I gave up trying to read it all on page 12...
Anyway, we bought our camper on Labor Day weekend in 2017, we've got an '18 Palomino Puma bumper pull. We talked about it for a long time and my nephew in Houston was about to get married so we thought we would just jump into RV'ing and take a two week road trip around the wedding. Just like troph I went out and bought a bigger truck immediately too. Our trailer dry weighs around 8900 lbs so that was a little much for my F150.
The first truck was a '10 F-350 daully with the 6.4L diesel. I had it for 2 years. I loved the diesel torque and the stability of the duals but even though I live in a small rural town having a dually as a daily driver wasn't very practical. Plus maintenance on the diesel was beginning to strain the budget ($80 oil change, replacing the dual batteries, starter, oh and the fan clutch was a motherfucker.) So when it was time to replace the tires I just traded it in. Plus at the time I thought 10-11 MPG was bad.
The truck I have now is a '15 Silverado 3500 with the 6.0L gas engine. It's my fist GM truck. It will probably be my last GM truck. It pulls the trailer OK I guess, but it is pretty gutless and any kind of up hill has it almost redlined. Oh and thirsty, with the trailer I get about 6 MPG. My plan is to just hang on to it though for a few years, I'd like to get one of those new F350's with the 7.3 gas engine next but I'm gonna have to wait a few years until the used ones drop down into my price range.
Our trailer is a Palomino Puma 32 BHKS, its a 36 foot bumper pull with a bunkhouse. Our first big trip was my nephew's wedding trip. I live northeast of Tulsa and he was getting married in Houston. So I took two weeks off and we drove to New Mexico. We spent a couple days in Red River then spent a night in Roswell, then the next night we stayed in San Angelo on our way to Houston. Then Houston for a few days in a commercial park for the wedding. Then we went to New Orleans and stayed at Bayou Segnette for a couple days then headed back home, with a stop at Petit Jean State Park in Arkansas (this was probably my favorite). It was a handful of a trip for us as first timers. We've taken maybe 15 or so trips since and made some boring youtube videos of some of them (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCp_VFVVO_bMTtKx_WOSJ1BA/videos) 😃
My girls are in dance and it's been pretty handy to have for their competition trips, we usually try to stay in a state park nearby and take an extra day on those trips to enjoy camping. Haven't used it so much this year though, the competitions were all cancelled in person. We had planned a trip for early summer to Mt Rushmore but put it off because of the 'Rona. Haven't done much recently either because we are saving up for a trip to Telluride in January.
I kinda love/hate the trailer though.... I really enjoy where it takes us and the time with the kids but I don't sleep very well in it. I have a few sleeping disorders that I have been able to kind of get under control in the last few years but the tiny bedroom in the trailer gives me trouble. We've been talking about upgrading to fifth wheel and right now this one is on the top of our wish list...