Saturday, March 7, 2009

the ultimate road trip accessory

teadreop Pictures, Images and Photos

You gotta admit - it's cute! And while the idea of "camping" probably doesn't conjure up visions of little teardrop trailers (such as the one pictured above), it is still a lifestyle within a lifestyle. I, for one, love this little teardrop. I also love the $583,000 monster of a RV that came equipped with...get this...a doorbell! The only problem with an RV that large is that I'm constantly reminded of:

a) what it's like to have all kinds of ridiculous dollars to waste (yes, waste!) on this monstrosity, complete with marble countertops, three big-screen TVs, and a second floor.
b) Bret Michaels and those nasty girls he hangs out with on a tour bus almost like this very one.

Eeew.

So Dad and I took my daughter to the RV Show here in downtown Jacksonville. It's a fun thing my dad and I do every year (and probably the only thing we do together at all). In the parkng lot of Jacksonville Municipal Stadium, we think of all kinds of ways he can quit his job, sell the house, and convince my mother that it was a great idea for my father to quit his job and sell the house. Oh, he'd also have to trade in his Honda CRV since it can't tow anything over 1,500 pounds. And that's too bad because that means he'd have to buy a new truck to tow the new camper and that would totally make my mother go apeshit and she'd never buy the whole "it's a great idea!" idea.

So we dream.

I grew up camping in tents and scaling my own fish if I wanted to eat that night. My childhood is full of memories of the orange/brown tent, the pop-up camper, and finally, the RV. It was small, but it got my family from Upper Michigan to South Florida. Our neighbors would all go camping with us so I usually had a playmate to go swimming with. My mother would cook pasties and parmesan fish over the campfire and the grownups would help us catch fireflies in old Mason jars. Then after dinner, our parents would send us into the woods to collect sticks for roasting marshmallows so we could make s'mores. My daughter knows how to make s'mores - in the microwave (I know I should at least teach her how to roast marshmallows over a Yankee candle flame).

Elle was getting caught up in the fun of it all, too. She declared herself the "bed-tester" and would let us know how the sleep comfort rated for every RV or pop-up we visited. Even those campers that came equipped with a Sleep Number mattress had to be tested. Eventually we made our way into the big ones, the monstrosities, the RVs that were the size of Bret Michaels' Rock of Love tour bus. Elle declared herself the "drivers-seat-tester".

Photobucket
Don't fear, America. She is at least nine years from obtaining her driver's license.

3 comments:

Geekzilla said...

Elle looks VERY determined to drive. You might wanna hide the keys from her for a few years...

Chris said...

My parents got a pop up camper when they retired and they have more than gotten their money's worth out of it. While for tax purposes they live in Jax for 6 months and 1 day a year, they spend the rest of the time, camping around Western North Carolina or at their cabin. I envy that lifestyle....one day!

Remo said...

I have a Coleman Santa Fe pop-up that I will NEVER get rid of. It weighs next-to-nothing and makes it easy to get away in literally ten minutes. I keep it packed and ready so all I have to do it hook it up and grab some groceries on the way out.