Riding Out the Storm in PA

I wanted to make it to Hagerstown, MD yesterday, but didn't quite get there. I am about 100 miles short. Decided to ride out the impending ice storm. I probably could have packed up and moved out this afternoon, but I stupidly paid for two night's stay and you can't get your money back at a KOA if you decide to leave early. I should have done one night and then, if I needed it, stay two nights. Oh well. It is already 5:30 and the sun is setting, so I guess I was able to fill in my day.

Here are a couple of winter scenes from around the campground:

The KOA I am at is in Pine Grove, PA. This has got to be the largest campground I have ever stayed at. They've got your typical swimming pool, outdoor pavilion, picnic tables, cabins, and play yards that are at many campgrounds. They even have an amphitheater

and miniature golf course that are typical of the more upscale campgrounds. But this one goes way beyond typical. They have:

                A Ferris Wheel                                               and               a                                                               Carousel

And what adventure of Diane's wouldn't be an adventure without something going wrong. Part of my trip is to transport two prairie dogs from New York to Alabama. One destructive little cretin chewed right through my bestest and favoritest cat carrier. Bad, bad, bad, bad puppy:

Van of Discovery

With all the traveling I've done, I've never really posted pictures of the Van of Discovery (Vof D). If it weren't for the Vof D, I would not have been able to see as much of the U.S. as I have, so it is only fitting that I pay tribute to the machine that has made my life-long dreams come true.

Before the Roadtrek, I had a 1982 Volkswagen Westfalia Vanagon, also known as a Westy. I LOVED that van, but after taking the infamous trip to Lubbuck, TX in 2005, we (me and Hope) decided that the Vanagon, loving named the Van of Disgust, just wasn't going to do it for us for any future long-range trips. I needed something that had air conditioning.
 

When deciding on what I was going to get next, I knew that I wanted to keep the acronym Vof D, so I decided that the next generation of conversion vans for me was going to be named The Van of Discovery (Vof D II, referred to from now on simply as Vof D).

I first started looking at the next generation of Westfalias, called the Eurovan. After looking for about six months, I realized that, although I would be vastly upgrading, the Eurovan still wouldn't solve the problem of keeping Hope cool while I played tourist. I needed something that had a generator and "house" air conditioning.

I don't even know how I decided on a Roadtrek. I remember seeing one near the CT/MA border and thought it was much too dark inside. Well, yeah, considering the fact that the Vanagon was all windows, anything else would be dark. After I purchased the new Vof D, I found out that there were many more Class-B conversion vans: Pleasure Way, Leisure Van, Sportsmobile, Coachman, and Great West, just to name a few. Luckily, it ended up being the Roadtrek that I liked the best.

The new Vof D is a 2000 Roadtrek 170 Popular. It is a converted 1999 Dodge B2500 Ram Van with the conversion being done by Home & Park, Roadtrek, in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada.

Below is a "tour" of the inside. The bed converts to a u-shaped dinette, but I don't have pictures of it set up. For the most part, I leave the bed made up:

The "house" section:

Looking forward at the cab:

The shower and toilet. Can't see the shower? It's in the middle of the isle, outside of the toilet closet.

A couple of improvements I made for better storage:

The other improvement I made was a screen room for the awning. Unfortunately, I cannot find the pictures anywhere.

So concludes the story and tour of the Van of Discovery