Aluminum Addiction
It was love at first sight—first line of the book Catch 22
My wife, Carolyn and I were walking around a vintage car show in Phoenix and on display was a Travelo Travel Trailer. We both were fascinated by the condition and charm of the camper. After a few questions to Craig and Jill McCormick, the owners, we decided we had to have one.
I had only been camping a couple times in my life so didn’t have any nostalgic memories but knew this would be fun. My wife had a family history of camping with her parents and four siblings. She was not a hard sell. We decided to look for a project that we could work on together.
Deciding what we wanted
On my job, I have spent one or two nights a week for the last 30 years in motels and the idea of taking a vacation to do the same, wasn’t appealing. Carolyn and I owned a small sailboat and loved the raft-ups on the lake. We belonged to a sailing club and would tie sailboats stern to stern forming what looked like, from above, a sunflower. Everyone would share food, drinks and spend the evening talking about just about anything. We wanted the sociability of that group in camping. Vintage travel trailer collectors looked like that sort of group.
First trailer Kit Companion
As each new listing on Ebay was posted, we would discuss the pros and cons. Our decision was to get a low cost trailer, less than a thousand dollars, just to see if we liked group camping. Carolyn found one sitting in a front yard with a for sale sign and we bought it. As I remember, it was $600, a 13 ft 1967 Kit Companion.
After repairing a leak in the kitchen drain and installing some new carpeting, we were ready to go.
The Silver Steak needed considerably more work than the Kit, the brakes needed to be redone; water leaked out of several places and a good percentage of the interior paneling was falling apart or missing. Another problem was that our home owners association does not permit trailer parking so we had to store it at a storage lot and bring it home on weekends to work on it.
Little by little we got it done. Well, done is a stretch but we made it comfortable.
After an exceptionally hot rally in Temecula CA, I bought an AC unit and installed it. I think my neighbors were placing bets watching my son and me lifting it up there.
Future plans
Well, off to watch “The Long Long Trailer” for the 20th time.
Submitted by Mike and Carolyn Cronin
