Hi,
I wanted to introduce myself in this forum. It's one of my favorite threads that I've been reading since I joined. My name is Suanne and I live in a small town just east of Seattle with my husband, two dogs, a parrot, and a small backyard flock of laying hens. John and I purchased a kit teardrop made by Jerome (dguff) last winter. I started outfitting it ... getting ready for use this spring and summer. I like tent camping (as a past trail cook), but hubby likes RV camping ... the teardrop will hopefully be a good compromise for us. I was looking forward to meeting some of you at the gatherings after my July 1 retirement. Instead, the teardrop got “broke in” in another way.
In February we found out my daughter (29 yo) has a brain tumor and I've been busy supporting her, her husband, and 4-year-old son. While in the hospital, Elise indicated that she wanted to go to Yellowstone NP ... and when her doctor heard of this wish, he referred us to the Fairygodmother Foundation (like Make-A-Wish for terminally ill adults). We applied and Elise got her wish granted for a 5-night hotel stay in West Yellowstone. We just returned after being gone 2 weeks. It was a good trip and she made some wonderful memories for us to cherish.
We got a wheelchair lift van (Elise is mostly paralyzed on her right side) and rigged it up to tow the teardrop. We camped our way from Western Washington to and from Yellowstone. Elise loves the outdoors. The teardrop worked great as cooking central and sleeping quarters for myself and the four-year old. Elise and her husband slept on the floor of the van on a queen blow-up mattress. This wasn't what I had imaged as our maiden voyage with the teardrop ... I would have preferred several practice runs ... but life didn't accommodate.
I'm so glad I'd spent a lot of time on this site reading and looking at pictures of your teardrops, their galleys, and how you stocked them. The camping that we did was challenging as it rained much of the time. Here are some things I learned that worked well for us:
Take three coolers: a freezer (dry ice), a refrigerator (block ice), and a small cooler for lunch sandwiches and drinks on the road (blue ice frozen each night in the freezer). Our freezer and refrigerator coolers are Coleman 5-days.
Plan, prepare, vacuum seal and freeze your meals. We had originally planned for 3 weeks out, so I came home with lots of extra food. But, it sure made cooking in the rain easier.
Bring a small shower/privacy tent. We got a small pop-up blind in a camo material. It's not strong enough to work as a shower, but provides good privacy and is super fast & easy to put up and take down.
Put an old unzipped sleeping bag or canvas over your bedding so when you hop into the teardrop because of a sudden thunderstorm you don't get your sleeping bedding full of rocks and dirt. BTW, it's fun hearing hail and watching thunder and lighting from the inside of a teardrop with a 4-year-old whose still eating the hot dog we fixed for dinner.
Somethings I will do differently in the future:
Put up a canopy, like an EZ Up, over the galley. That would have made cooking in the rain so much easier. I image that it will help provide shade in the heat as well.
Bring lighters that will stay lit in the wind and rain.
For future excursions, I'm also thinking about putting a propane tank in the front of the trailer and running a line to a fitting in the back to make cooking a bit more convenient. We will be putting on a new tongue box which already houses the battery. So, I'm thinking of getting a smaller battery and putting the tank in the box with it. Is that safe?
What I'd like to fix, but not sure that there's a solution: I'd like to stop using the sleeping area to haul stuff that doesn't fit in the galley or the van. Because all of our camping was one-night stays, I loaded and unloaded a lot of stuff, putting most everything under the teardrop or van so that when it rained it wouldn't get wet. In August, we may be camping our way to Southern California, I'm considering following in my Prius so that the sleeping area is immediately available upon arrival at the campsites. Any other ideas?
I should also say that our teardrop leads a double life. Tomorrow, it'll be in our small town parade towed by our 59' Chevy truck. We painted the teardrop's fenders to match the truck. If I can get going tonight, I'll fix it up so that the galley and doors will stay propped open on the parade route ... folks just can't believe that you can sleep in one of these!
Here are some pics:
Suanne & Elise with the van at a rest stop somewhere between Yellowstone and home.
Dusk at Missouri Headwaters State Park in MT.
On our way home from yellowstone ... the view out the back window of the van.
Almost home, leaving our last night of camping in Spokane, WA ... on our way home from Yellowstone National Park.
After 2 weeks on the road coming back from Yellowstone NP ... all packed up and ready to get home.
If you've made it this far ... thanks for reading. Later, Suanne
PS ... Amy, Your TD is beautiful ... hope we are able to meet sometime soon.
They all came out of their houses when they saw the trailer coming out. I had a hard time getting rid of them, so I could get the vent fan and tail lights permanently installed before the rain hit again! Oh, the fenders that I built (based off of yours and MaryK's designs) will be put on tonight!
She is awesome. I think you can safely say you will get no peace driving around with that one. 
Peg
