How We Chose Our
“Home”
Making the
decision to full-time was just the start of many decisions to come. When we came to this conclusion, we did not
even have a camper of any sort, let alone one we could live in! So, the conversation began regarding what
time of unit we wanted. We had to choose
between a 5th wheel and truck or a motorhome and pull our Harley for
transportation. We looked at both and
just kept going back to the idea of the 5th wheel. For us, it just seemed roomier and homier
than a motorhome in our price range. Did
we even want to keep the Harley? That is
where we started. We decided that when
it came time to sell our stick house, that would be the end of our
Harley-riding days. We felt we would be
ready to let that chapter of our lives end as we began a new chapter – living
and traveling in a 5th wheel.
Now, how to
pick the 5th wheel we wanted.
After several years of dreaming, we got serious in February 2013. Clark began searching the Internet for floor
plans and specs. He would capture the
pictures and put them in a file. We
would enter the specs on a spreadsheet. After we felt we had “seen ‘um all” (we could
no longer find anything new out there), we began reviewing all of the pictures
in the file.
We would
look at the pictures of a unit and see if there was anything about it that
would be a deal breaker, if so we moved it to another file – Not
Interested. This way we would know we
had already considered that particular model.
In addition to analyzing the photos, we reviewed the specs from the
spreadsheet on that unit. If there was
anything on the specs we didn’t like, we moved that unit to the “not
interested” file. We went down the line
until we got down to 2 units. We kept
coming back to this Mountaineer. There
wasn’t really anything we couldn’t live with about it and there were a lot of
things we were looking for in it. We
finally had a winner! The problem was
the particular model we liked was a 2012 – both the 2013s and 2014s had some
differences we did not care for. It was
hard to find the older year and model we really desired because we wanted to
buy new since we planned to live in it. Finding
a “new” 2012 in 2013 with the 2014s coming out was not easy, but Clark did find
a few online. We finally made a purchase
but we had to drive from Kansas to Michigan to get it. Wow!
But it was so worth it. It is
such a relief to have made the purchase so we could move on toward our goal. It was really beginning to become an
obsession.
We love our
new home and are excited to start our adventure, just not yet. We still have a house to empty. This will be truly difficult having lived in
this house for 22 years. Plus, this was
the home Clark grew up in so he has even more memories. When we begin to wonder what the heck we are
doing, we look outside to the 5th wheel and see adventure calling to
us and we are fortified and ready to go at it again.
