Considering all the years I've been camping, starting with tents, and going through all 4 of my Travel Trailers that I have owned I have to consider myself weather lucky. But, my luck ran out this Labor Day Weekend.
Saturday night I got hit by ping pong ball sized hail.
I have had many other times when I was camping and got a little nervous. A few times I hid out in the bathroom at the park. But, this time was different. I was sleeping around 1 AM when I woke up to big winds and I thought that I better get dressed. (The alert on my phone had been going off but, I am so used to it that I did not wake up) . Before I had a chance to even think about heading for cover the hail storm was beginning. I was feeling emotional pain each time a big stone hit, I knew damage was being done to both my TT and my pickup.
It only lasted a couple of minutes.
After it was over, as quickly as it had started, I went outside to look. The tent campers had all made a run for the bathroom and were starting to come out. Some of them had wrecked tents and they headed for home in their vehicles. ( The more expensive tents from places like REI held up well. The cheap tents were either blown down with broken poles or shredded.) A look at my pickup trucks hood and camper sides found lots of small dents. A roof vent was broken out and the refrigerator vent cover on the roof was shattered. A taillight lens on the camper was broken. Not much I could do in the dark so I stuck the chuck of foam I use to keep the light out in roof vent and I tried to go back to sleep.
The next morning I drove home to get a ladder. ( I was camping not far from home and my TT doesn't have a built in ladder) I had a old cracked roof vent cover in storage at home and I brought that back with me along with a roll of good duck tape. I replaced the vent cover and taped up the fridge cover best as I could. I spent another night at the campground but, there was a lot less people there. A lot of them had gone for home.
Actually, I am still quite lucky. It could have been much, much, worse. The pickup hood can be repaired (Though my deductible is 250 so it is going to cost me some) The camper vent covers I can fix myself. The dents in the camper are just going to have to stay. It's to old to be worth fixing. Some of them show up easily, others you have to look hard to see.
Could have been worse. I still feel lucky. But, It still sucks to be stuck with all the little dents in the camper from now on. Along with the cost of fixing the pickup.
The TT doesn't look as good as it used too.
Oh Well.
