First RV experience

I've always liked the idea of an Airstream Trailer, but got my first RV experience when an Esri friend was moving from Natick to Redlands. Natick is right next to Wellesley where Karin lives, so why shouldn't we offer to drive Dan's RV from Massachusetts to California, blitzing to western Colorado, then dawdling through southern Utah?

We made campground reservations across the country starting with a day at the Lime Rock Vintage Car Festival. I flew to Boston on a one-way ticket, picked up the rig at Dan's house and we charged the battery, filled the water, and turned on the gas 'fridge, which we quickly turned off when flames came out of the vent.  Oh, well, bring a cooler.

We stayed in a motel in Great Barrington, Mass and headed out the next morning for a day of races:

We left Lime Rock early. planning a daytime arrival just into Pennsylvania, and after a slog up a long hill on I-84, stopped at a rest area almost within sight of the Delaware River. Karin said she smelled smoke. Smartypants me said it wasn't a problem -- it was wood smoke, not electrical or fuel.  "So why is there smoke coming out of the engine?" asked Karin.  It was a squirrel nest, ignited by engine heat from the long uphill run.  We got the fire out with the help of a trucker hauling broccoli from Maine, who had a real extinguisher, not the dumb little plastic one in the RV.  When the engine cooled down we finished putting the fire out using the RV water supply, then took about a half-hour to remove the huge nest:

So instead of our first night in the RV we endured a lengthy learning experience;  Normal AAA coverage doesn't help with RVs.  Hotels are hard to find in an area just deluged by Hurricane Irene, and State Police are ultimately helpful lining up a tow (now at 11PM), as enough wiring was damaged by the fire so the RV engine wouldn't start.

We left the RV at a repair shop, cancelled reservations all across the country, rented a car big enough for all our gear, and retraced our heroic first RV adventure back to Wellesley in four hours.  

Two fires in three days, and the RV was deemed a total loss after another $1000+ tow. One more one-way ticket, and I was back to Redlands for work,