OMFG this thing is massive. And ours isnt even the largest one. Its actually considered a small RV!
Its literally like someone put a studio flat on wheels. Honestly, there are whole houses in the UK smaller than this RV.
But first I was forced to watch an instructional video about how to use it. It was cheesy, but actually very useful telling me how to hook up power, water, how to dump the tanks and where everything was located. Too bad the TV had played the same thing so many times it was distorting the image with huge black patches.
Outside the rental office, Aimi was making friends with some returning Germans. They said they had a really good time which was promising and then presented her with a bag of food and another bear spray canister. It was really helpful actually because they had given us useful things like pasta, herbs, salt and hot chocolate.
We still went to Walmart where we picked up food for a couple days. We also bought chairs because i thought they had been included in our package, but hadn’t been. But helpfully I could rent some for $37 each and I figured we could buy some for that price. I think we could have but for $44 we got much nicer ones and can gift them to the next camper crew we see or Julia and Graham on our departure.
After a quick tour around the RV and picking up our bundles of sleeping kit it was time to head out. And oh boy this thing is big. I was very conscious to give it a wide turning arc and not to come too close to anything. It took so much mental capacity I forgot to put my seat belt on momentarily, until a warning beep sounded.
Once we were out on the interstate things were a bit easier. Now I promise I’m not going to moan about the camper too much but there were a few things…
Firstly, the steering wheel is simply not connected to the front wheels. I swear they are only communicating using smoke signals or something because making small, or even medium adjustments to your direction is impossible. No wonder people in the movies look like they are swinging the steering wheel around randomly when driving, that’s how much you need to move the wheel to have any influence on which way you are going!
After parking up and unpacking the bundles we found quite a few things missing that I’d paid to be included, such as;
- Chopping board
- Potato peeler
- Tongs
- Spatular
- Tea towels
- Dish cloths
It’s not an insignificant list of things but the most annoying missing item is a plug for the sink which makes washing up a pain in the butt. After a little trial and error I found something that worked but it’s a bit of a pain.
Nevertheless, we arrived at Tunnel Mountain RV park, checked in and pulled alongside our pitch. Unlike UK camping, you don’t get a gravel driveway or patch of grass off the campsite road. Here, the road is your campsite and you just open your doors to the park bench beside your lot. It’s very easy, but it’s a bit like being in a carpark.
