Tag: travel

Back on Wheels!

Well, WordPress friends and family, after 4 years of being in regular housing, we are back to the RV life!

RV: In case your memories have gotten a little rusty, we moved to Okinawa, Japan in April 2021. We were unable to take our RV with us to Japan, and with the frequent threat of Typhoons, I don’t know that we really wanted to anyways. We were rapidly outgrowing our 32′ fifth wheel that we had called home for 6 years, so we decided to sell it to another member of the U.S. Navy instead of storing it. We spent two months in an AirBnB, then moved into military housing when we reached Japan. Upon returning to the states in 2023, we moved into base housing at our current duty station. We all enjoyed having space to spread out, and the older 2 kids enjoyed having their own rooms. However, we noticed that we really didn’t travel much anymore, in part due to the expense and hassle of finding pet-friendly hotels for 6 people anywhere we went. The kids also made passing comments about aspects of RV living that they enjoyed or missed while we were living in housing. So, in November 2024 we purchased a new-to-us 41′ fifth wheel. This larger RV offers us 9 extra feet in length, 3 additional slides, and a second bathroom compared to our former 32′ RV. Nine extra feet may not sound like a lot of difference, but upgrading from 300 to 380 square feet makes a difference! We let the craziness of the holidays pass us by, then focused on packing things up in preparation for RV living again. In mid-March 2025 we officially moved into the new RV fulltime.

Truck: When we returned from Japan in 2023 we only had the Van (Baymax) and my motorcycle, so I was in search of a truck. We found a 2009 F-350 single rear wheel truck with the 6.4L diesel engine. It served our purposes while living in housing, however after our first trip from California to Texas and back in January 2025 with the 41′ trailer in tow, the engine started making a knocking sound, and upon further exploration, metal flakes were discovered in the engine oil and the local diesel shop recommended we switch vehicles or face the pending “catastrophic failure” of the engine. I knew the 6.0L PowerStroke engines had some issues, but apparently the 6.4L had even more issues, and the truck was not up to the task. The local diesel shop made some recommendations of what engines to search for in a prospective replacement truck and in early March we started combing through online listings.

Another Truck: In late March 2025 we found ourselves a 2020 F-350 Dually with the 6.7L Turbo diesel engine. It has a 10-speed transmission, and came with the factory-prepared towing package for traditional, gooseneck, and fifth wheel towing. According to the manual, our truck is rated for a combined truck+RV weight of 40,000 pounds! We have done some towing around base as well as a 20-mile jaunt up the freeway, and the truck pulled the 41′ fifth wheel with ease!

We are again looking forward to exploring and traveling together as a family on wheels.

Winter Snow Squall in New Mexico

In November 2024 we purchased a new-to-us 41-foot fifth wheel RV. Despite being stationed in California, we maintain Texas legal residency. We desired to register the new RV in Texas, and while we could do it by mail, due to a number of contributing factors we found it necessary to make the drive over to Texas to file required paperwork in person instead to speed up the process. After the holidays we decided that early January was the best time on our calendar to make this trip. Growing up in Ohio I am accustomed to snow in the northern states, but didn’t expect too much across the southern route we were taking. I expected I-10 to be chilly, but fairly dry. Well, the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. We left the California sunshine and headed East across Arizona. Someplace in New Mexico we were met with a snow squall that brought traffic to a slow crawl. Then it brought traffic to a standstill. Snow was building up on the freeway, tires began to lose traction, and everyone was taking it really slowly with increased following distances to allow for sliding while braking. Being our maiden voyage with the new and bigger RV, Heather deferred her driving responsibilities back to me for the most part. As we started moving again from a half hour standstill, we started passing multiple wrecked semi trucks. These big rigs did not merely slide off into the median either, these were heavily damaged trucks. The highway patrol ended up closing the freeway altogether and we were forced off onto state routes to continue our journey across New Mexico.

We were behind schedule, but safe and unharmed, and we eventually made it to Texas to complete our paperwork. The return trip was much more uneventful with snow along the sides of the freeway, but dry pavement.

COLD!

To add to the complexity of the trip, our RV propane furnace decided to quit working the first night of the trip. A safety sail switch stopped working and shut the whole thing down. We kept warm with plenty of blankets and 2 small space heaters, which kept the inside temperature in the high 50s instead of the outside 29 degrees. We were able to purchase a new sail switch, and Heather and I got it installed parked in a truck stop in western Texas.

Train!

One of the nice things about towing an RV is that you don’t always have to stay in established campgrounds. The next to last night of our trip we decided to pull off to sleep along the freeway in southern Arizona. We looked at Google maps and found an exit with a large dirt parking area across the road from a fuel station that had already closed for the night. On arrival we found a single semi truck parked at the far end of the large dirt area, and we decided to position ourselves pointed toward the road with our trailer tail backed up to the row of scrub brush that outlined the perimeter of the lot. We were all just about tucked into bed when we heard it. The sound of one of those mile-long freight trains that sounded like it was coming right through our RV! We looked out the window and not 40 feet from the back of our RV were 2 train tracks. We had apparently missed that when we were looking for a stop on Google maps. We hoped that it was a single train for the night and we all slipped off to sleep. Well, the railroad is alive and well in Arizona, and I think we heard no less than 8 trains pass by (or seemingly through) the RV that night. We could have picked up and moved to a new location…but we didn’t, and have a story to laugh about now.

FUN!

After the stress of the snow squall, filling out paperwork in Texas, having to fix the furnace for proper heat, and spending 4.5 days in the cab of the truck, we needed some relief. Heather came through for us and got us Day Pass tickets to Great Wolf Lodge waterpark in Phoenix, AZ. We had a blast in the wave pool, on the various water slides, floating down the lazy river, and generally relaxing for the day. We finished the day with dinner at Cracker Barrel, another of our favorites that we don’t have in California.