We took our first trip in our new travel trailer last weekend to Paducah, Kentucky.

The trip was great! Karen already had about 30 miles of experience driving (so she was our expert). I learned how after we got it out of her driveway – she creased her car by turning it too sharply and made a trench in the muddy yard along the street by misjudging where she was on the road. I drove it around the block to learn how to drive it. The next time I drove it was out of a gas station somewhere along I-57. It took 6 hours of driving time. Found our “resort”. Would not have recognized it from the photos posted. There were only a few other trailers there. It served its purpose. Would love to go back to the area and find a nicer resort.

Got it disconnected from the car and all hooked up!!! Only took 2 hours!!! That stuff is heavy. We had not drained the winterizing stuff in the water lines yet so the biggest problem was trying to find the valves from the hot water tank. After googling it, we found that we had to take apart the lower bunk to get to the valves. Took a few pictures to let people know that we made it and were all set up. My boss sent back a note that we had to move the “shit hose”. Did that and got an OK from him.

A woman our age lives in the campground permanently and she came over to introduce herself right away. A while later she came over to let us know that it usually doesn’t take that long to get set up. Thank you. A few days later we met another camper and found that we had been the entertainment that night. I made her promise that we would get a share of any money she won from Funny Home Videos. Couldn’t have been that bad because the first woman decided that she and her cousin were going to do this. Both said that it looked like we were having so much fun.

We traveled with Karen’s 4 month old puppy. This was not part of my original plan at all. It worked out fine. But lessons learned – #1: Do not feed the dog a big breakfast before traveling; #2 – When the dog barks while passing the exit to a rest stop, you do not have 30 minutes to get to the next rest stop.

The weather was great but the forecast said that it was going to rain Saturday night and pour all day Sunday. Bright idea!!! We hooked up the car before going to bed on Saturday night except for the utilities. Took less that 30 minutes. The utilities took less time than that. It started raining as we were leaving the camp ground. We even remembered to fill up the car before we hooked everything up because it is easier – but found that getting gas wasn’t so bad. We just made sure we used a big truck stop.

We found that Karen’s vehicle has a gas tank that holds 16 gallons of useable gas. Total tank is supposed to be 19 gallons. After it hits the ¼ tank marker, it just zooms to empty. By the time we found a gas station, it was showing below empty. We’re guessing that is in the “prayer” region. We filled it with 15.73 gallons.

The trailer itself is a little cozy. We have to work on ways to organize stuff. Our remodeling project worked out well and we really liked it. We converted the queen size bed into two sofa/sleepers. It added more floor space and made it so much more useable. Sleeping was not so good. We had the mattresses and a 2” memory foam mattress that we added. We need another layer of something so it doesn’t feel like we are sleeping directly on the wood.

The trip to Paducah was great. Went to the quilt show and saw some fantastic quilts – way beyond what we do. Talked to some of my favorite quilt designers, went to the National Quilt Museum and Hancock Fabrics (a huge quilting fabric and supply store). Bought some stuff. Found some good places to eat. Came back to our trailer at the end of the day and relaxed.

Did I tell you that we named the trailer? Sort of like people do with a boat. It’s Desi. Our adventures look a lot like something from a Lucy and Ethel show. The vehicle is Fred. We liked Desi rather than Ricky.

Trying to decide where to go next. We are really happy with it and plan to use it more next year after I retire.

Karen is working on starting a blog.