Monday, July 30, 2012

Finding Dottie-The Journey Begins

The day began like any other.  As I eat my morning breakfast and sip on my favorite beverage, I log onto the computer for my daily vintage travel trailer search.  This is a tedious process, and although http://www.searchtempest.com/  is very helpful in searching all of Craigslist for terms you are searching for,  I never completely trusted it to do a thorough job.  This is due to the fact that I had done a search in my area and found a 1966 Scotty, (no title and really rough condition) but when I did my tempest search it did not come up in the search even though I knew it was there.

Any how, I started my search with my metro area, then expanded it to the other metropolitan area's within my area.  That is when I found her.  She was listed on craigslist and was located in a small town in central Nebraska.  The ad had no photos and only stated that it was a 13 foot 1973 Shasta.

Hmm, it wasn't as old as I was hoping to find, but I had to have more information.  I called the owner to ask for more info and to see if it was still available, and wouldn't ya know, it was.  Of course the first thing I wanted was photos.  Unfortunately he was heading out of town for a camping adventure of his own (He had a larger trailer parked at a campsite) so he would not be able to send pictures until he got back Sunday afternoon.  What!?! I still wanted more info, so he proceeded to tell me all about her.  He was the 2nd owner and owned her for 10 years, he used it as a hunting cabin.  Yikes! One can only imagine what kind of shape it was in.  However, he was an older gentleman and seemed to take exceptional care of her.  By the end of our conversation I had an appointment to see her that Sunday as soon as he got back from his trip.

Because I had no photos to go on, and had never researched a 1973, I got on the web and started seeking out for pictures of a 1973 Shasta compact trailer.  The body style looked just like the 1969 and 70 body styles, soooo HOORAY!!!!

My husband thought I was insane (and maybe I am) to travel 4 hours to see a travel trailer that we had no idea of what kind of condition it was in, and going only off the word of the owner who is trying to sell a camper.  However, after some discussion we decided that if we didn't buy this little vintage travel trailer, we would just make a little road trip out of it and go to the Omaha Zoo which just happens to be one of the best zoo's in the country.  On the other hand if we did buy it, and if it was as ready to camp in as the owner had stated, we would find a little camp site and let the camping begin.


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