BaseCamp Blue Sky

We are RV’er’s who love to go Camping!

We have been camping with our families since we were babies.  Over the years, we have camped in everything from tents to Diesel Pushers.  

Unfortunately we have not found the same love for the floor plan since!  Also, we had to lemon-law it, as the engine had a flaw that was not easily repairable.  So we had to give it up. 

Fast forward a few years, after working in NASCAR and having our son, Ean, we purchased a manufacturing business. The first few years was tough.  With hard work and perseverance, we purchase a black 20’ converted cargo trailer to market our products.  It had a toilet, shower, sink, bed, and room for a bunch of stuff.  It was our first foray back into camping since our Winnebago, and it worked out great for us.  But I had to buy a larger truck to tow it as it was so heavy!  

Eventually we sold it and purchased a new 5th wheel toy hauler.  A small one.  I found it up in Pennsylvania, so we drove our new Ram 3500 single rear wheel pick-up truck up there to pick it up and bring it back to our shop.  We had in mind to fit a side-by-side inside of it.  I found a new one-year-old Can-Am Maverick 2017 model and we drove the 5th wheel trailer to the dealership to see if it would fit:  we would buy the Can-Am if it did.  It did, just barely!

We used that combination for a couple of years.  We loved off-roading and camping at the same time.  We made weekend trips to places in the south East and put a few miles on the Can-Am. Even rolled it!  All good!

Then we got a dog.  Kenai, our golden retriever, changed everything.  So did the purchase of our Jeep Wrangler Rubicon.  We loved offloading, as I mentioned before.  Kenai didn’t fit into the side-by-side.  But she was brought home in the Jeep.  So that necessitated a change in camping equipment.  Our business had grown to the point were we could step up to a motorized RV.  

We found a used Class-C camper, and converted it into a 4×4 beast. The idea was to take it to Alaska.  We sold our business, and made our plans.  Then Covid hit and all our plans came to a screeching halt.

Instead, we took an 88 day trip thru the Rocky Mountain states, visiting family and friends along the way, even thru the covid crisis.  Camping was about the only thing we could do to stay safe.  Solitude, scenery and our own bathroom! 

Along the way we began the search for a new home.  Without NASCAR, or our business, North Carolina just too far away from our families.  While we didn’t find a new area to live on that trip, we did find our next camper:  the Dynamax Dx3 Super-C 36KD we own today. 

It was in Texas, and had been sitting in a field for over a year, thru the super-freeze that Texas had in 2020.  A dealership had errored in the online marketing and called it a Mercedes diesel camper van…. Needless to say, I jumped on it as it was at least $100k lower than market value, and we could afford it, barely! We made the drive from Minnesota to Texas, where my Sister lived, and basically purchased the Dynamax on guts.  

As a handy man, I believed I could fix or repair just about anything.  Owning a small business teaches you those skills.  So does growing up working with your hands.  This RV needed a little love: It drove great, and in fact it was twice as fuel efficient as the Ford Class-C we sold.  But I had to clean out the birds nests in the slide-out toppers, and replace the fabric too.  And so much more.  We planned to use it to travel the country, coast to coast.  So far so good.