Tampa RV Show

[Dave&Ginny]

For the last 3 days Ginny and I have been at the Tamp super show. We toured several RVs. The real disappointment was DRV but the Redwoods showed well and I was impressed. The jury is still out on what our next rv will look like. We’ve already sold our Entegra and now we’re rv-less.

[Ford truck guy]

Originally Posted by Dave&Ginny

For the last 3 days Ginny and I have been at the Tamp super show. We toured several RVs. The real disappointment was DRV but the Redwoods showed well and I was impressed. The jury is still out on what our next rv will look like. We’ve already sold our Entegra and now we’re rv-less.

Good to see you again Dave... Sorry to hear your RV-less at the moment..
Good luck with you search !! Any clue which direction may be in your future?
Fifth Wheel - MoHo ??

[Dave&Ginny]

Originally Posted by Ford truck guy

Good to see you again Dave... Sorry to hear your RV-less at the moment..
Good luck with you search !! Any clue which direction may be in your future?
Fifth Wheel - MoHo ??

We’re definitely going back to the 5th wheel. We really loved the last motor home but We’re preparing for retirement and a 5er will fit our future retirement better.

[rob_fla]

Good to hear from you again Dave
Hope all is going well with you
We are loving the retired life, it will be a year the end of February

[Dave&Ginny]

Originally Posted by rob_fla

Good to hear from you again Dave
Hope all is going well with you
We are loving the retired life, it will be a year the end of February

Ron I'm envious! The pandemic took about 40% of our business so we had to put off retirement until we reach 67 which will be in 2025.

Do you have one area you try to stay in?

[piper guy]

Dave !! Good to hear from you again. We’re in northern Arizona, have been for awhile. Went back to the east coast last fall and wound up coming back out here. Long story, best shared with a phone call.

Give me a yell when you have time, we’re on Mountain time.

[rob_fla]

Dave,
Wow, sorry about the business drop during the pandemic and having to delay your retirement. The company I worked for saw a surge during the pandemic and reported record numbers. It has been interesting the businesses that flourished and the ones that saw reduction's in business / revenue during the pandemic as all of us were in uncharted / unknown times during the pandemic.
I retired at my full retirement age of 66 + 2 months. (Since I have a consulting agreement with my former employer of 18 years I wanted to be sure I made it to full retirement age)
When I retired last year, we stopped fulltiming and we bought us a small Fixer Upper Cabin in the North Georgia Mountain's to use as a home base.
It turned out to be a little more of a "Fixer Upper" than we thought but we love our Cabin in the Mountains and the local area.
I have been busy with "Honey Do's" and we have not traveled much with our Redwood other than some local area weekday trips here and there. We are planning a trip out West for several months the end of this summer and a number of smaller trips with the RV plus working on a trip to Germany in the spring that was put on hold due to the pandemic.
Hope to see your "On the Road".

[Dave&Ginny]

Originally Posted by rob_fla

Dave,
Wow, sorry about the business drop during the pandemic and having to delay your retirement. The company I worked for saw a surge during the pandemic and reported record numbers. It has been interesting the businesses that flourished and the ones that saw reduction's in business / revenue during the pandemic as all of us were in uncharted / unknown times during the pandemic.
I retired at my full retirement age of 66 + 2 months. (Since I have a consulting agreement with my former employer of 18 years I wanted to be sure I made it to full retirement age)
When I retired last year, we stopped fulltiming and we bought us a small Fixer Upper Cabin in the North Georgia Mountain's to use as a home base.
It turned out to be a little more of a "Fixer Upper" than we thought but we love our Cabin in the Mountains and the local area.
I have been busy with "Honey Do's" and we have not traveled much with our Redwood other than some local area weekday trips here and there. We are planning a trip out West for several months the end of this summer and a number of smaller trips with the RV plus working on a trip to Germany in the spring that was put on hold due to the pandemic.
Hope to see your "On the Road".

Glad to hear things are going well for you. The other thing that slowed down our retirement is that we also started a new business called "Dave's Big Stuff Storage". We built a new building with five 20x60 garages for RV and business usage. They have 14x14 doors, fully insulate and fully plumbed with bathrooms, indoor dumping station and each one has it's own utilities. It's worked out well and I have a waiting list, but it ate up a lot of capitol building it. The ultimate man caves!


If we hadn't built this then the pandemic wouldn't have hurt us as much.

[Dave&Ginny]

Originally Posted by piper guy

Dave !! Good to hear from you again. We’re in northern Arizona, have been for awhile. Went back to the east coast last fall and wound up coming back out here. Long story, best shared with a phone call.

Give me a yell when you have time, we’re on Mountain time.

I'll call you sometime Monday

[Dave&Ginny]

Also.....


If anyone is coming through Illinois, I have a spot for camping behind my building complete with a fire ring. A few Entegra friends stop here through the summer. It not fancy because it's in an industrial park but I've got an outdoor dumping station that we put in.

[Char & Steve]

Great to see all you guys on this thread, some of the originals from when I joined.

[XCMARK]

Dave , did Luxe have units on site that you walked though? At Hersey last year they did a by request tours off site, odd but maybe the price point needs a slower tour to see the difference they bring to the table.

[travelin' texans]

We visited the rv show in Ft Worth before retirement, maybe 15 years ago, where they had a couple Prevost motorhomes on display, that unless you had a letter from your financial institution indicating you could possibly afford it you could not go inside them, even by appointment. They had a deck built in the fronts that you could go up & look inside. Which was fine with me, looking in the front with all mirrors, indirect lighting & plush furniture it reminded me of some of the brothels shown in old western movies, just on wheels.

[Dave&Ginny]

Originally Posted by XCMARK

Dave , did Luxe have units on site that you walked though? At Hersey last year they did a by request tours off site, odd but maybe the price point needs a slower tour to see the difference they bring to the table.

They did a off site display behind the museum. I personally thought that was a mistake. We had to speak them out to find them. They did have 5 units on display

[Dave&Ginny]

Originally Posted by Char & Steve

Great to see all you guys on this thread, some of the originals from when I joined.

Hi Char and Steve. It’s always good to catch up with old friends. As long as you’re a camper, regardless of the name on the rig or the dollars spent, everybody is welcome around our campfires

[Dave&Ginny]

Originally Posted by travelin' texans

We visited the rv show in Ft Worth before retirement, maybe 15 years ago, where they had a couple Prevost motorhomes on display, that unless you had a letter from your financial institution indicating you could possibly afford it you could not go inside them, even by appointment. They had a deck built in the fronts that you could go up & look inside. Which was fine with me, looking in the front with all mirrors, indirect lighting & plush furniture it reminded me of some of the brothels shown in old western movies, just on wheels.

Some of the more costly units look like they should come with stripper poles.

[Ren]

Originally Posted by Dave&Ginny

Some of the more costly units look like they should come with stripper poles.

Truth! I was waiting for Elvis to jump out of the closet!

We go to that show every year as its local to us. If you wanna check out DRV's make the trip to lazydays. Unfortunately, they seem to be really proud of everything they sell there now, we ended up going somewhere else. Plus, they don't sell Redwoods.

I just don't see the point in spending $$ on something with less features and NO paint for MORE money!... ok...rant off..

[woodman1]

We were at the 2023 Tampa show with our son and his wife. Although they were looking for a smaller TT, my wife and I decided to look at the RW's while we were there. We really liked the 4120GK with massive kitchen and bathroom layout. All had vinyl weaved flooring for transition strips on the slide outs. Some of the RW models also have an extra storage compartment above the generator. We didn't care for the elevated mattress head. Wanted to look at the Beacons by Villano, however; they're out of business as are the Landmarks. I know a lot of RV'ers are looking at the Riverstone's, and they have some great features, but the only floor plan that came close was the 39RKFB, their number one floor plan. We just felt the kitchen was crowded and having a DW as standard, was a neg. Also noted they had carpet on the slideouts, another big negative. All in all, Riverstone looked good, but we thought the RW's did show better and were our favorite in that price point.