We are on a road trip to Indiana, Iowa, and Kansas. It took me a while to find time to sit and tell you about it!

The first day - er, days

We’ve been away from home for 12 days now, and I have not managed to write a single journal. I can explain!

Well, I can at least make excuses. Here they are, along with some highlights that I should have been writing daily.

The first three days were sort of uneventful. We were headed back to Indiana to pick up our Rockwood MiniLite 2205s, so travel is a bit faster. We were in a bit of a hurry, so we didn’t do a lot of extraneous stopping. We didn’t even eat at The Big Texan. Crazy, right?!?

We did, for the first time, stop at Slug Bug Ranch, which is kind of like Cadillac Ranch except there are old VW Beetles, and limousines with big horns on the hood (buried trunk-end down of course). People are welcome to paint on the cars, like the original car-henge down the road, and a few ne’er-do-wells have painted on the signs and sidewalks. This is why we can’t have nice things.

We also turned over 50,000 miles on the 2015 Ram. When we bought it last October it had 24,000 miles. We more than doubled eight years of mileage, in just 11 months.

We made our typical stop at Uranus Fudge Factory, for a pit stop and to get the blood pumping in our legs. We did not buy fudge or any other snacks this time through. The Mayor of Uranus is, sadly, still headless. We asked inside, and learned that a new head is being built.

Other than those two highlights, we drove for three days, slept in two hotels, and ate two free hotel breakfasts. Not much to write home (or anywhere else) about.

Wednesday afternoon, we picked up our Mini Lite and went to get settled in Shipshewana Trading Place campground. This is home base for our RV activities - which I’ll outline below.

The fun begins

After setting up the camper we set up recording equipment. After all, the podcast was due the next morning and we hadn’t even started! We did talk a lot about it while we drove, and Tuesday night in the hotel we dined on hotel corn dogs while we each made our list of food favorites that we wanted to share.

Tony tried to set up the Starlink, and it would not boot. Dang it! We were up late just the same, editing the audio and video versions of the podcast. The audio managed to upload, but we just could not get the video to go. We went to bed exhausted and disappointed, but comfortable in our own bed-away-from-bed. The video finally did get posted a few days later.

The actual fun begins

Thursday morning first thing, Tony got through to Starlink, who determined our system was bad and said they would ship a new one. That accomplished, we headed to Elkhart for a couple days of working with RV Trader and a little “sneak-peek” at the Thor companies preparing for the dealer open house.  

Dealers and Manufacturers

If you haven’t heard of dealer open house, don’t feel alone. It’s not a public event. This event is for dealers from all over America and Canada (and we heard there was even one from Puerto Rico) to gather to see the new year models offered by each manufacturer. This is where the wheeling and dealing goes on between manufacturer and dealer. It was explained to us that the more units a dealer contracts to buy in the next year, the better deals they get.

Some dealers are there to make their contracts with the same manufacturers as always. A few dealers are looking at new brands to add to their line-ups. It’s pretty interesting to see, and we are really fortunate they allow us to attend. Our goal, naturally, is to look for trends for the upcoming year, and get a look at some of the new models. We are careful not to get in the way of dealers. After all, they have just a few days to figure out their whole year! Can you imagine?

It’s more fun with friends

On Friday, our friends Tony and Tina from TnTRVing arrived and camped next to us. We really enjoy spending time with them. They even let us use their Starlink signal so we didn’t feel completely out of touch.

I showed them around Shipshewana on Saturday (read: Tina and I window shopped every store in town LOL). We got hungry for lunch and Tony had just eaten, so we went to the Blue Gate buffet.

RVs Galore

Sunday, we got to attend a preview of the Forest River brands. Unfortunately around noon the rain started, and there was not much we could do without staying inside one RV or getting drenched. So we headed to a local Chinese restaurant for lunch, then back to camp to get some work done.

Monday was the official beginning of the event. We set an alarm, and got an early start on our day. We saw a lot of RVs and took a lot of notes to share on the podcast. In the afternoon, we looked around the event for a quiet place to record the podcast. Finding nothing appropriate, we went into the RV/Motorhome Hall of Fame and they allowed us to use the library for recording. When we finished recording, we met up with TnT and the crew from ABC Upfitters for dinner.

Marry me - again?

Monday was September 23, the 20th anniversary of when Tony took me to Switzerland and proposed to me. So, I proposed right back. Luckily, he said yes, and we will be renewing our vows in April. The restaurant helped us celebrate with “mini beer shots.” They were a tasty shot of Licor 43 with a whipped cream “head.” We had never heard of these shots, nor the liqueur, so it was a real treat. The restaurant even served them in tiny beer mugs to add to the fun!

Thank goodness I had told Tina and Tony about my plan; I was tired and distracted and nearly forgot until they reminded me to propose!

STOP!

Tuesday, we had the privilege of visiting a closed track so Lippert could show off their new anti-lock braking systems. We got to ride in the cab of the truck, and then in two different 5th wheel trailers to feel the difference in braking and suspension. It was fun and really eye-opening being inside the trailer while on the move. We wonder how anything stays on the walls of these things!

We headed back to camp and spent a rainy afternoon editing the podcast so it wouldn’t be so stressful to get it don’t in time this week. The new Starlink arrived at a local friend’s house (we picked it up Wednesday). The tornado siren went off in the afternoon, but I was assured by a local that it was nothing to be worried about. Still, you better believe we had the weather radio on!

We got everything ready to go Tuesday evening, so that we could attend the open house on Wednesday without worry.

Final day

On Wednesday we headed back to the open house and spent the day chatting with Forest River manufacturer representatives and looking at RVs. I sat in the 2506FK for quite some time, daydreaming about how it would be to camp in that floor plan. We had dinner, and then did some more fun filming. Tony and Tina wanted an instagram post, so we talked a bunch of Rockwood folks into a 5th wheel and Tony took a video of everyone hanging out. It was a lot of fun!

Tony and Tina went back on Thursday morning (today) for a final final visit. We decided to stay in camp so we could set up the Starlink and try to get some work caught up. Which is why you FINALLY get a journal entry today!

Lessons Learned

As tired as we are, we are still sad that the open house is over. We have already started developing a game plan for next year. For one thing, we need more stamina. Which means we need to start getting more exercise on a daily basis.

We also need to have a couple podcast episodes “in the can” and ready for release so that we aren’t so rushed to get them out on time. In other words, we need to Stress Less about our podcast (insert cheesy smile).

We also found out about a campground in Elkhart, thanks to Jason Epperson of RV Miles. I thought I had looked for a campground in that town and had not found one, but it does indeed exist! Although we really love staying in Shipshewana, we have driven 45 minutes each way every day for the open house activities. We would Stress Less, plus drive less, if we were closer to the action.

We also learned that recording and photographing an RV together is preferable to our original plan of “divide and conquer.” For one thing, we each notice different features in each RV. Additionally, when we both film in different places at the same time, our photo collection gets pretty confusing.

We will be here in Shipshewana for another day, then head westarrd and I’ll be better about keeping up on those journals. We plan to do new and fun stuff on our route that will be worth sharing!