We arrived back home to much warmer weather. We pulled into our driveway at 3:00 PM, much to Eva’s delight because we let her in the pool for the first time this year. Meanwhile, Tammy and I unloaded the trailer and I went about cleaning the inside. Then about 6:00 PM we rolled it back under the shop overhang, washing it would need to wait as storms were predicted for that evening. I never leave the trailer out if there is the threat of severe weather. Hail, is the most likely threat down here during thunderstorms.

Eva’s Happy to be back in her pool!

There were just a few glitches on our trip, but I think they are worth talking about. The first day out on the road our TireMinder gave us an alarm. It was a low battery alarm, so I wasn’t too worried and we pulled into the next rest stop and I changed every battery to avoid a repeat alarm. Then as we got on the road once more we noticed that the alarm would re-set. That is when I realized that when I changed the propane tanks, I never reconnected the signal booster. So, we took an off ramp, I hopped out of the truck, and I quickly reconnected the booster. Problem solved.

Now, that wasn’t the only thing I forgot to do when I replaced the tanks. I also forgot to open both valves, so when we were at Cliffside Park on day 8, I thought I was out of propane but I had only drained one tank. I must admit, this is the first time that I have had this issue. It really was of no consequence because the trailer never got cold enough that morning to be an issue. Personally, I’m actually pretty impressed that one tank lasted eight days given the weather, and all the cooking we did.

The other issue that happened was that we received a water leak alarm from our MarCell Unit. This has never happened before so it was a bit of a shock. I looked at the location and it told me that there was a leak under the bathroom sink. I went into the bathroom and put my hand in the cabinet, and sure enough there was water. The alert saved me from serious damage to that shelf. I just didn’t quite have the hot water line tight enough on the faucet. I grabbed my pliers and gave it a quarter turn and never had another problem. This is another good reason to always shut your water off at the campground when you leave the trailer during the day. That way if something does happen (leak), you have minimized your risk.

On the way home we stopped at the Double J campground in Chatham, Illinois. While we were in the trailer the power went out. Of course immediately the MarCell unit sent me a text message and a phone call to alert me of the outage. Since we were in the trailer, that wasn’t an issue. Had we been away from the trailer I would have immediately returned. It turned out that some of the maintenance folks were working on some electric boxes nearby and had shut off everyones power. It only lasted for about 20 minutes and power was restored.

A Red Sun with Orange bands, rises at the Double J Campground.

I highly recommend the MarCell unit if you don’t have one. I initially bought one so that I could monitor the inside temperature when we would leave the dogs in the trailer. Let’s face it, power does go out at the campgrounds, and air conditioners can fail. I didn’t want to leave things to chance. Later I added the s-pucks for monitoring water leaks. Now, as you can see it has paid off.

If your interested in checking out the MarCell units click here. If your interested in purchasing one then use TTN20, to get a $20.00 discount when you check out.

I also highly recommend that you have a tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS), like the TireMinder. There are several different systems available on the market to choose from, TireMinder is only one option. Keep in mind without a TPMS, your trailer probably will sustain quite a bit of damage before you realize you have a tire failure.

In addition to the TPMS, please invest in good tires for your travel trailer. Also, inspect them regularly and change them every five years.

All in all, a pretty uneventful trip from a travel trailer perspective as we have had trips filled with multiple issues in the past; click here to see what happened in 2018. There will always be things you need to address with your travel trailer, just like your stick and brick house. Staying on top of things will make your travel trailer adventure much more pleasurable.

Safe Travels!