The scape plan...

Vicky and I love to travel, and we have always tried to do it as lightly as possible. Backpacking in France, Italy, Spain, China, Peru. Or tent camping through the western states of USA.
But when we started contemplating the prospect of an extended road trip through the USA, the tent camping option changed categories, from "adventurous" to "ridiculous".
So, we took that bold mental step and started dipping out toes into the RV pond.

After some Google'ing, a RV trade show and a couple of visits to our local RV dealers, we found ourselves into an arithmetic puzzle of vehicle towing capacities, dry weights, tongue weights, axles, lengths and heights. After dusting the highschool diploma and a basic calculator we realized that with our Toyota 4Runner we could tow a 17' trailer at the most. We went back to the dealer showrooms and place ourselves inside such trailers. Claustrophobia does not quite describe the feeling of such small cluttered enclosures.

With this realization, we started the long painful decision process of weighting the commitment of trading our 4Runner for a bigger truck against just how much we wanted to travel around in a RV. Two months later, after many hours of internet research, books, advise from friends who RV, spreadsheets, and the always welcomed serendipity, we end up with what feels like a gargantuan combo: A GMC 2500 diesel truck & a 30' Airstream Safari.

The path that lead to this combo can be seen in a spreadsheet that list weights in one column, capacities on another one and % of difference. For every truck and trailer combo opportunity that came about, we used this spreadsheet to track compatibility and cost. I am a big Toyota fan, great dependable, long lasting cars and trucks. But for continuous dedicated towing and max load capacity, their biggest Tundra truck came pretty close to the spec limit. The next step in the spec ladder was a 2500 series type diesel truck.

Before boring you with more spreadsheet talk, truck specs and the fascinating subcultures of diesel people and Airstream fans (more on these two later), let me pause and juxtapose all these nonsense with the initial intent of seeking levity. I do not know about you, but driving a 3/4 ton diesel truck while hauling a 7000 lbs trailer hardly evokes a sense of lightness, nimbleness or weightlessness, and with all the safety precautions involved in hauling an Aluminum 30' behemoth, notions of carelessness, flippancy or jocoseness are almost slapping antonyms.

This seemingly contradiction weighted heavenly in our decision, and at times be backed away from it, but once we mentally place ourselves back in "square one" with uncumbered mobility but no sane shelter or plan to travel around, we realized that our resistance to "go bigger" had more to do with avoiding the un-familiar and new. This made me realize that even the fun sounding endeavor of seeking levity, seeking something new, involves gut wrenching process of rationalizing our actions and decisions. If we want to avoid this...we are better off not doing anything. Plenty of levity there. Ah! what is life without its crushing contradictions?