Driven by a Second Chance

Fifth Wheel, Travel Trailer, Class A, Class B, Class C, SuperC. Full hook-up, partial hook-up, boondocking, dry camping, mooch-docking, lot-docking. Fresh water tank, grey tank…and of course the black tank… WE WERE LOST!!!!

Our first trip into this potential life style was a trip to the 2025 Tampa, Florida RV Super Show this year. Talk about jumping in head first! We walked around the show, in a complete daze. When we entered the show, we were funneled in through an enormous building filled with vendors, showing everything from RV parks, campgrounds, furniture, RV accessories, memberships, tools, e-bikes and so much more. We were handed bags, and merch and just tried to act like we knew what we were doing and that we had any idea what they were all talking about. After stopping at a few booths, and getting several “swag” items, we exited the building and stopped cold in our tracks……

OH MY RVs! As far as the eye could see, there were RVs. At the time, we didn’t know the lingo, size differences, towing capacity, and what the heck the difference between dry weight and GVWR was. So we did what any rational human being would do, we picked a direction and went to the first set of rigs we saw. (of course the term “RIG”, was foreign to us at the time).

The first rigs we came to were travel trailers, I wish I could remember what the salesperson told us, but he might have well been speaking pig latin, because he was speaking but we were not comprehending. We did a great job faking it though.. At least I think we did! We continued through the day, walking in and out of various types of rigs. We talked to a few sales people, who I’m sure had a good laugh at us after we left their areas. We only stayed a few hours, because our heads were SPINNING from the overload of information. We left feeling excited, but really didn’t know what we were excited about.

We both decided that this was a lifestyle we wanted to look into, but we knew were were out of our element. So we grabbed an empty notebook, sat down on the couch with our LaCroix and Water, and turned on YouTube!

We learned the difference between the rigs (and to call them rigs), the sizes, the “lingo” and wrote down everything! The memberships, expenses to consider, apps we should check out, how to travel with pets (our two puppies Diesel & Prada), and wrote down a couple YouTubers to continue to follow (that list has grown a lot!). We filled up 6-7 pages of our notebook and spent the rest of the day talking, and deciphering what we learned.

That was less than 2 months ago! We have learned so much in 2 months and can actually speak more intelligently (or at least we think so) when we enter a dealership. Our notebook it almost completely full now, with different rigs, and weight distribution and hitch information, the fifth wheels we like and whether we have seen them IRL or just online. We continue to learn about memberships and apps, how to find campsites and parks, what apps will help us plan our routes and what we want out of this life we are chasing. Our excitement continues to grow as does our knowledge of the RV life!

So today, if you ask me what a “toad” is…. I can tell you, not only is it a slimy frog like creature, it’s also a vehicle being towed behind an RV. I can also look at the number and letter combination on different models of rigs and tell you what RL, BH, MB and RK mean (the numbers still confuse me a bit, but I’m getting there). We actually sound like we know what we’re talking about! (at least we think so).

This has been the most fun we have ever had learning a new language! We, by no means, know everything we need to know, but we continue to learn and get more excited about our future plans (more on that in a later blog post).

I hope you continue to join us on our journey… Driven by a second chance….at life!