usbackroads product--Casita Travel Trailers

usbackroads product--Casita Travel Trailers.

The Carriage 5th wheel is a wonderful trailer. We have used for almost five years, but found that we were using in large campgrounds and towing it on usbackroads was an adventure. Susie was looking for a small trailer that she could tow with a SUV during hunting and fishing season by herself. That is when I got fishing and hunting...she wants to go somewhere else!

So we moved the Carriage to a RV park in a sunny part of Arizona and are using it as our "winter" home. That meant finding a small RV for usbackroads and for Susie to use on her own. We ended up purchasing a Casita 17 foot Spirit Deluxe. We ended up with every option, but the TV tray and electric jack. Total price was just over 20,000 dollars for the brand new trailer.

Buying a trailer over the phone did have me worried. But then I have purchased trucks over the phone and those have worked out well. The salesperson on the phone was great.  In fact, he talked us out of the electric jack given our style of camping. The Casita's are built to order and you must pick them up in Rice, Texas or pay 51 cents a mile to have them delivered.

The trailers have their own little "cult".  Here are the links to forums on the trailer: Casita Forum and Casita Club.

They hold resale value well.  We could buy a 10 year old used trailer for 15,000 or a new one for 20,000.  You can see why we ended up with a new trailer.

They are considerable smaller than the 5th wheel. As you can see from this picture the Dodge truck is actually longer than the trailer. The Spirit is also considerable narrower than a lot of trailers at six feet and eight inches. You can see pretty well behind the trailer. Much easier than just seeing the "Wall" behind the 5th wheel.

Towing the Casita with the Dodge Ram is fun. The dry weight of the trailer is 2480 lbs. At gas stations and rest stops I do get asked by other RV'ers as to whether I have "enough" truck to tow the Casita. It has trailer tires so I try to keep the speed around 65 mph. On steep grades I do notice people trying to pass the Ram and Casita so they are not stuck behind a "slow moving RV". I have yet to find a grade out west that I could not accelerate all the way up the grade. Sometimes it is just plain fun to pass those "slower" vehicles while I am towing.

Casita Travel Trailers warranty covers the trailer. The individual components such as hot water heater, fridge, microwave, etc. are covered by the individual warranties offered by those companies. Currently, the hot water heater on gas has triggered the propane alarm and the electric water portion does not appear to be working. So the warranty work has to be through Suburban water heaters. That is a pain. I can drive it 60 miles to Yakima or get a local Wenatchee RV dealer call Suburban. Which they really do not want to spend time doing. So be aware that the warranty issues might be more of a problem than with a "home" dealer.

We have owned and used the Casita now for almost seven months and the water heater has been the only warranty issue that has come up.

The Casita is perfect for one or two people that are very much in love. Compared to a large RV there are some "changes" in standard living conditions. I will cover those in the next two postings.

Here are a couple of links to Casita blogs: roads less traveled and tilthelasthemlockdies.

Coming back home to Wenatchee from Arizona last fall I noticed lots of Alberta folks towing a small fiberglass trailer with a truck that sported a pop-up or regular truck camper.  So that makes it a two-bedroom, two bath combination. Those folks from Alberta are clever.  So I am looking doing the same.

In the meantime, the annual spring fishing trip to Blue Lake was a great. Less than five days after opener we had the lake to pretty much to ourselves just sharing it with one other camper. Weather was great with rain only at night and sunny skies for fishing during the day.