Stories Archives | NomadicNeighborhood

Last updated: October 20, 2023 Cozy rhymes with Hosea. I’ll explain… My wife, Heather and I have been enjoying our version of the “RV lifestyle” since April 2021 but we dreamed about it for a few years. We started dreaming without knowing what was realistic for us, without any thoughts of a budget, and imagining a comfort level on the road equal to the one we enjoyed at home. It’s a bit hard to remember now, but I’d like to think that our dreams started off small and realistic. However, I know me and all I can remember today about the start of this adventure is that at some point, I realized that my scope was expanding. Scope creep started slowly, but maintained a consistent, methodical march toward something completely unreasonable. Heather and I thought first about why we wanted to go RVing and naturally, the thoughts led to conversations about who we would take with us on trips, what their preferences might be, and the logistics about traveling with family – especially family with health issues. Anyway, after several months and lots of conversations about it, the Class A seemed like right platform for us. But we didn’t want just any Class A. I wanted an RV that would accelerate up the mountains with authority while fully loaded so a high horsepower high torque diesel pusher would suit me just fine. We needed a forty-five-foot rig with slide outs, high end finishes, a tag axle, a king bed, a great kitchen, lots of storage, auto level, a Freightliner chassis, a work desk in the co-pilot seat, a smooth and quiet ride, a bullet-proof technology package so we could both work from the road, and a washer and dryer. Lucky for us, we were not ready to buy and as our conversations continued, we found ourselves on a path to Sheila. Our research revealed common challenges that we decided to avoid, if possible. First, we realized that we could not easily drive a forty-five-foot motor home to the grocery store, museum, local hangout, or fast-food place at will. We also saw that without a tow, we were going to be stuck if the motor home broke. To avoid those issues, we considered towing a vehicle behind the Class A and that meant that we’d have to maintain two complete engine/power train systems. Then, we started thinking about the mechanical systems, working the slides, campground restrictions that come with large rigs, and maneuverability in tight spaces. In the grand scheme of things, the size and complexity of a Class A rig are manageable and others happily and successfully address them, but they are challenges that caused us to deselect the Class A. We also rented a Class C a few times over a couple of years and for those outings, the units were fine. They were convenient, allowed the family to move around and fix lunches, take bathroom breaks whenever needed, and they just worked. Still, the Class C was not something we could see ourselves in. The Class B – for us – was a non-starter because they seemed too small for the types of trips we envisioned. The only other option that seemed to work for us was a bumper-pull. Heather and I poured over brochures, YouTube videos, and blogs to find the right travel trailer and we found features with Airstreams that appealed to us. Slides were not important to us, and we liked the Airstream’s iconic look. We began to focus our research on the various models and similarly to the class A I mentioned earlier, we probably started off with a realistic scope that gradually began to expand. The Classic model, especially newer models from 2018 to present, had a look and features that appealed to us. In addition to the aesthetics, the Classic is constructed with material that adds more of a residential feel than the other models. The Classic models we looked at are technologically up to date with pre-installed solar packages, wireless connectivity that allows the owner to manage the lights and awnings from anywhere, and they have that table. The Classic is the only model we found during our search with a dinette table that raises and lowers to any position we would want with the push of a button. That utility would fulfill one of our needs very well because we were not looking forward to manually raising and lowering a dinette to make up a bed for guests and to put it away in the morning. Because we planned to work from the RV, we were both going to work at the dinette unless we bought the thirty-three-foot model with a desk built into it. Either way, a dinette that had only two positions – full up or full down - was potentially an ergonomically uncomfortable platform from which to work all day. The Classic’s fully adjustable dinette sealed the deal for me on the Airstream. But we were a few years out from retirement, and we didn’t plan on buying until we were a bit closer to that milestone. Then in December 2020 I was offered an early-out package at work and in January 2021 we found a unicorn. Amber is a nurse in Virginia, and she listed her 2018 Airstream Classic in an online RV marketplace. Her Classic had the interior finishes that we wanted so we talked about it, wondered if we could or if we should buy it, then Heather called Amber. We learned that Amber’s Classic was not used for recreational travel. She bought it to use as a guest house for her family’s farm and it travelled only twice a year between the farm and the dealership to winterize in the fall and to de-winterize in the spring. The listed price was not great for either one of us, but fair from the seller and buyer’s perspective. Over the next few weeks, Amber assured us that she was going to let us look at her Classic but found reasons to delay our visit. Four months later, Amber decided not to sell but we were still ready to buy. We found ourselves right in the middle of a tightly packed group of RV owner wannabes looking for something to bring home right away. It was a competitive hunt. We broadened our search criteria and started looking for any Airstream model twenty-five feet or better. Over the next couple of weeks, we found that listings older than a couple of days were no longer available. When we saw one that was interesting and only on the market a couple of days, we were told by the sellers that we were number two, three, or four in line. It seems like we spent hours poring over the same used RV marketplace listings and that was okay because new listings were added often enough to keep the search results interesting. On a Wednesday in April, I found a Flying Cloud that was listed only a few hours earlier. I called the owners to ask questions and learned that I was their first contact. As we finished the call, I offered to drive up to Lake Superior at the end of the week if they would commit to holding it for us and giving us the first right of refusal. They agreed. Kansas City to Wisconsin’s Lake Superior shoreline is a bit of a haul, but we made it up on Friday and looked at their twenty-five-foot Flying Cloud on Saturday. It was a 2019 model and the couple selling it were the second owners. The first owner took it out once and decided it was too small. The second owners took it out for brief trips a few times before deciding it was too big. Even though they did not own the RV for long, it was clear that they took very good care of it. We were stepping in as the third owners, but it felt to us like we were getting a new unit. We delivered the check that our bank prepared for us in case we decided to bring the Flying Cloud back then on Sunday, headed back to Kansas City with an RV in the rearview mirror. We could not refer to the RV going forward as “the RV” or “the Flying Cloud” or “the Airstream.” Our Airstream needed a name. One of our family names is Hosea so my wife suggested that we call our new RV, “the Cozy Hosea House.” That sounded great, and I suggested that we add to it just a bit and name her, “the Cozy Hosea House - Sheila for short.” Our RV is very different from the one we first imagined, but Sheila is a great RV, and we are learning that her size and simplicity are huge contributors to the fun we have when traveling. We are getting better with the “fun” part of traveling, next we learn how to work on the road!