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Fun Story- Nearby Crossville, in Pall Mall, Tn., several ,years ago my father was touring Sgt Alvin C. York's (highly decorated WW1 soldier) home. While taking the tour, the man giving the tour seemed to have a lot of personal information on the life of Sgt York. Afterwards my father pulled him aside and asked him about that... and the tour guides simple answer was "Sgt York was my Daddy." Just six years ago I also passed thru and took the tour and while I didn't get to meet Alvin York's son, I was told he still gave tours from time to time.

Currently Twist is parked outside the Cody, WY laundry. Crowds are lower this year and camp grounds are rarely full. Weather has been warm and windy. However, fishing has been good with more water in the streams than usual. Bill

When I first bought my flex-fuel F-250 in early 2020, gasoline was relatively cheap so I didn’t use E-85 then. All our trips with the Ollie had been done using gasoline. Now that gas has gone way up, I’ve switched to E-85, but haven’t done any towing trips yet with it. Only $2.99 a gallon for E-85 here in my area. With gasoline I was typically getting about 11.0 to 11.5 mpg when towing our Elite II, so I’ll see what the impact is on towing mileage/range & performance when towing the Ollie. E-85 has lower energy content per gallon than gasoline so mileage will drop, along with range, but at only $2.99 a gallon (or less) for E-85 it looks like a bargain. I’ll post results after some future trip.

Camped at Cumberland Mountain State Park TN twice this week during the trip to Oliver. This campground is in the plateau region in Crossville TN.

Hi Claudia, Here are some pictures I took of an Oliver at the mother ship back in May. They were experimenting with this arrangement. Jason said water flows over them in moderate to heavy rains. Wendy and I haven't gotten around to making those window vents you showed us at the rally. We're waiting for you to mass produce and sell them on line..lol! John

The hose that I fill my fresh tank with. I hook it up to the trailer, pour some bleach into the hose, hold the hose up so the bleach moves toward the trailer, then hook the hose to my fresh water faucet and fill the fresh tank. Mike

Well, there are people like us who literally use the ac once a year, if that. Sometimes, just to test it. I would prefer to keep the price difference in my pocket, if possible. We did install a very quiet houghton in place of the 2008 dometic (roaring) dinosaur, a few years back. In retrospect, we would have been fine with a $100 vent and fan, but I do enjoy the quiet ac in the driveway, setting up for the season. The slimmer houghton still allows us to adjust our now much larger 200 watt solar panels. Main reason for changing up our ac. We rarely camp with hookups, and carry only a Honda 1000, so we have not used our ac much ... We tend to move when temps rise, rain is coming, etc. (I don't mind snow. Actually, we enjoy it, if it melts in a day or two. 😁 We Just avoid heat when we can. Trailers have wheels, for a reason.)

Whenever I sanitize the fresh tank I pour some bleach (a couple of glugs) down the hose and then connect the hose to my water source and fill the tank. I don’t use the back bumper water connection so I’m not worried about sanitizing it. Mike

What has been your favorite camping spot for your Oliver, ever? This includes anywhere in the U.S., Canada, or Mexico. Thank you, Margaret This is where I've tent camped in the past, but Ollie is different, though a shorty might have made it up there. The Lost Man Campground in Colorado, 10k feet in altitude. The yellow tent was mine.

The directions from Oliver on sanitizing the fresh water system describe drawing a bleach solution in through the back bumper connection, and then connecting a fresh water hose to the fresh connection port to finish filling the tank. At the moment we have a Calmark cover on our Ollie, and the edges of the back bumper have protection secured in place to protect the cover from rips. To follow the above directions I would need to undo the cover, remove the protective corner pieces, and then proceed. What if instead, I pour the bleach down the fresh water hose, and connect it to the Fresh Water Connection and fill the tank with water, and do not use the back bumper at all in the sanitizing process? Maybe the pipe between the back bumper and fresh water tank needs bleach too, and it would not get any? Thanks for your help!

We have been thru a few chairs over the years but found the most comfortable camp chair made. Thought I would pass it on. . They are made by Strongback, We purchased the Elite Black 2.0 from Amazon. Believe use they are the most comfortable and supportive chairs made. I need to learn how to copy and paste sorry.

STRONGBACK Elite Black 2.0 Creating a hyperlink to a webpage is super easy. Click the “link” symbol, it looks like a chain link. Then a window will appear: Copy and past the url (address) in the top section. If it is screwy looking, either enter your own text description in the lower box, or copy and paste the official description from the webpage. That way a viewer knows what the link means. When you are happy, click Insert into post.. John Davies Spokane WA

That is funny. When I was in college and I had got a infuse of some new money from Dad, I would take my laundry to a place that washed, dried and folded and next door was a bar (to kill the time, have a drink and read one of my text books). I usualy did my own laundry though as I was penny pinching most of the time so I could buy some beer. Yes there are places that still fold your laundry. I know of a couple of places in the City of Portland that do that.

@rideandfly, I was excited to see $3.85 here in Florida at a Costco. That's awesome. Well, as awesome as it gets, these days.... 😁

Wow! We visited Sgt Alvin C York State Park a few months ago, beautiful area. First learned about Sgt. York in a movie with Gary Cooper playing the part of Alvin York.

John and Wendy, Thank you so much for the pix! I'm pretty sure I'm going to stick with the original type stripping. It's taller and rain seems to flow along it and out at the ends without much overflow. Other than the deterioration, I've been pretty happy with the way it works despite the collection of debris behind the brackets. If I was physically unable to get up there to clean, I would probably go with the J-channel style. As far as the window vents go, I've consulted with a patent attorney (who's a dear friend) to see what's involved with stepping forward with my design. The consensus is to make and sell a few (10-15) to see what the interest is and go from there. I have been busy camping so I've sort of put it on the back burner. I saw one member here make one and I was thrilled to see their attempt! Stay tuned.. 🙂

Well, they are the real deal as you will discover, and are very impressive, but IMHO you should not leave them installed long term while camping and towing. You need to keep the orings lightly lubed with silicone grease to keep them working well and remain leak free, that will attract dust…. If you have your hose connected to a campground faucet, don’t be real surprised if the coupler parts disappear 😳 . I have the female couplers on the male ends of all my garden hoses at home and extra Eley male ones, screwed onto spray nozzles and the pressure washer. I keep one extra close to the Ollie and attach it to the fresh tank fill port for a few minutes to top up the tank quickly. But it doesn’t stay there all the time, open to dirt or bugs… I am be pretty sure that is not going to be very satisfactory 🙁. The first stretch of road construction or gravel road is going to make it gross, which can contaminate your trailer water system. You can’t really travel safely with the huge heavy female part connected to the inlet port, for obvious reasons…. Don’t drop your female hose end into the dirt or onto concrete, or drag it over hard surfaces. Their nozzle set is extremely impressive (like their reels, there is nothing close to matching their stuff on the Internet or local stores). I use mine for car washing and rinsing the driveway and house siding, it is a fine piece of equipment. https://www.eleyhosereels.com/products/professional-spray-nozzle-set John Davies Spokane WA

Looks nice. We haven’t visited the Crossville area but it’s on our list. Maybe this fall. Mike

To your point Ralph while we were recently having service done on our 2020 and one of the sales reps mentioned to us that a new 2023 pretty much loaded would top out at an eye popping $107k 😳 …wow is all I could think. I am not sure I am seeing that kind of discretionary spending for an Oliver, but hey if they can sell them at that price well good for Oliver and great for owners as far as resale goes. I think of what we paid in June of 2020 with a significant discount in writing, I am very happy we purchased when we did. The days of any discount are rear view mirror images long gone. Oliver was producing 2-3 units a week we learned during our last service visit. It will be interesting to see what future sales look like. -Patriot

Our 2014 Ollie has a water connection in the back bumper for intake of antifreeze or water. In Jason's description of Sanitizing the Fresh Water System he calls it the rear winterization/boondock port. Am grateful for the support the folks on this Forum provide! My thanks to you and Mike!

Kadey Krogen builds beautiful boats. I had the pleasure of helping on a shakedown cruise, with a friend who worked for them, several years ago. Your manatee is an ultimate, stable trawler for a couple, with its great design. I'm sure you have great memories of a lifetime.

We stayed at Oliver campground last night, met some very nice Ollie Owners!

@csevel, we've also enjoyed the weatherstripping. Like you, we have the manual awning, and can roll it back to a short distance. We still have the original on our 2008. It has some stains, but it's still there, and works. But, we don't store in totally direct sun, nor pine trees or cottonwood and the like, and their mess.

My wife and I completed the Great Loop in 2017 aboard our 36' Kadey-Krogen Manatee. The 90 hp diesel pushed us along our 5,300 mile route at an average speed of around 7 mph. Following the seasons in a counter-clockwise direction it took us a year to complete the adventure.

dewdev, The solar panel tilt bars are intended to be used to help the panel capture more solar energy when the sun is low in the sky. I have not seen a need to use the for that purpose. I use them to tilt the panels when I am cleaning or waxing the roof. The fish rod was used to aid in running wires. Andrew

Something light and easy to tow, high quality build, enclosed cockpit, minimal maintenance, good fuel economy, and the ability to sleep in over a long weekend….. Cuddy cabin power boats have long fallen out of favor, everybody wants a bow rider so you can carry six people up front. This would be my choice, I happened to see one pop up on the local Craigslist. https://spokane.craigslist.org/boa/d/coeur-alene-2008-ranger-tugs-r21-ec/7448106603.html These are realllllly small cruisers. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ItUUGAY0f8U&feature=emb_imp_woyt I have been in love with Ranger tugs for many years, but in reality this one is a mite too small for a normal sized person. What would you replace your Ollie with? John Davies Spokane WA

Inspired by dhaig's use of a Harbor Freight suction cup to make an external towel rack, I decided to use another Harbor Freight suction cup, https://www.harborfreight.com/4-58-in-aluminum-suction-cup-lifter-110-lb-57500.html, to make an interior shelf. I fabricated the shelf out of a 1/4" sheet of polycarbonate. I'm using the shelf to hold a CPAP machine on the back side of the pantry cabinet of our standard bed Elite 2 but the suction cup shelf could be adapted to a number of different applications depending on a person's need. The suction cup is rated for 110 Lbs. Of course this is a straight line pull and not side loaded like it is in this shelf application, but that said, the shelf is quite secure and can support quite a bit of weight.

Hello fellow owners. Thought I'd put up some pics of our tow vehicle. Our truck is an old school GMC 3500 hand shaker 4x4. We picked up our trailer April first of this year and have rolled around 15000km since. We are taking a 2 week break at base camp before we head of to Northern Michigan site a Superior Lake tour. Thought people would like to see pics of the rig.

That was a great movie and is also where I first learned of Sgt Alvin C. York. After the war he was very instrumental in bringing things like electricity to his home town. If you remember the movie... you might remember that when he went to the rail way station to join the Army.... there was a sign on the depot that said Crossville, Tn. (hence the reason I got everybody side tracked on this little story 🙂 )

We were at Cody a few years ago, could drop the laundry bag off loaded, everything would be washed, folded, and placed back in the washed bag. Don’t remember the cost per pound, but we were able to go out to eat and returned with our laundry completed! That’s roughing it! 🙂

One of my favorites (and there are so many!) was on the Gaspe peninsula, Quebec. Most of the Provincial and national campgrounds were closed, so we "settled" for Camping Griffon. Simple rv park, we were one of maybe three campers there in early October, and we watched whales from our campsite. The owners were so very nice, even though we spoke little French, they spoke some pretty good English. Our camper was so small, they gave us a seaside tent site. The showers were older but clean and heated, and a very short walk in the brisk evening! Things have possibly changed. That's 12 or 14 years ago. But, the Gaspe is a beautiful drive.. do it north to south, if possible, as you generally are on the land side, not feeling like you're hanging out on the edge of the cliff (though you are, sometimes. )

Wow. Are there still laundromats that do that? When I was a student in Spain, many years ago, we'd drop off our clothes at a wash/dry/fold lavanderia, and go for tapas and vino. Thanks for the memory!

You can count us in

Too slow. My Ollie goes much faster especially when connected to by RAM.

Mike - What hose are you referring to?

I agree, I’m grateful we don’t have to use it very much but when we do I can’t run it long, it’s just too loud for me. I’m very interested in changing mine out to the Truma.

Her signature says Nissan Armada, so I guess you are right. Oops. OTH I have carried a generator in my LC200 for four seasons, and a steel NATO jerry gas can for one, neither of them smell at all. John Davies Spokane WA

That little generator will easily fit in the back of your truck bed, along with a GOOD gas can.. (A dual fuel model can be connected to your trailer propane system.) You don’t need to store it outside in the weather and filth. I assume that you have some sort of cover for the bed. Keep it near the back, slide it out into the tailgate to operate it, or just set it on the ground and loop a bike cable lock around the trailer frame. The little 1000 watt suitcase units are great for battery charging but they won’t multi-task at all. Or operate the air conditioning😥 For much easier access to everything in the truck, add a bed slide (loooong drawer with roller bearing slides). John Davies Spokane WA

We will consider signing up for swapping out to the quieter Truma. 👍🏻 Thank you for posting the video. -Patriot

The Honda 1000 weighs approximately 30 pounds. The 2200, about 50. I can lift either. If you can leave it on the tongue, in a basket, it's kind of immaterial, except for changing tongue weight. And, having to have the bathroom window and vents closed to eliminate the station wagon effect. (And setting off your co monitor...) Call Oliver about the basket, or you can get something fabricated locally. There have occasionally been some for sale on the forum. If you routinely camp with electricity, it's pretty irrelevant. I know your trailer doesn't have solar, but I'd suggest a portable solar panel, if you only rarely boondock.

Very Instrested in the retro fit, time line, cost and availability. Also would like info on the amp draw of the 13,000 unit. We just mostly run our Dometic on low while sleeping and plugged into 30 amp. If boondocking it goes into auto witch cycle the fan on and off and can be very annoying. But does save battery ‘s amp hours. Stay cool Hull #901

Great answer, thank you. How would I get the tray, just use the Oliver website? Sorry for being such a newbie. I haven't checked for the connection. The generator would definitely be a 1000, as that is all I can lift. I would have to go to higher elevations to escape heat.

I believe in keeping it simple with an old school truck. We enjoy towing the Oliver with it and plan to upgrade as needed. The truck sips diesel @100kph and I love having a manual for those pesky downhills in the mountains💯

I’m unfamiliar with the terms “overkill” and “tow vehicle” when used in the same sentence. How can one have too much capability? Personally, I need over 3000 pounds of cargo capacity. Could I travel with less? Probably, but I absolutely wouldn’t be able to fix your trailer with a set of broken springs on the side of the road.

This is why I bought an Oliver. Rough, tough, ready for boondocking. This is off of Highway 395, north of Mono Lake in California. Take Virginia Lakes Road for about six miles (paved) then turn onto Dunderberg Meadows Road (gravel) and look for the spot you want. It's all national forest land so the price was right. We took a spur with big bad rocks, but by crawling along and trying to pick the least bad path, the Ollie performed like a champ. The boondocking inlet port let us fill our fresh water tank again from a couple of 6 gallon water jugs I carry. The sun charged up our batteries and let us use all juice we needed. A hot shower and cold cocktails made cloud watching even better. And the composting toilet makes finding a dump station a non-issue.

"Eggcelsior" is home and soaking in a CT rainstorm after a week-long odyssey in 90+ degree heat following our delivery last Monday. We arrived on time for our delivery Monday morning (Steph was worried we'd hit "rush hour traffic" in Hohenwald, LOL) and were met by Ryan, who did our walkthrough. The walkthrough went fairly quickly, both because we were experienced RVers and because we had studied so much about Olivers on this forum and Oliver University. The only issue we spotted in the walkthrough was a blemish in the gelcoat on one countertop - which they addressed immediately. We then moved to the Oliver campground for the night. The plan was to run with shore power and water connected until the evening, then switch to boondocking mode for the overnight to test all the systems. While in the Oliver campground we met the new owners of Hull 1149 - who were camped overnight, too - and the owners of Hull 77 (Kathy and ? - forgive me, there was a lot going on...) who were there for service. We found a few more issues with Eggcelsior while we camped. We had a bad 30A shore power cable (it wouldn't twist into the locked position) which Oliver replaced. We also had a jumper set wrong inside the Xantrex unit that caused a 5 minute delay in delivering power to the camper after connecting to shore power. That was fixed onsite. Finally, the toilet was rocking on the flange. That which was fixed onsite, too. The next day we moved to David Crockett State Park. The site we chose (Campground 1, Site 1) would have been impossible for a larger rig, but the Ollie and our big dually were able to squeeze in. That night we noticed our air conditioner short-cycling so we filed a repair ticket and returned to Oliver service the next day. Jason was unable to replicate the condition after a morning spent in Service, but I think we found the issue later. The details are here: The next stop was a KOA in northeastern TN. (We booked commercial campgrounds for the entire trip home just in case there were any systems issues that would interfere with dry-camping.) The trailer pulled very well behind our 3500 gas dually, as expected. Steph did some towing driving for the first time in many years (she wasn't comfortable towing the fifth wheels), which was nice. Towing mileage ranged roughly from 9-12 MPG, typically around 9.5 at 70+ MPH and 10+ at around 65 MPH. The next day took us to MD. We have the Lithium Platinum package and ran the fridge on DC while travelling. On a full-sun day we saw the batteries drop to 99% after 7 hours of travel. On a partly cloudy day they were at 97% after 7 hours. On a 4-hour cloudy run we saw a drop to 95%. The third travel day brought us back to CT, where we experienced the worst traffic (and drivers) of the whole trip. (This is our usual experience when we come home.) A quick run to DMV the next morning to get registered, then the truck and trailer got a bath and we loaded up the rest of our stuff for our next trip. All in all, the staff at OTT were excellent and it was a successful venture. A few other observations: Tanks: The trailer is happiest slightly nose high with a slight tilt up on the curb side. After one day with no sewer in the state park, including 2 showers, the black read 19% and the gray 25%. Smart TV: This is really nice. We ran it off my 4G tablet's hotspot and it worked pretty well. There was a some buffering, but the signal strength wasn't great, either. Brakes: Braking was good, but one brake seems a little more aggressive than the other three. Something to watch.

We’ll be there from July 1-10, and nearly at Lake Powhatan June 16-19th. It is such a beautiful area, and has been our go-to for camping for over 30 years.

We have been fortunate in having had a 25 foot C-Dory Cruiser, which we could tow, and a Ranger 29 (classic) which I didn’t tow. There certainly is overlap with travel trailers. Lots of good times and memories with the possibility that we might get another boat some day. We kept the boats in marinas and used them as our condo on the water in SF Bay. We don’t really need a place to stay down there anymore and boats = $$. (ranger=$$$). One of the selling points of the Ollie was the marine grade hardware and clean interior. If being a landlubber gets too much for me, there is also the option of a bare boat charter, which we have done a couple of times in the PNW. I agree with Ralph, when they tell me I’ve won the big powerball (which I never play), a Nordic or an American Tug could definitely make the cut.

The Nordic Tug series has always been a favorite of mine. Also like the Corsair Tri for a sporty sailboat.

Ain't happing any time soon! Bill p.s. A former Oliver Elite II owner owned one of those small "tug boats". He went by the name - Windcrasher. His boat was really very nice as were his many other "toys".