Pacific to Atlantic and back - Part 1

Hi all.
Thanks to Leon, (AKA Texas Camper) I will give a go at telling you a little about our recent trip.
Left Northern Calif. on Dec 8 headed for College Station, Tx. Our daughter, son-in-law and two beautiful grandaughters live there. Takes us four days on I5 south through Mojave to Needles, Phoenix bypass, Las Cruces, NM, El Paso, TX, Fort Stockton, Fredericksburg, Austin and into College Station. We are members of both Good Sam and KOA but found the KOA's to be more predictable and accurate in describing their facilities.
Our Pilot towed the 3124KS beautifully, averaged about 13 MPG. Probably could have done better, but Pilot is a bit underpowered for that trailer. TM worked perfect and wife and I got pretty good and putting it up and taking it down in 10-15 minutes. To complicate things we had just gotten a 12 week old Golden Retriever puppy, her name is Izzie, short for Isobel.
She was great, traveling in the crate in the car and loving her stretches and poop breaks during the day and long walks after we stopped for the night. Lots of new smells and she was in heaven. Found that 400 miles a day is a full, full day but we have made that trip many times without the trailer and had no reason to stop.
Spent a few days with the kids then it was on to Kernersville, NC where my son, daughter-in-law and three grand kids waited for us to spend Xmas and new years. Since the weather at that point was so good we zipped up through Arkansas to Tennessee, across Tennessee to knoxville, across the Smokeys to Ashville, NC and then into Kernersville. It took us three days and two nights. We had also been this route before and threrefore didn't spend much time sightseeing. Spent one night in Arkadelphia and one just east of Nashville. Finally arriving Kernersville, then lots of Xmas shopping and prep for Xmas.
Parked the TM in my Son's backyard. Not thinking too much about the bare earth (NC red clay) the remnents of his having just had a swimming pool installed. By the way by this time, my wife and I are weary of the night after night set up and the morning after morning take down Still only a few minutes, but still extra steps over a regular trailer or motor home. Would not be a problem at all if staying for a few days but day after day does get wearisome. We organized the tasks so that she had one side to do the latches on and I the other. I had the front shell she had the rear. She'd pull out the bed, I the sofa section. We usually stay hooked to the pilot in order to speed our leaving in the morning. I would level and stabilize if necessary, she would do the bathroom setup and all the velcro seals. I would do the wardrobe and the cabinet above the sink, connect the electric and water and sewer if necessary. She'd make me scotch and water while I took the dog for a walk and we were settled in for the evening.
I'm going to stop for now as we enjoy Xmas and New Years with the kids in NC and resume when we start to leave NC on Jan 2 headed for Myrtle Beach, Charleston, Savannah, Jekyl Island, GA and thence west towards home.
Ciao.
Dan

[B_and_D]

Wow, sounds like quite a trip! I'm looking forward to hearing the rest.

Thanks for taking the time to share your trip. I hope to do something close to what you did later this year and reading your words help!

[Leslie & Nick]

Quite a trip!! Enjoyed reading about it. Glad everything went smoothly for you, and I'm sure you appreciated the cheaper gasoline prices - good timing!

We travel with two dogs, and you're right, I also enjoy stopping for stretch breaks with them. I know we wouldn't stop as often as we do if we didn't have the dogs - it's good for them and us

We've yet to go on a really long trip like that, but I can imagine the setting up and taking down every day would get old after a while. I can see where leaving TV connected overnight, would make things a lot easier each morning.

Train them well, Izzie.

Leon,
Well said.
We made the coast to coast trip by car a couple of years ago and stayed in hotels eating meals out etc and that was part of the impetus for us to look for a light weight towable. Don't get me wrong, we love our TM!
Also found that often, when we were staying hitched over night that we didn't hook up anything outside except electric. We could go several days without dumping the toilet and holding tanks. We also found that if we were in close proximity to a larger metropolitan area the the television antenna worked just fine for getting network news and favorite programs so we never worried about whether an rv park had cable or not.
One thing I would recommend to anyone doing a cross country trip is satellite radio! The first trip we made we were constantly trying to find acceptable listening using a regular radio and it drove us nuts. This time we subscribed to Sirius Satellite Radio. We were able to listen to our 49ers every Sunday, Fox News or CNN whenever as well as comedy channels and every sort of music genre we wanted whenever we wanted. To us it was a marriage saver!

I'll start the Part II thread of our trip in a day or so as I have some other issues taking my time at the moment and yes to all of you who have dogs, Izzie almost has us completely trained and we're luving it. As I right this we have just come back from our dailing morning walk (usually an hour), she has eaten and is now at my feet having doggy dreams. I hear little whines and wimpers and sometimes here paws move as if she thinks she's running or swimming. I guess you can see we don't luv her too much.
Dan