What a beautiful four days we had at Lake Havasu, AZ this past weekend. We put our name in a year ago for a spot at the Islander Resort. They called me about six months ago to let me know that they had a spot available. We ended up with space #33, which was right on the lake with our own private beach for the granddaughters to play on. Son in-law Dave even got a little fishing in! Saturday’s festivities were rained out, but the rest of the time was beautiful. Highs were in the 60s and lows in the 50s.

​We had a great time dry-camping (no water, electric, sewer) in our RV this Labor Day weekend near Pine Flat (exact location: 35.051240, -112.154390) with a nice group of relatives, friends, and friends of relatives. It was a perfect, cool, 78° in the afternoons at this 6,500' high elevation about 20 miles south of Williams, AZ. Pam and I took a rigorous 12-mile day-trip in our Jeep Cherokee tow-car, but it was worth the jostling around because the views were spectacular overlooking the Red Rock Wilderness Area.

We wanted (needed!) to get out of the Phoenix heat so we went to one of our favorite spots in Arizona for a few days this past weekend. We stayed at the Woodfield RV Park, which is a brand-new RV park in Show Low, conveniently located right next to the White Mountain Vacation Village RV planned community. The weather was perfect around 80° for the highs and 60° for the overnight lows. Pam and I took a nice ride in the Jeep on Saturday and enjoyed watching the zip-line riders and the dark, black clouds, thunder and lighting at the Sunrise Park Ski Resort. We took the long way back home on Monday via Holbrook and Flagstaff to avoid the many up and down hills on Highway 87.

Thanks to the RV, we've been to some beautiful places and stayed in some great campsites.

Some of the best sunsets we've ever seen are right from our RV campsites!

After five weeks away from home, we were ready to go back. We drove the 1,000 miles from Medford to Peoria in three days, staying the first night at the Flag City RV Park just off of I-5 in Lodi, CA, which is a perfect RV park for us to stopover at on the way to and from Oregon. It has nice, wide paved spaces and all the normal RV park amenities such as sewer, water, 50-amp electric, pool, spa and a big dog park. For the second night, we stayed at Valencia Travel Village in Castaic, CA. It's a very tight park and I probably wouldn't stay there again.  We had major smoke from the "Sand" fire in L.A. all the way through California, then blowing dust in Arizona, which didn't make for a very pleasant drive, so we're very glad to be home. Now, time to start planning our next trip!

Made the 1,062 mile trek from home in Peoria, AZ to Medford, OR in a 3-day/2-night drive. Stayed at one of our favorite RV parks in the L.A. area, the East Shore RV Park and had a beautiful spot at the River Point Landing Marina & RV Resort along the Sacramento River in Stockton, CA.

It's our third annual Bill Luke Bass Days 4-day weekend at Lake Pleasant, Arizona, located less than 10 miles from our house. This is the perfect place for us to get away for a short RV camping trip. Our son-in-law usually wins something in the $50,000 Bass Tournament but he and two friends struck out this time. Needless to say, they were very disappointed! The rest of us had a fun day kayaking and Paul took his Hobie Sail-Yak out for a sail. We've already reserved our spots for 2017.

While the RV is in the shop getting some warranty issues repaired, Pam, Spanky and I took the Jeep on a day-trip around the Apache Trail. For a different point of view, we drove to Roosevelt Lake via US 60 to Miami, then came in to the Apache Trail from Roosevelt Dam and back to Phoenix. After going the west-to-east route before, I highly suggest this east-to-west route instead. Coming into Fish Creek Canyon, you get better view of the mountains, plus you're on the lake-side of the road the entire way. We made the trip from NW Phoenix easily in a day and got home in time for Christmas dinner leftovers!

Two years ago, when researching which motorhome to buy for our first RV, I told myself after reading everybody's comments about gas-vs-diesel that a gas RV would be sufficient for us. Boy, was I wrong! Peoples comments in the RV forums all said that if you just drive it around your home state for short weekends or one-week trips, then the gas coach would be fine, but if you live it in or drive it long distances, get a diesel pusher. Well, I couldn't justify spending $75,000 more just for a diesel pusher at the time, so I went with a brand-new 2014 Tiffin Allegro 35QBA. After putting over 10,000 miles on it in the first 18 months, I now know why people said to get a diesel pusher. Our new 2016 Tiffin Allegro RED 33AA does everything head-and-shoulders better than our gas RV did.

1. We just drove it to San Diego last weekend for its first long-trip. We towed our 2015 Jeep Cherokee and had the coach full with 4 adults and 2 kids. I remember driving on stretches of I-8 between Phoenix and Yuma last year where the gas coach downshifted to 3rd gear and revved up to 5,000 RPM on every slight hill along the way. And, I mean SLIGHT hills. Just going over an overpass would cause it to downshift abruptly. The diesel pusher very rarely downshifted unless is was a major hill, such as the long passes going to and from San Diego. Maximum speed going up the pass was 45 MPG for about 10 minutes. Other than that, it held 55-65 easily the entire way. I was able to drive almost the entire way with cruise control on. With the gas coach, I had to manually turn it off if I saw any kind of a hill coming up and build up my momentum to make it to the top of the hill without sounding like the engine was going to explode.
2. The diesel is so quiet compared to the gas coach. You can listen to the radio and hold a normal conversation between the passenger and driver in a regular voice.
3. Another advantage of the new diesel pusher over the gas coach is the way it drives. I added a front steering stabilizer and rear trac bar to the gas coach to try to get it to handle better. While those helped, they didn't begin to make up for the problem of the lightweight Ford chassis vs the heavyweight Freightliner chassis. I would get sore shoulders driving the gas coach just 200 miles because of constantly adjusting the steering wheel to keep the coach from wandering in its lane. The new diesel pusher is more like driving a luxury car vs driving an old VW Beetle. You can take your hands off the wheel for several seconds without it running off the road. I find myself driving with two fingers on the steering wheel now. The gas coach you had white knuckles from holding on to the steering wheel so tightly!
4. The air shocks are another thing that makes a huge difference. The ride on the new coach is so smooth! 
5. The diesel has an air brake system, which, until you've driven an RV with and without it, you'd never know what you're missing. It's great to apply it when going down hills, such as the long pass going to and from San Diego. It kept our downhill speed in the 45 MPH range without hardly touching the brake pedal going down that mountain pass.

If you're even THINKING about getting an RV, you owe it to yourself to test drive a gas RV then a diesel RV. There's no way you'll ever want to settle for a gas coach!