SeaDawg

Dave, The water bladder we carry is empty, unless we need it. Looks like a crib sized water bed mattress. If we need to refill the fresh water when boondocking/drycamping, we put the bladder in the pickup bed and go to a freshwater source (usually a local park), and fill it and use the switched-over pump to refill the tank in the Oliver. I'll look for the thread where I show how we do that... I posted some photos five or six years ago. There is a switch on the pump system to make it easier to fill from a tank or bladder. And, you're so right... there's an amazing amount of storage in our trailers. It takes awhile to figure out where to put the things you use every day, and where to store lesser used items, etc. I just follow the same principles I used in my dad's rv and trailer, and in our sailboat... heavy items low, light items high, and it all finds a spot.\ Sherry

We have a small rubbermaid trashcan that we keep under the table, like Pam does. Before we travel, I empty it, and place all the cleaning supplies that I keep on the floor by the toilet (windex, black tank deodorizer, lysol, etc.) in the can, and keep it in the shower floor. I wedge other lightweight items on the floor to keep stuff from sliding around... hiking boots, etc. I store mostly lightweight and softer items in the upper cupboards. Clothes packed in soft cubes, paper goods, etc. The back cabinet has black Ikea skubb fabric contrainers, and I keep cereal, chips, crackers, and baked goods up there. Plastic ware goes in one of the small overheads. Heavier items go in the sturdy drawers (canned goods, pots and pans, silverware, etc.). My plates (melmac) and glasses (plastic) go in suction cup shower containers affixed to the wall behind the stove. In the bins under the bed/large dinette seats, I keep only items we rarely use, as they're kind of a pain to get to once the bed is made up. Extra coats and raingear, the water bladder for refilling fresh water, etc. Manuals and a small toolkit are under the small dinette set.Two or three large bins hold extra bedding and towels, and folded clothing items, under the bed. You'll find lots of places, and eventually a pattern so you're not always hunting for an item.

We had directTV for a year, but didn't use it, so cancelled. We bought a small, flat antenna at Walmart that we keep in the big cupboard above the large dinette, and use that if we want to see the local news. There are a surprising number of antenna only channels here in our county. One plays movies all day. We can usually at least get the news wherever we are. Sherry

I got another pm from a member about this campground today. I love this place. And, we continue to take friends and family to the lodge for breakfast for the amazing views. (Go early in the day... view at lunch and dinner is not as good even with the floor to ceiling windows....) If you're thinking about driving and camping the Blue Ridge, this is one stop to not miss. In my opinion. The campgrounds are basically all the same along the Blue Ridge, lots of rhododendrons separating the sites, plenty of privacy, no servces, which is part of the joy, honestly... Lots of quiet, and amazing scenery. Here's a link to more info on Mt. Pisgah cg: http://www.recreation.gov/camping/mount-pisgah-campground/r/campgroundDetails.do?contractCode=NRSO&parkId=75021 Though this is the reservation website, we did not make a reservation anywhere on our tour of the Blue Ridge. We just went. Never had a problem finding sites. Most of the sunblockers want services, and we don't. This site says that showers are now available at Mt. Pisgah. That would be nice. http://www.blueridgeparkway.org/v.php?pg=19 And, finally, here's a link to the National Park Service info on the Blue Ridge. http://www.nps.gov/blri/planyourvisit/camping-on-the-blue-ridge-parkway.htm If you do camp at Mt. Pisgah, spend a few days and visit Asheville. Our favorite city, honestly, for food, fun, music, and well, just a lot of energy and old time feel. Along the Blue Ridge, you'll want to stop at the visitor's center near Asheville, where you can enjoy a fifteen minute movie of the building of the parkway, a lot of info on the area and the construction, and tour a very green, modern building on an old, wonderful site. The Craft museum, just a few miles away, is awesome. The Craft guild has rotating and permanent exhibits, showing some of the best of woodworking, quilting, glass blowing and other Highlands crafts. Definitely worth a stop ad an hour or two, Sherry Sherry

Paul and I have decided to dry camp again at the RV Supershow in Tampa, at the Fairgrounds, in January. The show is open to the public 14 to 18th. We really enjoy the comraderie of the dry campers after the show closes. $20 a night for dry camping. An attendant comes around and collects after the show closes. Anyone interested in joining us? We'd love to make it an egg enclave. Especially love it if some more Olivers joined us. Sherry

Steve's link looks like our Harbor Freight tow dolly. Should work to move it around the garage. Works ok on the level parts of our driveway. Our 17 won't fit thru our current garage door. New garage/new house was built with the trailer in mind, 10 ft door, so we can park the Ollie inside if necessary. Sherry

Merry Christmas, and a very Happy 2015 to all our Oliver friends.

We often dry camp there and enjoy the two day pass for the show. We'll see you there. Let us know if you're coming, and when. Sherry

Here are a few taken shortly after we had the panels installed: In this one, if you look closely, you'll see the awesome saddle bracket Oliver made to match the curve of the hull. We took all these at beautiful Lake Ouichita campground on our way to the River RV Rally. Sherry

Dave, while I look for photos of our installation, here's a link to a thread by Andrew, who did his own pv installation, based on our factory install. If you go down the thread, you'll find a link to a photo album of Andrew's install. It looks a lot like ours. He did a great job. Sherry

The ingenious crew at Oliver added solar to our trailer seven months after we bought it. That included running the heavy cable that your already have, which was no mean feat, and maybe not even possible now with the new insulation techniques. Glad you pre wired. The metal shop made custom saddle brackets for our two fixed panels, based on my husband's sidemount concept, and added them to the trailer. We've not had problems with anything they did, even though it was an addition, and not part of the original build. The thin film flexible adhesive panels take up a lot of rooftop "real estate" to create the same amount of power as our racked panels. That's one of the reasons we did not seriously consider flexible panels for our pv installation on our new home. They do, however, have that great advantage of "no drilling required" on the travel trailer rooftop. The flexible panels don't really add any "drag" to the roof top, either, and I've read of a number of very happy users on other forums. You might consider boondocking a few times without any panels, but with a good monitor installed, to see what your actual power requirements are. With all LED lights, and camping in Florida weather without heavy use of the furnace fan (our biggest power draw in the mountains, usually), you may find one 100 or 160 watt panel may just be enough. A lot depends on your consumption, camping style, and of course, battery storage. Tough decision to make. Sherry

Hardrock, Congrats on your retirement. Likely you'll feel the same way we do... wonder how we ever found time to work! We have used three methods for moving our Oliver without the trailer: 1. Least satisfactory: trailer dolly from harbor freight, and lots of manual effort. Actually, on a flat surface, the dolly isn't so bad for me and Paul, but on an incline, or over grass or turf block, it's either a bear, or impossible. Or, we had to recruit a couple neighbors, as well as me and Paul, to move the trailer 30 feet. 2. The EZ Tug... Great product. Don't know if they make an upgraded model, but the tire was really small, and tended to go flat on us. Paul hooked it up to our trailer battery, so we had plenty of "power", but going even slight inclines, on grass, usually required me pushing on the front of the trailer, while watching to avoid the tree on one side, shrubs and garage eaves on the other. It worked, way better than a tow dolly, but not ideal. It really helped if my very kind neighbor sat on the bed in the back to take some of the weight off the tongue while we maneuvered the trailer. Yes, she is a very, very good friend to do that for me. 3. The Parkit 360 is our newest addition. We bought a nice barely used large or xl unit. First attempt didn't go very well. Then, we read the directions online , and watched the youtube on how to use it... (I know, when all else fails, read the directions.) Seriously important if you use this, because it has two wheels, and if not attached properly, and seated properly, you feel like you could tip the trailer on a sharp turn. This works fairly well. More power than the EZ tug, but perhaps not as much "traction." Both times we've used it have been after heavy rains, and on slick ground, we lay out old plywood cutoffs to give a better footing on the grass. I'm looking forward to using it at our new house next year... concrete and turf block over shell, not grass, and not much of an incline. We did think about adding a front hitch to our Honda 4 wheeler, briefly, but rejected that. Firgured the weight of the tongue might lift the Honda off the ground... As good as Paul is at backing and maneuvering the truck (and I do believe he's really skilled at it), there is no way we'd get our trailer into its winter spot by our garage with a front mount on the Ram truck. Just way too tight, and we'd tear up the lawn for good measure. Personally, I'd probably try a really good trailer dolly first, if you could borrow one. Then look for the Parkit 360, unless Ez Tug has upgraded their tongue weight capability. For quick use, and you can swing it up and carry it around with your, the EZ Tug is tough to beat, just a little undersized for our trailer. It's a lot easier to set up and operate than the Parkit 360, one wheel, portable, and uses the trailer battery. The parkit 360 has its own battery, and is heavy, longer setup, and doesn't feel quite as intuitive.. Big pro for the Parkit 360: It moves the trailer pretty well. Sherry

Dave, you may just want to give the factory a call tomorrow. I'm sure they'll be helpful. Glad you love your new Oliver. We love our 17 a lot. Still looks pretty great after almost 7 years, and 60,000 plus miles. Sherry

And, many pages of reviews from a truck camper forum. A couple of the forum members ordered the less expensive Chinese made version. One wasn't very happy with the "clone.' Here you go, Larry. http://www.wanderthewest.com/forum/topic/4643-lagun-cockpit-table/page-5

Here are a few, Larry. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GriVnVrjLYw Demo of two sizes of table Installation and review by a liveaboard sailor. Spoiler alert: very long! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndgkur197js https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOZsFMOU8Pg Used as a drop down table with a u shaped dinette: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sa_vdIcl9t0 Sherry

Larry, we went to the boat show in St. Pete yesterday. While Paul was studying marine hardware in an adjacent booth, I spent some time in the SVHotwire booth. They market a Swedish made table for boats and RVs that is fascinating, and really well made. It's not quite like the one you posted, but it's quite a versatile little table bracket. It is, however, wall or bulkhead mounted, not floor mounted like ours. Sure would be nice to be able to lift up the small dinette table at a flip of a lever to make it more practical to use as a prep table in the kitchen. http://svhotwire.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=97&product_id=13 The people who market this product, among many others, are serious renewable energy innovators. They manufacture a wind generator, at a fairly reasonable price, for boats, rvs, homes. They lived on a boat powered by renewable energy for years, now live in a renewable energy powered home. They also sell pv panels and systems.Their shop is in Tarpon Springs, near the sponge docks. Sherry

Love the ocean colors... sea blue and grey graphics. Hope you have a safe and happy trip home. Let us know if you wander over our way to the Tampa Bay area in your travels. Sherry

Cool table. This poster says it's made inhouse at Leisure: http://www.thefitrv.com/rv-tips/in-depth-review-of-leisure-travel-vans-unity-24ib/ Scroll down to comment 1 on post 13. I see this coach starts around $140k. Wow. Nice, but, wow. Sherry

Great looking truck. I see you have the ground effects cover. That's supposed to reduce drag, as well. Don't you love the fog lamps? We love ours. Really helps with visibility. Was the bed cover on the truck on the lot, or did you add it? We love our UnderCover. Lockable (not that it's that secure...), keeps everything out of sight, and also helps with drag. Really light... the two of us can take it off the truck bed in a few minutes. Another one of those things that might even be faster to accomplish if Paul does it alone.... Sherry

Welcome to the Forum, Jeff!

Canadian government website link: A guide to transportation within US. Follow the links for New York, which is a typical gateway to Canada, and not firearm transportation friendly:

The awning, deployed or retracted does direct roof runoff away from the curbside window, and the door. We added the gutter to the curbside window just because we thought it would look better if all the windows had the same "trim." Our biggest problems with weepholes being overcome are often of our own making: 1. dirty weepholes 2. our sidemount solar panels, left adjusted at a certain angle, can send rainwater down in a sheet onto the port side windows. This we discovered, unfortunately, in the middle of a hard, cold rainstorm that swept through our side of the mountain on a cool summer night. Unable to adjust the panels in the rain, Paul jacked up the port side with the electric jack. Since then, if heavy rain is in the forecast, we try to remember to check the adjustment on the panels before we retire. Often, we do set up our trailer with the port side a little higher anyway. That's the head of the bed side for us, and if our site needs to be a smidge out of level, it's more comfortable sleeping that way. By the way CpaHarley2008, welcome to the forum. You've asked a lot of good questions on your first visit here, and offered some great comments and info as well. Sherry

CPAHarley2008, as to the length, besides the bumper and the tongue, I guess you also have to add in the depth of the propane cover. I'd ask Steve to get out his tape measure again, but I think he requested an even longer stinger than the usual extendable tongue. Our propane cover is well over a foot in depth. The new model cover looks larger to me. Sherry

cpaharley, Does your 2014 have the air suspension and tubular foot steps, as well? Glad they were able to improve the mileage so much with the shutters and other improvements. The Ram is a great truck. Sherry

Awesome. Thanks, Matt. I can now see what I'm typing.