Changes to the Blog

Well, as all of you know, I am pretty new to this blogging thing. As such I am working on trying to learn a few new tricks. In the last couple of days I have added a couple of new tabs under the Home page picture, labeled HOME, MODIFICATIONS AND CHANGES, LIFE ON THE ROAD AND HOW IT CAME TO BE, THE STORY.
 
HOME: Is normal blog activity

MODIFICATIONS AND CHANGES: are well, modification and changes that we have made to the truck and trailer, This will update periodically.

LIFE ON THE ROAD AND HOW IT CAME TO BE, THE STORY: This is a running narrative of how we decide to go fulltime,  and the continuing saga of our progress and drive toward that goal. This will continue to be updated

Hope these additions have some information that some of you will find useful.

SHAKE DOWN OF THE MOUNTAINEER

Well the first tour is done...............

     We hauled the new Montana Mountaineer up to Ruidoso for the weekend. This trip was for relaxation and shake down. It rained a little off and on so it was great weather for relaxing. Worked with every system and played with all the new stuff. Only issue was a knock in the ceiling fan, which I will address soon. We did find a few things to modify, such as adding vanity lights in Janice bathroom. Those have now been added (they arrived as we were departing). LED lighting in the switch cabinet, no lights and THAT'S WHERE THE LIGHT SWITCHES ARE AT, that was corrected this afternoon. We played with the new convection oven, it works, imagine that.

     We tested Janice's sewing room, figured out where things need to be placed, and of course she did a little sewing.

This works out much better then the dining room table.

     I did some tile work during the rainy days, adhesive, tile, grout, hard work for relaxation, so...................... the heck with that, used Smart Tile and knock it out in an hour, hell, I'm in.
Before Stove Picture

And after hours of labor, OK, not so much labor

And the Master Bath (ran out of tile for the back bath, will have to order more)

Well everything worked great, furnace was quiet, A/C was cold, new Level Up System for auto leveling the rig, worked great, I love it.  I really enjoyed pulling this new one, it tracks very true to the truck, much truer then the High Country. It also had no chunking, none.

     So for the first trip, it was great. We will continue to modify and tweak, and keep you informed.  I will say that the shake down trip, goes to show that working out a good PDI and working with a good dealer, makes for a good start. Main Trailer Sales Inc, in Roswell has been great as usual.

     And I made a little money at the casino, very little, but I walked out with a win.

      We will see you down the road.

Time for Modifications

    Well, the time has come to add all the things we removed from the High Country and reinstall on the New Mountaineer. We reinstalled power vent covers, screen door handles(bars), relined all the shelves and cabinets in the coach, replace sleep number bed and compressor, towel racks, reloaded pot and plates, fire extinguishers, etc, etc. We then tackled the under storage, install inverter, eyebolts for tie downs, fishing pole holder. We had a few busy days and evenings.

    Now the entire reason for going to the Montana Mountaineer 356TBF floor plan, was to have a space for Janice to set up her sewing/embroidery/quilt/craft area. So after looking at numerous options, from building a desk area, to buying a sewing table type system, we started to looking at DESK. Gee, they are right height, and could have a lot of storage if drawer configurations was right. And if you could find one with a large enough top. AND the big one (ok, so its a matter of being a small one), it had to fit through a 28" inside door. We did a search and reviewed a few, and this is what we came up with. Length 6 feet, Depth of surface 31",  Drawers for storage, and enough room at the end to store a 6 foot table for travel and set up when we arrive.

Saturday morning we started building and moving finished section through that 28" inside door. And Saturday afternoon we had this:

Now we all know that sewing/embroidery/etc, takes a lot of storage. Above the desk, you can see the full bunk bed in its up positions (rated at 300lbs capacity) so the bunk can be used for storage and lots of drawers on the desk for storage. And....................... across the room is the closet, entertainment center, with another bunk. I added removable shelving to the shallow closets.

So I hope we have made a good start on getting this room set up. We are awaiting the arrival of the Theater Seating, and the Microwave/Convection Oven(which has arrived and is awaiting install) Hopefully, the next major project with be installing the tool chest in the front storage bay. As mentioned earlier we did get all the vent covers installed, it gives the rig a look of a bunch of AC units, but there are only 2 AC's, the rest are Fantastic Power Vents.

    I just realized that I have not show MY favorite part (other then the hydraulic auto leveling system. So here it is, "The Outdoor Kitchen". Of course there is an indoor kitchen, but this one is MINE.

So there ya go, the adventure continues.

Well We Pulled The Trigger On A New Rig

We did our annual trip to Fun Valley in Colorado, fishing was good, weather was great for the first 5 days and then the wind came, 6 days of 40mph+. But other then that, it was a great vacation. Old friend showed up, just like clockwork, Wyman, Carroll and Janis, Sleepy and Ron, George and Jo. It was nice catching up. While we were up there and bushed up from the wind, we had a chance to evaluate what we would like in a new rig, and came up with a list. And.......................

We took delivery of a 2015 Montana Mountaineer 356TBF on July 3, after several days of PDI, we pulled it home. We have been looking at floor plans that give us alittle more area for Janice's sewing, embroidery and quilting. So we decided on the 356TBF, which is a 40 foot bunkhouse. The bunkhouse is being remodeled into a sewing room. This will give her ample space to spread out and sew. With a 6 foot desk and a 7 foot table, she will have a lot more space then we had planned in the 343RL. The new 356 has a rear 1/2 bath and back door off the sewing room. It also has a full outdoor kitchen(for ME), it also has the Level UP system, that levels the rig automatically, yea, no more leveling the rig with blocks under the tires. Five slides add to the interior space. We had the dealer remove the tires and install our's on the 356, it came with China crap tires that we just won't pull with. Had them remove the rear couch out of BH. We are awaiting our new Theater Seating for the living room, and then they can remove the second couch and install the new seating assembly. We also had them pull the quad steps off ours and replace the triple on the front door with our quads. The unit came with a 30" MicroWave, we ordered a 30" MicroWave/Convection Oven, should be here this up coming week, dealer will do the swap.

We have spent the past week, empting the old rig and removing many of the modifications that we have done. And over the holiday weekend we spent the day light hours, reloading the new one and installing modification on the new unit. I still have a lot of work to do, install sewing desk, add shelving. Most of the modifications I had done on the 343 have been moved to the 356. So those pictures will still be pretty accurate in the past blog. I did have to add 2 more Fantastic Vent Covers, this thing has 4 power ventilation fans. And 2 AC units, should be able to move some air.

Now for some fun stuff, we had a great 4th of July dinner with our daughter and husband Jack and his side of the family, crab legs, clams, shrimp, crawdads, corn on the cob, potatoes, well you get the idea, more food then we could eat.

After dinner, we convince daughter, Bridget and Jack, that the baby, Jase would be better off with us at the house then listening to those LOUD fireworks. You remember this little guy right.

 So we got to baby sit for a couple of hours. Hey this is big, because as parents, they are such baby hogs. :-) And we love having the boys over. But, Brayden has gotten old enough to really enjoy the fireworks so he went with them.

We will get pictures of the new rig posted soon. Inside and out, just been going 90 mph and haven't had a chance to get pictures yet. Until then enjoy life, and we will see ya down the road.

Busy Week......

Well, the week started out exciting around here, with an early morning call on Monday, daughter heading to the hospital to have the baby, grandson number four. We were there, and we were so lucky to be included in the great day. This is my daughter Bridget and husband Jack, and the newest addition to the Taylor family, baby Jase.

 

This is the oldest grandson with baby, Jase. First time for big brother Brayden to hold his little brother.

 

Friday night and Saturday morning we got about 4.5" of rain in 3 hours, along with hail and high winds. Now for those of you that aren't aware of the drought in south east New Mexico, this is the most rain ever recorded in a single day and more rain then we have had in the past six months. The town and surrounding areas were flooded pretty bad, water still draining 14 hours later. This mornings survey showed no hail damage to truck or Montana, so far so good, looks like more coming tonight. We are prepping our rig for our first summer trip to Colorado. Let the fun begin.

 

Until later, be safe