After our first camping season with our new Hawk, we took it off the truck and put it into storage in our garage for the winter. We're not diehard winter campers and until we retire we really don't have the vacation time to go south during the winter. I bought a flat bed trailer to put it on and it just fits into my garage once I took the jacks off. That's one of the reasons I bought the Hawk in the first place as we don't have a large garage and I wanted to be able to store it inside and didn't want to pay for inside storage somewhere.
Overall our first year went very well and we learned quite a bit about what works for us and what doesn't. The truck/camper combination worked well. For those who don't know, we bought a 2011 Chevy Silverado 2500HD specifically to haul the camper. No complaints whatsoever with the truck. I'll go over some general comments about our first year and the options we bought.
1) Organization - Probably the biggest struggle we had was with interior storage and organization once we set up camp. It took us a while to find the right combination of things to bring and how to store them between uses. We got a lot better as the year went on.
2) Mattresses - I'm sure most people know the standard FWC mattress leave a lot to be desired and it took a few trips (and some money) to find something that worked. We ended up buying 2 Exped Comfort MegaMat 10 sleeping pads at REI. At 219 bucks each they weren't cheap but I got them on sale and I had some dividend money left. One good thing is that 2 of them fit perfectly together on the queen size pullout bed. I have to move them around when I put the top down but it's not too bad.
3) Roof lifter - I ended up buying one of those speaker jacks from guitar center. I screwed a wooden closet rod end onto each lifting panel to fit the end of the jack in so it doesn't slip. Worked great.
4) Exterior Lights - I bought every optional exterior light FWC offered. Didn't really use them a lot as I used flashlights most of the time. Maybe I'll use them more in the future.
5) Awnings - Bought both side and rear. Never used the rear awning after the first trip as it's not super easy to install plus it's pretty large to store when you're not using it. Used the side awning a few times. If I had to do it over again, I would get the side awning but not the rear one.
6) Cassette Toilet - This worked well for those times we had to go in the middle of the night so we didn't have to leave the camper. My wife absolutely loved it. We usually used other facilities the rest of the day so we normally got two+ days before the tank filled up.
7) Inside shower - Wasn't sure how this would work but we ended up using it on almost every multi-day trip. Took a while to figure out the best sequence to get everything set up and getting the interior organized helps (see item 1) but worked pretty well once set up.
8) Refrigerator - Defintely a thumbs up. We got the 110L compressor fridge. Worked great and kept all the food cold. One thing to worry about is packing it properly if taking it off pavement as stuff can get knocked around pretty good in there if you don't.
9) Sink - Worked well except the drain using the graywater container would get backed up sometimes. Had to mess with hose to get it going again.
10) Hot water - Tank would heat up pretty quickly.
11) Fresh water tank - Capacity seemed to be enough for about 2- 3 days.
12) Stove - Worked well when we used it but only used it a couple of times as we did almost all our cooking outdoors.
13) Furnance - Worked well when we used it. Not super quiet but wasn't too bad.
14) Power system including solar - This is the one area where I might have to do something different next year. My wife uses a CPAP which runs on a 12V adapter and between that and the other power requirements (Fridge, furnace, lights, etc) we would take the batteries down pretty far by the third day sometimes. This happened in places where we didn't drive anywhere once parked and the solar charging due to clouds or heavy forest wasn't too great. The last trip I ran the truck for half an hour but I'm not sure how much that helped. I don't want to put a lot of money into it since it worked fine in those situations where I drove the truck or got a lot of sunlight.
Overall the camper worked great and more than met our expectations. Our dog really enjoyed it too because as soon as we started to load the camper she'd get all excited. I definitely look forward to further adventures. Big thumbs up to FWC for making a great product.
Overall our first year went very well and we learned quite a bit about what works for us and what doesn't. The truck/camper combination worked well. For those who don't know, we bought a 2011 Chevy Silverado 2500HD specifically to haul the camper. No complaints whatsoever with the truck. I'll go over some general comments about our first year and the options we bought.
1) Organization - Probably the biggest struggle we had was with interior storage and organization once we set up camp. It took us a while to find the right combination of things to bring and how to store them between uses. We got a lot better as the year went on.
2) Mattresses - I'm sure most people know the standard FWC mattress leave a lot to be desired and it took a few trips (and some money) to find something that worked. We ended up buying 2 Exped Comfort MegaMat 10 sleeping pads at REI. At 219 bucks each they weren't cheap but I got them on sale and I had some dividend money left. One good thing is that 2 of them fit perfectly together on the queen size pullout bed. I have to move them around when I put the top down but it's not too bad.
3) Roof lifter - I ended up buying one of those speaker jacks from guitar center. I screwed a wooden closet rod end onto each lifting panel to fit the end of the jack in so it doesn't slip. Worked great.
4) Exterior Lights - I bought every optional exterior light FWC offered. Didn't really use them a lot as I used flashlights most of the time. Maybe I'll use them more in the future.
5) Awnings - Bought both side and rear. Never used the rear awning after the first trip as it's not super easy to install plus it's pretty large to store when you're not using it. Used the side awning a few times. If I had to do it over again, I would get the side awning but not the rear one.
6) Cassette Toilet - This worked well for those times we had to go in the middle of the night so we didn't have to leave the camper. My wife absolutely loved it. We usually used other facilities the rest of the day so we normally got two+ days before the tank filled up.
7) Inside shower - Wasn't sure how this would work but we ended up using it on almost every multi-day trip. Took a while to figure out the best sequence to get everything set up and getting the interior organized helps (see item 1) but worked pretty well once set up.
8) Refrigerator - Defintely a thumbs up. We got the 110L compressor fridge. Worked great and kept all the food cold. One thing to worry about is packing it properly if taking it off pavement as stuff can get knocked around pretty good in there if you don't.
9) Sink - Worked well except the drain using the graywater container would get backed up sometimes. Had to mess with hose to get it going again.
10) Hot water - Tank would heat up pretty quickly.
11) Fresh water tank - Capacity seemed to be enough for about 2- 3 days.
12) Stove - Worked well when we used it but only used it a couple of times as we did almost all our cooking outdoors.
13) Furnance - Worked well when we used it. Not super quiet but wasn't too bad.
14) Power system including solar - This is the one area where I might have to do something different next year. My wife uses a CPAP which runs on a 12V adapter and between that and the other power requirements (Fridge, furnace, lights, etc) we would take the batteries down pretty far by the third day sometimes. This happened in places where we didn't drive anywhere once parked and the solar charging due to clouds or heavy forest wasn't too great. The last trip I ran the truck for half an hour but I'm not sure how much that helped. I don't want to put a lot of money into it since it worked fine in those situations where I drove the truck or got a lot of sunlight.
Overall the camper worked great and more than met our expectations. Our dog really enjoyed it too because as soon as we started to load the camper she'd get all excited. I definitely look forward to further adventures. Big thumbs up to FWC for making a great product.
