RV Chronicles: The Journey Begins
Sit down and take a ride with me. We'll travel along life's adventurous highways and byways and explore all the people, places, and philosophical ponderings along the way.
Something needs to be said here by way of introduction. I'd much rather just jump into the stories from the road. In media res. In the middle of things.
But, if you must know the history, the who what when where why of how it all began, stick with me through this brief introduction.
The Shasta Revere, a 1988 30' Class C, came into my possession on August 1, 2017. I'd been thinking of taking a job caring for llamas near Salida, Colorado, in exchange for rent. It seemed like a fun venture, but a couple friends told me about a used RV for sale and how I must go look at it, about how it would be a step up from my four-month-car-living experiment.
"The car living has to end," an elder said. "Winter's coming. Do you really want to be outside in the mud working with llamas?"
"Just go look at it," a nomad traveler encouraged. "The nomad life might be for you."
The nomad life? Is that a thing?
It was kind of what I'd already been doing with my living-in-the-car experiment, but with a bathroom and stove and space to play my ukulele.
"If it smells like mildew or foot sweat, I'm not buying it."
My nomad-friend, Seth, went with me to look at it. The seller wanted $3000 for the RV. I didn't know anything about RVs, but Seth had been living in one for the last eight years. He could ask all the right questions and inspect the mechanics of the Shasta. The only thing I wanted to do was give the rig a sniff test and check for questionable stains. I wasn't going to buy anything gross. I'd have to sleep in it after all!
While Seth spoke with the seller, I stepped inside, sniffing the air while my eyes fell to the sea-blue carpet. No stains.
I lifted my eyes to the front where two grey seats faced forward in the cab and scanned the length of the RV. Two grey chairs faced a four-person dinette. Behind the dinette, the kitchen sink hooked around like an L, making the kitchen area feel separate from the living room space. After the kitchen, two doors faced each other: the bathroom and the shower. At the very back was a small bedroom.
Nothing smelled funky. Nothing looked out of place.
I stepped outside and looked to where Seth and the seller discussed the RV.
"We only used it when we went hunting," the seller said, noting the low mileage of 46,000 miles on a rig so old.
While they talked, I walked around the backside. What were all these strange doors and fixtures? Were they storage? I knew one of the doors housed the generator. Seth had pointed it out to me as we pulled up.
More importantly, would I ever understand how a generator works to feed the electrical system? What about the plumbing? I was afraid even think about doing the first poo-tank dump. (Later I learned it was called the "black water tank.")
Seth came hustling around the backside of the RV. "What do you think, Pyra?"
"It doesn't smell weird, and it could be a fun living experience. What about the engine and all the other...the other...parts?"
"The house functions?"
"Yeah," I said, gauging the tone in his voice to listen for any hesitation or concern as he discussed both the driving side and the home side.
"It's really two systems," he began. "You've got to look at it as a house and a car." He lead me up to the front of the RV and pointed at the engine, which was propped open with a wooden stick. "The engine is your main concern. You want to get that running first; otherwise, you could end up stuck somewhere. The engine runs fine, but it's going to need new belts and hoses. I'd also recommend a carburetor rebuild. It sounds like it's choking up. Plus, after sitting so long, it probably needs one."
From there, we went inside to look at the various appliances and set-up.
"He said everything runs fine in here, but you're going to have to do something about the generator. That's the only thing that doesn't work."
We took it for a test drive. Seth drove.
"You're going to have to drive it to see if you're comfortable with it," he said when we reached a good place to turn around out by Mt. Harvard.
"You turn it around and just point it straight down the road," I said, feeling apprehensive about taking the wheel.
"The long back end's gonna swoop out into the other lane if you made too sharp of a right turn, so be careful," he said as I climbed behind the wheel.
My foot went to the brake pedal as I shifted the RV into Drive.
It choked and stalled.
"Oh....I was afraid that would happen," Seth said. "See this is why you're going to need a carburetor rebuild. Just try restarting it."
It took several pumps of the pedal and a few more tries, but we got it started again.
The ride itself was comfortable, like slowly sailing forward on a land yacht.
In the rearview mirror, I saw the entire "house" part, but focused on the little window at the back where a swift red car came to a quick slowdown behind me.
"There's a car behind me," I announced.
"Just do what you normally do when that happens and drive," Seth advised.
Of course. I would drive, but I worried about the turn we'd have to make to get back to the owner's house. I didn't want the long back end swooping anywhere.
The red car passed me.
"You're going to have that happen," Seth said. "I'm going to put a bumper sticker on my rig: I can't drive 55." He laughed at the irony of using the Sammy Hagar song to mean the exact opposite of the original intent.
Somehow, I managed to get the rig returned safely to the front of the seller's house.
Seth said he wanted to check out a few more things, but I was already sold on the idea. I walked up to the seller who was wrapping up the electrical cord he'd had plugged into the RV, which was another mystery to me. Why plug in an RV? (I knew absolutely nothing about RVs at this point.)
"Would you take $2000?" I asked, ready to start the price-haggle game.
"Sure," he said.
And so began my RV Life Adventures!