First camping trip is in the books, so thought I would share what was learned and a few pictures from the trip. Since winter is not quite over in the northwest, we expected to hit some snow, so left the dual sport motorcycle at home. This meant we could fold the bed down and make it for the duration of the trip, but more on that later.
The first stop was for gas. My tow vehicle is a 2014 Jeep Rubicon X with 4.21 axle ratio, so it tows the trailer just fine at 70 mph in 6th gear with its 285 HP motor.
The folding bed provides a lot of storage underneath the bed, which was nice since the trailer is only 14 feet long.
This was actually the area of our first revelation. My initial thought was that we would have to fold the bed each day to provide sufficient room to adequately access the kitchen and eat breakfast inside the trailer. This didn't turn out to be the case, mostly because the bed is across the back of the trailer instead of along the wall, so we gain room since the bed is longer than it is wide by almost a foot and a half. Here is a picture of my wife of 35 years working in the kitchen with the bed in the down position. She was actually my 8th grade girlfriend, and I'm lucky she still likes me.
The Bed is 5 feet, the kitchen counter is just over 5 feet, which leaves 4 feet between the bed and the kitchen area. This was the area of our second revelation, organization. While we have a lot of organization in the cabinets, I had not allowed for coats, and we didn't want to keep dragging them out of the Jeep or from the tub inside the cabinets. This was easily remedied with a stop by Walmart, where I purchased 4 satin coat hooks. The area under the window on the left side was underutilized, so by attaching the four coat hooks to the wall just under the window, we had a place for Sandy's purse, coats and keys. I purchased two additional hooks and installed high on the wall by the toilet for towels.
The water jug under the sink worked great, but I will eventually locate an inexpensive water tank that is 5" deep, about 60 inches long, and no more than 24 inches wide, as this is the dimension that will allow mounting under the rear of the trailer.
I also installed a flat screen TV on the wall at the end of the bed next to the plug I had installed high on the wall for the TV. I used a locking RV mount I purchased from Camping World like this:
http://www.campingworld.com/shopping/it ... mall/51564 I was nervous about leaving the TV installed while travelling, so removed prior to moving each day. The tilt part of the mount uses two thumb screws to attach the TV to the mount, so removal took less than 2 minutes, including putting the TV inside the original box for storage. I had neglected to wire the TV plug to the inverter, so had to use an extension cord for the TV that plugged into the coffee plug that is wired to the inverter. I remedied that problem last night, so now the TV can run off shore or inverted power.
With temps in the teens at night, and a storm coming into the area, we were greeted with snow on the last morning.
We have a small electric heater that will run off the 2000 watt generator, and since we were boondocking with no neighbors, I ran the generator until the wee hours of the morning when it ran out of fuel. Since I have not yet insulated the floor, it was going to get pretty cold inside the trailer after the generator ran out of gas, so used a Mr. Heater inside propane heater for the remainder of the night. I wasn't sure about using a vent-free propane heater (I've read several posts here that are not in favor of vent-free propane heaters), but my research supports the safety of this unit, and a friend of mine used one for 3 years while he traveled the US in his converted cargo trailer after he retired. I have installed a smoke detector, CO detector and LP gas detector in the trailer, but still cracked the window and the vent a little during the night. After using the heater all weekend, I am comfortable with the choice.
Finally, this trip was to visit several Ghost towns in Montana, and although we both came down with horrible colds that required an early return, we still had a great time, so thought I would share a few pictures.
I worked on the trailer a little more so it is organized for day trips when we just need to haul the motorcycle to a dual sport location, or for a one night trip for some exploring on the bike in the mountains or desert. My goal is that the trailer is useful for more than just camping trips, so required a little thought to get things like the spare tire, chairs and table affixed to the wall with a strap so they are ready to go without any additional work. Some of our best (and most extreme) adventures have been spur of the moment, so I need the trailer to accommodate that part of our life.
I leave you with two pictures, a before and after in one grouping. The first one was taken the day we took delivery of the trailer from the lot, and the second is the trailer fully completed. Like others have said, you are not really ever done, but given that everything worked as expected during our first outing, I think the changes from this point forward will be refinements, so are unlikely to be noticed by the casual observer. Thanks to everyone for all the guidance while I plowed through this project.
by Wookie97 » Sun Mar 29, 2015 10:37 pm 
