Never Say Never!

Sunset at Worlds of Fun Village 

   
      Over the years, we have taken great pride in boasting that we bought our last RV first.  We toured four different RV manufacturing plants in two different states.  We toured Winnebago, Monaco, Newmar, and Gulfstream, (and later the Four Winds/Thor factory after our purchase). We traveled to Iowa, Tucson and Phoenix in Arizona, Denver, Colorado, and Elkhart and Nappanee in Indiana meeting with dealers.  We made lists of pros and cons and found that we even had to weight their importances.  We followed message boards of several manufacturers' groups.

      We fell in love with a Safari Cheetah with an area in the rear we thought would serve perfectly as an office.  The problem, we learned after looking at Holiday Rambler and Monaco's versions, was the space layout did not permit either a king-sized bed or a washer/dryer, both of which were critical items for us, unless we upgraded to a 42' Monaco at an additional cost of nearly $100,000.

Christopher S. Bond Bridge in Kansas City

      After realizing that the perfect RV within our price range was non-existent, we felt sure we had made a good compromise in choosing our first rig -- a Four Winds product -- the Mandalay, which we found at Loveall's RV in Columbia, Missouri.  The color scheme was not my favorite, but the living space was workable and the price was right.  George made a video presentation, we selected the perfect stoneware, glassware and accessories, and we moved gradually into our new home.

       It was our intention to retire and travel with our Shetland Sheepdog, Ellie.  But we were soon introduced to work camping and then recruited to work at Disney World in Orlando, followed by four years with the traveling Carson & Barnes circus and finally, (at least to date), as owners of the RV Driving School.  

      The Mandalay has served us very well, and we had made a lot of upgrades for comfort.  But, frankly, we now required that office space and occasionally, at RV rallies, began to look at other rigs and floor plans which might better serve our needs.  While in Arizona last winter we searched the internet on a fluke for a Camelot 42PLQ, by Monaco, which we learned at Escapade last year had greatly depreciated in cost, but had our originally desired floor plan while accommodating both the king sized bed and the washer/dryer.  And, with just a few keystrokes, we found there was one in nearby Mesa at Autoboss RV Sales.  We looked and measured and negotiated to no avail.

Almost our Camelot's floor plan where the washer/dryer is next to the stove

      Our busy work schedule took us far away and months passed.  George still felt the pangs of disappointment.  The Camelot had disappeared from their online inventory, and we were not dissatisfied with our Mandalay.  It held so many fond memories over more than seven years and nearly a hundred thousand miles.  And we had made great friends in the Mandalay and Thor Diesel Clubs.  The Mandalay was familiar and held fond memories.

June 16 we stopped in Pratt, Kansas at Walmart for the night.

       But George perservered and again found the 2007 Camelot we had seen in Mesa available on the web in June.  He sent an email message to Joe, the sales manager, letting him know our offer still stood.  George received the call -- they accepted our deal, and off he flew on Friday, the 13th to Phoenix for a second look and test drive, which began the process of the trade.  He called back to Kansas City -- all systems were go!

June 17 at Mountain View RV Park in Tucumcari, New Mexico

      Valerie was insistent there was less storage in the Camelot than the Mandalay, and, as fate would have it, there happened to be garage sale in the kids' neighborhood on Saturday, where we began the painful process of unloading things we had accumulated over seven years' time.

June 18 we spent our final night in the Mandalay at Twin Arrows Casino just outside Flagstaff, Arizona

      We embarked on our final journey in the Mandalay from Kansas City hurriedly on Monday, June 16, for Phoenix, of all places.  It would be a bittersweet 1200 miles.  We would have but a few days to move all of our belongings from every nook and cranny inside the Mandalay into the Camelot in temperatures well above the hundred degree mark.