A look back at our first six months
We have officially been on the road for six months. In that time, we’ve traveled over 15,000 miles (about 24,140 km), visited 33 States, and stayed everywhere from luxury RV parks to free land in the middle of nowhere and everything in between.
We’ve spent much of our time in State or National Parks, and we continue to thrive in this lifestyle. However, as we’ve said before, it’s not all roses and sunshine sometimes it’s stress and rain!
How do we handle it when things go wrong? Although we’ve been truly blessed with safety, things have been somewhat tough at times. Here are some examples of issues we’ve faced.
On our way to Glacier National Park this summer, our truck’s AC began to make a dreadful noise and then stopped working altogether. It was 97º outside, and we spent the next three hours trying to stay cool with all our windows down. It was miserable.
The following day, Kev discovered that a rodent of unusual size had made its way into our cabin air filter and although he enjoyed a tasty meal of dirty filter, he didn’t survive the journey through the fan. Now we have a cabin filter box full of rodent remains and a broken fan. Thankfully, Kev is mechanically minded and was able to not only fix the fan and replace the cabin filter, but also clean the whole compartment and finally apply rodent repellant to hopefully prevent any four-legged friends from getting back into the engine.
This may appear to be a minor incident, but the Toyota dealer we contacted wanted to keep our truck for four days (our entire time in Glacier) and the estimated cost started at $350! When you live on the road, it absolutely pays to be mechanically minded.
We also had a major issue with our new truck brakes when going over the Rockies. Even though we had researched the mountain pass we chose to take, and we know how to put our truck in a low gear and keep our trailer brake on high we found ourselves stuck behind a huge eighteen-wheeler doing 20 mph, forcing us to be constantly on our brakes. As anyone who drives down steep mountain grades will tell you; this is a bad situation. Our brakes began to smell horrendous, and Kev told me to immediately pull over to the emergency pull-out. It was a good call as our brakes began to smoke like crazy! As Kev got out to check them, I grabbed the fire extinguisher convinced the truck was about to ignite. All I could think was, how will we get the dogs out of the truck to safety, the fire extinguished, and keep the trailer safe all on the side of a mountain road with an 8% grade???
Thank God, the brakes which at first smoked like an old diesel train began to calm and we were soon joined by a truck driver who was also struggling with hot brakes. He recommended we wait at least 15 minutes before venturing back onto the steep grade. We decided to wait for thirty and eventually got back on our way with our brakes, truck, and trailer all intact. It’s not an exaggeration to say we were terrified, but we did remain calm and followed our protocol.
We love our incredible solar system, but after a long and exhausting day hiking, we returned to the rig and forgetting we don’t live in a regular house proceeded to use all the electrical things all at once, such as the microwave, water heater, kettle, and fireplace! *Note: Never do this! We completely blew our main power. It was dark, it was cold and maybe even raining (memory fails me). Basically, we were dead in the water, we couldn’t do anything, not even bring in the slides (although you can do this manually). It took Kev three hours while talking to our solar guy, Derek from https://ccrvtechandsolar.com/ to diagnose the issue. We’d blown the main emergency fuse that prevents damage to our system. With Derek’s help, Kev was able to Frankenstein a spare fuse we’d been given. A temporary fix until we could purchase a new fuse.
Our most recent ‘dip in the road’ so to speak, was during an adventure into the National Forest for more free camping. We had been given coordinates by a friend to an amazing site off the beaten path which our rig would easily fit into. We checked it on Google Earth, and it did indeed look fantastic. Heading off the main road, we took the directions per Google Maps (this is almost never a good idea once you’re off actual roads) and after two miles of sketchy, somewhat flooded, dirt roads, we found ourselves at a dead end! We’d not followed the correct forest road and did not make it to the suggested coordinates. We were in the dense forest; on a dirt track and we are 50’ long when towing the trailer.
The only saving grace was the end of the track was a camp that was wide enough for us to do a 37-point turn, which is a lot harder than you’d Imagine (see what I did there?) before making our way back down the single track, windy, sketchy road. We twice had to reverse and maneuver around trees, rocks, and stumps to ensure the rig didn’t incur structural damage. We finally made it back to the graded road, but we still needed to find a spot for the next seven days. Mercifully, the graded road led to much easier sites to access.
All this being said… the title of this blog isn’t ‘A List of our Trials on The Road’, so what do you do when things go wrong?
Having a prepared plan when towing and something goes wrong is your top priority.
Who will do what? For example, when we had to maneuver out of the tight spot, Kev drove, while I was outside watching all the way around the rig to ensure we didn’t hit anything.
What roadside recovery do you have, and do they cover your RV?
Do you have insurance that covers hotel stays if necessary?
Can you fix your truck/RV if it breaks down – if not who can?
Do you have a repairs and maintenance line in your budget?
Do you know where your fire extinguishers are and how to properly use them?
Here are some top tips for living on the road when things go wrong.
Have a plan in place in case of an emergency.
Stay as calm as possible.
Remember, the driver isn’t always at fault.
Things will break.
You will get lost.
You will probably damage your rig at some point.
Be KIND to one another – even if one of you is at fault – it was an accident.
Everything that breaks can be fixed.
Are you someone who can roll with the punches? This is probably not the life for you if you like all your ducks in a row, all the time 😉
We’re thankful that we’ve not had any major dips and that our issues have mainly been moderate to annoying.
As always friends, stay safe out there and let us know if you enjoyed this blog post.