Her
Thoughts on Roadtrek Life
A
Mobile Vacation Home or a Portable Hotel Room?
I
remember standing in a 26 foot travel trailer at an RV show when a lady walked
in followed by her husband, “Ugh!” she groaned, “This is way
too cramped! I could never stay in
this!” She left quickly. I looked around at all the space and
wondered what she would have said about our Roadtrek.
I’ve
never felt cramped or claustrophobic in our Roadtrek
– but I can’t say that about every Class B I have been inside. One fulltiming
couple proudly showed us the innovative features of their custom Sprinter Sportsmobile.
Some really unique ideas stood out, but I couldn’t have lived in
it for two weeks let alone fulltime.
The front seats were not usable as living space and there were exactly
two spots to sit – opposite couches with or without a table in between. The bathroom took up ¼ of the living space. It is one thing to travel and sleep in a
Roadtrek – with most of your time spent either
driving or outside of the Roadtrek. The Roadtrek
becomes just a portable hotel room for the night. That’s good, we use our Roadtrek that way too, but it can be so much more than a
portable hotel room.
I view
our Roadtrek as a mobile vacation home. It can be that cottage in the woods, or
a beach house or a mountain cabin.
If this is how you use your Roadtrek, there is
a need for more comfort – but not necessarily more space. The comfort comes from both how you use
and how you configure your space. I
think Roadtrek did some wonderful things with their
designs to maximize comfort in a minimum amount of space. And by making minor additions and
modifications you can have a very comfortable “home”.
It is
important that you do things differently in your Roadtrek
than you do at home - unless you live in a very tiny home.
Maximizing
Comfort
Put It Away.
Increasing comfort in a small
space has to do with decreasing clutter.
To make life in your Roadtrek better, each
item you have needs to have a place to be “put away”. And put it away right after you
use it. Don’t let stuff sit
around. Stuff that is lying
around is stuff you have to keep moving around. Or it fills up your limited space. Don’t do it. I tend to leave stuff out at home, but
I’m learning not to do that in the Roadtrek
Avoid Moving Stuff. Things need one home not
several. The exceptions should be
as few as possible and should still have a moving vs camped spot. In our case the laundry hamper is one of
these. It is the pop up variety so
it is on the towel shelf until needed.
Then it sits on the toilet when traveling, and it is moved into the
passenger foot well when camped (and the seat is rotated). Many of our modifications have been to
provide “put away” spots for items. Our laptops, cameras and all the various
charger cords were a problem in our early Roadtrek
days. Now they all have a home.
Get Rid of It. Another way to decrease clutter is to
remove the stuff you aren’t using from the Roadtrek. All those nifty gadgets you bought at
Camping World but have never been used can be left at home. Do you really need measuring cups or
spoons? Those brochures
and maps from the last trip?
Toss them or leave them at home.
Use It All. It is amazing to us how many people miss
out on the finer things in their Roadtrek. And I don’t just mean the people
who have never used their toilet (let alone the shower). We run into many Roadtrek
owners who leave their bed set up permanently. If you leave the bed set up you lost
more than half of your living space!
You lost the dining room, the living room, the game room, the TV room,
and the large office – you sacrificed all of those for something only
useful at night. Do you really want
to give up those “rooms” to save yourself 5 minutes of time in the
morning and evening to take down the bed?
No wonder some people decide their camper vans are too small! Good small RV design involves multiple
use of space and using borrowed space.
You can only be in one space at a time. If there are two of you, you can be in
two places. You change the spaces
to be what you need at the time. Jac Hanemaayer played with a number of designs before settling
on a 3 section floorplan for the Roadtrek. Those 3 sections had more than a single
use. Single use spaces should be
kept to a minimum and made small or designed to use borrowed space only when
needed. The aisle bath is a wonderfully
clever design – the footprint of the single use bathroom space is only
about 18 inches x 18 inches and contains the toilet, shelf of towels and some
toiletries. But when the bathroom
is in existence it has counter space, a sink, a big changing room, a vent fan,
a shower with more elbow room than most big RVs and two doors to make it
private. It is in the perfect spot
at night when both the rear master bedroom and the front guest bedroom are in
use. Our dinette area is our favorite place in the Roadtrek. How could others miss out on that
wonderful spot surrounded by 3 windows?
For sleeping in the Popular try both the king and the twin
configuration. You may be surprised
at which you prefer.
Physical Comfort. There is
a physical part of maximizing comfort as well. Knowing what window to open and how far
to open it to get the best breeze is important. It took us awhile to realize that
opening as many windows as possible only decreased the breeze. The Fantastic Fan is worth its weight in
gold. Learning how to redirect the
A/C air back into the sleeping area is important on a hot night. Depending on where your furnace is
located (varies a lot over the years) you may need to learn how to redirect the
heat as well. Reflectix
is the wonder product for both hot and cold weather camping. But it needs a “put away”
spot when not in use. Little things
make a big difference. A standard
pillow is not only a pain to store; it is so deep it effectively shortens your
bed. Find a travel size pillow
instead.
Housekeeping. Maybe you
are a bit lax about this at home.
Or you do it once a week.
Don’t do it that way in a Roadtrek. Clean the stove and wash and put away
the dishes right after dinner. Wipe
out the microwave, get out the cleaner and clean the mirrors, sweep the floor
with your little whisk broom – it only takes a couple of minutes. Don’t you wish you could do it
that fast at home? A squirt of 409
and a paper towel wipe and the bathroom floor is clean. Not only will you be more comfortable in
a neat and clean Roadtrek, you are prepared to show
it off to anyone who asks you about it.
Simplify. Simplifying the basic tasks goes a long
way toward maximizing comfort. How
to set up and break camp, how to wash dishes, how to take a shower, how to
prepare breakfast – these need to become routines. Dream up ways to make things
easier. An example: We almost
always have sandwiches for lunch. I
found some stacking plastic containers we use for lunch meat and cheese that
fit nicely under the fins on the second shelf. Now it only takes a quick opening of the
fridge to grab the containers and condiments – no fishing around for
individual packages and warming up the fridge. This is very important with sleeping;
preparing the bed and putting it away should be quick and easy. If not, change things to make it that
way.
The Away Room. I admired
the book, The Not So Big House. The
author emphasized the importance of sight distances to avoid things feeling
small (I’ve seen a few Class Bs with extremely
short sight distances and they really feel cramped). The illusion of more space
is important in how a place feels. If you can see everything from one spot the
space feels smaller than when there are (or could be) things around the
corner. Changes in ceiling and
floor level add to this. Our
closet, bath, pantry, and clothes cabinet doors all have mirrors on them. It gives the impression of more space
and increases the sight distances.
The author also was a proponent of the Away Room – a room
away from the hubbub of the rest of the house. Obviously a Roadtrek
doesn’t have that, but if we set up front and rear tables, we can each
have a nice work space and we are out of each other’s way – and
depending on which seats we chose, may not even be visible to the other. It is the Roadtrek
equivalent of the Away Room – something lacking in many bigger RVs.
No Fear. Don’t be afraid to modify your Roadtrek. But
don’t jump into it immediately as a new owner. Use it awhile, travel in it, sleep in
it, and spend a few rainy days stuck inside it. So many new owners immediately
start “remodeling” their Roadtrek without
actually using it first. We see so
many of these up for sale again the next year. And revise what you need to pack for your
travels after you have some experience.
If the designer of your rig was talented (and actually traveled in the
RV and made changes based on experience), you may discover that the original
design was far more practical and delightful that you thought at first. You bought it for you to use. Make it what you need for your lifestyle
– but you need some time and use to find out what that really is. And please don’t paint the
inside until you have had it a few years and know you will keep it. The same is true for other non-reversible
mods. Haven’t seen a painted
interior that still looks good 2 years after painting (unless it was
unused). The wear and tear on small
spaces is really tough on paint.
Experiment. Some of the mods we have made just
didn’t pan out. They turned
out to be more trouble than they were worth, or we really didn’t use them
as much as we thought we might.
Sometimes a better idea comes along. Or perhaps our style of travel
changed. Look at what others have
done. Boating and RV stores,
magazines, and websites can have some great ideas. Many of our modifications were first
done by others on the Yahoo Roadtrek Group. Try our ideas if you think they will
suit you. And come up with some
better ones to share with others.