The New Camper and first test run

Soooo, it was nearing the end of the summer, and aside from a couple weekend trips, we hadn't really gone anywhere different this year. Nic had just moved out to Seattle, and Lindy and I had been talking about a Northwestern trip for a while, so I asked Lindy one evening "hey, want to go to Washington....state...?". She looked at me and my attempt at an innocent smile (which probably looked more like a mischevious ear to ear grin) and to my surprise said "Sure, let me check my calendar!". About 10 minutes later we had located the largest hole on her work schedule (2 weeks and August) and the ball was in motion.


With the sale of our old camper last year, we didn't have anything that really suited the two of us for a long-duration trip. While I love my truck tent, it was clear after a weekend trip that it just wouldn't do for two people over anything more than a week. So the search was on. After a couple ambitious plans, one of which involve hastily building a basic teardrop camper, we settled for a popup trailer we found on Craigslist (what a wonderful website). We went one night to check it out, and talked it over. It wasn't ideal for our style of travel (typically only staying one night at a site), but it provided adequate space for two, and all the amenities we'd come to appreciate from our previous camper, with the slight advantage of being able to set up camp earlier in the evening, with the option to leave and come back later. "We'll take it!"

We were now the proud owners of a new (to us) 1999 Starcraft Meteor. It doesn't have all the luxuries of the newest popups with bathrooms and A/C, but it fit our needs (and more importantly, budget) just fine. After Lindy gave it a thorough cleaning and I went through the mechanicals, it was time for a test run.


Elkins, WV is the site of Rally West Virginia, a WRC - style rally race, and it was the perfect opportunity to put a few miles on the camper. After talking to coworker Mike Harris, the plan was hatched for us to go out and spectate/volunteer for the weekend, I'd tow the camper and he'd meet up on his motorcycle.


The Rally was great and the camper did fine, even after a thorough leak test courtesy of a summer thunderstorm. No leaks, and it tows pretty well. On normal roads/backroads the Tacoma does fine and you hardly know it's back there, but I soon found out that my driving style was not suited to fuel efficiency while towing up and down the mountains of WV. After nearly running out of fuel (I put 19.5 gallons in a 19 gallon tank once we made it to a gas station.........) I decided to take it easier on the return trip and stretch the fuel a little further. I found out today that my improved driving style paid off, netting 17mpg on the return trip as opposed to 13mpg on the way out.

I gave the truck a fresh dose of Mobil 1 synthetic today, and she's all ready to go. I also picked up a deep cycle battery for the camper, all that's left to do now is pack it up.

(Rally photos copyright James Shoulders, 2008)