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