ShellyLast weekend we took the little camper out for a camping test drive to get the kinks out before the big trip.
Other than our older dog keeping us up most of the night with her anxious panting, I think the trip was a success.
The great little camper you see above is a NoBo 10.6. We are renting this same camper for our bigger cross country trip, from outdoorsy.com. We are just pulling it with our Highlander. It has a 5000lb towing capacity but since it’s our first time towing anything, and the Highlander is 9 years old, keeping it on the smaller side seems wise to me.
This little camper (our home away from home, aka “HAFH”) seems to fit the bill. HAFH is only 2,000lbs, a queen size mattress pad folds out inside, and the boys have a California King sized tent on the roof. It comes complete with a little refrigerator, a two burner camp stove, and a little camp sink….oh, yes, and there is a/c and heat inside. Score!
We picked up HAFH on Friday, got a quick lesson in how to set it up and take it down, then hit the road for our 90 minute trek to Blacktop Mountain State Park in the N. Georgia Mountains. The Highlander pulled like a champ. The only trouble came when we had to back into our camping spot. The tight 90 degree turn from one little alley to our spot, that was framed by two huge trees was just not made for newbie tow drivers. Thankfully one of our camp site neighbors took pity on us and backed the camper in for us, otherwise I’m afraid we would have been there all night trying to do that. Mental note: practice backing before we leave on the longer trip…and try to switch to all pull through sites if possible!
Our friends, Adam and Lea, from Atlanta rented a separate cabin in the same campground for the weekend. I think they were also going mad in quarantine. I’m glad they came up to practice social distancing with us in the great outdoors.
The first night I cooked up nachos and the boys made a roaring fire for some smores.
It was a delightfully cool evening when we climbed into HAFH for the night. Sam and I drifted off to sleep, only to be awoken a couple hours later by our old dog standing on top of us, panting. We got her to settle and sort of fell back asleep…only to wake up a couple hours later, drenched in sweat. Who knew, if you close yourselves into a tin can without ventilation, even if it’s cold outside, it will get HOT. Another lesson learned: no matter how chilly it is outside, open the two side vents and turn on the fan before going to sleep.
Day two started with Huevos Rancheros over the camp stove. Just ’cause you’re camping doesn’t mean you can’t eat well!
Then we hiked around a bit and the boys fished.
Dinner that night was just sausages over the fire and a campfire pound cake, berry, and chocolate melt. Yum!
We played cards till quiet hours.
Remembering to keep the vents open, we drifted off to sleep…only to be awoken many times through the night by our anxious old dog. She reaffirmed our decision to leave her at home for the big trip. Another sleepless night. <sigh>
After a short walk with the dogs and a hearty breakfast hash, we started breaking everything down to head home…90 minutes later we pulled out. I assume we’ll get much faster at that as the trip goes on, but wow, that took a long time. We couldn’t figure out how to detach the blue hose. Then the zipper got stuck on the big tent cover. Then the hitch wouldn’t quite go on right. But we finally got on the road and got the trailer returned.
Not too bad for our first outing 🙂
xoxo,
Shelly
