If you have seen our last post, a few months ago we purchased a Motorhome to live in during our time in New Zealand. You can read about it here! What has followed is some quick and hard lessons during our first month of owning our Motorhome so we thought we would share them with you. And this article is not about us being a Negative Nancy we just thought other people who are going through this process or thinking about buying a Motorhome may benefit from the lessons we have learned. Not all of them are mistakes which is a great thing as well!
You Become Aware of Your Consumption:
At home, we turn the tap on and have instant water, flick a switch and we have electricity. In the Motorhome, we quickly have become aware that the longer the light switch is on the sooner we run out of electricity, the longer we run the water for the sooner we have to move the 10-meter beast to find water again.
Whenever I hear that water pump operate I find myself doing a little jump and think, ‘Isaac you better hurry up washing your hands!’ And vice versus, we are constantly asking each other if we have turned a certain device off or for how long a certain switch has been on for!
Monitoring the Battery & Inverter Status has become our hourly habit.
You Become Aware of How Wasteful we Are:
This point coincides with the above but we have now come to realize how wasteful we all actually are. I am guilty of leaving the Bathroom light on at home…I just forget okay! We just do the standard recycling and take it to the bin and my sister has to run the tap 4 cup amounts before she will drink from that cup!
When everything isn’t on demand anymore you just realize how wasteful we are when living in a normal home. Consumption, preservation and what we actually throw aware has become so important to us now. And I am almost ashamed to say I didn’t think about it much up until this point. I am happy we are now going to change our outlook for the better. It’s this personal growth that I am looking forward to the most.
Emptying the Waste Tank is a Whole New Chore:
Gone are the days when you just flush the toilet and forget about it! Once we have flushed the toilet weeks later we have to empty it, and even with our Motorhome having a ‘clean dump’ system (basically where you don’t have to see the mess) it’s still not an enjoyable task. Maybe we are paranoid and maybe overdoing it, but Isaac now has dedicated ‘dump trousers’, shoes, gloves and hand soap! Even the thought of emptying the waste puts us off especially when you realize the waste flows so fast you fear the pipe is not properly fitted and you worry it’s going to splash all over your ankles! I am sure we will get used to this and learn to trust the system after a while!
Storage is Gold:
Every person who has a Motorhome has told us, storage is like gold. You need storage. So, what do we do? We ripped out the dining booth on the first day of owning the vehicle! So now we have lost the storage underneath the dining booths, so we have to build more cupboards!
Goodbye Practical Dining Booth, Hello Better Looking Dining Table.
The Awning is Not as Easy as it Looks:
The awning looks like a great addition, it looks so practical to you new outdoor lifestyle. But damn it is hard to figure out how to use it correctly! Perhaps it is because we are small and our vehicle towers 4 metres in height in total, but the awning is a get the step ladder type job which is just such a lot of hassle! We envy those people who have automatic awnings!
YouTube has been our friend.
Maintenance is Important:
General maintenance of the Motorhome is a pressing everyday issue. With a house, you can get by with weeks not fixing something, with a Motorhome you fix it its breaks even more!
You can’t be lazy! We have created a nifty Motorhome maintenance schedule that we have to follow on an almost daily basis. Laziness won’t fly with a motorhome, you have to protect your investment!
Cleaning is Fast:
On the flip side to point 6 is the cleaning. You can keep the inside of your Motorhome clean really darn quickly. The other day I had cleaned the shower, toilet, sink, washed up, hoover and removed spiders in less than 45 minutes. It was easier and certainly wasn’t a workout!
Cleaning is fun.
The Drive is Different:
When we first purchased the Motorhome we thought about just heading up to our favourite destination on the North Island, Taupo for a few days on the ‘Maiden Voyage’, the drive is only 4 hours. But by the time we had packed up and headed off 2 hours later we were only in Foxton Beach.
Motorhomes are not like cars, the car in comparison goes like a go-cart! They are slower, you have to drive to the safety of the road and it is generally more tiring! Isaac has to really concentrate on driving the vehicle and pays close attention to the width of the vehicle and the length. Good job it’s a Motorhome there’s actually a bed in it, we never need to travel fast again.
We had a wonderful four nights at Foxton Beach by the way 🙂
Misty Mornings at Foxton Beach.
This Hobby is Going to be Expensive:
We have already blown Septembers and Octobers budget and we haven’t even taken it to the mechanic yet. Where it needs a new fan belt amongst other things. Parts for Motorhomes seem to be expensive here in NZ.
The Feeling of Freedom is Unbeatable:
But on the flip side, the excitement and thrill of having NZ as our backyard in our opinion is worth all of this! Freedom on the great open road has always been a dream of ours, we have many dreams for our lives and we are so grateful we can soon live this one.
Move in Date: 15 days!