Last Run. Short Season. Thursday.

Thursday is packing up day, and we'd decided to get a way a little earlier than usual, so we were both up with the lark. Well, I was, not so much DW.

The weather was still good, and the gazebo had dried out, or at least on the outside. The roof inside was wet with condensation, so as we took it down for the second time this trip, we didn't fold it up tightly, just threw it loose into the back of the van.

The rest of the packing up went to plan, and I took special care to put things away properly, given that Towed Haul is headed for her winter sojourn next week. So much to plan were we that it was almost dead on noon when we rolled off the site and made our way to the dump station. It was there that things took a slightly sideways twist, although not in a bad way. I was about to get grumbly because the Park people had decided to change the fitting on the sewer station's water hose which meant that I couldn't connect it up to the black tank flushing system, when we were approached by some very nice people who had apparently been reading these blogs. They recognized the car, and the trailer, and engaged us in animated conversation, and asking us all about the tow vehicle and it viability. I was a bit surprised to meet someone who had read the blog, although these were not the first, but they weren't camping in the park, just visiting. It got me thinking that I should conclude this, the final trip of our thirteenth season, with some well chosen words about the combo they said would never work.

Before I go there, though, I'll just mention that the waste tanks were dumped successfully, I couldn't get the clear plastic hose extender off the hose and had to stow it in the rear bumper storage compartment until I got home. Our run back was without incident, there was virtually no wind (when you live in an area heavily populated by wind turbines, you notice when there's no wind), and the fuel mileage was down to 16.4 litres per 100 kilometres (the smaller the figure the better), so that was a win. We deviated from our regular route after we were stuck behind one of the double-trailer tomato trucks that ply our roads at this time of year (field tomatoes are big business here and French's Tomato Ketchup plant is just down the roan in Leamington), and drive very slowly. Our final backup onto the driveway was good and we were ready for Charlie's arrival home from school in good time. A very good day, I think.

As to the combo they said would never work, well it has worked for thirteen years with nary a hiccup along the way.

As you'll know, we tow our 28' Airstream (around 7,000 lbs loaded) with a 2011 Toyota Sienna Minivan. This tow vehicle offends the sensibilities of just about everyone who tows a travel trailer because, well, it's not a pickup truck. But, you may also know that North America's most respected towing authority, Andy Thomson, set the Sienna up and said it would work. He'd been in the business for 40 years at that point and had set up thousands on non-truck tow vehicles building his entire business on his reputation. He is Airstream's towing consultant after all.

So many people told me that the Sienna wasn't a proper tow vehicle and would either conk out on the road, or have us all killed in a fiery crash. Even friends looked at us pityingly and wished us good luck and hoped we didn't come to regret our choice, all said with drooping eyebrows and looks that said "you WILL regret your choice". But, we had gone to the best for our setup, and as I will elucidate, he was right on everything, everything he said. All of the naysayers, conversely, were entirely wrong.

A tow vehicle doesn't have to be heavier than the trailer, that's the first thing people get wrong. If tow vehicles did have to be heavier, what size would the tractor unit on an 18-wheeler towing a 53' trailer have to be? We were told that the "tail would wag the dog", but after all these years towing I have never felt the trailer pushing the Sienna around, nor have I ever experienced a "sway" event.

The next thing people get wrong is power. The Sienna will churn out around 270 brake horse power, but actually only ever uses about sixty or seventy when under way. At maximum load, I only ever saw 120bhp required (measured using a ScanGauge) once. The Sienna feels strong on the steepest grades. Not fast, for sure, but strong.

Then they told us the Sienna would never stop the Airstream, but that's wrong, too. The trailer has four braked wheels which will stop the trailer on their own. The Sienna's brakes, discs all round, are pretty good for a car, too. 

Front wheel drive can't be used to tow a trailer they said, and again they were wrong. Yes, when towing I can spin the front wheels, but I can do that when not towing as well. In fact I've only ever lost traction twice with the FWD when towing, and that was applying power on steep, gravelly roads in camp grounds. Indeed, where I've seen pickup trucks spinning their rear wheels to get a trailer moving on wet grass, I've never had any wheel slip at all, and have hauled our trailer out of muddy and wet grass on numerous occasions without ever spinning the front wheels.

Apparently you can't use a unibody constructed vehicle to tow a trailer. After thirteen years towing, I think the Sienna has shown that in reality, a unibody does work.

I've had people tell me it's illegal to tow with the Sienna (it's not), and that my liability is too great to be insured (no one has ever produced a documented case of such a thing happening, although the incidence of "I know a guy..." cases is high). I've even had people say to my face that it was impossible for the Sienna to tow the Airstream, despite the fact that it's sitting in a campground, so patently having been dragged there by the Sienna. 

Actually, it all gets a bit wearing and as people newer to towing than us join the online groups, I go through the same loops as I've described above, over and over again. Every one knows what's best for me, and I'm a poor sap who'd been conned by an unscrupulous salesman, this despite a total lack of experience towing using anything other than a truck.

The Sienna is really a very good tow platform with it's forward weight, independent, low-slung and wide stance coil spring suspension, and six-speed automatic gearbox and is a better design than any pickup up the road.

Of course, I didn't just buy the Sienna and a hitch, and drive off. The hitch receiver had been modified to limit the torque at the hitch head and transfer the weight more effectively to all the available axles. There's an electronic brake controller, a second transmission cooler, weight distribution and sway mitigation systems in place, all of which are essential to make everything work safely. There's the key statement, to make everything work safely, and it so patently does as thirteen years of hassle-free towing demonstrate. 

Apart from the additional transmission cooler, and brake controller, the Sienna is bog standard. It has 230,000 kilometres (143,000 miles) on it and still has the original transmission. I'm not sure how many changes of tires it's had, but it's on its second set of shocks, new ones fitted as routine maintenance rather than as a result of a failure. I've just had the rear section of the exhaust system replaced, and one suspension strut was renewed at around 75,000 miles. It's only on it's second fill of synthetic transmission oil.

That's a lot of information, and I wouldn't be surprised if you fell asleep reading it. The crux of it, though, is that despite all the bad stuff that's been said and written about our setup, it's still going strong and has been entirely safe and entirely reliable throughout. I would love to think that we've challenged people's ideas about towing with a non-truck, but sadly If I put up a photo of our combo, I'll be hit with "it'll never work" nonsense all over again.

Anyway, that's a wrap for season thirteen. Hibernation starts next week, and we're looking forward to season fourteen.

No wheel slip pulling off a waterlogged site.
The puddle is formed in dip made by trucks spinning their rear wheels.

Last Run. Short Season. Wednesday.

 Nowhere to be this Wednesday, so it was a slow start for us both.

Surprisingly, not only didn't the promised thunderstorms show up in the night, it didn't even rain. Not a drop. Putting the gazebo away in the fading light wasn't necessary, nor was weighting down the groundsheet we use in the gazebo to prevent it from blowing away. The temperature was even bobbling around 19C. Where had the weather gone?

I consistently praise the campground's "Comfort Station", that is the shower, toilet and laundry block, and today was no exception. Certainly the campground is very quiet this week, so the shower cubical was dry and clean thanks to little usage, but the copious hot water was an absolute delight this morning and really set up the day for me. I could use the shower in the trailer, but why have to eke out the onboard water supplies when I can go mad in the Comfort Station?

On the way to have my shower, I said hello to a couple who are camping with their three under school age children. The kids looked clean and pink, dad looked OK, but mum looked a little ragged around the edges. She said they were good kids, but not necessarily when taking a communal shower. I can't cope with one kid, let alone three. Still, camping is great for the little ones, so well done mum and dad for putting in the effort.

For breakfast we had crumpets. If you're not British you might not know what crumpets are, so have a look at the Wikipedia definition. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crumpet. There are scads of people who will offer the "best" recipe for crumpets, but you can't beat a shop bought, mass produced crumpet, at least when you've been brought up on them. The problem with these crumpets, though was that they were frozen, and we have the world's worst electric toaster on board the Airstream. For reference, it's a Black and Decker model, and looks quite nice, but it can't toast anything properly to save its life. Even with a regular, unfrozen slice of bread, you have to put it on maximum power, and run the cycle twice, just to get the bread even slightly brown. It's hopeless. I wonder if it wasn't designed by someone who didn't really know what toast is? More likely, though, even when it wasn't cheap, it's made from cheap, inferior components. It's made in China, for sure, but the manufacturers will only build to the specification they're given, and B&D is a Canadian company, shame on them. We have promised ourselves a new toaster for next season. The crumpets, with three cycles on maximum power, turned out to be passable. For the non-Brits, if you ever try them, don't be tempted to add jam, or even Marmite, to the piping hot crumpet. You only need plain butter or spread for the authentic taste.

Just before lunch, and given that the weather was looking far from the rain that had been forecast, DW suggested a drive out to Ridgetown, just to have a walk. We're camped in a place with lots of walks, but Ridgetown promised to be free of bitey bugs, so off we went. The town itself is typical south western Ontario, full of wooden houses in tree-lined, grid-patterned street. We nipped into the residential areas north of Main Street and meandered around to a little park we'd visited before. Then we followed the small stream that flowed though the park, up the hill and onto the south side of town, enjoying seen the start of the autumn colours in the trees, and listening to the bird calls. Ridgetown lacks any modern development, at least in that area around the centre, so the streets are broad and straight and most of the houses date back to the mid nineteenth century. We walked a big square, north and south of Main Street and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

Back at the campground, we set up the still slightly wet gazebo again, pulled out the slightly damp chairs, and positioned ourselves inside for an afternoon, enjoying the bug-free environment. I fell asleep in my chair, and for far longer than perhaps I should have because I woke with a very stiff neck and the start of a niggling headache. Getting old sucks.

After supper we put some music on inside the trailer and spent the evening chatting and putting the world to rights. Again, no TV, which is a feature of more recent camping trips we've made. I'm certainly not desperate to be watching TV, and our stay away from home is our chance to do things a bit differently.

Tomorrow, Thursday, is packing up day, and we have decided to get moving a little earlier than usual, thanks to a commitment at home. I hope the weather holds, because apart from Monday night, the weather's been glorious for late September.

Last Run. Short Season. Tuesday

 A different start to the second day's camping, at least for me, as I jumped into the car and headed back into town. At 7am!

I had a breakfast appointment with the world's greatest school bus drivers (it says here), but I wanted to do double up the run with a haircut in preparation for our travel to the UK. It had been raining in the night, quite significantly if the puddles in the campground were anything to go by, and yet I hadn't been woken up by it. Anyone who's been inside an Airstream in the rain will know what it's like to be inside a drum; it's very noisy, but clearly I have become used to it.

That said, on the run back to town, just a few kilometres north of the park, the roads were dry. So, it was localised rain then.

While in town, I dropped in at home to shower and get a change of clothes, then headed over to the Links Golf Course for breakfast. I did get my hair cut afterwards, a process I do not enjoy, although I always like the end result. Then it was back to Rondeau.

We went out for a walk, given that the rain was holding off, but didn't stay out as long as we'd have liked. In the summer it can get very "buggy" in the park, although it's not usually so bad in the autumn. Unfortunately, the east side of the peninsular seemed to be under attack from some horrible little flies that were, to say the least, a bit nippy - as in bitey. We met a woman pushing a baby in a buggy and the poor baby was getting bitten, this despite there being a net over the buggy itself. We put up with the nipping for only a few minutes before retreating to the safety of the trailer and its nip-free environment.

 

 

The remainder of the day was spent in full relaxation mode, doing a whole lot of very little, which was the aim of the trip after all. 

Just as the night was drawing in, and with the prospect of some heavy rain and thunderstorms, we decided to take the gazebo down and stow it in the car, it being largely dry at this point. I say largely dry, but what rain and mud it had on it was quickly transferred to me and my clothes as I manhandled the beast into the car. Still, we didn't want the thing damaged in a storm, nor did we relish having to take it down wet, so it was looking like a wise decision.

The opportunity to spend time simply unwinding should never be underestimated. Sometimes to sit and do absolutely nothing is good for the mind and the body. There are many people who are not happy unless they're busy, and many that think to be constantly busy is a virtue. Well, that's not us thankfully, and we both enjoyed just sitting around chatting and idly browsing the Internet for, well, nothing of any great value. We didn't even fire up the TV for a movie, but put our brains in neutral and relaxed. 

That is the essence of quick and easy camping.

Last Run. Short Season. Monday.

 

Here we are, back at Rondeau, and back on site 16 of the South Campground. Same old, same old, but easy when you're in need of uncomplicated camping.

It's been a short season for us, with other travel at either end of the summer, and our usual self-imposed hiatus when we don't camp in July and August. I say self-imposed, but since COVID it's been impossible to get camping reservations at Provincial Parks during the school holidays, unless you're prepared to get up in the middle of night when the booking system releases the sites, which I'm not. There's the double irritant there of some 44% of booked camping reservations that are never taken up, which is a product of people over-booking blindly, usually to make sure they get something, then being happy to swallow the cost of not taking up the site. But I digress.

We're heading off to the UK in a couple of weeks time so after this trip we'll clean Towed Haul up and put her into winter storage, around a month early. The camping season in this balmy part of Canada now runs into the first couple of weeks of November, but we've opted not to camp late this year,

September's weather has been hot and dry. I was in the pool up until last week, and still watering this year's new tree plantings, such was the fine weather. So, our first real rain came at the weekend, and now we're looking at a very wet couple of days here at Rondeau. Still, a wet day's camping always beats a dry day's working.

We hadn't really cleaned the trailer up since the last trip, but I re-sanitized the fresh water tank, and cleaned the bathroom and kitchen, even if I didn't get the duster or the vacuum cleaner on the job. I had worked hard at maintaining the batteries over the summer, and even though I'd hooked her up to the house's power a week before so that I could run the fridge up ahead of time, I was pleased to note that when I hit the electric jack button, she sprang to life without a hiccup. 

When you've not been camping for a while, there's always a nagging thought that you're missing something, or not doing something right, but we loaded up, and hitched up, all without incident. We use something called a Weight Distribution System on our trailer hitch, and put simply it acts a little like the handles on a wheelbarrow and pushes the weight at the hitch ball both forwards and backwards, to spread the load over all the available axles. In order to get the system attached, I have to drop the tongue of the trailer onto the ball of the hitch on the car, lock it in place, then lift car and trailer up together a couple of inches using the trailer's jack so that I can get the mechanism hooked up. Dropping it back down and letting the weight distribution system take the strain is always a worrying time because if anything is going to break, that's the time it will do it. Happily, it all went well.

All loaded and hitched, we put our grandson into his seat in the back of the car with strict instructions to watch the trailer and let me know if it became detached. He's only four, but even he didn't fall for that one.

On the way down to Rondeau, we usually negotiate Indian Creek Road, just on the south side of town. I think the various tranches of sewer work in the street has made the road sink in places, and watching the trailer in my driver's mirror as it lurches up and down over the dips and rises in the road surface is quite alarming. Still, both car and trailer seem to deal with it.

I think we must have had the wind at our backs this day as the drive down to the park was very smooth and easy. I record the gas/petrol usage as we go, and it bottomed out at 17.4 litres per 100 kilometres by the time we arrived at the park. That looks seriously scary as it's more than twice the usual consumption, but it can go up around the 20-21 mark if the weather's against us. It's a fact that steep hills don't really bother the tow vehicle when it's under load, but driving any length of time into a stiff headwind really puts some strain on it, and the gas mileage suffers. Given that the Airstream is quite aerodynamic compared to other trailers, I hate to think about the gas mileage you'd get with a taller, flatter-fronted model.

Down at the park we filled up the fresh water tank, then dumped out what was sloshing around in the waste tanks so that we could start completely empty. We camp three nights at a stretch, usually, and the tanks will deal with three showers for the missus, and all the general toilet and water usage that ensues. We are careful with water consumption, not least because there's a finite amount of water, and a finite amount of capacity in the waste tanks. However, we manage the fine balance between supply and waste quite well these days. One little trick you can do is to tip any washing up water you have into the toilet. That has a two-fold advantage of both keeping your toilet solids from drying out in the Black tank, and spreading your waste Grey water across the two waste holding tanks. 

Backing onto the site was fairly easy, which is one of the reasons we like this site, but we readjusted because there was a lot of Poison Ivy in the bush right next to the trailer and, as I have to get down the side of the trailer when setting up, we thought it wise to move the old girl a couple of feet away. Again, we do this sort of thing a lot when we're camping, so repositioning the trailer isn't a tough job for us anymore. I should perhaps add for the benefit of my European readers that these North American trailers weigh a couple of tons and have to be moved around using the tow vehicle; there's none of your grabbing it by the handles and manhandling into position.

Because we had Charlie with us (his mum had followed us down in her car), I strung up our fairy lights inside the camping gazebo, and set a camp fire, which is something we rarely do. With an inquisitive four-year-old around, you have to be super-vigilant with a fire burning, but we cooked some vegan sausages over the flames and no one was harmed in the process. Of course, we all stank of wood smoke, but I guess that's what camping's about.

Once the young people had left us, we settled into our grown-ups' camping routine of relaxing, relaxing and more relaxing. The beer and wine flowed, as did the chat, and we settled in for a few quiet days on our own. The weather had stayed dry all day, too, despite the forecast saying rain. Sometimes these things just work for you.