One year later (almost)

One year later (almost) and things have changed.

Our original 35' Fifth-Wheel Montana High Country 273RK trailer (Holmes) was modified to suit our needs.  We moved the office from the slide out to where the love seat was.  (Removing the love seat was a chore).  We replaced the king sized mattress with a sleep-number mattress.

Somewhere during this time, a pesky hurricane popped up that required us to evacuate up to Tennessee for a couple of weeks.  The RV park we were staying in had a forced evacuation...the day after we left. :-)

But that wasn't enough change. We needed major changes.

What major change you ask?

That Fifth-Wheel trailer is *TOO* big for us.   Can we go *SMALLER*?

How small?  Weren't we already at tiny home size?  Something like 250 sq ft?

Yep...*SMALLER*.  As in Cirrus 820 truck camper smaller (Tiny Holmes), or roughly 75 sq ft. (We traded in Holmes for Tiny Holmes).

It's hard to put into perspective how small the camper is.  There's barely enough room in the "hallway" for two people to get past one another, even two people who love each other. There's a dinette (more on that in a bit) that can seat two and a bed in the cab-over area.

And yet, as small as it is... it's comfortable.  One can relax and stay dry and cozy on a wet rainy day.  On mild days, we open the windows and get great cross-ventilation. When it's hot, there is A/C. When it's cold, a space heater does the trick.

But the real advantage Tiny Holmes has over Holmes?  We can pick up and go - leave a campsite and be on the road - in less than 10 minutes.  One person can do this. We can go anywhere the truck can go.

And that's before our modifications.  Of course we made modifications.

We decided to replace the bed mattress which was thin and didn't look comfortable, even given the nice mattress-plastic-box springy thing (Froli bedding system if you want to be technical).  So, we wanted to replace the thin mattress with a nice foam one.  Easier said than done. The foam mattress is shipped in a roll and is pre-compressed.  You simply unroll the mattress in location and it expands up to a nice 10" thick.  (Note to self - read instructions before unwrapping package).

So thick that it interfered with the TV swing out display.  Sigh.  TV and swing out display removed. We watch tv through the computer and weren't using the swing out one, anyways.

However, the Froli bedding system didn't seem to get along with the thick foam mattress either.  No big deal, simple remove the Froli bedding system.

The Froli bedding system isn't just for comfort.  It allows air to get underneath the mattress.  This airflow is necessary to prevent condensation.  Without the Froli system, we noticed moisture under the foam mattress in short order.  Time for another modification.

We considered trying to get the Froli system to work with the mattress but it didn't seem possible.  Instead, we lifted the foam mattress up a few inches by sliding PVC pipes (1/2" diameter) under the length of the mattress....ten of them to be exact.

Result - a lifted mattress and no moisture that we can detect.  (And no, I can't feel the pipes when I'm laying in the bed).

But these were just the beginning. We will explain more about our modifications in our next post. Thanks for reading!