Thom and Cari's Parkliner

[accrete]

I can imagine your second season in #34 will be more relaxing on the road than the first season! Yippie

[Brian M. in NY]

Indeed! Here's wishing you the same. Even at 6 below zero, we've planned our first 4 outings and are trying to decided where to go next.

[accrete]

!!!
Parkliner #35 is back home from the Boatyard !
The fiberglass work on the wheel wells is AMAZING.
It looks factory-showroom condition...this time with what looks like plenty of tire clearance.
While driving home there are a few places that pre-fix the tires were definitely rubbing and causing the jolt to the tow rig...today's trip home? Perfect.

I will post pictures probably this weekend...it is snowing at the golf course as i type, with warmer (~40+ temps) this weekend projected.

Cheers,
Thom

[frank_a]

Boy Thom, that is GREAT! We're off to the factory for a week in May for some warranty work. For some of the stuff, they said it would be helpful to leave it for a full week, so we caved and rented a 1st floor condo over on the Outer Banks to wait the week out. Times can be tough...

Frank

[accrete]

The Outer Banks Condo sound fun. I recently saw a house hunters episode with the shoppers in that area. Beautiful.

Here's to excellent work on #006 while at the Parkliner factory!

It took the boatyard fiberglass tech about 5 days to do our mod. A real class act. Almost hate to get it all dirty the first off-road trip this spring. HaHa. not really

Gonna head back here:


Cheers,
Thom

[frank_a]

Thanks Thom! We've been to a lot of the Carolina coast, but never the Outer Banks. I'd really rather be camping, but I also very much appreciate what Parkliner is doing for us, so we bit the bullet. Rates were relatively low because the weekend we leave the condo is Memorial Day weekend!

Enjoy!

Frank

[Brian M. in NY]

Great news on the wheel well fix, Thom,
Boats or Corvettes, I guess if a fiberglass tech knows his stuff it translates to campers as well. Do you think you could go back to the original size tires when they need to be changed? We have enough clearance now on #34 that I think it would be no problem. Looking forward to seeing your pix. I'd feel bad about your snow if I hadn't cleaned 16" of it off the roof of our PL this morning with the temp hovering around +2 F.

[accrete]

Yea i'm not complaining...the golf _green_ gets a white dusting every now and then in the winter months. It is rare that we see more than 3" to 5" on the ground for more than a couple days at a time. Of course the biggest issue for us is doing some gymnastics outside (our full time DRV Mobile Suite) making sure the water lines don't freeze up...for me it is running the outside shower onto the ground at a low volume through the night. Good thing water is included in our monthly space rent! But IMO...Better to waste a few gallons of water though than have the park's pipe freeze up.

On the tire size? I suppose there would be room, though i will sure stay with LT Radials no matter the size. I luv the ride difference.

Thom

[accrete]

The highly anticipated close up of Parkliner #35's wheel-well wheel-rub fiberglass fix/repair... drum roll...



As mentioned in the above post i'm thinking there is now plenty of wiggle room in the wells. If you recall the PL well design cuts up inside behind the outer wall facade...gives it a sort of classy-retro look. Anywhoo there is now at least two fingers worth of clearance in the front/rear where as before i could not even squeeze in my pinky finger.

This is a fun shot of the golf not-so-green out our Mobile Suite's (the 38' 5th wheel that we call home) front porch this morning...got a little dusting of the white stuff



Cheers,
Thom

[DJO]

What a nice feeling it must be to have the wells opened up! Looks good.

[accrete]

This week we took a mini-trip to Sunset Falls Campground - Battleground WA , and i posted a quick trip report at our travel blog here at FGRV forum.

It was a nice three day getaway to check the water levels (my wife is laying out her plans for the upcoming gold panning season) on the Lewis River that flows through that campground.

What i wanted to include in this post was that we have about 400 miles on the wheel-well _fix_ and there are no signs of any rub...and the trip included about 30 miles on a forestry road in serious need of repair (read...lots of unavoidable pot holes!). It was pretty much the equivalent of going off road on a dirt trail ,( . . which leads me to say that anyone wishing to travel to that campground should be ready for some rough riding on the roadway.

[frank_a]

Originally Posted by accrete

This week we took a mini-trip to Sunset Falls Campground - Battleground WA , and i posted a quick trip report at our travel blog here at FGRV forum.

It was a nice three day getaway to check the water levels (my wife is laying out her plans for the upcoming gold panning season) on the Lewis River that flows through that campground.

What i wanted to include in this post was that we have about 400 miles on the wheel-well _fix_ and there are no signs of any rub...and the trip included about 30 miles on a forestry road in serious need of repair (read...lots of unavoidable pot holes!). It was pretty much the equivalent of going off road on a dirt trail ,( . . which leads me to say that anyone wishing to travel to that campground should be ready for some rough riding on the roadway.

Good for you guys! That must be a great feeling, especially after those rough roads. Best of luck to Cari with her gold panning! Strike it rich!

Frank

[FTTRV]

Originally Posted by accrete

This week we took a mini-trip to Sunset Falls Campground - Battleground WA , and i posted a quick trip report at our travel blog here at FGRV forum.

It was a nice three day getaway to check the water levels (my wife is laying out her plans for the upcoming gold panning season) on the Lewis River that flows through that campground.

What i wanted to include in this post was that we have about 400 miles on the wheel-well _fix_ and there are no signs of any rub...and the trip included about 30 miles on a forestry road in serious need of repair (read...lots of unavoidable pot holes!). It was pretty much the equivalent of going off road on a dirt trail ,( . . which leads me to say that anyone wishing to travel to that campground should be ready for some rough riding on the roadway.

I saw you in Battle Ground, I could not catch up with you as you breezed past my driveway. Hope you had a good time at BG SP.
Chuck

[accrete]

Originally Posted by FTTRV

I saw you in Battle Ground, I could not catch up with you as you breezed past my driveway...

Let it be known, WE ARE REAL even though we've never ended up in the "Sightings" thread.

Thanks Chuck!

And yes Frank, it is a good feeling to now not be concerned about loosing some fiberglass layers driving down the road.

Cheers,
Thom

[frank_a]

Originally Posted by accrete

And yes Frank, it is a good feeling to now not be concerned about loosing some fiberglass layers driving down the road.

Cheers,
Thom

I hope to be sharing that same feeling in 3 weeks!

Frank

[accrete]

Greetings,
Here are several shots of the Gander Mountain (12'x12') Dining Canopy we are utilizing on our Parkliner. I know there have been questions in the past as to just how we are attaching it and such. . . so here goes ask any clarifying questions as needed.

Here is a shot from the curb side showing the two vertical poles and guy lines (2 for each pole in this case...it was windy!)



here is what it looks like up inside (the canopy peak is ~2ft above sides)


this one from the rear showing how i have the lines going through a garden knee pad (which i place under the awning poles to protect roof) and then the lines going to the bumper in two places:


this one from the front showing how i have the lines going through a garden knee pad (which i place under the awning poles to protect roof) and then the lines going to the front A frame in two places:


here is a closeup of how the awning wraps over roof and fabric-edge is located at the inner edge of Parkliner's anti-trolley roof. This actually came in handy in the moderate winds as this edge was lifted off roof and bled excess wind caught under canopy:


Overall i am impressed with this little canopy for our use with the Parkliner. There were some stiff winds in camp this trip to Nehalem Bay State Park (i have a short write up at our adventure blog thread here at FGRV).

Cheers,
Thom

[accrete]

I updated the original first post to reflect our current "Look" of the charming couple



I'm still thinking of asking the shop that did our van's rhino lining to do a matching trim on the parkliner...maybe a fall makeover?

Thom

[accrete]

We had a great five-day-mini-adventure (our preferred Monday through Friday).

Here is one shot taken coming up from one of the hammocks i set up down near the creek...



and one from the road...


the creek is right beyond that dense folage and trees. . .

And this was my view from the hammock a few feet over the water (other than keeping an eye on Cari while she was panning for gold a few yards away) ...



The Parkliner performed perfectly. The road was actually quite rough and i'm glad the wheel well mod had been done before this season because i'm sure some fiberglass would have been missing in the wells this trip!!

The math on the fuel economy stated 12.5 mpg during the ~240 highway miles + ~80 miles forestry road round trip. Cari drove to camp, i drove home. It's that Yin-Yang thing. She likes all the excitement of getting to camp (while i navigate), and my mellow personality can handle any potential Friday-Traffic-Insanity that might be nearby. We have an interesting situation in that we currently live on what is one of the top tourist destinations during the summer months on the Oregon Coast. So it's like a stampede on Fridays going home with all the crazies that think we live in Paradise. If they only realized it rains ~80+ inches a year!

Happy Trails,
Thom

[War Eagle]

Beautiful! Looks like our kind of place. Any luck panning? We live on 40 acres, and the western boundary of our property is about a 1/4 mile stretch of meandering creek that we've never seen go dry even in our worst drought conditions. We're certain the Mother Load is down in that creek bottoms somewhere. Haven't found it yet, but we'll keep looking - and keep an eye out for water moccasins that also seem to enjoy that cool creek bottom during our hot summer weather!

[deryk]

Beautiful countryside!