Allan Hendrix and Fran Govean (allan_fran)
August 20,2012
GETTING STARTED WITH VEINISSE
My dad had started to build a teardrop from scratch in 1950 or so. There were those plans
in Mechanix Illustrated. He built the axle, stored it in the garage of the new house
he was building, and passed away in 1962 without doing more than move the axle around
a little when it got in the way. The last time I looked, it was still there, no worse for wear
but certainly no closer to completion, either.
Fran and I began thinking about teardrops after seeing the Huell Houser show on classic
teardrops around 2003. We also started with the idea of building a new one, but the
memory of that axle dissuaded me. I can’t speak for Fran but she didn’t push for a home-
built, either. Then we thought of rehabbing a “classic,” but again that axle was on our
minds. Finally we decided to investigate new factory models. A lot of Internet research
showed we could get a cheap one for a few thousand bucks, but it would just be a trailer
shell with a shelf for a “kitchen” and off you go. We could get expensive, luxurious
modern teardrops for the cost of a new car; no further comment. Finally we found the
Camp-Inn website, liked what we saw, and asked for an estimate in June 2006. Delivery
would be June 2007...
We went ahead, waited out the year, and took delivery of our “Veinisse” in Necedah
on June 8, 2007. She is what’s now a Model 550 with some options and accessories.
Veinisse means something like “road elf.” It’s easy to pronounce if you know a little
Norwegian. We call her Nisse (two syllables) for short. We took an initial week to drive
from our home in California’s Sierra foothills, through Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, South
Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin to the Camp-Inn factory.
Pick-up day was interesting. We had just hooked Nisse to the truck when Cary came
out to say there was a tornado alert, the tornado was nearby and coming our way. We
put Nisse back in the shop and got ready to run to the storm shelter if we heard a big
wind coming. We spent an hour or so before the “all clear.” We went down to nearby
Buckhorn State Park, got our second set of tornado instructions from the campground
host, and spent the night in a very nice campground with one other camper. Everyone
else had scrammed. There was plenty of wind, but nothing approaching a tornado.
We had a fine several days heading back across the northern tier. A couple more
tornado instructions, but no problems. We visited the Kensington Runestone Museum in
Minnesota. It was a nicely done little museum, focused on the runestone and the history
of immigrants in the area, and several rungs up the ladder from the usual hometown
collection of everything that didn’t sell at the garage sale.
We spent a couple of days at Theodore Roosevelt National Monument, another high spot.
The first night a ranger came by to warn us that there would likely be big thunderstorms
that night, lots of lightning, and we should consider whether we wanted to leave. If not,
he said, when we hear a train coming, hole up in the outhouse. The wind picked up.
There was thunder in the distance and coming fast. Already a long line of Class A motor
homes was grinding up the road to the top of the bluff, on the way out to Medora. What
with everything coming our way, the last place we wanted to be was on the top of a long
open butte. Why on earth would anyone decide to take a Class A up there? Even Nisse
would be a dandy lightning rod. We and our two dogs spent a cozy night in Nisse. The
lightning was everywhere, heavy rain squalls as the cells passed over, the racket was
incredible, but otherwise the night was uneventful.
The next night Fran woke me up to reprimand my Shi-Tsu for being noisy. He was
chewing or licking or something. Tigger was in fact asleep, and “something” was a
huge bull bison grazing about six feet from our screen door. Tigger woke up and began
to growl low and deep, making it clear that he, 10-pound Tigger, would tear out that
buffalo’s throat if it got any closer. I’m sure it would have chuckled indulgently if a bison
could, as it respectfully moved off to a new patch of grass.
We had smooth sailing from then on. Our trip home was 20 nights and a little more than
4600 miles. Nisse behaved perfectly, we were comfortable throughout, and we were
committed to more adventures. Family health issues slowed us up in 2009, but Nisse has
been busy otherwise.
What have we learned?
Check your equipment! One day the electrical plug fell out of the receptacle on the
bumper, bounced for 200 miles on the pavement, and got ground down to a sliver. I
found it when I noticed sparks on the pavement as we pulled into a campground for
the night. That took the next morning to fix. Another day the ball bounced out of the
trailer hitch on a 10-mile downhill from Angel Lake to Wells, NV. Everything worked
OK until the bottom of the hill. No damage; I had crossed the chains correctly; lesson
learned. (A corollary lesson – you simply can’t see the trailer if you’re towing with a
large vehicle. If something feels funny, get out and look!) Yet another time we heard
the water pump running as we pulled into our driveway after a long day’s travel. I guess
I had left the pump switch on – the one that shines bright red so you can’t miss it – and,
coincidently, the spring clamp holding the hose that feeds water to the pump had come
loose. It filled the under-sink storage, not the gray water tank, but again, no real damage.
A trip to the hardware store for a screw band clamp and a couple of hours sticking my
head under the sink time and time again got it fixed.
Take a good look at the little amenities other campers have put on their teardrops. Any
group camping events are great for this. We found out about the remarkable Tear-E-Z
(“tare easy” not “tier easy”) paper towel holder and the wonders of yachtsman’s kitchen
gear at the Northwestern event last summer. I show off the canvas covers padded with
that foil-colored corrugated insulation I made for our Coleman coolers. They extend the
life of our ice by at least 100%; they’re great for boondocks camping. And the folks at
Camp-Inn are always improving their product and sometimes have kits to upgrade the
older units. It’s worth checking.
You will be asked about your trailer. Some are just looky-lous, but many are genuinely
interested in getting one just like yours. On that first trip home, we had two cars full of
South Dakotans follow us for 30 miles until we stopped to take a breather, just to ask
us some questions and take some pictures. Keep some of the brochures to hand out.
You’ll get used to the stock questions: Where do you sleep? (And ...you’ve got to be
kidding). Can you stand up to dress? Don’t you hate to cook outside? Don’t your toes
get cramped?
On the other hand, people will look at your trailer in the campground while you’re not
around, so a little security consciousness is a good idea, too. We have a hitch lock, a long
tie-out cable, and locking lug nuts. We also lock the doors even for a short trip to the rest
room (by the way, that answers another question you get asked), unless we know for sure
there is no one else around.
So, that’s Nisse’s story about how we got started. There are a lot of adventures in Fran’s
logbook: Yellowstone, Zion, Great Basin NP (the highest and coldest), fall color in the
Sierra, the most beautiful single campsite on the West Coast (El Capitán State Park near
Santa Barbara). Portland, Seattle, the Mendocino coast. Dispersed campsites around
the Great Basin. As of August 2012 the logbook shows 19 trips, 24,000 miles and 118
nights, with many more to come.
I almost ordered the "Perfect Tear" paper towel holder, but now I keep seeing reviews that the ratchet system that prevents the roll from unraveling fails after a short time. If you find any good prospects, please post.
