Always learning...
For the first time, we stored our cereal and crackers in
zip-lock bags and kept them on the open shelf above the dinette. This storage
method was very practical to access, kept the food from getting damp in the
cold, wet weather, and avoided boxes which might abrade the vinyl wall
covering of the insulation package.
Even with the optional insulation package and thermal
windows, when it was too cold at night to leave a window open, by morning there
was some condensation on the windows from our breathing, and on the vinyl walls behind the mattress
and behind the dinette cushions. We will start pulling the dinette cushions
away from the walls at bedtime to allow for air circulation there, but we can’t
do this for the mattress, since it’s enclosed at three sides.
When we ran out of propane
in both tanks unexpectedly, one exchange tank of propane (Blue Rhino) purchased at a gas
station in Ohio was about $23 with sales tax.
We love our Garmin GPS, and really like the feature that
shows which lane(s) to be in in advance of a turn. We also like the feature
which shows a pictorial representation of upcoming exits which apply to your
route. Because the Garmin has a strong preference for interstates, sometimes we
must insert a waypoint to force it to take the non-interstate route we have
chosen. We cannot imagine anymore the
effort it would take, especially at night, to go back to navigation by maps.
It's our style to set the speed control for 60 mph as much as possible and just let the faster traffic move around us. It's a lower-stress way to drive.
Great Husband and I enjoy planning details for our trip by making
a detailed Excel spreadsheet at home. It includes the expected campground for
each night, the length of the drive for each day in miles and hours, GPS
coordinates and addresses, museums or other special places we want to visit,
and info for campgrounds. We send the spreadsheet out to relatives so
they can know where we are for emergencies.
I like the thought of flying by the seat of our pants more
than we do, but it doesn’t seem to work for us.
On this trip, I drove the Flex under towing conditions for
the first time ever. Great Husband loves to drive and tends to keep that job for himself. But a migraine overtook him, and suddenly it was my turn to drive. It was a little unnerving to get initiated to towing in a town rather than out on the highway,
including learning to look at our Aero towing mirrors instead of the car’s
mirrors. All went well.
I also towed on the interstate for the first time, and I found
it so easy! It will still take me some time to gain confidence about changing
lanes in traffic. Great Husband and I
are both convinced that our towing mirrors are an absolute necessity and it
would be foolish to try to tow without them.
We have given several tours of the Escape on this trip, but
are also surprised at how much interest is generated by our Ford Flex. Lots of
people ask what it is and have never heard of this car before. They are
surprised that we can tow a camper with the Flex and always ask about towing
capacity and how much our Escape weighs. We think Ford is missing out by not
promoting the Flex better than they do.
There has been a minor problem with the Escape’s electric cord
getting tangled up on stuff under the bed, so Great Husband intends to build a little partition in there to keep the cord separated from the rest of the under-bed
storage.
At multiple campsites, we have had a problem with our old
water pressure reducer (used for years with our pop-up). The water flow would dwindle to a trickle and then
Great Husband had to go outside and work some magic to get the flow started
again. He thinks we are due to buy a new pressure reducer. His research has
shown that some are advertised as lead-free, so that sounds good.
When we had the Escape 19 built, we asked Reace for longer
stabilizer jacks than he was typically using. He installed some that we believe
are the ones he has been using on the Escape fifth wheels. We are very pleased
with the longer stabilizing jacks, and don’t need to put any wood under them,
which simplifies life.
Speaking of wood, we need some shorter pieces for leveling on the next trip. We are using pieces of 1 x 6s and need some shorter ones that will fit between the two tires.
The black water tank indicator typically reads high. But since we have never come close to filling that tank, we don’t worry about the tank reading much. When we clean the tank thoroughly at the end of a trip, the indicator works fine again.
The bumper pads under the stove cover and on all the cabinet
doors are sliding around. We have pushed them back into position, but will they
stay there? Hmmm.
We are pleased with our ability to hitch up. We have learned
that after lowering the tongue onto the hitch ball, pull the tow vehicle
forward an inch or less and that makes it really easy to lock the tongue onto
the ball.
We travel with a little electric space heater (1300 watts on
high) and use that whenever we can. It is much quieter than the propane furnace and
easily heats the interior of the Escape to a comfortable temperature. Plus, of
course, it doesn't use our propane.
The awning is so easy to operate that we never hesitate to
put it out, even if briefly. Whistling Son timed us at 30 seconds to open up
the awning.
We are using microfiber bath towels, and they came with a
loop at one corner. I’m going to add a second snapping loop near another
corner, and we will hang our towels from the cabinet handles across the bed and
across the dinette for indoor drying. For various reasons, there haven’t been
too many days when we could hang the towels outside.
For this trip, we bought a TV. It is an Apex 19” from
Walmart, and was under $100. It stores beautifully under the passenger side
dinette seat, in an upright position, and using the foam packing material that
came with the TV. The storage height is perfection, and the plywood seat
presses down slightly on the packing material to stabilize the TV. When we
ordered our Escape, we chose not to have the wall-mount for the TV. We had our
cable connection installed under the driver’s side of the dinette. We set up
our TV either on the dinette or on the flip-up counter extension.
We brought our antenna from home to use with the new little
TV. It looks just like a sheet of laminated paper, and works great. We
can position it to get the reception needed, sometimes hanging it from a
cabinet handle with a twist tie. It is called The Leaf and we got it on Amazon.
For the first time, we also got to use cable TV (an option
with the Escape). We found that a 25- foot coaxial cable works well at the
campsites we’ve encountered. Shorter may not be enough.
This was the first trip during which we made zero
reservations for campsites in advance. It worked out in every location,
although we were surprised how often the campgrounds were nearly full in
September and October.
We bought a year’s membership in Passport America since we
could easily make up the membership price on this trip at just one of our
chosen campgrounds. Passport America campgrounds give members 50% off the
normal price. Their website lists the participating campgrounds. http://www.passportamerica.com/
By calling Passport America to order our membership, instead of signing up online, we avoided an extra charge for the printed copy of their participating campgrounds.
