texasdiver
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Re: Electric service at Waco Airport Park (Corps of Engineers)
Well, since yesterday the water level in Lake Waco has risen another 6 ft and now all the campgrounds, day use areas, and boat ramps around Lake Waco are closed. We are now 16' above normal water level which is a LOT around here because it is pretty flat. It will probably be mid-July at the earliest before anything starts to re-open. Many of the access roads are now underwater and the local news says that they require the ground to be dry for 2-3 weeks before they will let traffic back on the roads after the water levels go back down because if they are too soft the pavement will crumble. Frankly pretty much all the COE campgrounds around the state and many of the state parks are on rivers or lakes so who knows how many are closed. Do your homework before planning to camp anywhere in TX that is near water.409Views0likes0CommentsRe: Oregon State Parks....campsite sizes?
cpaulsen wrote: I also host at Oregon State Parks and have found almost all have a few spots that will take over 35 foot rigs. You may have to park the tow vehicle in extra vehicle parking but they are usually very close to the sites. What size would you recommend we stay under for maximum weekend and holiday use of Oregon State parks? I'm thinking of selling my popup when we leave Texas next year and buying something hard sided for Oregon use but don't want to wind up having to stay at KOA and other crowded private campgrounds because we overbought. We are 15 years from retirement so for at least the next 15 years we'll be competing with the rest of the state for sites during prime weekend and holiday dates. Maybe we are better off getting something smaller like a Casita and kicking the kids outside to sleep in a tent or perhaps in the truck bed with a truck camper of some sort537Views0likes0CommentsRe: Electric service at Waco Airport Park (Corps of Engineers)
The water level is currently 10' over the normal level and will probably continue to rise as they are holding back water to prevent more flooding downstream. Consequently most of the parks and campgrounds around Lake Waco are closed except for Midway Park which is the more suburban one on the other side of the lake in Woodway. Here's an article: Waco Tribune - Lake Waco Parks Flooded They will probably remain closed well into July and perhaps longer because even if the rain stops upstream and they can get the water level back down it will take a couple of weeks for them to dry out the asphalt where the roads are flooded. Perhaps longer if they need to repair damages to park structures. I usually walk my dog at the lake daily and every access point and ramp was closed and all the access roads and trails are underwater. There are also some private campgrounds in the Waco area but frankly they look a bit sketchy and are in crummy areas. Frankly if I was staying in Waco right now and couldn't get into Midway Park I would just get a hotel.409Views0likes0CommentsRe: Towing a travel trailer with a truck camper?
twodownzero wrote: texasdiver wrote: twodownzero wrote: You should not consider any non-dually truck, and should even consider an F450 or 550. The HUGE difference betweeen an F250 and 350 is payload...and you need to maximize that to be able to tow ANYTHING with a camper on. Geez....I'm talking about dropping a 900 lb camper onto an F350 SRW truck and pulling a 5000-6000 lb camper with it that has a tongue weight in the 700-800 lb range. Obviously those are dry weights and there will be people and gear but still.... that should be well within the range of any properly equipped 350/3500 SRW truck. I bet there are a bazillion guys out there towing camping trailers with trucks that have that much weight in gear and fuel on the bed. My 1 ton SRW has about 2700 pounds of payload. But it is a diesel, stick, 4wd, and 4 doors. A regular cab 2wd with no options could probably do a whole lot better with single wheels, but where have you seen one of those trucks for sale or on the road, anywhere? They're not common anymore. They once were the norm! My truck would probably be overloaded even with the camper you describe if I had loaded it for even a 5 day trip. That said, I'm also skeptical that there exists any 900 lb hard side camper for a full size of any kind, and even a pop up with a bathroom is going to probably be several hundred pounds heavier than that. Newer trucks have higher payload ratings, but if you have a 4 door truck with 4wd and a diesel engine, it's hard to stay within the GVWR with any trailer and a hard side camper. A DRW is the answer. Especially a 1 ton so you can get a numerically lower rear ratio so as not to waste too much fuel, since carrying a camper doesn't really require deep gears. I'm talking about a lightweight aluminum popup like this with minimal interior to basically give the kids a place to sleep and hang out. The spec sheet says dry weight is 895 lbs: Four Wheel Hawk Popup Camper not one of the 3500 lb hard sided models with slide outs that some of you guys are using.1.6KViews0likes0CommentsRe: Towing a travel trailer with a truck camper?
twodownzero wrote: You should not consider any non-dually truck, and should even consider an F450 or 550. The HUGE difference betweeen an F250 and 350 is payload...and you need to maximize that to be able to tow ANYTHING with a camper on. Geez....I'm talking about dropping a 900 lb camper onto an F350 SRW truck and pulling a 5000-6000 lb camper with it that has a tongue weight in the 700-800 lb range. Obviously those are dry weights and there will be people and gear but still.... that should be well within the range of any properly equipped 350/3500 SRW truck. I bet there are a bazillion guys out there towing camping trailers with trucks that have that much weight in gear and fuel on the bed.675Views0likes0CommentsRe: Towing a travel trailer with a truck camper?
KD4UPL wrote: What you want to do will certainly work but you're highly underestimating your weights. I haven't seen any figures on the weight of the family but I would guess you're putting them all in the truck. At an average of 150 pounds a person that's 750 pounds right there. Add in all the gear that will likely be brought along, the TC, the tongue weight, etc. and you will wish you had a 3500 SRW truck at minimum. There's really no reason to buy a 2500 truck. Right. I haven't really researched all the different brands. I'm kind of partial to Ford based on family history so I know more about them but I'm not fixated on Ford. I would definitely want to outfit any new truck for maximum payload and towing capacity possible with a SRW axle. So camper package, snowplow package, payload package, max tow package, whatever they call it and possibly swap out tires as well. If I bought new most definitely a F350 or equivalent. However my understanding is that there is often very little functional difference between F250 and F350 depending on the model year and package, sometimes as small of a difference as the block between the rear axle and spring. So if I was buying used I would probably spread my search to include properly outfitted F250 trucks just to have more options as there often aren't that many good F350 SRW trucks in the used market. One way or the other, I'd be buying the most capable SRW truck I could find just to have as much extra capacity as I could buy, especially if the wife eventually decides we need a larger 5th wheel. I expect this is the forum to go back through and read for best advice on outfitting a truck properly.513Views0likes0CommentsRe: Towing a travel trailer with a truck camper?
Don't have a tow vehicle yet. Well, actually I'm towing the current popup with either the wife's Highlander or my Sienna. But the Sienna has about 280,000 miles on it and will soon be replaced by a truck. I've been looking at Ford F250 or F350 diesel 4x4 trucks with SRW as I don't want to deal with a dually for my daily vehicle. So that will restrict what kind of 5th wheel or camper/trailer combo I can pull. But just looking around it seems like with a F250 with the camper package and heavy duty tow package I should be way able to put a lightweight popup camper on top like the aluminum 4 wheel model above and then still be able to tow something like a 20' fiberglass camper like perhaps this one: Oliver Legacy Elite II which would give me about 800-900 lbs dry weight for the slid-in camper and about 500 lbs dry tongue weight on the camper which should leave plenty of payload for passengers and gear and maybe also an auxiliary fuel tank. Trying to think about maximum versatility here. The ability to squeeze into small campsites and or tow a boat when I want or tow other gear when not camping with the kids. Seems like a much more versatile approach to family camping than getting a big 5th wheel and being stuck with all or nothing approach to camping. I'm also at the point in my career when I may soon have a lot more time on my hands than my wife who is younger and still in full career mode so there is the possibility of doing some fishing and camping sans wife and hence, sans trailer.514Views0likes0CommentsRe: Towing a travel trailer with a truck camper?
Right now we do a lot of summer camping in Texas and the southwest which makes tent camping pretty miserable without air. But we are planning to move back to the Northwest where we are from and would like to get back to doing a lot of camping along the Oregon coast where the wind and rain will make tent camping for the kids pretty miserable as well. I was thinking that something like a this Four Wheel Shell Models where I just have a bed and maybe dinette table on the truck for the kids and use it for hauling gear such as a generator. then My wife and I can basically pick whatever smaller and lightweight trailer we want for ourselves. The kids are 9, 12, and 17 but the 17 year old will soon be gone and the other two will soon be teenagers who will just want their space. So the truck camper shell option seems logical. Obviously this would work better with a 3/4 ton truck with plenty of payload to hold both the camper and the trailer. But a truck camper in the 800 lb range paired with a trailer in the 800 lb range tongue weight should not exceed the payload for most 3/4 ton trucks. The key would be to make sure the camper does not extend past the truck bed and interfere with the hitch I think.128Views0likes0CommentsTowing a travel trailer with a truck camper?
My wife and I are looking for ways to move up from our current popup camper to something more comfortable and all weather. Thing is, we are a family of 5 although the oldest is soon to leave for college so we really need to accommodate 4 for the next few years. My wife has been looking at big bunkhouse style 5th wheels. I'm more enamored with smaller truck campers and smaller fiberglass trailers like the Casita and Scamp, or even and Airstream, but they really aren't set up well for a family. It occurs to me that the most versatile family camping rig might be a lightweight truck camper space for the kids (or even a large canopy with bed installed) towing a smaller trailer for the parents. When it's just me and my wife we can take one or the other campers, when it is the whole family we can take both. Our preference is for more wilderness style camping in state and national parks and forest service type campgrounds so the big 5th wheels don't really fit into many of them anyway. So is anyone else doing this sort of thing? Putting the kids on the truck to sleep and keeping a smaller trailer for the parents? Seems like the key would be to get an absolutely lightweight truck camper to reserve plenty of payload for the tongue weight of the trailer. So I'd probably want a truck camper that was just beds and storage, no heavy cabinetry or kitchen. Am I on the right track? Any suggestions on models I should look at?9.9KViews0likes32CommentsRe: Oregon State Parks....campsite sizes?
Thanks guys. It really seems like it defeats the point of living in Oregon if one is forced into staying in KOA type campgrounds next to freeway interchanges because one owns too large of a 5th wheel to get into the nice parks. But it sounds like a modest 5er in the 30-35' range will about hit the sweet spot for comfort and keeping one's options open. The problem is with the RV shows when one goes with the wife and she sees what a 42' model looks like inside with all the residential stainless appliances and 5 slide-outs. The last time I did the Oregon coast parks was 2 years ago but that was with my daughter on a tandem and we tent-camped so I never paid attention to the sizes. We stayed at maybe a dozen different parks between Astoria and San Francisco, mostly camping in the hiker-biker sections where they always accommodate you no matter how crowded the rest of the campground is.539Views0likes0Comments
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