Pics of Camp Inn being built/pateardropper

[Al-Les-Palace]

We pulled the tear to Delaware State Park north of Columbus for our second outing. We made our first pass at packing - still needs some work. Arrived after dark but just love the ease of setup (almost none?) compared to tent.

Beautiful late fall weather with Halloween moon both nights. Attended OSU-PSU football game on Sat.

Have uploaded several pics to our album.

Trying to paste one into this message:

[img]http://www.tnttt.com/gallery/image.php?image_id=614[/img]

[yhgail]

I just made my first camping trip with my new Camp-Inn. The ease of camping with these trailers is awesome. I wasn't able to get an electric camp site but didn't need it at all for heat. I used my heated mattress pad which got the bedding cozy warm for getting into bed. I had to turn it off as the teardrop was warm enough for sleeping. However, I turned it back on while I visited the ladies room in the morning and I came back to a nice cozy warm bed.

I was able to make and break camp in 5 minutes. The canopy tent worked great. It's just the right size and in severe weather, I can get the whole teardrop under it .

As a single camper I try to not bring a lot of attention to myself. This is one area where having a Camp-Inn does not perform. Attention is unavoidable. People in camp come right over to take a look at this intereating trailer!!

Cheers
Gail
Rochester
New Camp Inn Owner

[Chip]

Pateardropper if ya can work out the schedule and come back for myrtle beach ya'll can lock it up in my garage for the week and pick it up later in the week,,just a thought if ya dont want to pull back and forth two weeks in a row,,,its a lot of travling but I hope yall can work it out,,we would love to have ya at the get together,,,from Greenville I am about 5 hours from the beach,,gonna leave out on friday am heading east

chip

[anonymous2]

Hi Chip,

I wish we could come to Myrtle Beach. I am on call at work,and the other guy has tickets for a football game out of state that weekend,because he is off call. That leaves me the only one for emergencys. Also the wife is training a new group of dispatchers,and is working 11-7 that weekend for training. This year has been a dufficult one to go camping. Most of my kayaking events fell when I was on call,and to get off, I had to be on call for weeks at a time. Hopefully next year will be better. You just wanted to copy my tear for your next project .LOL I am on to you ,Chip. See you in about 2 weeks.

Happy Camping pateardropper

[anonymous2]

Hi Gail,

I know what you mean about attention the Camp Inn gets. The night I got mine delivered I hooked it up for a test tow. When arriving home a guy followed me in my drive,and asked me where I got my teardrop. Last weekend was very windy,and I wanted to test it driving in the wind.Did a back road,and major expressway trip. On the expressway cars would cluster up trying to get a better look,and several nearly rear ended each other. I am traveling at night down to SC. for Thanksgiving,and maybe that will generate less attention. Cary said this would happen. Just keep handing out those brochures.

Happy Camping pateardropper

[yhgail]

Dave,
It is disconcerting when you see people pointing at your rig and laughing !!

Seriously, I did have one situation. I was parked for lunch and had car door open, trunk open and the hatch open. A car came up and 5 adults came out all gawking at the TD. While one was asking me about the kitchen, 3 others were looking inside the TD and one seemed to be heading toward the car door. The guy at the kitchen even opened up my cooler to look in !! shesh. (maybe he was looking for the beer)

Fortunately, my wallet was tucked away or who knows. In the future, I won't have all the doors open at once. and if people come up, I will immediately shut doors so I have more control over the situation.

Most of the people are really polite and just curious which I don't mind. But the last situation was really out of control.

Gail

[Paul W]

I envy all of you. We still have to wait until April until we get our Camp - Inn. We hope to see you all on the open road next spring.

[campadk]

These stories make me laugh! I remember last year going down the freeway and a van drove by video taping us. Funny too this spring when we were parked by a park for lunch, and an elderly gal that came up to Kate who was cooking lunch in the galley, and ask "could I have a hot dog". Kate said "sorry I'm making grilled cheese!". The gal says "but I wanted a hot dog!". So I suppose we were mistaken for street vendors... oops!

We meet a lot of people with the tear. For us it makes our trips mucho enjoyable.

[Al-Les-Palace]

Maybe we've beat this thread to death since I think all of the originators now have their Camp Inn.

Anyway, we completed our 3rd outing in our tear this weekend at Alum Creek State Park north of Columbus. Beautiful clear, blue sky weather - temp about 50F daytime and 20's nighttime. We used the West Marine heater that we bought many weeks ago. The lowest (600w) power setting with the thermostat at about 25% of the unmarked range kept the cabin very pleasant. Our old down bags from tent days were a bit of added overkill. We had the side window open an inch or so and the hatch vent open a little for ventilation. I had previously looked down at the big rigs with their hookups, but this little bit of luxury wasn't all bad.

It sounds like the mattress heater is a very practical option for campsites with no power. We will consider as a possible option for next year.

Keep posting about the outing at Fish Creek Ponds next summer. We usually make a trip or two to the Adirondacks every year, but usually stay at the smaller campgrounds. It is about 10-12 hours for us. We would like to meet the other folks and let the teardrops reunite with their nestmates. We have enjoyed CampADK's website very much. Their stories and photos probably were the clincher for us to make the final decision to get a trailer and pitch the tents a lot less.

[yhgail]

Well, this thread is not quite dead. Thanks to the generally mild november weather, I got in a second and "real" camping trip with my new Camp Inn. I drove to Allegany Park on Thanksgiving day and camped out for 4 nights. Finally, a real camping trip!!

The first night it snowed and I pulled the TD under the tent so I was out of the weather getting in and out of the trailer. I was surprised how much the tent area was heated from the teardrop. I got a camping site with electricity. This is really plush camping! And the state camp ground bathroom not only have showers with HOT water but the bathroom is heated. Amazing.

I had one night and morning with heavy rains - good news - no leaks!

Sunday was the best, the hunters all went home and I had the park to myself. I stayed sunday night and this morning, I woke to animal sounds ( as opposed to trailer doors clanging open and shut ). Despite the rain, I was able to walk/hike 5-6 miles each day. A nice outing for me.

Here are some photos of my camp setup and of yours truly, Gail

[anonymous2]

Hello All,

Hey Gail , nice setup! It looks like you had a great time.


We got down to visit our friends in Greenville, SC for Thanksgiving. The trailer towed flawlessly for 620 miles. Of course it rained when we got there to set up. We now offer a drought reduction service. If you need rain ,we will camp in your yard ,and it will surely rain.

Our first use of our Camp Inn was not exactly camping,because we had a warm bath,and shower within 30' of us,and our friends fed us lunch,and dinner every day. We did however find out what it is like to sleep in it in cold weather. We have a small ceramic heater that we used just to warm up the inside,just before going to bed,to get undressed. Once both of us were in bed we did not need the heat,because we sleep in 15 degree sleeping bags. We slept with the windows wide open so that it didn't condensate on the inside. Everything worked well ,and we are pleased with everything about the teardrop. The tow vehicle got great gas milage towing the tear,and we are elated about that for our long distance trips.

We got to finally meet Chip from Greenville,and we got to look over his teardrop,and he did the same. We even managed to talk a kayaking buddy of mine{from Greenville} into maybe building a tear also.
Chip and girlfriend Nancy joined us at our friends ,for a late dinner of Real Columbian food. I think they both survived ! It was great to meet Chip& Nancy,and we are going to try to get together next year a few times.

Here are a few picture from my web shots album of our first real trip.

http://community.webshots.com/photo/204 ... 8708OwLibX
http://community.webshots.com/photo/204 ... 6562LRJoCe
http://community.webshots.com/photo/204 ... 6997CPUAWd
http://community.webshots.com/photo/204 ... 9081ISyTqa
http://community.webshots.com/photo/204 ... 0056RFeyfe

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving,and we hope to see you all on the road someday.

pateardropper= Bill & Joan

[yhgail]

Bill and Joan,
Love the photos with the big trucks.