February 16-20th: San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua.

We went to visit Thom's friend, Adam, in southwestern Nicaragua. There are hardly any street names in the town so Adam told us to arrive at the bus station, look for his yellow apartment, and shout out his name. I was a bit skeptical but, sure enough, we found Adam without any difficulty. Here's the street where he lives and that's the three of us getting ready to embark on our first zip-line adventure.

Click on this link for more pics of San Juan: http://www.kodakgallery.com/Slideshow.jsp?mode=fromshare&Uc=58zzb4pj.4c1j5yfr&Uy=2iuapy&Ux=0

Van conversions seem to be gaining in popularity. These RVs are small enough to take anywhere. The downside to their size is that there's not a lot of storage. They're also pretty expensive for the square footage you get and they require daily conversion of the living/dining quarters to sleeping quarters. More fuel-efficient than most though.








We considered getting a motorhome just like this one.

It's a Class "C" like the one we bought but it's got a Mercedes engine and runs on diesel. It's also a good $20,000 more than ours. The interior has a hip Ikea look to it which beats the dated feel of most of the other interiors.


Believe it or not, there are still more kinds of RVs. I know, crazy, right?
Stay tuned.

There are other kinds of trailers that hitch to the back of a pickup truck as opposed to the bed of it. Although trucks seem to be the most common tow vehicle, we've also seen SUV's towing these trailers.










Slides are big features in newer RVs. With the press of a button, a section of the motorhome will "slide" out thereby creating more interior space. We've got one in ours but many of the RVs we've seen have as many as three.









Truck campers are great for a weekend trip but you probably wouldn't want to be in one full-time. A camper shell is attached to the bed of a regular pickup truck. Hard to imagine a toilet and shower in there but I'm told that's a feature of the upper-end camper.

February 2, 2007: Bradenton, Florida.
It's been raining here in Florida and since the whole appeal of coastal Florida is the beach, we've been spending a fair amount of time hanging out at our campground. As I walk around the campsites, it's fun to check out the various types of RVs. There are two kinds that seem to be the most popular in the campgrounds that we've been staying at.
The first is the extravagant, just-like-home Class "A" motorhome:


The Class "A" is good for full-timers who don't want to miss out on the luxuries of home (some even have washer/dryers). The downside to these rigs is that they're expensive ($150,000+) and they pretty much require that you tow a vehicle so that you have a means of transportation once your motorhome is stationary at its campsite. They're also usually about forty feet long which makes them hard to maneuver and prohibits them from staying at many of the national parks.

The second most popular is the fifth-wheel trailer. This trailer mounts to a hitch in the bed of a pickup truck. Fifth-wheels are neat because they come in all sizes and price ranges.

The big disadvantage here is that you have to have a powerful pickup truck to tow the fifth-wheel. The upside is that once you've set up the trailer at the campsite, you simply un-hitch it from your pickup and then you've got a vehicle to drive around with.