Today, Shirlee and I made our annual pilgrimage to the Timonium Fairgrounds for the Maryland RV Show. This isn’t the only camper show we’re likely to go to but it’s the one we never miss. As usual the show took up 3 of the 4 largest buildings and included everything from the smallest “peanut” we’ve ever seen to largest Class A coaches and a couple 5th wheels that would take monster truck to pull.

As you know if you’ve followed this blog, Shirlee and I have a 5th wheel that is serving us well and we have no plans to replace it in the foreseeable future. As Shirlee told someone today the best thing about the “Dog House” is that it is paid for.

So why do we go to RV shows if we’re not looking for a replacement? To see what’s new this year and what’s disappeared since last year. For instance, a year or 2 before we bought the “Dog House” we saw electric fire places in the high-end 5th wheels for the first time. When we bought the “Dog House” the fire places weren’t common but today we saw electric fire places in all but the low-end units.

Here is something that I wish we had in the "Dog House". Everything but power and sewer in one place. See the hole in the floor for the cables and hose to enter?

An outdoor kitchen is one of those options that was only found on high-end units a few years ago. Now you can find them everywhere. If you're considering a unit with this option be sure to consider what you're loosing inside ... the space has to come from someplace. Ask yourself; "what would have been there?"

Now this is an option that we saw for the first time last year. I've never understood the logic of putting an exterior door in the bathroom. An exterior door with a screen in it no less.

The kitchens are getting nicer. Be careful if you're looking at kitchens that are on the slider. Make sure you can get to the fridge with the slider retracted. We stop along the road all the time for lunch or just to take a break. Imagine not being able to get to the fridge without extending the slider to get a cold drink or make a sandwich? We even saw one unit today (a VERY expensive unit) where the retracted slider blocked the hallway to the bathroom. What was that designer thinking?

This is a well thought out sitting area. Lots of glass and all the seating can orient to the TV without obstructions.

Another nice seating area (our favorite of the entire show). Notice the electric fireplace below the TV. Speaking of TVs, one of this year's new ideas is TV's that retract into the casework (sorry no picture to share). While this picture is of the interior of a "SilverBack" 5th wheel it was nice to see that this layout has made its way into several of the pull behind campers.

Now here's an example of a poor floor plan. One of our pet peeves with the floor plans is placing the sitting area and entertainment center on opposite sides of the kitchen. This pic was taken from one of the lounge chairs. No, I wasn't slouching and in all honesty I could see the TV fine, if the spigot was rotated to the left and I tilted my head to the right.

This is another idea that we saw for the first time last year. Traditionally travel trailers have had a square, blunted front end. Last year we saw one or two with a "pointy" front end (no exterior pics). Designers must are really getting comfortable with the idea because today we saw kitchens, closets, bathrooms and this cozy sectional built into the "pointy" end. VERY NICE!

A couple of years ago this was the "cute as a bug" camper. This is the mansion compared to the one below! Seriously, with the "tented" bunk in the back, this is surprisingly roomy.

Talk about low profile and high-speed! But, you better be pretty "comfortable" with the person you decide to share this camper with. Ever hear the old joke about the hotel room that was so small that there wan't enough room to change your mind?

Here's another small camper. I think the tires on this are the same as on my lawn tractor. I bet a Prius could tow this.

After walking around for more than 4 hours and climbing in and out of more than 100 campers I’m tired. Hope you enjoyed.

Shirlee has been out in Portland Oregon since January 24th. Her return trip was originally scheduled for February 4th, but for reasons I won’t go into she elected to extend her stay until tomorrow.

Southwest has something called “Early Bird check-in”. For a fee of $10, a passenger receives early check-in which usually means that they will board in the “A” group and the boarding pass can be printed out 24 hours before the flight. Being the good and considerate husband that I am I coughed up the $10 for Early Bird check-in.

Shirlee just called to tell me that her boarding position is B45 and that she couldn’t print out her boarding pass. I called Southwest and after only a couple of minutes was connected with a very nice customer service agent who checked into our dilemma.

As it turns out, Southwest has a rule that says if a passenger changes their reservations within 25 hours of flight time the “Early Bird Check-in” does not transfer to the new reservation. Since hearing this I’ve returned to the Southwest website and read ll the information thy have posted about “Early Bird check-in” (you can find it here). Three guesses where this rule is posted. You’re right, at the very end of the list, number 14 out of 14 and it’s the only question that has any monetary importance.

I guess they need to 10 bucks more than I do.

Reminds me of a song by the Five Man Electrical band:

“Sign, sign, everywhere a sign
Blockin’ out the scenery, breakin’ my mind
Do this, don’t do that, can’t you read the sign?”

Cold hearted orb rules the night,

Removes the colors from our sight,

Red is gray and yellow white,

But we decide which is right.

And which an illusion?

Pinprick holes in a colorless sky,

Let insipid figures of light pass by,

The mighty light of ten thousand suns,

Challenges infinity and is soon gone.

Night time, to some a brief interlude,

To others the fear of solitude.

Brave Helios wake up your steads,

Bring the warmth the countryside needs.

We had another one of those “perfect snowfalls” last night. The Shelties got me up around 6 needing to go out. The picture below doesn’t do justice to the scene that greeted me when I opened the back door.

As I made my way into the office I passed over Carrol Creek on East Street this was the view into town.

A fresh snow makes everything look clean and new.  Mother Nature rarely graces us with a “Perfect Snow” by staying within the lines when she paints everything in white.

What makes this snow “Perfect”? We got all of the beauty and none of the work … I didn’t have to shovel it.

We’ve dry camped with every camper we’ve owned and in spite of the fact that we didn’t have a generator we have boon-docked at Wal-Marts and Flying J’s on occasion. Occasionally we’d be out on a hot night and not sleep as well as normal but we’re tough … we grew up before most houses and cars were air-conditioned. We knew going in that on this trip we’d be boon-docking at least as often as we stayed at campgrounds. We also knew that we’d be in Yellowstone for a couple of days and had been warned that it could get cold there in mid-September.

We knew from experience that we could stretch the on-board water and holding tanks for about 4 days and as long as we ran the engine occasionally, the battery capacity wouldn’t be an issue either.  But, without a generator we wouldn’t be able to run the furnace or the A/C … and it was looking like we would want to run both.

So a in mid-August I started looking for a generator. I had just a few criteria; 1) able to run the A/C which meant a 30 amp or 4000 watt capability, 2) reasonably priced (less than $500), 3) able to run at least 8 hours on a single tank of gas and 4) quiet enough. What’s “quiet enough” you ask? Quiet enough for us meant that you could carry on a conversation while speaking normally or quiet enough that the noise isn’t noticeable inside the camper.

At this point I knew next to nothing about portable generators but I did know that the Honda line was highly regarded so I started with a Google search for “Honda generator 4000 watt” then clicked on the “shopping” option. The least expensive generator with a Honda engine was nearly $1400 and if I wanted to go the “ultra quiet” route the cost for a pair of 2000 watt generators was almost $2000.

The next I searched for “4000 watt generator”. The search results were priced as low as $258 and literally dozens were within my upper limit of $500. up. As I read the specifications and customer reviews of these machines I found that most of them would run for more than 8 hours on a tank of gas. All that was left was to find a generator that was “quiet enough”.

Every spec sheet included a noise level specification in decibel (dB), several units were rated at 68dB and some others at 80dB. Have you ever heard Bill Cosby’s rendition of the Old Testament story about Noah building the ark? God tells Noah to build an arc 300 cubits by 50 cubits by 30 cubits. Noah replies “what’s a cubit” That’s how I felt … what’s a decibel?

According to Wikipedia “The decibel (dB) is a logarithmic unit that indicates the ratio of a physical quantity (usually power or intensity) relative to a specified or implied reference level.” That’s helpful isn’t it? I thought so too. I still had no idea is 68dB was good or bad.

As luck would have it one of the generators I was interested in was available through Camping World (also available through Amazon). I called the local store and asked them if they would run one of these generators so that Shirlee and I could hear how loud it was. They said they would, so we hopped in the truck and drove to the store. True to his word, the store manager had one of his guys pull a brand new unit off the showroom floor, set it up in the shop, filled the oil and added a splash of gas. The generator started on the 2nd pull. We stood there next to the generator asking the service manager questions in a normal voice and had no problem hearing his answers. We bought it.

To top it all off, the generator also fulfilled our 5th criteria. Oh that’s right, I only had 4 criteria. I wasn’t smart enough to think of the 5th criteria until after we’d paid for the generator and were ready to put it in the back of the truck to take it home. The 5th criteria was that it the generator had to fit in the truck. Luckily The generator we just bought fit neatly in the space between the 5th wheel hitch and tail gate.

During our trip we ran about 8 gallons of gas through the generator which works out to about 16 hours of running time. I’m happy to report that it started on the first or second pull every time … except when I forgot to open the fuel stop. It has proven to have more than enough power to run the camper’s A/C, lights and TV simultaneously at altitudes from sea level up to nearly 8000 feet and it was “quiet enough” that we didn’t even notice that it’s running when we’re inside.

I have a post nearly ready to go that I promise to work on after tonight’s Board meeting. Hang in there … I promise to get a post up in the next day or so.

Yesterday was beautiful; sunny, upper 60′s and no wind … sweater weather! Today was a close second with only slightly lower temperatures and a little wind. More like April than January!

To celebrate the weather we took the Shelties into Frederick for a walk along Carroll Creek … photo-op’s for the Shelties.

This is one of many good pictures of Carroll Creek that can be found on-line.

Today I organized something of a “guy’s day” with my local son-in-law’s and male grandchildren at the Silverado Gunshow that was in Frederick for the weekend. As we were leaving the Fairgrounds, Devin commented about a private plane leaving Frederick Airport. We spent the next hour or so enjoying a guided tour by the pilot of “Trooper 3″, the MD State Police helicopter based in Frederick.

Now there are two Flight Attendants and one of the pilots looking and pointing at the floor near the cockpit door. The pilot disappears into the cockpit for a few minutes then emerges and picks up the hand set to make an announcement.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, can I have you attention for a moment?” Here it comes, we’re going to be asked to go back into the terminal. ”It appears that we have a stowaway. There’s no way we’re going to catch him now so unless someone has a real phobia about flying with a mouse I’m just going to close the doors and head for Chicago … but if he goes for my donut, all bets are off.”

I guess Steward Little has relocated to Chicago.

Antietam is special to us. About 10 years ago Shirlee discovered that one of her great-great-great grandfathers, Issac Pierce Rodman died from wounds suffered at Antietam. That day we visited Antietam for the first time and went straight to the visitor’s center. After looking through a few books dedicated to the battle and not finding any references to a “Colonel Rodman” we approached one of the Park Rangers. After introducing ourselves we explained Shirlee’s recent discovery and the reason for our visit.

The Ranger explained that the reason we couldn’t find a reference to a “Colonel Rodman” was because General Burnside had promoted Rodman to the rank of Brigadier General. The Ranger described Rodman’s role in the battle explaining that he was mortally wounded defending General Wilcox’s flank after the taking of Burnside’s Bridge earlier in the day. The Ranger also showed us a picture of Rodman that Shirlee immediately recognized; she had seen it regularly as a child when it hung in the attic of her grandmother’s house in Burlington NJ.

A total of 6 General Officers were either killed or mortally wounded on the battlefield at Antietam. The National park Service marks the place on the battlefield where these men fell with a “Mortuary Cannon”; a cannon barrel, muzzle down in a stone base bearing a bronze plaque bearing the name of the fallen.

The photos below are arranged according to the self guided auto tour that can be found on the park map. I’ve sprinkled pictures of 4  Mortuary Cannons where they occur in the auto tour. Unfortunately I did not think to make note of who these were dedicated to.

Leaving the Visitor’s Center the first stop is “Dunker Church”.

"Dunker Church"

North on Hagerstown Pike to the North Woods and Stop 2 at the “Poffenberger Farm”.

Poffenberger Farm

Continuing east and then south on Mansfield Ave then west on Cornfield Ave. to Stops 3 and 4 at the “20 Acre Cornfield”. The first Mortuary Cannon is just east of the tour route near the intersection of  Mansfield and Smoketown Roads.

Making a left onto the Hagerstown Pike, Stop 5 is in the West Woods.

The Shelties got to stretch their legs here.

The second Mortuary Cannon is found along the drive into this monument.

Stop 6 is at the Mumma Farm.

Stop 7 is only slightly south of the Mumma Farm.

Stop 8 is at the Sunken Road, otherwise known as Bloody Lane for the fact that a force of roughly 2,000 Confederates held off 10,000 Union soldiers for hours.

Not surprisingly 2 Mortuary Cannons can be found along the Bloody Lane.

Heading south across the Boonsboro Pike to Rodman Road and the Sherrick Farmhouse.

Stop 9 is at the Burnside Bridge.

The Shelties got to stretch their legs again.

Stop 10 is on Branch Ave. and overlooks ground west of Antietam Creek and Burnside’s Bridge.

Although we didn’t visit General Rodman’s Mortuary Cannon on this trip it is located near the Hawkins’ Zouaves Monument a few hundred yards west of Stop 10.

Stop 11 is the Antietam national Cemetery. Since pets are not allowed on these grounds I have no photographs to share.

Harpers Ferry is a neat old town at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers nestled between the rivers and the mountains. We parked just off of Rt-340 on Shenandoah Street and walked the quarter-mile or so into town and back again.