{"id":27,"date":"2012-06-02T09:46:00","date_gmt":"2012-06-02T09:46:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/83c9f15d-e8bf-4057-b249-d02f4e5e43ec"},"modified":"2014-09-07T15:58:36","modified_gmt":"2014-09-07T19:58:36","slug":"the-start","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/?p=27","title":{"rendered":"The start…"},"content":{"rendered":"

OK, so it’s not really “the start.” We’ve been RV’ing for 30+ years. But it
\nis<\/span> the start of our RV’ing adventures in a new motorhome, a 2013 Thor ACE
\n30.1<\/a>, which we expect to use in retirement, once we get there, if we
\never do. Or maybe we’ll switch to something different, but for now it was exactly the right choice for us for several reasons:<\/p>\n

Layout:
\n2 slides to make it livable when camped, but with everything we need
\neasily accessible without putting out the slides. TV across from the
\ncouch–we don’t watch a lot of TV while camping (although we do watch
\nvideos (mostly Jack Ryan and Jason Bourne movies)), but nearly all
\nunits nowadays have the TV mounted sideways from the couch. Like, why? Enough
\ncounter space. Enough storage. A bathroom that can be closed off from
\nthe living area. When we toured the ACE 30.1, Wendy said it was
\nobviously the first RV she’d ever seen designed by a woman. Enough said.
\n\"2013_Hybrid_Class_C_Class_A_Motorhomes_30_1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Class A category. Just a couple months prior to getting the
\nACE 30.1, we had purchased a Coachman Catalina 27′ trailer. We liked it
\njust fine (well, not really, but that was a fact we didn’t discover
\nuntil after our first trip), but we discovered that we’re getting old.
\nNow, that’s news. But one consequence is that it was impossible to
\nspend long hours in a pickup: too cramped and too immobilized. The ACE
\n30.1 is really a Class C frame and engine with a Class A body, but that
\ndistinction didn’t matter to us. It was the Class A driving experience
\nthat it provided that was an essential factor.<\/p>\n

Size. Everything in an RV is a tradeoff, and the overall size is no
\nexception. But we camp a lot in National Parks, Corps campgrounds, and
\nso on, and the bigger the unit, the more difficult it is to find
\nsites.<\/p>\n

The size factor is worth saying more about. We’re not big fans of “RV Campgrounds,” at least in the sense of full hook-up, check-and-jowl, parking lots. We’d much rather be out in the woods. But many of the best campgrounds have campsites that have surprisingly small size limits. In Rocky Mountain National Park<\/a>, some of the campgrounds have a size limit as small as 30 feet. In Yosemite<\/a>, with only a few exceptions, the size limit is 35 feet. Things get even more restricted in National Forests. In Sequoia National Forest<\/a>, for example, many campgrounds have size limits as small as 20 feet and only a few can accommodate rigs as big as 45 feet. Thirty feet seems to be the limit if one wants a fair selection. Ditto Corps campgrounds. Ditto state parks.<\/p>\n

Someone once said that the rule is: “Get the smallest unit you can comfortably stay in for the longest time you expect to be gone.”<\/b><\/i> That sounds right to me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

OK, so it’s not really “the start.” We’ve been RV’ing for 30+ years. But it is the start of our RV’ing adventures in a new motorhome, a 2013 Thor ACE 30.1, which we expect to use in retirement, once we get there, if we ever do. Or maybe we’ll switch to something different, but for … Continue reading “The start…”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p68mhx-r","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":212,"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27\/revisions\/212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skiprd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}