Hey everyone, time for a little update on our rv blog! Cannot believe how time flies – given we arrived at this rv park in central Illinois May 1st and today is…the 10th?! Here are the main highlights from our time here to date…as you see in the title, we have a lot of “B” words to chat about. Wanted to add “bearings” because we are getting new wheel bearings put on the truck, too…but that brings about another B word – BORING topic. BLUEGRASS Oh to have had my camera. We stayed up a little later than usual one night, enjoying the comfortable and quiet evening, sitting outside. Jim went into the rv first and I was soon to follow…but the I heard music. Not just any music…it was a (here’s that B again) BANJO and a (ok, this is getting ridiculous) BASS plus singing. It sounded so clear, … Continue reading
Meet Our 5th Wheel, Wilbur – RV Swap A Success!
***This is the last post we will put in Joey’s Journal on our rving blog, now that Joey has gone back to Australia. From now on we will post in “Daily Living In Our RV”*** Well we are FINALLY back in business and have our new (old) truck and new (old) 5th wheel…Mr. Ed the 3/4 ton pickup and Wilbur the fifth wheel Jayco camper. We actually retrieved Wilbur a few weeks ago, having to drive 150 miles one way to get him, but in this cheap rv living lifestyle you have to go where the affordable rvs live – which is NOT in the Chicago suburbs, might I add. So we did the rv swap dance – unloaded and cleaned Joey, putting our belongings in the house. Fingers crossed he would sell, which he did. Then shopping for truck first. Got it. Then shopping for the camper. Got it. … Continue reading
Naming Your RV – Why To Avoid Names To Name Your Car, Camper
Well we did it – we sold Joey last week and have decided to put together our reasons to avoid finding names to name your car, rv or whatever in the future! We’ve had so many things going on while our possessions are now boxed in our family’s garage, feeling “homeless,” scouring craigslist for a new home…we will have to save those stories for another post or two or three! Currently we have a truck and that’s it. But let’s get back to Joey, our cute, funny Australian Fleetwood Bounder whose wit has filled this cheap rv living blog. He is gone. A moment of silence please. (moment) He needed a new roof and was just too big of a financial risk for us on our limited, cash only budget. But when his new family came to pick him up, it hurt just like it did when we sold our … Continue reading
The Best RV To Live In – Here We Go Again!
So here we are again, deciding on the best rv to live in. We have an eerie similarity to the Goldilocks story – we’ve done the travel trailer, we’ve done the motorhome – now? Well…stay tuned! It isn’t easy parting with your rv – especially when you name him/her and give the camper its own personality. I cried like a baby when the woman who bought “Ward” hooked him up and took him down the highway. Joey, our current Fleetwood Bounder, is our sassy Australian author on many of our posts. But we can’t keep rvs for “cuteness” can we? We have been thinking about the best rvs for living in for months (have changed our minds countless times) and while we currently have alternate shelter visiting family in the suburbs of Chicago, the time is now to try to make this work. For those of you fulltime rvers who … Continue reading
Joey Updates The Blog Again Without A Hell Of A Lot To Say!
G’day, mates. I’m trying to keep a stiff upper bumper but this is getting ridiculous. Last time I talked to you here, I was sitting in the aftermath of winter storm Saturn, wondering how much longer winter would last and which letter we’d get to before we saw the last one. Well, it’s the end of March, and here I sit expecting a dusting of snow on my poor thin roof, and another few cold days and nights using up my ever-dwindling supply of propane to keep the cat warm. And yes, according to the weather channel, we are now about to experience Winter Storm Virgil, in capital letters, no less. So in just a short 2 or 3 weeks, we’ve had 4 blasts of wintery wet stuff, and the evidence is still on the ground. I CAN RELATE TO THIS GUY BELOW – LOOKS LIKE ME, EXCEPT I’M A … Continue reading
Thinkin’ About The Atlantic Article THE CHEAPEST GENERATION
I found a few articles recently, one in The Atlantic titled “The Cheapest Generation.” As someone who came of age in the tail end of the fabulous 1960s, I have always prided myself on having an open mind. After graduating from high school in a small central Illinois town in 1969, I went to college when the anti-war protests and the counterculture were both booming. I learned that there are many kinds of cultures, many kinds of norms, and that tolerance up to a point is a great virtue. Although I soon left behind the outer signs of being a hippie freak (long hair, granny glasses, bell-bottoms), I felt like each new decade brought new challenges and changes and I always kept up with pop culture, music, technology, and social change as the decades passed. As each generation gets its own name and character, I find that sometimes I feel … Continue reading
Winter Storms Q And Rocky Beat Up Joey The Fleetwood Bounder
We love winter, especially here in central Illinois (if you believe that, I’ve got a bridge to sell you). We made it through December and January thinking that, to our disappointment and mild sense that we were missing something, we were seeing another almost snow-less season (again, my tongue is in my cheek). Last year we really thought that climate change had come to us for good. But this year has shown us a few surprises so far, and it’s not even quite March yet. As you know from Joey’s recent post, we headed north during the first week of February, when the month-long forecasts online were giving us hope for an above average remainder of the month, with little precipitation in the form of the white stuff. Being wishful thinkers, we forgot the first rule of weather watching – if you don’t like it, wait a few minutes and … Continue reading
Joey Updates The RV Blog From The Burbs
G’day mates – Joey the Bounder here gabbin’ at ya, updating our cheap rv living blog. Just wanted to let you all know that we finally headed north, back to the land of suburbia, shopping malls, restaurants, Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, thrift stores, a boozer on every corner (that’s a pub to all you yanks out there)…according to Jim and Robin, that’s a good thing and a bad thing. It’s aces because they would have starved to death these last 2 months out on the prairie without me to take them into the Walmart and Meijer in Champaign, so they will be glad to get back to so-called civilization for a little while. It’s a bloody bad thing because, while they will definitely feel relieved to be able to go to the store for bottled water and decent tucker without starting me up and stowing away all the breakables, that … Continue reading
The RV Cat, Snow Cancels Plans, Etc.
Well, as we sit here in our rv campsite, given the storms canceled our travel plans for now, we find amusement in the little things. Actually, where Spot our rving cat is concerned, guess we could call it a LARGE thing, as you will see in the photo below. We were supposed to head north to driveway camp for awhile at my stepfather’s house. You know how it goes. We stopped buying groceries, eating our way through perishable goods and taking pride in the fridge being nearly empty. We cleaned up inside, got the motorhome in order, talked in high, squeaky voices to our dog and cat (suffering from cabin fever and boredom right now) saying “are we gunna gooooo soon? Yeahhhh? Oh boyyyy!” as they gazed back at me in fear and confusion. Then Thursday came. The weather where we are was almost 50 degrees, not a snowflake on … Continue reading
Electric Bills KILL The Full Time RV Budget
Ahhh, the full time rv budget. We love having few bills now and we’ve done a fair job, given the obstacles we’ve faced, of keeping things on the cheap. The loss and hardships that have taken place in the past few years kept us from the ability to go super frugal, like being a camp host, boondocking, etc. because we couldn’t choose our location or commit to being able to stay in one place long. But we found creative ways to live cheaply, even advertised needing a place to park on craigslist, resulting in 5 private, wooded acres to ourself! Yep, not now. “The summer went… Sam Gross Buy This at Allposters.com But even with our hands tied behind our back and being stuck in a very expensive state with few rv parks around (Illinois), we’ve done okay. Then, we didn’t. Enter the joys of the rv parks that charge … Continue reading
