Your Worst Camping Trip???

[PNWGirl]

Originally Posted by Grumpytrkr

Ya know, this could lead to a new thread. Worst camping trip???? I think we have all had them. I remember a trip to Florida we took, and from Illinois to Florida, the entire trip, did nothing but rain.

Another trip thru Tennessee, the weather alert went off about dense fog, so we pulled into a rest area, and it 20, fog so thick that you could hardly see the truck next to us.

Humm, one time I forgot to make sure the connection on the sewer hookup was tight, and pulled the gray water handle, only to find out the connection wasn't tight.

We have all had the "bad trips." Live and learn, and keep on trucking....

Florida Fred posted a thread called '3 Days in Hell' where EVERYTHING went wrong. It was like Robin Williams movie 'RV'! Wouldn't want to be there but lots of fun to read!

Grumpy suggested adding a new thread called 'Worst Camping Trips'. I think it's a great idea, so am starting it with something that happened a few weeks ago.

There is a big dog show at the Portland Expo in January. However, the fees, for parking your rig there, have gotten beyond ridiculous. It is $50 a night for dry camping and if you want electricity, add another $60 (for the weekend). For a four day show show, with only electric hook up, it costs $260.

I, however, live 10 min away, so told my friend she could bring her Class C and park it in my driveway and then I could hook her up with water and power. She could then use my van to travel to/from the show site. Sounds perfect, huh?? NOPE.

First, my driveway has a gentle slope. Never a problem to back in my TT but her vintage Monoco class C sits a LOT lower. Tried to back in and almost got stuck in my driveway. So she pulls straight in and that was a close call but she made it.

I was going to pull out my TT (which sits part on gravel and part on the driveway) to make more room for her. She says no, plenty of room. Well, not so much. We get her in and leveled but there is not enough clearance to pull out her awning so I grab my 10x10 pop up and that fits.

Get the water and electric hooked up. Took FOREVER to start the water heater. Did NOT want to start and was just about to give up when it finally caught. But now there isn't any water coming out of the faucets. HOWEVER, getting water on the bathroom floor. Pull out the front of the vanity and find a leak. She patches that up. Still no water, however, out of the faucets.

As she is showing early the next morning, she goes to bed.

Next morning there is water on the bathroom floor AGAIN. She looks at her patch and no, it's still good. Then she sees that her vent cover is cracked and the little overnight rain shower we got has left a gift for her in the form of a wet bathroom.

To add insult to injury, she finds that her frig is getting warm BUT the faucets start to work (had a LOT of air in the lines).

Then we had another thought. She barely got into my driveway, when she came, but now she has half grey water and half her water tanks filled. Oh boy. Good news is that her husband was coming to the Sunday show and came over to see if he could help. My thought was to back out at a sharp angle and miss most of the crown in the road. That worked, the rig came out easily

Of course, all the days that she was here, the weather was lovely (weird for this time of year). That day is was raining cats and dogs, which started about an hour before breaking everything down so she could head home. The frig was warm as toast at that time, might be dead but her husband was going to take a look at it.

Would love to read your stories!

Sheila

[Norm4015]

My worst camping trip came way back in 1972 when we were tent camping. We had a 9' x 15' tent and my wife and I slept in one side and our two small bays slept in the other side. We were camping in the Smoky Mountains and the Park Ranger warned us about bears and told us to keep all food items locked in the trunk of the car.

About midnight on a moonless and dark night we heard people screaming and yelling "Bears." We heard cars starting and leaving the campground, but our car was so far away I didn't want to try to find it amongst the bears.

We heard bears rip the top off a nearby trash barrel and two bears brought scraps down to our tent and started eating. Then they got in a fight and one of the bears fell in the middle of our tent and mashed it to the ground. If the bear had fallen four feet over it would have been right on top of us.

We didn't move and kept quiet and the bears left and we never heard them again. The next morning we found garbage all around our tent and the campground looked like a war zone. My wife said she would never camp in a tent again so we bought our first RV - a 1968 18' Terry travel trailer.

[PNWGirl]

Norm, your story DEFINATELY trumps mine! Winner and current champion!! I must say, I think I would be with your wife there. Wow!
Sheila

[Superslif]

I think this may relay to most early RV'ers...

Both my wife and myself came from "RV'ing" families. So we started out tent camping back, maybe in about 88'. We did that for a number of years. My son was born in June of 95'. Soon after, we were camping in the mountains of SW PA. in maybe late July or Aug. There was a real bad thunderstorm were we had 6" of water running thru our site. My wife and me were outside each holding onto the tent and dining canopy with the high winds. We looked at each other and said, you know what, we got to think about getting "off the ground". Because this sucks Our new born son slept thru the whole thing......

We know RV'ing was going to be a part of our future for many years to come. We started looking at used pop-ups, but never really liked what we saw. Finally settled on a new Coleman. The rest is history.....In hindsite kind of wished we bought a trailer earlier, can't belive we tent camped for that many years....While tent camping in those earlier years we kept it simple...but as you become older you want more of the creature comforts found at home.....hence the move up to a hybrid (Aerolite Cub)...maybe a 5er (Carriage) some day...

[kenyonman]

Gee where to start... Between freezing weather with no heat, the blizzard we had Friday and Saturday, to bears (been there) to crazy dogs and even a creature, I still dont know what it was but the dog wouldn't even go out, to the DW going 85 mph down the road wondering why the rig is vibrating .... Maybe a thread with the best trip...then again It's all been great and I wouldn't trade the memories for anything though..Arn't RV'ers a weird breed. Oh yeah can't forget the trip where we made it 4 hours down the road and it only took us 3 days...

[George Schweikle]

We had a front wheel break off in Maine several years ago, but our 2009 adventure has more elements:

Three years ago the GM 6.5 Diesel in our '95 Safari TREK broke a rocker arm while at the SCCA National Solo Championships in Topeka, Kansas. We had the repair done in Topeka, were able do complete the competition, and towed our car trailer home. Last spring, while coming back from an event in Kokomo, Indiana, another rocker arm broke. We limped home and had all rocker arms and pushrods replaced since we planned a trip to Portland, Oregon for the Alfa Romeo national covention.

We left Lexington, KY, for Portland but only got past the river in Louisville when the engine water pump began leaking. We camped for the night, drove back to Lexington for a new water pump, and left two days later. This time, we got as far as Indinanapolis when the transmission would not stay in overdrive. Luckily, I saw that a plug had come loose at the alternator and replacing this brought adequate voltage to the electronically controlled transmission and we continued West. Until... just East of Omaha, Nebraska, the engine started missing. We camped West of Omaha for the weekend, and drove to Lincoln the next Monday. A mechanic at a great independant truck repair came to the waiting area with a bent pushrod, and said he had to remove the cylinder head to find the problem (both broken rocker arms were also from this cylinder). Once removed, we saw that an intake valve had worn so deep into the head that a new valve seat could not be installed, so we ordered a new cylinder head. This installation was within a few hours of completion when the shop owner informed us he was closing at Friday noon so the employees could enjoy the Forth of July holiday. We spent the 4th enjoying several bottles of wine at a local winery.

We finally got to Portland in time for the Alfa convention. This was because we had left early in anticipation of meeting friends in Yosemite, Carmel, and Napa valley. We missed all but one day of this activity, but completed all of the car convention and started home. All went well until Idaho, where a car that I assumed would remain behind me at a construction zone lane closure decided to pass, and clipped the left front of the TREK when turning into the single lane. No one was hurt, and we completed the trip home and took the TREK for it's $6000 fiberglass repair.

The end of the story came about when a local TREK owner came by and said he had lowered the price on the '99 that he wanted to sell. This was too good to pass up, so we bought it, and sold the '95 TREK. Now we have a 52,000 mile RV instead of one with 137,000 miles - and can hardly wait to start traveling again this summer.

Edit: The repair facility is Stephenson Truck Repair, Lincoln Nebraska 402-466-8532. They do a lot of heavy truck plus Motorhome work, and have a large body shop. Really good people; a father, two sons, and 17 other employees.

[RedneckExpress]

Beverly Beach, Newport, Oregon. September. Roof over main bed hard started leaking a couple days before, found it out by trying to take a nap a day or so before. So, I climbed up and tried to patch it with asphalt (It was still raining). Thought I had gotten it fixed, nope.

Drove off and went camping, no problems getting a site. Got setup. Went out and did stuff in town, it rained.

Came back, roof was leaking again.

And our campsite had flooded. Camper was an island sitting above the water.

Yeah.... that trip sucked.

[two2go]

Several years ago when I was among the working class, I had to take a mandatory vacation in March due to slow business. Now RV vacations in March in Colorado don't usually happen, but we had had a run of unseasonably warm weather and we had two young kids on spring break and a sweet little 16' travel trailer, so why not? We toured from Denver to Albuquerque back to Santa Fe. On the way home we hit snow going over Poncha Pass. We stopped at a rest stop along the Arkansas River canyon east of Salida for the night. It got cold. Real cold. When we stopped, the river was clear water. Next morning, there were chunks of ice in it. The snow had blown and frozen against the door and we couldn't get out of the trailer. The ice box drain froze and a minor flood of water poured out when we opened it. Fortunately the little gravity furnace and a full tank of propane kept us relatively comfortable until it got warm enough that morning to get the door open and drive on home. This fall, we lived through a 22 inch snow storm in our motorhome and hardly noticed it. However, we still prefer warmer climes for RV'ing.

[TXiceman]

Took a spring trip out to west Texas with our 1 month old truck and Prowler trailer. First night the TV died and we got a new one at walmart in Marble Falls, TX. Next night we had the wine bottle leak in the frig and had wine all over the floor when we stopped. Next night wife was making a marina sauce for the dinner and spilled the anchovies all over the cabinet.

Finally made it to Junction, Texas and the new truck was making a lot of racket. The local Ford dealer checked and there was a problem with the heat shield on the muffler...He did not have one but wired it up with bailing wire to stop the noise.

Went out site seeing and had a deer run into the right front fender of the new truck and broke the head light and dented the fender....so much for the new in new truck.

Could not get any worse.....we made it to Lost Maples S.P. between the peak weekends for the leaf color. It was too late to hike the trails so we turned in early to get an early start the next day. There was a big storm and lots of wind. All of the beautiful leaves were wet and on the ground.

But we still had a great time.

Ken

[Jim Stewart]

Many, many, many moons ago, my DW and I went camping with my Brother and his DW. We asked for and received the real nice spot on the top of the hill with a path down the hill to the restrooms and bathhouse. We set up our little pop-up trailer and went into town for dinner. While out, it started to rain buckets and it appeared like it was going to be one of those 40 day 40 nighters.

The restaurant we picked was not the greatest place in the world and my Brother ordered a turkey sandwich. Well, that turkey was not as fresh as one would have liked. About midnight my Brother started to learn the downside of eating old turkey, he sat up, put on his pants and ran out the door toward the restrooms, apparently that turkey was real old and had caused food poisoning.

Now remember about those buckets of rain I mentioned earlier. About midnight, that cute little path down to the bathrooms had become a real slick mudslide. About half an hour later my Brother reappears covered in mud, apparently he slid all the way down to that bathhouse. The rest of the night was an un-pleasant experience.

The next morning, being the trooper that he is, my Brother got up early and we both went down the other side of that cute little hill on the path that went down to the lake and started fishing. My DW knowing we all had a tough evening, decided to be sweet and bring us both a good cup of hot coffee. Going down that cute hill, she hit the newly formed mudslide on that side of the hill and slid down ending up taking both myself and my brother into the lake. Thank God we broke her fall, cause she broke her arm!

On the way to the hospital emergency room my brother has another attack of the bad turkeys and we stop at a McDonald. He is squeezing his you know whats as he enters the door full speed to use the facilities and when he gets to the door and grabs the knob, it comes off in his hand. He proceeds to think fast on his feet and turns and opens the door to the Ladie's Option and opens the door that the Lady using the facility before him forgot to lock.

After a stint in the ER for my DW and a trip to the drugstore for some Imodium for my Brother, we decided that it was time to end the adventure and return home. Funny thing, my Brother has not been camping with us since. Come to think of it, that DW divoced him too!

[PNWGirl]

WOW!! It is a good thing that we are not holding some kind of contest- on the worst because I have NO idea how I could choose!!

I do know that after a few decades you can look back on all of this and laugh because you all have written this so well that you have given me more than a few chuckles!!

Thank you all for taking the time to share

Sheila

[WilleyB]

Hey! what do you know that kind of stuff happens to others too.
Well our worst (so far) was a trip in 2007 which I called a 'Trip to Hell and back".
Always liked setting out after Labour Day in Sept. kiddies all in school summer tourists all back at their jobs much less traffic let's face it a great time of year. We purchased the food including 4 "Thai Chicken Noodle Bowls" (frozen food stuff) DW liked and thought these would great to have for the evening meal on the first day out. (there was lots of other things too). All the utilities furnace, hot water etc. the reefer was running, everything checked out good,. All that was left to do was load up and be on the way. The day of departure came and DW had problems brought on by her Multiple Sclerosis affliction, so it was a late start in the afternoon, I wanted to postpone until the following day but DW insisted we get on the road, and so the trip to Hell started.
We travelled 191 miles and stopped for the night. We had the Thai noodle bowls for supper then shortly after the pump started cycling. Cause was hot water squirting out the pressure relief valve so shut down the water heater. During the night it got cold, and I mean cold all the furnace was doing was blowing cold air so shut that down too. BY morning DW wasn't feeling too good and I was a bit off myself, neither of us felt like eating so it was on the road again hoping the sick feeling would pass. (We have determined that it was food poisoning from the noodle bowl stuff, we then put the other two in the garbage) Well we got 125 miles further on this ill fated trip (no heat and wash in cold water) both feeling pretty bad so we found a Wall Mart and settled in for the night after buying 2 heavy cold weather sleeping bags, (well at least we were warm). In the morning we felt a bit better so after washing (brrr) we were on the road again. At about 55 miles further DW looked distressed so I asked her if she wanted to go back home. Being the trooper she is she wanted to continue so we stopped for the night at a WM 171 miles from the last stop. One good thing here was it was starting to warm up DW was recovering and I discovered we could have some hot water by turning the hot water on for a limited time, the furnace started working (didn't need it now) so life looked a lot better. Stayed a week with a niece on Ontario, got a thermostat for the water heater, checked out the furnace and couldn't find anything wrong.
After the week passed time to head for the next visit about 175 miles away. On the way there and in a little town a jackass in a van cut in front of me. I hit the brakes there was a loud bang and it sounded like a blown muffler, but it was the Ford V10 disease a blown spark plug. We had 100 miles to go it was a Sunday afternoon. Well figuring out the options (nothing open other than convenience stores, and with a 100 lb dog options were few) I decided well since it would still run on 9 cylinders I thought we might as well drive it to our destination and there I could arrange for repairs and we'd have a place to stay while it was in the garage. Now folks by this time I had little if any trust to this nemesis getting us home safely, so the decision was made to go directly home after completing our visiting. The visit to the Gaspe QC regions was canceled. It was now cold during the nights on the East coast, and true to form the furnace again quit working, the new thermostat didn't fix the hot water either, but we were feeling well and still had the heavy sleeping bags so all was not lost and we did arrive back safely and warm.
In 2008 I didn't have much use for the RV or any yen to go on the road with it, so there it sat like a great white elephant in the driveway, there was to be a costly consequence for that negligence also. However after $$$ repairs for letting it sit and some more renovations we did a very enjoyable 8000 mile trip this past summer (I did repair the furnace and the hot water heater) so our faith in RV'ing is some what restored. Also we no longer eat prepared frozen dinners and do make full use of the RV's facilities for storing and preparing our own meals, that can be enjoyable and most of all rewarding too.

Cheers
Willey

[chasfm11]

Our worst trip was mild by comparison but definitely qualifies as bad for us.

We were in a rental, driving West on I-80 toward Grand Island, Nebraska at 8am. We were 3 days into a 15 day trip. From 55mph and without warning, the transmission downshifted, sending the engine RPMS very high. It would not change back so we limited off at the next exit, pulled into a small motel parking lot and waited 4 hours for a tow. We only had a 30' Class C but they brought one of those huge tow trucks like they use for the OTRs. After the driver had prepared the RV for towing, we had to climb what seemed to be two stories into the cab of the tow truck and he proceed to drag the RV down I-80 at 70mph!.

He dropped us at a transmission shop (at the instruction of the rental company) where they connected a computer to the unit, drove it for over an hour and pronounced the situation a "fluke". We started off again, got into Grand Island only to have the torque converter blow. We managed to limit into another transmission shop and it is now 4pm. The transmission shop owner is telling us that the trans will have to be rebuilt, that it will take two days and that we will have to wait until the next Wednesday before he can even start on it. The rental company is saying that it is the height of the season and that no replacements are available. After intense negotiations, they agreed that they could give us a replacement - in Rapid City, SD and we would have to be there before noon on Saturday.

The transmission shop owner was kind enough to give us a ride to the regional airport where we rented their last available vehicle, a mini-van. We stopped and bought a couple of styrofoam coolers and dri ice. In an hour (it is now 6:30pm) we had the RV unloaded into the mini-van (camping chairs, food, clothes, etc) and there is not a square inch of space left. We grabbed a fast food dinner and started driving. We drove until around 4am, found a motel where we crashed for a couple of hours and finished the trip to Rapid City and the rental agency by 10:30. We picked up the RV, returned the mini-van and then discovered that the new rental had issues, too. We parked it at a local KOA and took the bus tour on Sunday of Mt. Rushmore, Custer State Park, etc. These were places on our original itinerary. We returned the RV to the rental agency on Monday, got it repaired and were on our way. We backtracked to the Badlands, Wall Drug and several other attractions before picking up our original sequence at Devil's Tower. The rest of the vacation went ahead as planned and without incident.

We had been using full service CGs and dumping the black tank too often. Remember that we were renters and didn't understand proper procedures. When we tried to empty the black tank at the return rental agency, we found out that we had "issues." They were very kind and worked with us to get those issues resolved. I suspect that we were not the first renters to have such problems.

The breakdown cost us about a day and a half out of the middle of our vacation but, overall, wasn't much of an impact. It did teach us that we wanted an RV with a solid drivetrain and lead to our eventual purchase.

[CorsairIIAT]

Mine was the Summer of 1994. The wife at the time was not a camper. We borrowed her friends 34 ft Bounder for a week. We were 250 miles from home and lost one of the rear tires. Limpted into a truck stop to have it changed out. The next few days weren't bad. Then going down Highway 395 along the eastern Serria. She decides to detour to Death Valley. Did I mention this was August? Don't ever go to Death Valley in Aug. It will live up to it's name.