I grew up in a camping family. My parents started in my teens with a very small Shasta pull behind camper that all 7 of us slept in, and learned the ins and outs of very close quarters and everything having a place and always going back into its place! I married and moved out but they continued to upgrade to larger pull behinds, a succession of increasingly larger motor homes, and their final toy was a huge Allegro motor home that was about as long as a railcar, it seemed like! They took their dream vacation in that; a 3 month trip that took them up to the midwest, out to the Dakotas, down through California, back through Texas and after 10,000 miles returned to Barnwell with albums filled with pictures to share.
My first solo (meaning without Daddy to do all the set-up and break-down chores) was with my late hubby, Terry Pack. We did a few trips in a tent, to the coast and to the mountains of North Georgia. Next we borrowed an ancient all-canvas-topped pop-up that we took our daughter with us in, to join my parents and siblings at the ruby mines in Franklin, NC...once. When we had our second child, we also borrowed a pickup truck camper that was our worst experience camping, at Hunting Island State Park (delightful place, not delightful camper). The sand gnats nearly carried us away that first - and only - night, and the storm that came through demolished our screen room and shook that camper all night. I promised myself, him and the Lord that if we lived through the night I would NEVER camp in a pickup camper again, and have kept that promise! Our last camping experience was really his experience....he got a job in Oak Ridge, TN in 1984 before the school year ended so my uncle graciously loaned us his small motor home for Terry to set up and live in until we could get all of us out of school (even me, I was finishing my Associates Degree at USC-Salk!) and moved into a home up there. After freezing and bursting pipes, flooding carpet and generally being miserable separated from his little family, he had lost the camping fever and it was never rekindled. His failing health from Parkinson's probably contributed the most to that, but I always joked about how I preferred to camp at the Holiday Inn!
I should add here, that in 2011, the summer that I retired, I had the wonderful experience of camping a whole month with my youngest sister, Nevilee, in HER very first camper. We had a campsite on a creek at Grandfather Mountain Campground out of Boone, NC. It was older, previously mildly damaged in a wreck but still sound. She and I, our two Shih Tzus and their two wire crates, had a delightful experience in spite of both of us being sick or injured at the outset. The rain destroyed our awning and made for a very memorable morning trying to get a bent awning roller to retract, in the pouring rain, after poking holes in it to drain the water that had filled up between the two layers like a giant bladder and pulled it down to the point of barely opening the door enough to squeeze out! So thankful the neighbors didn't video it.... we might have been on America's Funniest Videos, hehehe!!
Now, being widowed for 9 years, and finding myself with the camping bug again, I began a search for a small, affordable camper that I can enjoy and share with someone special. Never in a million years did I think I would find it right here in Barnwell, but I did! We had looked at one out of town a week before, but it was in pretty rough shape, with lots of repair and cosmetic work needed, and very much overpriced. It did, however, have a feature I had never seen but was absolutely in love with... a front kitchen, plenty of room to move around and work, and not have to step aside to let other people pass by between you and the dinette to get to the beds or bathroom. We heard that friends might be selling theirs, made arrangements to see it, and I was smitten....a FRONT KITCHEN!!! and a full bath across the whole back!! It was in great shape, immaculate, and within the meager budget. Tomorrow we finalize the sale and Jimmy will pull it to my driveway for a few weeks so we can go through it and see what all there is to enjoy using.....you see, these wonderful friends also sold it to us completely ready to camp with all dishes, cookware, linens, everything you could possibly need to have a home-away-from-home! I am so excited, I feel like a little girl setting up her very first playhouse!
 |
| Sitting in storage, waiting for me to find her :-) |
