We are considering selling our 36ft, 3 slides, fifth wheel and getting an island bed Serenity. We absolutely love the floor plan of the Serenity and the ease of driving, and overall quality. Our one major concern is if we can adapt to the much smaller space. I am looking for comments from folks that have downsized from a 5th wheel 0r motor home, to a Leisure Travel Van. How did you adjust? Did you have any regrets? Is the smaller space easy to get used to? Please let me know any tips or experiences you had downsizing.
Thanks
We downsized from a Safari Trek, 29’ with the bed in the ceiling so it lived more like 35’ with a large bathroom and kitchen.
We traveled ini itfor 6 months every year. Very comfortable but with my age it just became too much ti drive.
Purchased our 2019 Wonder FTB in March 2019, pulled the Trek next to it and were able to transfer about 90% of our “stuff”. Amazing amount of storage in the FTB, inside and outside. And did not overload the CC,
Left in June for a 5 month trip towing a 2007 Honda Fit, covered about 7000 miles. It was very easy to drive, more like a large SUV then a motor home! Sure, some screws came loose, but nothing to interrupt our trip. Still have not been back to the dealer for any warranty work. Ford has plenty of power, we averaged 15.5 mpg, towing.
Had no issues with livability for 2 people, over the years from 40’ to 35’ to 29’ and even a 19’ Sprinter B, which was too small. Our LTV is now the perfect size.
Douglas,
We've been fulltiming for 13 years in a 31 ft fifth wheel with two slides. We recently (this month actually) just purchased a 2016 Serenity. We are spending this time getting acquainted with the new-to-use rig. As soon as the stay-at-home order is lifted, we'll be on the road.
We will say that the learning curve going from a fifth wheel to a Class B (Serenity) is significant to us. Granted, our fifth wheel is 13 years old and doesn't have all the bells and whistles, so keep that in mind.
When we first started RVing, we were told by many that a 31 ft fifth wheel would be too small for fulltiming. We didn't find that to be true at all. Our goal is to continue full time RVing in a Class B and going to areas that we could not do with our 32 ft fifth wheel!
Keep us posted or drop us a line!
Regards,
Art and Connie
We downsized from a 38 Ft Class A Fortravel motor home. We purchased a new Leisure "Wonder" and have had it for around two years now. We do not full time, but a couple of months a year we are traveling to find warmer weather south and west. We are from CT.
During the summer we travel northeast, some NY and PA camping. We liked the class A but did not like the expense of owning one and realized in a short period of time that we did not need anything that big for two people. For the type of traveling, we do we enjoy how nimble of the Wonder is and the ease of finding parking places. When we had the Class A and traveling we would come up to something and wanted to stop and see most of the time we would have to drive by and then decide if we wanted to drive back to see. We like the quality of Leisure products and so far happy with the decision we made.
Happy Traveling
Charlie