Thursday, December 20, 2007
Stuff & Things
It occurs to me that while we are home for the holidays, and the "Roadhouse" sits quietly in storage, I might impart a number of thoughts/experiences/etc. on our RV experience.....
So....here's one.
Rain. I love the motorhome in the rain. I love sleeping in it in the rain, and just sitting reading and/or watching a movie on TV in the rain. When I was a kid in Pekin, Illinois I remember my room was on the 2nd floor of our two-story home. When it rained I could hear the individual drops striking the roof shingles. I loved that sound and found it comforting.
My guess is that must be the origin of my current RV rain sound enjoyment. My feelings are not shared by Duchess who finds rain, particularly driving rain to be a distraction.
Driving the big fella in the rain is another story altogether. Light rain provides a great way to get the bus dirty! It also depletes the windshield washer fluid quickly as road dirt soon covers the windshield and the huge wipers need a good bit of rain to operate efficiently. Heavy rain provides quickly appearing puddles and runoff areas across the road. That can be real fun when you hit one and the 33 foot - 18,500 pound beast develops a love of water skiing!
Other things that one, not an RVer, might miss about storms and rain. Awnings can be a problem. Our vehicle has a 16 foot awning that opens to about 8 feet in width. It even has dampers which help hold the awning in the wind, but at about 15 mph the wind begins to whip it quite a bit, and I roll it up. Some high end coaches (Our Damon is strictly mid-range to lower range in price) have electric auto-retractors. If you are gone, or it is storming the device detects high winds and retracts the awning. In addition to the large awning for cooking/sitting/etc. we have awnings over both bedroom windows and one over the large living room window located in our single slide. These awnings are to keep out bright morning sun, and bright summer sun in the afternoon. They are usually small enough to avoid wind problems...however, on our recent trip to Dickinson, Texas, I had to retract these in a three-day storm with 20-35 mph gusts rocking the vehicle...even as it sat on 6 tires and four leveling jacks! That is wind.
Wind on the RV is an other subject. More later.
Duke
|
So....here's one.
Rain. I love the motorhome in the rain. I love sleeping in it in the rain, and just sitting reading and/or watching a movie on TV in the rain. When I was a kid in Pekin, Illinois I remember my room was on the 2nd floor of our two-story home. When it rained I could hear the individual drops striking the roof shingles. I loved that sound and found it comforting.
My guess is that must be the origin of my current RV rain sound enjoyment. My feelings are not shared by Duchess who finds rain, particularly driving rain to be a distraction.
Driving the big fella in the rain is another story altogether. Light rain provides a great way to get the bus dirty! It also depletes the windshield washer fluid quickly as road dirt soon covers the windshield and the huge wipers need a good bit of rain to operate efficiently. Heavy rain provides quickly appearing puddles and runoff areas across the road. That can be real fun when you hit one and the 33 foot - 18,500 pound beast develops a love of water skiing!
Other things that one, not an RVer, might miss about storms and rain. Awnings can be a problem. Our vehicle has a 16 foot awning that opens to about 8 feet in width. It even has dampers which help hold the awning in the wind, but at about 15 mph the wind begins to whip it quite a bit, and I roll it up. Some high end coaches (Our Damon is strictly mid-range to lower range in price) have electric auto-retractors. If you are gone, or it is storming the device detects high winds and retracts the awning. In addition to the large awning for cooking/sitting/etc. we have awnings over both bedroom windows and one over the large living room window located in our single slide. These awnings are to keep out bright morning sun, and bright summer sun in the afternoon. They are usually small enough to avoid wind problems...however, on our recent trip to Dickinson, Texas, I had to retract these in a three-day storm with 20-35 mph gusts rocking the vehicle...even as it sat on 6 tires and four leveling jacks! That is wind.
Wind on the RV is an other subject. More later.
Duke
