How We Learned Awnings Are The Most Expensive Part on The Trailer

When we bought our 2004 Frontier trailer, a guy from the dealership walked us through how to work everything. He reminded me of Barney Fife from the Andy Griffith Show – kind of high strung. He said things like, “When you drive – trailer brake first – car brake second” and “If it’s windy bring in your awning, it’s the most expensive part of the trailer.” 

We listened, took notes, and dutifully tried to carry out everything that he taught us. When it was windy at night, my husband would get up, bundle up, go outside, and bring in the awning. It was a manually operated awning and kind of a pain in the neck. Lucky for me, I was too short to reach most of the awning parts so I couldn’t bring it in! (Now, we have one that goes in and out with the push of a button – much easier!). We wish he would have said, “Don’t get your awning stuck in a tree.” He probably didn’t think he needed to tell anyone that. Clearly, he didn’t know who he was dealing with!

It was one of the first summers we had the trailer. We were having a do-over from the Big Sur Family Reunion camping trip two years before that went so haywire it got us RVing. My brother and his family had even decided they were done regular tent camping and had bought a pop up tent camper. My parents came in their camper. My other brother and his family stayed in the Big Sur Lodge. We had a great time!

If you’ve never stayed at Pfifer Big Sur State Park, you should know that it’s a gorgeous park. It’s full of giant redwoods. A river runs through it. There’s even a waterfall you can hike to. There are no hook-ups for trailers. It was set up for tent camping. It’s famous for 1960’s camping complete with hippies and all manner of hippie shenanigans. Peace out man! In the 1970’s and 1980’s, when I was a kid, we tent camped there as a family in a canvas tent that smelled a little weird, but we loved our camping trips. Some of our best family memories were from Big Sur.

The park was definitely not set up for RV camping. That’s where our problems began…

We were dry camping. We did pretty good on the water and sewer situation. However, we didn’t have a generator and ran out of juice in the battery. Thankfully, my brother had a generator and we were able to re-charge the battery. No big deal. We spent most of our time outside and things went really well. We thought we were pretty tough dry campers! The big problem came when it was time to leave.

We got hitched up and packed up. We said our goodbyes. My husband, an engineer, and a careful “how am I going to get out of here” type planner, had scoped out his route out of the park. There was a loop and we could get turned around. GREAT! Somewhere along the line, he had talked to the guy who drove the garbage truck. The trash truck guy suggested we NOT drive the loop to get turned around. We looked at it, and thought, “Nawww.. we can make that!” So, we gave it a go.

I got out of the car and we got connected on our walkie talkies. It was my job to make sure he wasn’t going to crash into anything. I watched the ground and sides of the trailer very carefully. Then, there was this tree…. with a branch sticking out….what were we going to do? So, he got out of the car, scoped out the situation, backed up a bit, re-situated the turn, and … that branch again! Repeat that process a couple of times and pretty soon…oops! The awning was stuck on the tree branch! We tried hanging off the branch. Other people in the campground came out and tried pulling the branch. It wasn’t going anywhere! It was just like the song “Going on a Bear Hunt” – Can’t go over it. Can’t go under it. Gotta go through it! And that’s just what we did!

Of course, the awning ripped and was ruined. It cost us $1,200 to replace it or something like that. We should have broken the refrigerator instead! It would have cost less! It was an expensive lesson. Here’s what we learned

• Barney Fife, the trailer trainer, wasn’t kidding when he said the awning was the most expensive part on the trailer.
• Listening to the garbage truck driver is a good idea.
• Un-hitching and moving the vehicle until you can get the right angle is a good idea. Your time is worth it!

Like I said in my first blog post, we learned almost everything we know by making mistakes. I hope you enjoyed our little story and will learn from our mistake. Don’t get your awning stuck in a tree! Happy Camping!

Next Trailer Girl blog post – Don’t Burn Your Biscuits! Tricks for Dealing with RV Ovens.