Updates and Discussion

I’ve started a Google Group to discuss stuff about the wedding. The main reason I did this is to give those of you who live far away a place to discuss carpooling and maybe sharing an RV or something. Go here:

“http://groups.google.com/group/Rich-and-Molly-Wedding-Stuff”:http://groups.google.com/group/Rich-and-Molly-Wedding-Stuff

Feel free to remove yourself if you don’t want to be in the group. I’ll probably remove it after we get back from the honeymoon.

So I have an RV now.

I’ve been thinking about getting an RV for a while. I actually started looking for one a couple of months ago and I finally found one I like that fit my budget (well, almost). I was looking for a used fifth-wheel trailer on the smaller side that Molly and I could use when we went to visit family and friends and take with us on our honeymoon. The one I found was a little bigger and a little more expensive than I was looking for (I’m not saying how much), but it fits the bill.

It’s a 2000 Tahoe (by Thor) 25SDS. It’s 27′ long and has a single slide out[1] (the dinette). I originally wasn’t looking for a slide out, since that tends to raise the price, but they do provide more room. I was originally looking for something about 5 years old, so it’s about right from that standpoint, but I didn’t look at it on my initial visit to the dealer because of the price. I saw it later while looking at the dealers site and what caught my eye was the word “solar” and the price was lower, too. Most of the units I had been looking at were closer to 10 years old, and smaller, with no slide. Between the extra room of the slide, the age, the solar, and the price reduction, it looked much better, so I went for it.

I bought it last Thursday, and last Friday night I took it to Yosemite for the weekend. Some pictures from the trip are on “flickr”:http://www.flickr.com/photos/rcgreenw/tags/yosemite200603/ though I don’t have any of the RV yet. I’ll post again when I have some up. The trip went well, and it was really nice to have a heater, a flush toilet, and a kitchen, especially since it was snowing, hailing, raining, etc. for much of the weekend. The RV sleeps six (as long as four are under 5’8″), but we squeezed ten in for dinner Saturday night. and slept four comfotably. I stole the following picture of it from Molly’s sister’s flickr:
!/images/3.jpg (RV in Yosemite)!

Having a pair of solar panels is also a plus. They are large enough to recharge the two large batteries during the day after using lights, water pump, fans, etc. the night before. There is also a charger that can be plugged in to normal utility power or “shore power”[2], but I haven’t had to plug it in yet, since the solar keeps the batteries up. There is no inverter, so if I want to use the microwave, or any of the outlets, I’ll have to plug in. There are a couple of automotive style power outlets, so I can plug in a small inverter to run a laptop or something, and I may permenantly install one at some point.

fn1. For those of you who don’t know what I mean by slide out, it means a section of the RV can be extended to give more interior space when camping, then retracted for towing so the RV will be under the legal vehicle width. This also means it takes up the same amount of room inside the RV when it is not extended. In my RV, the section with the dinette slides out so there is more floorspace between the kitchen counter and the table. If it didn’t slide out, it would probably only fit two at the table instead of four, and/or the kitchen counter would be much smaller. It makes it a little cumbersome to get around when not at a campsite, but much more comfortable when camping.

fn2. Yes, I said “shore power”. Since camping in a self contained RV is a bit like being in a boat, with a limited supply of fresh water and power, and much of the technology was developed for marine use, several of the terms have also been adopted by the RV world. Don’t worry, you wont have to ask for “permission to come aboard” my RV, just wipe your feet so I don’t have to vacuum!

Where to stay

We’ll be updating this as we get more information, but here are the basics:

The nearest hotel is (Best Western?) Weaverville Inn in Weaverville, CA (an hour or less from Hayfork). They begin taking reservations April 1st for July 1st. Everything else in the county is booked. There should be hotel rooms available in Redding, CA (two hours from Hayfork on I-5).

If you have an RV (or want to rent one) you can reserve a spot at the Trinity County Fairgrounds (in Hayfork) with full or partial hookups. You can also arrange to park your RV on the ranch, but there are no hookups (plan on being self-sufficient).

If you want to rent an RV, you should reserve it as soon as possible, since it will be a holiday weekend. Trailers are generally cheaper than motorhomes, but require a full size truck to tow. You can rent an RV in Paso Robles at Sky River RV. They have “trailers”:http://www.skyriverrv.com/rentals_towables.htm and “motorhomes”:http://www.skyriverrv.com/rentals_motorized.htm . You can probaly rent one in Redding, but we haven’t researched that yet. If you don’t have a tow vehicle and can’t afford to rent a motorhome, you may be able to rent a trailer in Redding and make arrangements with someone that does have a tow vehicle to tow it to Hayfork for you. You can also just pitch a tent next to the RV’s on the property. We will hopefully have portable toilet facilities and maybe even a generator at the RV camp on the ranch.

For those of you still reading, please add a comment telling us where you think you’ll be staying, so we can get an idea of how many people will be where.

Gift Registries

We’ve registered with a couple of registries so far, and we’ll continue to update them over the next few months. We can also use gift cards from Home Depot or any of the stores we’re registered with.

Look for our list of registries on the left side of this page.
–Rich

About Us

Long story short, we’re just two people who don’t have enough time to keep our web site up to date.

We finally have a date

Yes, that’s right, we’ve finnaly decided on a date. We will get married on July 1, 2006 in Hayfork, CA.

For more information about our wedding, please visit our “Wedding Page.”:http://www.mollyandrich.com/wedding Check back regularly for updates!

Remind Me

Welcome!

We’re setting up this site to keep our friends and family informed about our wedding and other events in our lives. Let us know what you think.