Day 1540 – Pull The Trigger?

Another decision point has arrived. Perhaps it’s that neither Annette nor i have had a real vacation in over two years that’s causing me to fixate on escapist thoughts. But whatever the cause i’m back to the perennial question of recreational vehicle selection. This question dovetails into how we’d like the coming segment of our lives to play out. Specifically the question is “are we going to try for stability, or are we going to consciously abandon stability and invest in mobility?”

We’ve pondered yurts, yomes, cabins and tiny houses. The problem is we’ve yet to find a place that speaks to us with such authority we realize it’s where we need to be. In our case the old chestnut “you can change the house, but you can’t change the location” seems to dominate our decisions. We’ve seen many, many places in these United States, and there have been many moments when we’ve looked at each other and simultaneously thought “oh hey, this is nice.” But invariably that thought fades. So now my scheming has drifted back to mobility.

Years ago we went to an RV show. But wait, i must set the stage first. I’ve always camped. It started with my parents when i was quite young, we tent camped all over New England, enduring the fickle weather as best we could. Later my father bought a chevy pickup and a Mobile Traveler camper. This time we went south and spent a great deal of time on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Traveling in the pickup was hell and cramped quarters of the camper were hard on all of us. But we covered some vast territory in that rig and i got to see some very cool places that i would, years later, drag Annette back to.

Later, expressing brand loyalty, my father bought a small mini-motorhome. It was Mobile Traveler’s next-to-smallest unit with a full bed over the cab of the van front end. Compared to the pickup truck camper it was luxurious. But it wasn’t very well made and most of the systems failed with alarming regularity. Basically what those two campers taught me was this: despite obvious disadvantages, travel trailers were the better choice. They had more usable interior room, they could be disconnected and you then had your vehicle to use for local exploring and they provided separation of purpose. By that i mean you didn’t lose the use of your home when the motive unit needed an oil change or other maintenance. Likewise you didn’t lose use of your car when the living unit needed some repair.

My finalists are shown above. I’ve been inside the Scamp and the Airstream. I know a couple who own the Casita and like it very much. Look at the prices. I could easily buy two Scamps or Casitas for the price of the Bambi. Naturally the problem is both Annette and i have been inside the Ocean Breeze Bambi. We both fell in love with the little aluminum pod. The quality of manufacture, the quality of installed systems and the floorplan simply worked for us. Airstream doesn’t offer loads of options…. they come equipped with everything you’d want.

I’m choking on the price, but more than that i’m choking on what spending that kind of money represents. It would me giving up the idea of permanence. It would mean surrendering to mobility. As the salesman said “you don’t buy one of these every day. You need to think hard and plan accordingly.”

Indeed.