January 4, 2020 • 12 mins
One of the topics of conversation that comes up with our listeners often is about the RV lifestyle — how to get started, which vehicle is right for you, what to know before you head out on the road. So this season, we'll be devoting a number of bonus episodes to just that. In this first installment of Boondocking With Brad, we'll talk about the different classes of campers available, from pop-up to big rig, and what you should know about each of them.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hi, I'm Matt and I'm Brad. This is Park Glandia,
our production of I Heart Radio. We sold our loft
in Chicago, moved into in r V full time, and
now we're shopping in the country with our dog fin
exploring America's national parks. And today I'm really really excited
because we're going to introduce a new segment in our
show called boon Docking with Brad. This is a new
(00:26):
segment that we're doing throughout the podcast. Throughout the season,
we'll have five episodes of these, and really what the
main goal is is to help you find the right
RV for you, to help you dive into the essentials
that you don't even realize that we're not included in
the r V um. It's about hooking up for the
(00:46):
first time. It's about boon docking for the first time
and going back to the basics like minimizing your life.
So what the goal is of Boondocking with Brad is
to really help you dive into seeing if this is
right for you, to give you the tools and the
necessities to find out how to do this in order
right Because not everybody grew up going to places with
(01:09):
r V, whether that be a pop up, a Class A,
Class C, Class B, whatever it is. You know, families
just don't always have those opportunities. But that doesn't mean
that you can't do it yourself. So my goal is
to help you start your education process on this. It
won't be a complete three sixty circle, but stick with
me because I really want to help you find these essentials.
(01:32):
We're going to take you on a big journey so
you don't make the same mistakes that we've done. What
was the biggest stake that we probably made, Mad Well,
that's hard for me to answer because I feel like
I'm pretty oblivious when it comes to most r V things.
Stillbably was that the incident in Santa Fe. What was that? Oh? Yeah,
(01:52):
that was in the dump tank. The dump tank. Yeah, okay,
so I was really going I was trying to lead
in for the size to the RV. But but yeah,
we'll we'll get into that. Um, but you're gonna have
to stay tuned for a future episode of Boondocking and
Brad to talk about that incident. Um, the biggest mistake
(02:18):
we probably made was finding the right r V for us.
We got a Class C, which is great, and there's
a lot of great um portions of a Class C,
like the slideouts um where they're positioned um like ours
is in the back in the bed, but it would
have been better to have one in the front room
so you have more living space. Right. So there's different
(02:38):
classes of r vs which are gonna go over first,
and then there's different slide out options for all of these.
So I'm gonna start telling you with the Class A
these are the big rigs. You know, those are the
ones that people use for tour buses to travel around
the country full time for their bands or you know
anything like that. So, uh, these are the big big rigs.
(02:59):
There's gas and there's diesel versions, and it's always better
to get a diesel pusher when you get a Class
A UM just because the fuel and the engine maintenance
and everything like that. It's a much better run r V.
When you're talking about over thirty ft r vs Class
B conversion bands, you would think that that would just
go down, but actually that's the conversion fans, right. So
(03:20):
those are your van life campers, you know, the ones
that are trying to stay off the grid. They have
the generators and they're A C s that way. They
can just live off the land and do a lot
of boon docking. Um. They're a beautiful way to view
the country and visit the country. For Matt, night didn't
make sense because we have Matt, myself and Finn, so
(03:40):
three of us living in that full time would be
a little more than intense. That would be a nightmare. Yeah,
but there are the Class B conversion vans like the buses,
those would also be technically Class b's and yes, but
there would have been way too much build out in
time and effort, and seeing how we lived in Chicago,
we didn't have enough space to actually build out our
own conversion fans. So we had to go with something
(04:03):
that made more sense for us. And what we thought
that would be a Class C. And Class c's are
gonna be mostly under thirty foot. Um. There the trucks
that have the built in campers and basically you're looking
at that overhead piece over the drivers and passenger seats.
You're gonna have that extra bunk. Um. These are great
(04:23):
for like long family road trips and then coming back
like a month long or things like that. Those are
really what Class C s were built out for. It
really wasn't made for full time living, but it can
definitely happen. I mean, we've been making it work for
over a year now, and you know we've ran into
our own issues there and that's mostly of for us
where the slideouts have been placed. Like I was saying,
(04:47):
our slideout is in our bedroom, which is in the back,
so it means we have a very slim path to
walk up and down in and so we always run
into each other and like we're trying to like when
guests are over, Oh my gosh, how complicated. Forget it.
I know, it's like human tetras. It really is, like
we're like, okay, so you know, when you're sitting there,
make sure that your legs are over the side so
(05:08):
we can still walk through. Now, if our slide out
was in the living room, we would have that extra
space and it would be so much easier to travel
with multiple people. But it really works for a little family,
you know, the two of us in finn it's like
that perfect size um for for us and what we're doing.
It's just if that slide out was different, it would
be beautiful and be perfect perfection. Now, going into some
(05:44):
other types of r VS, when we're talking about ones
that are not with a built in motor. UM. We
have a lot of different pull behind options. There's the
fifth wheels, there's toy hollers, travel tailers, pop ups, and
trunk campers. UM. Now, some of these you can live
in full time. Some of them you would never want to.
It would be horrendous. The fifth wheel options, those ones
(06:07):
are normally with a big like thirty plus foot living
spaces behind and basically a fifth wheel is installed into
your truck and there's a big hinge basically and you
drive your truck into it and it picks it up.
But you're talking about the whole bed of your truck
is taken up by this. So if you wanted to
try to like you know, do an event or you know,
(06:28):
packing your truck as well, you're not going to because
this where this hooks up. It doesn't hook up on
your tailgate like the rest of UM pull behind stew
There's toy haulers, which are actually an amazing UM one
to have because what that basically means is the whole
back will actually drop like am a ramp, so you
(06:49):
can actually bring in your a t V S, you
can bring in your motorcycles. You can sometimes even fit
a whole car in there if you're like a car
collector or things like that. So there's the toy haulers
can really fit in a lot of extra space and
a lot of times when you pull down that back door, um,
your bed actually pulls up to the ceiling or an
(07:11):
extra couch or things like that, so there's like hidden
It's like it's a really fascinating build for a trailer.
So if you're an outdoorsman and you want to do
more with your life outside of like you know, with
a t V s or motorcycles or dune buggies. Um,
if you're a car collector, then that's probably more of
your style. And when you go down from toy hollers,
(07:34):
you kind of go into these travel trailers. Um. These
travel trailers are ones that you're gonna find that are
like twenty ft maybe um you can go a little
bit longer, but they're gonna go on your normal hitch. Um,
So those are gonna be your normal truck hitches, UM
that are gonna be pulling it. And when you pull those,
you definitely want to get more. Um, You're gonna want
(07:55):
to get more equipment, like a sway bar in a
load bar, which basically that will help you from jack
knifing your trailers or like when you're driving from it
tipping and things like that. When we were pulling behind
a regular trailer behind our V this year, we had
one of those, and it made it feel like it
was part of the r V and I never felt
unsafe pulling that trailer across the country. The next one
(08:17):
is actually really great for weekend trips. Pop up campers.
Your family had a pop up camper, didn't they. Yeah,
I think we used that a lot whenever we would
go camping. It's a family like a pop up type thing,
which is fine. Yeah, it's a lot of work. You
have to like literally pop it up, pull it out,
and all this stuff. Could you imagine living on the
(08:38):
road full time and a pop up Absolutely not no, right,
But it's perfect for your quick weekend maybe a week
but like you don't really want to like live in
it or anything like that. And because like every time
you take it down the road, you have to put
it back down because otherwise it acts like a kite world.
Just like you'll definitely mess that thing up real quick
if you don't. Another beutiful addition to UM the r
(09:02):
V world was truck campers. These truck campers basically your truck,
you back up into it, you drop it on your truck,
hook it up, and then you can drive away with
your camper. These are great again for weekend trips. I've
seen people use these as like conversion van styles where
they're living on the road with them. UM, kudos of them.
(09:24):
But I could not do that because we're talking about
a ten by ten by ten space and a tend
by ten by ten space. I mean, you have to
love and be in the perfect climates all year around,
like right now where it's a little bit colder for us. Um,
it would be miserable to sleep in that. I couldn't.
I wouldn't because I would hear Matt like yelling at
(09:45):
me and all these kind of things. But I'm crazy
now in OV. Yeah. So basically, you know, there's all
these different kinds and it's really about finding the right
one for you. If you're a weekend warrior, you know,
definitely truck campers, pop ups, travel trailers, and even some
toy hollers. Um. But when you're living in at RV
(10:05):
full time, you kind of want to find the right
hookups in the right place for you. UM. For us,
Class C was really great because we can get into
a lot of national parks and around them. We've only
run into like two where we're three ft two big
to like drive the RV through that specific national park. Um,
So we could actually almost get around the country easy
(10:28):
with our Class C, Class B s or just like
any kind of van. It's like a sprinter van that's
converted or a bus. So most places you're gonna be
really able to get around that country. Class A we're
gonna definitely want to pull behind a car because you're
not going to be able to get everywhere. You can't
go into the cities with these things. You know, it's
not gonna be easy. Um, So when you're driving, you
(10:50):
have to find out your skill of driving to find
out really what's right for you. These aren't the easiest
(11:18):
conversations to have. But if you have questions about finding
the right RV for you and you want more answers,
you can find us at park Landia Pod on Instagram
or on Twitter at park Landia Pod and our Facebook
group park Landia Rangers. There's many different ways to get
ahold of us, and I would love to have those
conversations with you and help you find what's right for you.
(11:45):
You've been listening to park Landia, a show about national parks.
Parkland is a production of My Heart Radio, created by
Matt Carouac, Brad Krouac, and Christopher has The otis produced
and edited by Mike John's. Our executive producer is Christopher
hasiotis our researcher. It's Jess lynch Field Especial Things. Goes
out to Gabrielle Collins, Crystal Waters and the rest of
the Parklandia crew. And Hey listeners. If you're enjoying the show,
(12:07):
leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps other
people like you find our show. You can keep up
with us on social media as well. Check out our
photos from our travels on Instagram at Parklandia pod and
join in on the conversation and our Facebook group Parklandia Rangers.
From our podcast My Heart Radio, visit the heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,
(12:28):
and as always, thank you for listening.
Hi, I'm Matt and I'm Brad. This is Park Glandia,
our production of I Heart Radio. We sold our loft
in Chicago, moved into in r V full time, and
now we're shopping in the country with our dog fin
exploring America's national parks. And today I'm really really excited
because we're going to introduce a new segment in our
show called boon Docking with Brad. This is a new
(00:26):
segment that we're doing throughout the podcast. Throughout the season,
we'll have five episodes of these, and really what the
main goal is is to help you find the right
RV for you, to help you dive into the essentials
that you don't even realize that we're not included in
the r V um. It's about hooking up for the
(00:46):
first time. It's about boon docking for the first time
and going back to the basics like minimizing your life.
So what the goal is of Boondocking with Brad is
to really help you dive into seeing if this is
right for you, to give you the tools and the
necessities to find out how to do this in order
right Because not everybody grew up going to places with
(01:09):
r V, whether that be a pop up, a Class A,
Class C, Class B, whatever it is. You know, families
just don't always have those opportunities. But that doesn't mean
that you can't do it yourself. So my goal is
to help you start your education process on this. It
won't be a complete three sixty circle, but stick with
me because I really want to help you find these essentials.
(01:32):
We're going to take you on a big journey so
you don't make the same mistakes that we've done. What
was the biggest stake that we probably made, Mad Well,
that's hard for me to answer because I feel like
I'm pretty oblivious when it comes to most r V things.
Stillbably was that the incident in Santa Fe. What was that? Oh? Yeah,
(01:52):
that was in the dump tank. The dump tank. Yeah, okay,
so I was really going I was trying to lead
in for the size to the RV. But but yeah,
we'll we'll get into that. Um, but you're gonna have
to stay tuned for a future episode of Boondocking and
Brad to talk about that incident. Um, the biggest mistake
(02:18):
we probably made was finding the right r V for us.
We got a Class C, which is great, and there's
a lot of great um portions of a Class C,
like the slideouts um where they're positioned um like ours
is in the back in the bed, but it would
have been better to have one in the front room
so you have more living space. Right. So there's different
(02:38):
classes of r vs which are gonna go over first,
and then there's different slide out options for all of these.
So I'm gonna start telling you with the Class A
these are the big rigs. You know, those are the
ones that people use for tour buses to travel around
the country full time for their bands or you know
anything like that. So, uh, these are the big big rigs.
(02:59):
There's gas and there's diesel versions, and it's always better
to get a diesel pusher when you get a Class
A UM just because the fuel and the engine maintenance
and everything like that. It's a much better run r V.
When you're talking about over thirty ft r vs Class
B conversion bands, you would think that that would just
go down, but actually that's the conversion fans, right. So
(03:20):
those are your van life campers, you know, the ones
that are trying to stay off the grid. They have
the generators and they're A C s that way. They
can just live off the land and do a lot
of boon docking. Um. They're a beautiful way to view
the country and visit the country. For Matt, night didn't
make sense because we have Matt, myself and Finn, so
(03:40):
three of us living in that full time would be
a little more than intense. That would be a nightmare. Yeah,
but there are the Class B conversion vans like the buses,
those would also be technically Class b's and yes, but
there would have been way too much build out in
time and effort, and seeing how we lived in Chicago,
we didn't have enough space to actually build out our
own conversion fans. So we had to go with something
(04:03):
that made more sense for us. And what we thought
that would be a Class C. And Class c's are
gonna be mostly under thirty foot. Um. There the trucks
that have the built in campers and basically you're looking
at that overhead piece over the drivers and passenger seats.
You're gonna have that extra bunk. Um. These are great
(04:23):
for like long family road trips and then coming back
like a month long or things like that. Those are
really what Class C s were built out for. It
really wasn't made for full time living, but it can
definitely happen. I mean, we've been making it work for
over a year now, and you know we've ran into
our own issues there and that's mostly of for us
where the slideouts have been placed. Like I was saying,
(04:47):
our slideout is in our bedroom, which is in the back,
so it means we have a very slim path to
walk up and down in and so we always run
into each other and like we're trying to like when
guests are over, Oh my gosh, how complicated. Forget it.
I know, it's like human tetras. It really is, like
we're like, okay, so you know, when you're sitting there,
make sure that your legs are over the side so
(05:08):
we can still walk through. Now, if our slide out
was in the living room, we would have that extra
space and it would be so much easier to travel
with multiple people. But it really works for a little family,
you know, the two of us in finn it's like
that perfect size um for for us and what we're doing.
It's just if that slide out was different, it would
be beautiful and be perfect perfection. Now, going into some
(05:44):
other types of r VS, when we're talking about ones
that are not with a built in motor. UM. We
have a lot of different pull behind options. There's the
fifth wheels, there's toy hollers, travel tailers, pop ups, and
trunk campers. UM. Now, some of these you can live
in full time. Some of them you would never want to.
It would be horrendous. The fifth wheel options, those ones
(06:07):
are normally with a big like thirty plus foot living
spaces behind and basically a fifth wheel is installed into
your truck and there's a big hinge basically and you
drive your truck into it and it picks it up.
But you're talking about the whole bed of your truck
is taken up by this. So if you wanted to
try to like you know, do an event or you know,
(06:28):
packing your truck as well, you're not going to because
this where this hooks up. It doesn't hook up on
your tailgate like the rest of UM pull behind stew
There's toy haulers, which are actually an amazing UM one
to have because what that basically means is the whole
back will actually drop like am a ramp, so you
(06:49):
can actually bring in your a t V S, you
can bring in your motorcycles. You can sometimes even fit
a whole car in there if you're like a car
collector or things like that. So there's the toy haulers
can really fit in a lot of extra space and
a lot of times when you pull down that back door, um,
your bed actually pulls up to the ceiling or an
(07:11):
extra couch or things like that, so there's like hidden
It's like it's a really fascinating build for a trailer.
So if you're an outdoorsman and you want to do
more with your life outside of like you know, with
a t V s or motorcycles or dune buggies. Um,
if you're a car collector, then that's probably more of
your style. And when you go down from toy hollers,
(07:34):
you kind of go into these travel trailers. Um. These
travel trailers are ones that you're gonna find that are
like twenty ft maybe um you can go a little
bit longer, but they're gonna go on your normal hitch. Um,
So those are gonna be your normal truck hitches, UM
that are gonna be pulling it. And when you pull those,
you definitely want to get more. Um, You're gonna want
(07:55):
to get more equipment, like a sway bar in a
load bar, which basically that will help you from jack
knifing your trailers or like when you're driving from it
tipping and things like that. When we were pulling behind
a regular trailer behind our V this year, we had
one of those, and it made it feel like it
was part of the r V and I never felt
unsafe pulling that trailer across the country. The next one
(08:17):
is actually really great for weekend trips. Pop up campers.
Your family had a pop up camper, didn't they. Yeah,
I think we used that a lot whenever we would
go camping. It's a family like a pop up type thing,
which is fine. Yeah, it's a lot of work. You
have to like literally pop it up, pull it out,
and all this stuff. Could you imagine living on the
(08:38):
road full time and a pop up Absolutely not no, right,
But it's perfect for your quick weekend maybe a week
but like you don't really want to like live in
it or anything like that. And because like every time
you take it down the road, you have to put
it back down because otherwise it acts like a kite world.
Just like you'll definitely mess that thing up real quick
if you don't. Another beutiful addition to UM the r
(09:02):
V world was truck campers. These truck campers basically your truck,
you back up into it, you drop it on your truck,
hook it up, and then you can drive away with
your camper. These are great again for weekend trips. I've
seen people use these as like conversion van styles where
they're living on the road with them. UM, kudos of them.
(09:24):
But I could not do that because we're talking about
a ten by ten by ten space and a tend
by ten by ten space. I mean, you have to
love and be in the perfect climates all year around,
like right now where it's a little bit colder for us. Um,
it would be miserable to sleep in that. I couldn't.
I wouldn't because I would hear Matt like yelling at
(09:45):
me and all these kind of things. But I'm crazy
now in OV. Yeah. So basically, you know, there's all
these different kinds and it's really about finding the right
one for you. If you're a weekend warrior, you know,
definitely truck campers, pop ups, travel trailers, and even some
toy hollers. Um. But when you're living in at RV
(10:05):
full time, you kind of want to find the right
hookups in the right place for you. UM. For us,
Class C was really great because we can get into
a lot of national parks and around them. We've only
run into like two where we're three ft two big
to like drive the RV through that specific national park. Um,
So we could actually almost get around the country easy
(10:28):
with our Class C, Class B s or just like
any kind of van. It's like a sprinter van that's
converted or a bus. So most places you're gonna be
really able to get around that country. Class A we're
gonna definitely want to pull behind a car because you're
not going to be able to get everywhere. You can't
go into the cities with these things. You know, it's
not gonna be easy. Um, So when you're driving, you
(10:50):
have to find out your skill of driving to find
out really what's right for you. These aren't the easiest
(11:18):
conversations to have. But if you have questions about finding
the right RV for you and you want more answers,
you can find us at park Landia Pod on Instagram
or on Twitter at park Landia Pod and our Facebook
group park Landia Rangers. There's many different ways to get
ahold of us, and I would love to have those
conversations with you and help you find what's right for you.
(11:45):
You've been listening to park Landia, a show about national parks.
Parkland is a production of My Heart Radio, created by
Matt Carouac, Brad Krouac, and Christopher has The otis produced
and edited by Mike John's. Our executive producer is Christopher
hasiotis our researcher. It's Jess lynch Field Especial Things. Goes
out to Gabrielle Collins, Crystal Waters and the rest of
the Parklandia crew. And Hey listeners. If you're enjoying the show,
(12:07):
leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps other
people like you find our show. You can keep up
with us on social media as well. Check out our
photos from our travels on Instagram at Parklandia pod and
join in on the conversation and our Facebook group Parklandia Rangers.
From our podcast My Heart Radio, visit the heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,
(12:28):
and as always, thank you for listening.
Parklandia News
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Brad Kirouac
Matt Kirouac
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