Yesterday, we traveled down from St. Petersburg, Florida, to Connie's sister's house in Naples. Not much to report, as we didn't stop at any points of interest, and spent most of our time on the Interstate system just cruising and listening to the last of our James Lee Burke novel. The novel was terrific, scenery was blue-sky beautiful, and traffic was pretty light. We spent our lunch hour in a strip mall parking lot, chosen more for it's "easy off/easy on" freeway access then for it's beauty. There was only one thing I wanted to accomplish for the day: visit an RV sales lot.
Since our driving distance to Naples was fairly short, I wanted to spend at least an hour wandering through new RVs to see if we might pick out a particular model that we liked more than others. Now that we've spent a month in the Tioga, we've come to be reminded of what we like and don't like about its design. I felt it would be a good time to see if the things we don't like had been solved, or at least addressed, in newer models. Conveniently, a Camping World dealer popped up alongside Interstate 75 yesterday just when we were ready to stop for a break from driving.
Personally, my biggest complaint with the current truck is not having enough room in the bedroom. There's very little room on either side of the bed to make the bed each morning, or change out the sheets and blankets when required. In a new RV I would want at least a foot on either side of the bed. On the newer models, depending on the length, they have provided more room. But having provided the room, the manufacturers then stole it back again by locating a storage locker in the rear of the coach, under the floor, that eats into the aisle and blocks access to about half of the mattress on each side (photo right). Major flaw for me.
We both object to the smallness of the bathroom area in our Tioga and in new models they seemed to have gotten that point. Almost every rig in which we toured had made the bathroom larger or split it in two so that the shower was on one side of the center aisle and the potty and sink on the other. Kudos for that design improvement.
Another objection we have with our 1996 model is the carpeting throughout. Because you can't help but track dirt and sometimes worse things into your RV depending on where you're traveling, our next RV will have some floor surface other than carpet. All of the RVs we walked through sported vinyl flooring, which would be easy to care for and more suitable than carpet (See photo left).
On the worrisome side, our Tioga has enormous lockers on both sides of the coach in which I store all kinds of things, from a trio of padded lawn chairs, to my drive-up ramps and blocks, to just about every possible piece of gear you'd need on the road. New RVs do not appear to come with these huge lockers unless you're buying one of the giant Class A models. Since we intend to keep to the Class C models with a length of thirty feet or so, we didn't see a single model yesterday that would be acceptable when it comes to storage. Above left is a photo of the largest lockers I've seen in a Class C coach.
Following the same theme, it looked to us as though they've actually cut down on interior storage as well. In our model there is a sort of peninsula cupboard arrangement, that comes out from the side wall in the kitchen, in which we store lots and lots of things related to cooking. None of the new models have retained this feature.
Having brought up the kitchen, this is the area that bothers Concetta the most about the present RV. The coach does not have enough working room in the kitchen area, though storage doesn't seem to be a problem. I'm not sure just what we can do about this as from what I've seen and researched, you don't get much additional kitchen room until the coach size exceeds thirty feet. Thirty-one and Thirty-two foot models seem to put that footage into kitchen counter tops in most cases. The problem you run into when you exceed thirty feet is that some state and national parks limit coaches to thirty feet. However the kitchen counter in the photo at right from a Thor brand coach probably would be adequate.
On the subject of overall storage, I've always been satisfied with the interior storage in ours. The upper lockers over the side windows are large enough for most anything we want to store. I noticed in a lot of the models we toured yesterday that they had reduced the height of the side lockers, making the storage of anything taller than a package of napkins difficult if not impossible. That would be a deal breaker.
Most of our "overflow" storage takes place on the forward, cab-over bunk area. This area is so cavernous that we have no problem storing things like extra winter clothes we don't usually need or large bulky items like extra blankets or quilts, as well as bunches of other "crucial" items to numerous to mention. I sure hate to do without this storage area. However many, many new coaches have turned this into a media wall where the TV resides accompanied by some small lockers and drawers. This wouldn't work for us.
I like it where they've put just a small cutout (see photo left) on the front bunk which keeps you from bumping your head when you come back from inside the cab, but allow for the bunk to be fully extended to provide the most storage. With our current model, if you push the bunk back to where you don't hit your head then your storage area is cut in half.
Arriving at my favorite subject, that of the internet, I would really like to have a coach that has some sort of built in up-link device with a powerful aerial so I could quit having to depend on parks with inadequate WiFi setups. As I see it, the future of WiFi at parks where people are not prevented from streaming videos and such is not good. We won't be hitting the road again without being independent from the RV park systems.
On a more frivolous level, I would sure like those steps that pop out and pop in on their own as you open and close the door. This would be handy since occasionally I forget to push the thing in when we leave camp. I'd also love it if the rear corner jacks were automatic, but I don't know if such a thing exists on the Class C models.
Lastly is paint. Anyone who knows me knows I don't like white for vehicles. Just too common. I simply must have a sand-colored one or maybe multicolored model (like model right).
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