Traveling in a Camper Van was a unique experience! The journey, exploring the Pacific Northwest Coastal and the Redwoods, was an adventure that we will never forget and one that we feel everyone should do. Our country is Beautiful! It was a lot of traveling and the camper van was a perfect size and transportation tool to do it all. Having our food, personal belongings, kitchen sink & stove, comfortable bed, bathroom and an easy mode of transportation to get from place to place conveniently, made our trip an amazing adventure. The camper van was extremely powerful, handling the steep mountainous, narrow and curvy drive with ease. We traveled about 1,610 miles in the camper van, departing from Seattle, driving the coast south as far as the Redwoods in California and returning north mostly along I-5, back to Blacksford. The Winnebago Solis PX was a powerful engine and handled the road well. With regard to gas mileage, It averaged about...17 miles to the gallon for the whole trip.
Comfort wise, most of the Solis is extremely comfortable, especially the bed. It has a Murphy bed, which we only kept it down in place as a bed, never raising it at all. It was just what we needed. Blacksford is great too, in that they provided our bedding, pillows, our bath towels, kitchen supplies, dishes and more. We only had to buy our food and a few personal items. The 2-burner stove worked well and we managed without an oven or microwave, although one or the other would have been nice. The refrigerator is tiny, but we improvised and managed just fine. It mainly meant a couple extra stops at the grocery store. We even enjoyed the truck seats that turn around to face our tiny dining area...it became a nice hang out. As for the bathroom....tiny, tiny. We only used it for middle of the night and very early morning personal needs. Otherwise it was a great place to hang towels, my toiletry bag and some laundry. We used the campground facilities for showers and more. There was plenty of storage in the Solis, handling our shoes, suitcases, jackets, paper goods and more. Now, funny story, the Solis was great, but we will never, ever forget about the 'constant bumping of our head' on the cabinets, molding, archway, getting in and out of bed, moving from dining area to truck, reaching for kitchen supplies and more. At first it was annoying, and we thought...we will learn, but we did not. The Solis is so tiny that we just kept bumping our head and eventually just started laughing about it. I do think it will be the one thing we will never forget about traveling in a camper van. Oh, and that we kind of think....we may be too old...climbing up into bed each time was a real challenge...at our age. Hahahaha. We totally loved this camper van otherwise. It truly allowed us to see and do so much more than we might have, had we just been staying in a hotel here and there. This really got us outdoors into nature and close to all the beautiful parts of our country. We are both so grateful for this camper van experience.
