Monday, February 25, 2013

New Tow Vehicle

We had been shopping for a few months on & off for a new truck with higher load capacity as our single rear wheel truck when loaded was at its maximum capacity.  Our plan to live full time in the 5th wheel is now coming to fruition, so we had stepped up the shopping.  On Thursday, Feb 21, we decided to drive to Brandon, FL to the Ford dealer there to see what they had. We found a truck we liked that would do the job, negotiated a deal, and decided to buy that truck - but, told the dealer we wouldn't have the money we wanted until Tuesday the 26th.  He said that would be fine if we wanted him to hold the truck he would and so off we went. He didn't have our last name or number and we didn't sign anything.

I had been talking to our local dealer who is considerably smaller, and they had not had a truck we wanted, but about 2 months ago we had stopped in to see them discussing options, load limits, etc. The sales lady introduced us to their truck guy who had all the answers to my many questions and during the process, he worked up on his computer my ideal truck with color, options, & packages for a best case scenario.  We thanked them, but at the time did not want to commit so we left.

This brings me back to now... On Friday the 22nd, I decided to stop in to the local dealer - just to see what they might have.  She said they had two in stock like the one I was needing, a white one and a dark red one. After looking at the options list, I said let's look at it. The truck was off-site at the Pasco County Fairgrounds where the fair was getting underway, so we drove over and found the truck, drove it back to the dealership and proceeded to talk money.  This Red truck was about $3000 more list than the one we found Thursday, but the deal we got was $1000 less, so that was a $4000 swing and I said "let's do it"..... She leaves to get the manager to sign things and came back saying they may have a problem because their system said this truck was a special order, which meant they had ordered this for a customer but their system had no name attached to it on the computer.  She then goes to ask their truck manager, who orders all the trucks,  and finds out that he had mistakenly ordered this truck based on my hypothetical, wish list two months ago. When we were in his office at that time, he had in error, hit the order button on his computer and had not said anything until now.  Was this providence or what! .... The exact truck I wanted had been ordered and no-one knew unitl i show up on a whim to buy it..... It was meant to be!

Anyway..... here it is.............

Sunday, February 17, 2013

Our 2013 Summer Route/Plan

Click below to see a Google Map of our 2013 Summer Plan.  (Give a minute to load to see the entire route) We are leaving home on March 21st and will return to Florida in mid October..... The map doesn't show all of our stops but it is the route we will be following.  We will spend April & May on the Southern portion and enter Colorado on June 4th. We will be in Colorado during June, July & August then head to Fort Wayne for a few weeks before heading back to Florida in October.  Updates will be made periodically - Hope to see you along the way.

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