus, sort through everything, and move what we are going to keep into the bays of the Winnebago. As I have said before, the great thing about a bus conversion is that you can carry a ton of stuff, and the bad thing about a bus conversion is that you usually do end up carrying a ton of stuff!

A lot of stuff did not make it into the bays of the motorhome, and Bobby Patel, owner of Elkhart Campground, is the proud new owner of some tools, a lot of hardware, and other things he can use around the RV park. Bobby and his wife Gita have always treated Terry and me like family, and we were happy to bequeath it all to him.

My friend Mac McCoy from Fire and Life Safety called the other day to see if we had buyer’s remorse yet. He said when he first bought his American Tradition motorhome, he went through a period of near panic, wondering “What did I do?” This is common after any major life event, from getting married to making a large purchase. Mac said all of those misgivings disappeared when he was about forty miles into his first trip in the motorhome.

We have not taken any trips in the Winnebago yet, but we have been living in it for several days now, and it is starting to feel more and more like home to us. So far we are very happy with it, except for a couple of little things.

The shower doesn’t have as much pressure as we had in the bus, even here on the same site where we always park the bus. My buddy Ron Speidel did some adjusting, and hopefully that will help. We may just need to replace the shower head, and we have been looking at the Oxygenics models, which we have heard good reports about. I am also finding that the shower is a bit more cramped than in the bus, where we had an apartment sized tub and shower.

The motorhome has an open bath/bedroom arrangement, with a separate water closet, so the bedroom area feels very large to us, which we enjoy. And with the two slides, as well as the fact that the Winnebago is six inches wider than the bus, we really notice the extra space. In the bus, when I was sitting at my computer (and it seems like I am always sitting at my computer), Terry had to squeeze between my desk chair and the couch to get past me. In the new rig, there is plenty of room to walk around, even when I am working at the computer.

Miss Terry loves to cook, and we seriously considered moving her stainless steel Avanti range into the Winnebago, but it would require some major renovations to the kitchen area, so she is going to try to adjust to a simple cooktop and a convection oven. The jury is still out on that one.

Terry also has a learning curve to adjust to the Splendide washer/dryer combo in the Winnebago, after her separate washer and dryer in the bus.

We are looking forward to getting back on the road soon so we can experience traveling in the new rig. I’m especially looking forward to tackling some of those mountains in the west, which were so problematic in the bus. There are a few creature comforts we’ll enjoy when traveling that we didn’t have in the bus, such as cruise control, that will be fun to have.   

On another note, Bad Nick tells me he has a new post on the Bad Nick Blog for those of you who have been waiting. Check it out.

Thought For The Day – We have confused the free with the free and easy.

Register Now For Our Ohio Gypsy Gathering Rally

This really isn’t an RV topic, but I wanted to share something with you, besides the fact that we are still moving from the bus to the Winnebago, between a never-ending series of rain storms that have made the move a real hassle.

Like most people, I have seen magnetic jewelry for sale at RV rallies and craft shows, and probably like most folks, I really didn’t give it a whole lot of credibility. I had heard that wearing a bracelet of magnetic hematite could reduce all kinds of physical pain, and over the years I have even had friends tell me that they have had amazing results when they tried the things. Still, I guess I am too much of a skeptic, so I wasn’t convinced. Until now.

For two or three months now, I have been dealing with a lot of pain in my right elbow, to the point where it seemed like I was taking Advil or Tylenol a couple of times a day just to keep the pain at bay. I’ll be having my annual checkup at the VA hospital in Lexington, Kentucky soon, and it was one of the things I had planned to talk to my primary healthcare provider about.

I have also been dealing with either a bone spur or something on my tailbone, which over the winter got so bad that I could not ride my bicycle, and just sitting in the office chair I use at my desk was extremely uncomfortable after more than an hour or two. That was also on my list for when I have my medical checkup.

Last year at our Ohio Gypsy Gathering rally, vendors Russ and Debbie Davis were selling magnetic bracelets, and they gave me one. I promptly laid it down on my desk and forgot all about it.

About three weeks ago I came across the bracelet when I was sorting through all of the stuff I allow to pile up on my desk, and I slipped it onto my wrist just to get it out of the way. About three or four hours later I suddenly realized that my elbow had stopped hurting! I was amazed, because the pain had been there so long, and it took me a while to notice that it was gone.

I have been wearing the bracelet pretty much fulltime ever since, and if I had not experienced it myself, I’d still be very skeptical. If I had to put it in mathematical terms, I’d honestly have to say that the pain has been reduced by 80%. My elbow still hurts if I lay on it wrong at night, or if I leave it extended in any position for a long time, but otherwise, I really am not aware of it any longer.  

Just this week there was a vendor at the Carriage RV rally selling magnetic bracelets, and I bought a couple more. When Miss Terry and I were talking about how much the bracelet has helped my elbow, I suddenly realized that the pain in my tailbone has been dramatically reduced too.

Yeah, I know some of you are shaking your heads right now, but all I can tell you is what I have experienced. I can’t explain how it works, but for me, it does. I’m not selling magnetic jewelry, and I’m not pointing you toward any particular vendor who does. But I know I have felt a tremendous reduction in my pain levels since I’ve been wearing the bracelet, and for the few bucks they cost, you might want to give one a try. What do you have to lose?

Thought For The Day – Friendship isn’t a big thing – it’s a million little things.

Slowly, ever so slowly, our old bus conversion is getting emptied out, and the Winnebago is starting to fill up. It is amazing how much stuff we are finding that we did not even remember we still had! A lot of it is finding its way to the dumpster, or into the van to be dropped off at Goodwill.

Miss Terry has been doing most of the work of sorting and moving, mostly because she has a place for everything and wants everything in its place, and according to local rumor, I may be more of a stash it anywhere and we’ll look for it later kind of guy. I suspect that may account for a lot of the stuff we didn’t know we still had.

I keep pulling things out of closets, drawers, and cubbyholes and wondering why I have it. I finally gave up on the idea of ever being thin again, or even pleasantly plump, so there are some jeans and shirts that were part of that fantasy that will definitely go away.

But how about some of this other stuff? Why do we even still have it? A holster for a handgun I sold ten years ago. A music stand from my ill fated attempt to become a saxophone player. Some VCR tapes of movies we never got around to watching. We have not had a VCR in forever. An antique marble rolling pin. (I want that gone before Miss Terry whacks me over the head with it!) I have a feeling that whoever buys our bus, once we’re moved, out may get a lot better fuel mileage than we ever did!

Some of this is kind of bittersweet. In our old life, when space was not a problem, Miss Terry collected hand carved Native American fetishes, which are small stone or bone images of animals that have significance in the Indian culture. She gave most of them away when we hit the road, but she came across some of her favorites that she kept, which have been packed away for years now. Maybe she’ll find a place to display them in our new motorhome. She also came across some beautiful handmade Native American jewelry she has not worn in years, but that still has a lot of sentimental value to her.

For many people making the transition to the fulltime RV lifestyle, getting rid of their stuff can be quite challenging. However, once the trauma of seeing their first two or three treasures going away to a new home is over, most have found it to be a liberating experience. We soon come to the realization that we sometimes get to the point where we don’t own our stuff anymore, it owns us.

And just like we did way back when we first started our own fulltiming adventure, we are getting rid of even more stuff, and just like this old bus, soon we will be carrying a lighter load.

Thought For The Day – Sometimes all a person needs is a hand to hold and a heart to understand.

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Moving is never fun, but I guess the good thing about moving from one motorhome to another is that there isn’t much furniture to lug from the old rig to the new one.

Since the customer traffic at the Carriage RV rally was so slow Monday and Tuesday, yesterday Miss Terry stayed home to start moving her kitchen items from our bus conversion to the Winnebago, while I drove to the fairgrounds in Goshen to man our vendor booth. By the time I got home in the afternoon, Terry and Brenda had pretty much moved and set up all of her kitchen and the bathroom.

The rally was such a bust that I decided not to go back today for the last day of vending. Every day we have spent more time talking to the other vendors, who were just as bored, than we ever did to any customers. The problem is that every day they are off to some tour or event away from the rally grounds. That’s fun for the attendees, but it makes the rally a complete waste of time for the vendors. I can use the time much better to help in getting the move completed. 

Right now we living in a sort of disorganized limbo, because half of our stuff is in the Winnebago and half is in the bus, so whenever we need something, it always seems to be in the other motorhome. But hopefully we can get moved and settled in within the next few days.

Some good news for the RV industry; Dutchmen RV in Goshen, Indiana announced yesterday that it is hiring 50 new employees to fill new manufacturing positions. Company executives said they’ve recently made “internal structural changes to support additional job growth” within the company. Hopefully this is just a start and we’ll see more RV industry workers going back to work in the near future.

I have had a tremendous response to the new Bad Nick Blog, and it has been interesting to read some of the comments and e-mails that have come in. I just posted a new blog entry titled Bad Nick Gets A Discount that I think every frustrated shopper can relate to. 

A few people have commented on the type of Google ads that have shown up on the blog. As expected, some hard core Republican conservative readers are already objecting to the ads pushing a Democratic liberal agenda, and just as many folks from the other side of the fence are upset when the ads Google serves up are about things they disagree with.

I don’t control the ads, Google’s AdSense program automatically inserts them. I just cash the small commission check I get from them to help pay the bills. But here’s an idea from Bad Nick – if you see something that piques your curiosity or interest, by all means, click the ad link and check it out. And if a particular ad offends you, don’t click on it!

Thought For The Day – When I read about the evils of drinking it scared me, so I gave up reading.

Register Now For Our Ohio Gypsy Gathering Rally