Patriot

Not sure if this is 💯 accurate, but I-40 in Western North Carolina is now projected to be closed until September of 2025. I-26, north of Asheville and into Tennessee is now projected to be closed until March 2025. Saw this post on a Meteorologist page and thought it was worth sharing. The floods have destroyed roads everywhere in North Carolina & Tennessee.

We are here right now -https://www.nps.gov/deto/index.htm and had a decent hike around the base. In 1906 President Theodore Roosevelt proclaimed the tower and over 1000 surrounding acres a national monument. We are camped essentially on the door step of this tower. We woke up to a nice crisp 37 degrees but were both toasty warm inside our Oliver aka XPLOR. There were there people climbing the tower today as we hiked around its base which was pretty awesome to see. Onward tomorrow saying so long to Wyoming to XPLOR parts of South Dakota.

@Mike and Carol Thank you Mike for your concern. As reported the Western NC foothills and mountain areas are in really bad shape in a lot of areas. A close friend of mine who works for Duke power told me it looks like a war zone. We did have had friends and neighbors check on our home and to our surprise we were spared and had no damage with exception of a few pines over on the ridge we live on. Sadly, this is not the same report for many of our neighbors. Our LNG Generac standby generator ran for 60 hrs before our power was restored keeping our home on 💯 full power. We are very grateful to say the least. All this said our hearts our heavy for ALL impacted by this storm. I40 which connects eastern Tenn with western NC is closed and it appears it will be for a long time. Our Starlink mini has been a game changer with regard to staying up to date. I have made several attempts to call and txt topgun2 and have not had any success. Mike I am glad hear you got through this morning. We are both relieved he and Sue are ok. I would ask everyone to take a moment and lift up ALL people impacted by this storm in your thoughts and prayers. David & Kathy

Yes, every night at 7 pm. Ha!

We left Cody the land of Buffalo Bill Cody and arrived at Devils Tower KOA this afternoon. The sites are close to DT have FH’s and are level. Yay! The staff was welcoming and really helpful. We will get a good nights rest and check out this National Monument. The drive through Big Horn National Forest was just pretty spectacular. Safe Travels and Happy Camping! IMG_2221.mov Our site with a decent views of DT.

Good looking cargo box and you will be really glad to have it. Well done!

Hey Jim, My input- We are one of the first owners of many to install the SB cargo box. We absolutely love the amount of room it has, and it suits our set up gear with quick access perfectly. I use to secure our generator in the OEM Cargo box. After our 6000 mile trip out west last year and never using the generator, we reevaluated keeping the generator on the tongue and decided to just carry our Honda 3200i in the bed of our TV. The room in the SB cargo box allows me to keep all my immediate set up gear ready to deploy - 30 amp cord, chocks, Andersen blocks and levelers, 4 rubber chocks with lots of room for other miscellaneous items. Before the SB box install I was storing these items in the bed of our TV in an Action Packer box. The SB cargo box has made life easier just keeping everything right where I can get to it quickly vs unloading gear out of the bed. This box has continued to serve us very well even right now as we are out west again. We have not had any issues with water getting into the interior of the cargo box and we have been through some heavy rains on past trips. We always try and support USA made 🇺🇸 products and I think you will find David and Kristine Hess the owners of SeaBiscuit some of the finest people you will ever meet. David and his team take pride in what they craft and produce. I would also suggest you consider the moose rack he makes (pic below the hitch). It will keep your safety chains or cables stowed and off the ground. For what it’s worth, that is my input all the way from Cody, Wyoming now slowly headed home the long way round to North Carolina. 🇺🇸 Cheers and Happy Trails! Patriot🇺🇸

We are based camped at the Ponderosa CG right in Cody. A lot to do and see here and this town has a really nice vibe. Landed another nice FH site and even a little shade. Tomorrow morning we will get breakfast at Roosters and then head out to Bear Creek Pass and a place called The Red Lodge. Safe Travels!

So we left YS after a week of awesome fun touring and hiking around and taking in the sights and we headed out the east gate to Cody for our next place to base camp with XPLOR. Came up on this gorgeous pull off and decided to capture a vid. IMG_2186.mov Safe Travels!

Enjoying our last what we thought was going to be a nice quiet evening here at Fishing Bridge CG in Yellowstone, we had an unexpected Oliver visit and showing. Where does a 2000# Bison graze? Anywhere he wants!! I kept real quiet, he had no questions, but he loved our Oliver. What a last night at YS send off! 😂 The Beast head to head with our Beast of Burden. So glad he did not munch our SL mini cable. He tugged on it a few times as he ripped grass out of the soil. Glad we decided to enjoy dinner inside.

@MAX Burner Yes! We did that last Sunday…awesome views and the weather was perfect! Did you guys camp inside the park? If so where and your thoughts on the CG.

This big fella was out munching this morning not far from our site here at Fishing Bridge. We have a large herd of Buffalo being farmed not far from our home in Western NC. It’s still pretty neat to see them in the wild. The guy that owns the fiver you see had eyes the size of teacups. 😄 His expression was priceless. Onward with a short drive to Cody in the morning! We will be there a few days and longer if we really like it! IMG_2130.mov

Still looking for the snow front you said was moving through. 🙄 You must be watching a local channel! Ha! 😂 Stay dry, I do believe you are going get some hard rain. I did have a short encounter with a bear in Montana at Beartooth Pass in Cook City. Fun times! We bought him a T-shirt and all was good.

We extended our stay 2 more days here at Fishing Bridge CP inside Yellowstone NP to give us a full week at this magical park. Why leave? Ha! And the CG staff have been just awesome taking great care of us. Loop E is the where you wanna be if you are gonna stay at Fishing Bridge. The other loops are very close. This morning we enjoyed a short hike to the overlook at Grand Prismatic Spring. wow factor for sure. We enjoyed lunch at the Old Faithful Lodge and watched Old Faithful for the third time since we have been here. Every 90 minutes give or take it does it's thing. On our way back to Fishing Bridge we pulled off the road and walked out to the shoreline of Yellowstone Lake just to take in the majesty of this huge lake. More proof that the natural beauty surely is everywhere you look here. This is the time of year travel out west suits us best. A lot less peeps, much more campsite availability, beautiful sleeping temps, very little traffic and no long lines. What more could one ask for? Not a cloud in the sky, and gorgeous temps! (Excuse the poor audio in the lake vid, it was a little windy) Happy & Safe Travels from Hull #634 XPLOR IMG_2115.mov IMG_2116.mov

Excellent reminder especially for owners who don’t know this about the BAS.

We park our Oliver at our home under cover in a steel building. I choose to leave the fresh water tank valve open so that IF there is any water or moisture in the tank around or in the valve it does not freeze with the valve in the closed position. A freeze would cause the with water in the valve it to expand, and possibly crack can and fail. We don’t get really long extended hard freezes where we live in Western NC, so it’s not a huge deal. This has worked fine for the last 4 years. As far as any residual RV antifreeze in the fresh water tank or system, a good system flush is what I do after de-winterizing. We do not drink water from our fresh tank. As far as the toilet seal, add a little Vaseline to the seal in the toilet and it will be fine. Please post up your Olivers year and Hull #. It will make it much easier to help you with future questions. Welcome and Happy Travels!

💯agree, I think my set up time is about 5 min.

@TxMN2020 now is the time to take a deep dive into Oliver University and also the forum. This knowledge will give you somewhat of a leg up on delivery day! Congrats on your choice of a world class Travel Trailer!

Hey Max, awesome vid and ride! Wow! Looking forward to the fall colors and getting in a little seat time when we get home whenever that is? Ha! Glad you had a safe and fun trip! Thanks for the color report, the Aspens are little late this year here in YS, the beauty of this park never ends. Glad to hear you getting Casablanca ready to roll again! 👍🏻🇺🇸

Checked our weather forecast and we decided to add two more days to our stay here at Fishing Bridge here in YS. This will give us a full week to enjoy as much of this gorgeous park as we can. We are staying put in our site! The staff here has been just really good to us. New Loop E is making a perfect base camp for us and I highly recommend it. The bath house and laundry facilities are huge and brand new and kept spotless. Fired up our trusty Weber and got busy grilling to carry us over for a few days. We have visited 5 NPs on this trip so far. Between a week at Grand Tetons and a week here at YS, Kathy and I both agree YS is our favorite NP. Truly a magical place to visit. Happy & Safe Travels! IMG_2005.mov

Now 5 weeks into our western trip our Starlink Mini has worked flawlessly with usually 4 devices attached. With our use, the upgrade to the unlimited plan is the way to go and it still has the pause feature when we are not using it. I can’t imagine having to ever deal with WiFi at CGs or cell phone hots spots. As soon as I deploy the mini dish which takes about 5 minutes, it immediately recognizes our devices. I am glad I purchased the aluminum protective case/cradle. The mini is really light weight and could easily be blown around by strong winds if not secured or weighted down. The added weight of the aluminum protective case makes a difference in my field use experience so far. An impressive useful piece of technology. It was a frosty 32d when I took this pic here in Yellowstone two mornings ago. As long as SpaceX keeps those satellites sailing we are in great shape. Ha!

There are some ideas that may help you resolve your issue in this recent post. -

No snow forecasted for YS, a little chilly in the early mornings, but gorgeous and in the mid 70’s tomorrow here according to our weather app. Nothing but sunshine and blue skies! 🤩

Olivers have made quite a few improvements over the years and continue to do so. I suggest you continue to read and research here on this forum and come to your own conclusion. If I were in the market right now I would really consider a newer 2020 and up preowned Oliver with Solar and Lithium batteries. Then again it all depends on how you plan to camp and use your Oliver. Better yet call Oliver Sales and ask to speak with a sales rep, they will be able give you some really great information on the progress Oliver has made over the last several years. If you’re considering a used Oliver do your due diligence. I suggest you take a look at Oliver University and the owners manuals for different YM are located there. Better yet, if you are seriously considering an Oliver take the factory tour.

It did, and I had no plans to remove or reuse it. Cash is king and I gave the guy a break as I pre-sold it to him like a month or so before I had our Truma installed and he kept his word on the deal. Oliver had stacks of old Dometics that folks left behind after the retro fit.