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We have the manual Fiamma awning and have used it quite a bit. We’ve done a lot of hot weather camping and it provides shade when sitting and cooking outside. It has also provided shelter during light rains so we can sit outside and enjoy the weather. We have a sunshade that easily hooks onto the awning providing even more shade and enables the awning to be used even in pretty windy weather.. I’m not a fan of automatic awnings, but it seems that is where RV’s are trending. At Lake Guntersville. At US Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs. Lake Guntersville.

Just pulling into Abilene, KS, going through town saw an LEII parked in a driveway. We’re hear for two nights on our way to Colorado, Utah, Wyoming.

This information is from September 2022, so it’s not as current as you might want. We started this portion of our trip in Ottawa, IL after my mother’s family reunion and the destination was TRNP before heading back to Florida. THNP has 2 campgrounds, Cottonwood is in the south unit and Juniper is in the north unit. Cottonwood has about 70 sites in 2 loops, north and south. The south loop has small areas and it would be cramped for a LE2. The north loop has larger sites, more suitable for LE2's and larger rigs. We could not get a reservation in Cottonwood in advance, so we booked a night in Sully Creek SP, just south of Medora. We headed to Cottonwood first thing the next morning. There were not any campground hosts available when we arrived, so we proceeded to drive through the campground, we didn’t see anything large enough in the south loop and then found 3 available in the north loop. Since I always what to know what’s around the corner or over the hill, we drove around the north loop again and found 2 of the available sites were already taken. We took the 3rd spot and I walked up to the self serve check-in station and filled out some paperwork. We ran into a campground host while walking back to our site and he showed us a site that was reserved for the new shower/restroom building construction crew and said that we could use it for the next 3 nights because the crew was off for a few days. So we moved to that site and had a great stay. We did drive to the north unit to see the Juniper campground and over all liked the north unit better, less people but also so less to see and do. We wanted to say in Custer SP in South Dakota, but couldn’t find anything and headed to Badlands NP and dry camped for 3 nights, just off SD-240 about 9 miles south of Wall, SD and before you get to the entrance to Badlands NP. Look for a dirt road on the left and other campers a mile or so off the highway. You should also be able to see 2 or 3 radio towers several miles in the distance also on the left or east side of SD-240. Drive along the dirt road until you find something you like. A word of caution, it's very windy! Good luck, Mossey Cottonwood campground - TRNP Outside Badlands NP on SD-240

MDIV is in storage now, but I will definitely give this a try. There is very little downside for me since I never use it as is. THANK YOU P.S. This forum continues to be one of the highlights of Ollie ownership.

Its under his info - Hull #1432 - 2023 YM

Couple of thoughts. Just for the record your trip locations are not really the NW but rather should be considered the Northern Rockies. Have not been to CN in a long time so will leave those areas out of the comments. As for chains, I have lived in MT for almost half a century and never owned them nor used them. The likelihood of needing them this time of year is unlikely too but anything is possible. You might see some triple digits temps in SD and ND that time of year and certainly well into the 90's. I did photoshoot in TRNP once in the summer and it was brutal. At least 110º perhaps more, but at least the assignment was with horses. Cameras got so hot it was difficult to hold them at times. Two Medicine is awesome and will be quite a bit cooler, days will be getting much shorter too by then. Same for East Glacier of course. Autumn colors start quite a bit earlier up in this neck of the woods compared to the SW but you should be hitting it at a good time. Expect cool to downright cold nights and with some frost on the later part. I have seen bitter cold temps and near blizzard conditions in Sept but it is rare and certainly not every year. Normally, the roads would not freeze up this time of year, but again anything is possible. Early winter snows tend to melt fairly quick on the roads and Montana has a great road crew system for clearing. I would imagine CN to be no different. Have a great trip

I do like our manual awning. Zero issues.

Not sure if this will work with your awning.

We already have most of our campground reservations (based on previous visits car camping). We also have a bunch of the now-required reservations for hiking and buses in CA (Lake Louise, etc.) Just wondering if anyone has recent info on conditions or suggestions for Badlands NP (dry site) 8/17-21 Bismark restock 8/22 Theodore Roosevelt NP (dry site) 8/23-27 Great Falls restock 8/28 Glacier NP Two Medicine (dry site) 8/29-9/1 East Glacier KOA (hookups) 9/2-9/15 Waterton (hookups) 9/16-22 Tunnel Mountain, Banff (hookups) 9/23-10/6 Whistler, Jasper (hookups) 10/7-13 All weather permitting, of course. If winter starts we plan to donate our reservations and head south. 🤪 We have a few family visits the set the course outbound, but no fixed return plans. Again, depending on weather, we may just make a bee line for FL or try our luck heading East on the trans canada highway. Both are VERY long, but we got nothing but time 😁

We visited TRNP and Glacier NP (Two Medicine) in September (2019). Weather in ND was warm during the day and nice and cool at night. Lots of sun. At Glacier, weather was cool during the day and cooler at night. Very little sun, I had to run the generator at Glacier a couple times since there was not much solar activity going on. Two Medicine is a pretty dramatic site, mountains all around. Camping at TRNP, lots of blue skies. There were also lots of Bison wandering around the campground. At Two Medicine campground, GNP. No sun, cool damp weather. This park is a must see!! More Two Medicine…

You are wise to avoid the snow and stay really weather aware in the shoulder months, weather can change quickly. In 23 we camped right outside Rocky Mountain NP at Spruce Lake CG in Estes Park. (Super close to RMNP) We got to know the couple running the CG and they told us that in 2022 in the last week of Sept they had 6” of snow. As @routlaw said “anything is possible”. Last fall on our 48 day trip out west we had amazing weather in Sept and Oct. I recall we only had 2 days of rain and perfectly cool temps. We will likely only travel out west in the shoulder months. Winter certainly has its beauty and totally changes the landscape. I am in the crowd that has zero desire to camp in snow or pull our Oliver in winter conditions for sooooo many reasons. Sodium chloride aka rock salt on icy roads being the biggest one. One of many great advantages of living here in the south aka the “land of cotton” are long summers and short winters and very little rust on our vehicles. Wishing you safe travels!!🇺🇸 Patriot

Awning brand?

Lucky you, sure wish we had a manual awning! Oliver should make that an option.

We moved out of the Midwest 26 years ago and there were two things I had forgotten about, one bad and one good. The bad are the huge storm fronts that can come through slowly and sometimes just sit for what seems to be FOREVER! Low pressure started with the storm that came through central Kansas. Then we caught up to it again the next day in Nebraska. And then it was still there ALL through Iowa and after two rainy days at Wilkinson Pioneer Park near Mason City Iowa it also covered most of Minnesota (so far). Fortunately we only had 3 rainy days but we have not seen the sun in 12 days! Let me tell you, this is difficult for us who live in sunny Arizona. Non-descript GRAY skies. You can't make out clouds, it's just a pale shade of gray. I remember a year in Chicago about 1980 when the Chicago tribune headline stated 45 days of gray. That was during the winter though, the first 12 days of June being nothing but gray, wow! The good one I had forgotten was how large and tall deciduous trees can be in the Midwest. Over the last 20 years we've lived in AZ, Central TX and S FL. No tall trees in these locations except for Ponderosa pines in AZ. Every town in Iowa, the pretty houses are surrounded by huge tall trees. Then we got to Chris' sister's home in Farmington MN. This was our best campsite so far. A private little spot in the woods along their driveway a couple hundred yards before their lakefront home. We spent 4 overnights with family here. We left today and drove up to Brainerd MN, staying Gull Lake Rec Area another ACOE park. Drizzle and gray again today. Just staying here one night. The plan is to boondock in the Chippewa NF for the weekend, but... If it's raining to the north when we wake up, I'm driving west to Fargo ND or further west as far as we must to see the sun again! 🤣

Well, I sort of agree. We've already gotten caught in several snow storms while camping with Oliver. They were just very comfortable nights. No worries at all. But that snow melted in a day or so. Given the latitudes and elevations we will be visiting, and the time of year, I'll have my eye on the weather. I don't want to end up towing hundreds of miles in a Canadian blizzard. I don't even own chains for the truck. At least not yet. I'm probably going to buy some before we head north.

We struggled with the same question when we bought our Elite II in 2022. We ultimately chose to stick with the Gen. 2 (2019) Tundra 4.7L Double Cab we already owned. We have towed our 2022 Elite II with that 2019 Tundra with the 4.7L engine, a transmission oil cooler and an Andersen weight distribution hitch, without trouble. We live in Idaho, and have towed it over mountain passes in the Pacific Northwest many times. I know that some on this forum will disagree, but my experience is that at least Gen. 2 Tundras are not true "1/2 ton" pickups. They fall somewhere between the 1/2 ton and 3/4 ton pickups offered by their competitors, and so are up to the task of towing an Elite II with an Andersen WD hitch. Your Gen. 1 Tundra may be different. Your specific door sticker controls over the more generic owners manual. The door sticker on our Tundra also reads 1421 lbs. payload capacity. We initially towed our Elite II from Hohenwald to central Idaho without airbags. The addition of airbags helped reduce jounce, so I would recommend them. We have not upgraded the already substantial 4-wheel disc brakes on the Tundra, yet with the gain properly set on the brake controller, the Elite II braking system has enabled us to safely make a couple of panic stops (such as for a deer in the road) without incident.

Most of us suggested no but you can just make it, if that's what you want. However, the mountains of the Pacific NW is not an easy traverse. I have an older Ram Diesel and wish it had more than a 4-speed trans and an exhaust brake like modern diesel trucks have today. The mountains we travel through are not an easy climb for the trans and not as easy descend on the brakes. I also upgraded wheels an inch larger to upgrade to larger brakes of the next gen Ram, big help. I believe the 600 LB number is subtracting the average weight of a full 5 passenger load from the total available 1421 LBS. Another thing from your tire pressure label. Same on our GX, Toyota puts P-rated tires on these trucks, P stands for passenger cars. It's a must with towing to upgrade to LT tires. Our GX now has LT265/70R17 Load Range C tires and if I was going to tow with it regularly I would have purchased Load Range E instead.

This will be a first for us, though common to many of you who have more time for travel. I have 6 weeks off work, for our personal longest camping trip ever. I was inspired by a post our friend Steve @ScubaRx made last year where wrote that he and Tali often travel across country without reservations! This is difficult for the Project Manager in me, but should make for a spontaneous and exciting adventure! First stop just 5 hours from home, we’ll stay 2 nights up at 7760 ft in this beautiful McGaffey Campground SE of Gallup NM.

I had a 2005 Sequoia with the 4.7L. It worked pretty well on the flat lands. But in the hills not so well. In fact, my son and I got passed by the US Olympic Cycling time seven times north of Denver when we were goin up-hill (Not mountain, hills). My son was handing out free ice cold waters to the Cycling Team as they passed, we picked up their empties on subsequent down-hill runs. We all were laughing our heads off. That 4.7 will work, but just not enough power for even hills let alone mountains. Once we finally got to flat lands we were fine and smoked them all! But my son said, "Dad, you need a truck". It would have been ok (Not OK) if I had he 5.7. But in the mountains it was sketchy. The next year I bought a F-150 Crew Cab 4x4 FX tow package. With the addition of Bilstein 5500s shocks on the back and Firestone airbags I could not be happier. Since we USE our truck off road hauling free flying (No motors) glider pilots up to mountain launches, for us, getting a F250 or larger was not practical. Besides we use our TV as a daily driver as well. So the F-150 SuperCrew was and is out ticket. PS: By the time you get decked out, your OE2 will most likely be around 6,000 pounds. With your mountain use, I am with the above owners. Get a truck. In your case one with four wheel drive and off road package (Something like the Ford FX4). Then there is the tire swap on the TV to meet your style of travel. I have Nitto Recon's on mine.

The few times I’ve left the awning out overnight I regretted it because I had to get up and crank it back in. So, I’m with you 100% there. Mike

That's the real difference. We hope to travel so not to use the awning, nor the air conditioner for that matter! It's 52F cloudy with light rain here in Brainerd MN today. Yes, the awning could have helped for the rain, if I put it up when we got here yesterday. But, we were hearing thunder and you can't trust to leave it out overnight in these conditions. Get stuck in a burst of wind and downpour trying to manually retract it. I imagine that wouldn't be fun, so ours just doesn't get used.

Nice Itinerary . I sure wouldn't pull out if it snows. Enjoy the White Stuff. You have the trailer for it 😊

We were just at TRNP in April! Lots of Bison about, sometimes walking right down the middle of the road. Saw a few pronghorn, lots of prairie dogs, and a lone coyote looking for a late lunch in an active prairie dog village. In addition to the South Unit and the North Unit, we also visited Teddy Roosevelt's Elkhorn Ranch site. To get there you need to follow about 30 miles of gravel road (we didn't take the trailer!) and an easy flat 3/4 mile hike to get to the ranch site. The rangers seem to be pretty cautious about sending folks out over all that gravel road, but it seemed pretty solid to us. There were only a couple of spots that might be challenging if there was a lot of rain. There's not much remaining there other than a few foundation stones, and a couple of historic plaques, but you do get to see the view that TR saw during his time there along the Little Missouri River, and you can say "I stood where Teddy Roosevelt stood" 🙂 They're working on building TR's presidential library in Medora, but I don't think its supposed to be finished until next year. There's lots of TR history in David McCullough's "Mornings on Horseback" if that's your thing. The visitor center also had "Theodore Roosevelt and the Dakota Badlands" (Chester L Brooks & Ray H Mattison) which is a short, easy read about TR's time in the Dickinson & Medora area. Its likely available elsewhere as well. If you are into museums and have the time, there are a few in the area with lots of info/displays on dinosaurs (which were apparently abundant in the area), cowboys and native americans of that time and place: Bismark ND: https://statemuseum.nd.gov/ Dickinson ND: https://www.dickinsongov.com/museum-center Medora ND: https://medora.com/cowboyhalloffame/ (lots of rodeo stuff, but also other cowboy and native american info) We do have Glacier on our list, but haven't been there yet...

Simple answer, NO. When we purchased our Oliver EII two years ago, I was hoping to pull it with our ‘08 Lexus GX470. So, same engine with some frame differences and ours has completely rebuilt Eibach suspension, new springs shocks, CV axles, everything. I installed a Redarc brake controller and this GX has the tow package. I pulled the Oliver around town. The Oliver was tossing the rear of the GX left and right, up and down, btw with the Andersen WDH attached. Came home and I looked at Chris, “Honey, we need to buy a truck.” She nodded, yes in agreement. Several owners do this, that or the other to make their half-ton truck or even an SUV work. Do yourself a favor and get a 3/4 ton truck with long bed so you can carry what you need now and through the years. Our Oliver was 6400 LBS first camp out, thinking we must be a couple hundred more today. Our truck has 8,800 LB GVWR. BTW, when I did my test drive, third row seats in the GX were removed, rear cargo area empty. The Oliver was also pretty much empty, fridge closet cabinets pantry, were all empty. It’s better to feel you have AMPLE capacity, not close to advertised limits. Sorry.

New Mexico is a wonderful state in its hidden treasures from the area NE of ABQ (where Art lives) up to Santa Fe and to Taos NM, then further up to Raton NM for the Santa Fe Trail Balloon Rally (we just happened by this rally when moving from VA to AZ back in 2005)! Then there is Ruidoso! It's Gods Country in Lincoln County NM of Billy-the-Kid and Smokey-the-Bear fame. Don't travel across southern NM without spending some time here. The area is named the White Mountains of NM, wild elk and feral horses walking the city streets daily and so many cute carvings Smokey is shops everywhere. If you're ever traveling through Albuquerque and need breakfast, lunch or dinner, or just great sides to go, like their amazing salsa and beans, Mexican meats and stews and much more, you've got to stop at the Frontier Restaurant. Just one exit S on I-25 of I-40, head a few blocks east on Central. This is my 4th visit here but the first time I parallel parked with an Oliver! (There was a car behind me when I parked and just a narrow alley in front). It worked out great and we could even keep an eye on our rig from the window seat! Chris had the Taco Salad and I enjoyed the Frontier Burrito, pints of salsa and beans to go for upcoming campsite dinners!

I hope you have a great trip. I would love to travel without scheduling everything to a gnat's ass. Wave if you see us. We leave Sunday for six weeks

I’m committed to my 50th reunion at West Point in Oct ‘26 (class of 1976) so we won’t be attending. We’ve got plans already for all of Sept/Oct. Fall at Lake Guntersville should be nice, though! Mike

Another copy of @Snowball‘s mod just used different but almost the same components. Took a few pics. I was able to save about 2/3 of the upper front maple crossbar. Real trick since the sink is 2 in deeper was maintaining drainage grade. Had to remove metal tube securement (screwed to the back of the cabinet) and was able to reuse the 1 1/2 in ABS but may end up cutting it under road side bed to shorten a bit to get more of a grade. But seems to be draining ok… we shall see. Love the sink and faucet. SO much more useful. Just have to close up top left drawer with faceboard some how. Oh, I did shim the middle between the middle maple cabinet support and counter, the counter had small bow in it. Easily corrected, then was able to silicone the sink to the counter top. Amazon Links: Brushed SS Sink 17x19x9 18g sink, 11g sink rim https://a.co/d/ I wasn’t able to use the deep drain basket that came with it due to limited space. Grohe Bar faucet https://a.co/d/hK5IcRy Best, Mike

So, lucky you! Two great young assistant engineers. Your Ollie is full of great smiles! Great mod. Great look.

Finished the top drawer mod. Keep the wood blocks on the end, they hook into to the end connectors for soft close assembly. You do have to trim them down like the rest of the drawer to make it fit under the sink. Happy that I got to keep the drawer for small things. Turned out better than expected. Had a little helper too!

Summary: Check under your kitchen sink I walked up to an Oliver at a campground one time to introduce myself. I noticed water running down the curb side rear stabilizer. After exchanging greetings I brought the leak to the attention of the owner. After looking under the curb side bunk and finding nothing I suggested that he look under the kitchen sink for the source of the leak. Upon removal of the drawers he found water soaked plywood caused by a loose coupling on the kitchen sink drain trap. Since then I have tried to check mine occasionally to ensure that it is tight and to look around for any other problems. Today I found that the quarter turn stop on the hot water was not completely open. It had probably been like that since we took delivery. Anyway, I opened it and improved the hot water flow at the sink. Occasionally remove your (kitchen) drawers and check on stuff down there -tightness of the drain coupling -quarter turn stops fully open -refrigerator plug plugged in -hose weight located between back of drawers and rear of cabinet carcass -hose not twisted -any sign of moisture -anything rubbing against something -and especially that blue clip on the faucet hose assembly. There was an owner that heard water running underneath her sink when she turned the faucet on. Turns out that blue clip was missing and the hose had completely separated. We have a 2018 OEII, hull 313. Some of this stuff has probably changed. The round port was added after production to access a loose clamp on the exit end of the fresh tank overflow hose. It sure is useful for checking below the cabinets. There is a plumbing vent under the back right corner of the range. It is supposed to let air in and not let grey tank smells out. If you are smelling something foul (grey tank odors, not black tank odors) and you can’t locate a leak you might have a bad plumbing vent.