1st trip in my oldy but goody!

eimac99 wrote:
Did you choose to go with an older Lance because of the floor plan - is this one similar to your previous Lance? I'm curious because we used to have a 98 Lance 945 which I really liked. We had an accident and it was totaled so we bought a brand new Arctic Fox which, although very modern and full of goodies, did not suit us as well as our older one. We are now thinking of selling the AF and are looking at another 945 we found on the Internet. I'm glad we are not the only ones going backwards.Our 98 had a wrap around dinette and extra counter space which we can't find anywhere - even in the newer Lance.

Interesting question. We basically acquired his one because it was available and priced right. We weren't in the market for a TC, but I was becoming a bit disenchanted with only the travel trailer and was thinking of returning to tent camping on occasion to be able to access area where the TT was simply too big.

I can comment on how it compares to our previous TC, an '05 Lance 981 Max. The 981 was a bit more spacious inside because of the slide, had more outside storage and had the now common queen bed that is vertical in the cab over so that each person can access it without crawling over the other. It obviously had more modern accessories such as the Atwood jacks with wireless remote. It was however our one and only RV and lacked some features that we needed on longer trips and in certain circumstances like even more space and access to the truck bed when traveling. My wife is a musician and when you go to a bluegrass festival for a week with a couple of guitars, banjos, one mandolin and an acoustic bass any TC is confining!

So how does the 20 y.o. Lance 880 compare to the 981 for shorter trips? Well to start its close to 1000 pounds lighter and since we can't go to the 7-11 without climbing a 6 or 7% grade that's wonderful. It has pretty much everything the 981 had in terms of conveniences - full kitchen with microwave and wet bath. Although it's 10"3' as opposed to the 981 being 9'6" the overall length is about the same because the 880 has the standard cabover (crosswise bed). Maybe most importantly, I LOVE ITS LOOKS! Modern TCs look bulky to me, I guess because of the basement design of most of them. This appears more streamlined to my eye.