I bought our used tent trailer last June (2008) and we love it. We found it on craigslist, and for us it was a good experience. We wanted a camping trailer that would fit in our garage, so a big travel trailer was not an option. Here's what I learned: - A good used tent trailer is clean, free of mold, and the wood around the sink area is not swollen with water damage. No smoke/dog/food odors whatsoever. Very clean and in good working order. - Have a trailer repair/service shop check out your trailer before you buy - they'll be able to tell you if everything works as it should. Worth the money. They'll also be able to show you how everything works. - It takes a few camping trips before you really get the hang of it. I was nervous about the propane furnace, how the 3-way (gas-elec-battery) fridge worked, and the leveling of the unit. But now that I have it figured out, I'm good to go! - The guy we bought it from kept it in a large clean shop/garage, so it was dry all winter. No mice. I wouldn't buy one that's been kept outside. - No toilet/potty in ours. We only camp in parks with showers and restrooms. I did buy an outdoor shower, though, for use at the campsite for private quick cleanups. - Be careful about the weight - the trailers with the extra storage are typically bigger and weigh more, especially by the time you add the rest of your camping gear (chairs, bikes, rafts, food, etc.). - I wish our camper had a bike rack on top; it's a difficult trick carrying bikes on the racks that go between truck and trailer. - Bear Country: check with the park to see what they say about tents and tent trailers. Food lockers are common in those areas. We survived a severe lightning storm in our tent trailer last summer at Lost Lake in Oregon (and my teenage boys thought it was awesome). - We don't have a generator. Just a good battery. Extended camping trips of 3 days or more might benefit from having a generator, but you'll add weight with that. An extra battery might be easier. - Find a good rv forum like TrailerLife to get a lot of your questions answered. - We have two large propane tanks, and that is more than adequate. The water tank under the trailer holds something like 30 gallons, and you shouldn't fill it until you get to the campground (weight, see?). - There is a bluebook for RV's. Check before you buy. - Our brand is a 10-year-old Jayco, and it's very good. - I bought one of those cabela outdoor kitchens to use since I like space and convenience when I'm cooking. The indoor sink is just used for quick cleanups. - The gas hot water and furnace is awesome; I wouldn't go camping without it again (think cleaning pots/pans, warm water for showering, etc.). - My husband is not mechanically inclined, so it's up to me to make sure it's set up properly and running right, and I do just fine thankyouverymuch. - Getting it level at the sight is SOOO important. There's a lot to learn about using one, but once you figure it out, you're ready to go camping any time. My greatest helper was the trailerlife forum. Really found the experts there extremely knowledgeable and eager to help. Hope this helps. Good luck, and happy camping!! (I can send you pictures of the trailer and the setup if you'd like.)

Might as well bump this again. Most of it has been said, but I'll add that with tents you generally get what you pay for. I wouldn't buy a new tent that costs less than ~$150. And if the place you're shopping for tents has more than a few tents for under $100, I probably wouldn't recommend getting your tent there. That's not to say that WalMart, Target, and the like don't have some serviceable tents, but they sell more bad tents than decent tents. And many of the nicer tents sold by more outdoor-oriented stores have lifetime warranties in case you ever snap a pole or have the shock cords go limp. The above may sound harsh, but a tent is THE piece of gear that can make the difference between a horrible camping experience and a fun one. All it takes is cutting a trip short once, or having to hang sleeping bags out to dry, and the cost difference between a nice tent and a cheap one seems trivial. I can tell you that sitting in a nice Kelty tent during a pretty severe thunderstorm knowing we would stay dry sure beats my old cheap tent where you hoped you wouldn't get too wet. All that said, a tent with a full rain fly is a must. The fly should come almost to the ground on all sides. If there's an open side at the door, the fly needs to have a pretty good awning/overhang so rain doesn't easily drip/blow onto the tent itself. Most good tents have taped/sealed seams from the factory but I usually use SeamGrip on floor corner stitching to keep the holes made by the threads from getting enlarged by stress/age. A footprint and/or tarp under the tent can help keep water out from under then tent floor. These MUST be smaller than the perimeter of the tent floor so any water shedding off the tent/fly walls doesn't run onto the tarp/footprint and then between it and the tent floor. Depending on the temperatures you camp in, you might look for tents that have vents in the rain fly. There are even some tents that have zippers in the tent that provide access to the rain fly vents from inside. If it's raining out and the tent gets steamy (or cold), you can open or close the vents without having to go out in the mud/rain. So I'd recommend getting a new tent: no tarps to try to hang and make sure they don't collect water, no Easy-Ups to lug around, just a good tent/fly/footprint combo that does the job right all by themselves.

whisperlite stove is a good stove. nice to have the flexibility of multi-fuels especially is you're backpacking in another country where white gas is rare. you should really test the stove out to see if a jet stove is really for you. using a liquid fuel stove is a little more work than a canister stove. pressurizing the fuel, priming the stove & cleaning the jets make this kind of stove a chore. my camping friends are 1/3 for jet stoves, 2/3 for canister. jet stoves have the advantage of working better in really cold weather ( below 30 degrees), but watch out for spilled fuel on bare hands....it can cause frost bite at those temperatures. this stove has the shaker needle so it claims to clean it's own jets. you have to prime the jet stove by opening the valve to let a bit of fuel out & lighting it until the manifold is hot enough to vaporize the fuel as it sprays into the burner. i have the msr dragonfly multi fuel stove, but think the whisperlite is a better choice. the dragonfly is really noisy and a bit cumbersome. works great in the snow but now i choose to bring my snow peak gigapower canister stove with a isobutane/lpg canister fuel mixture canister for use in cold weather. you also have to keep the canister warm for better results. as a backup, i also carry the esbit stove. i tried to use it exclusively to see if it would work as a primary stove. it works great, although because the fuel tablets burn for about 12 minutes, you have to get everything ready for your meal beforehand. then after your food is done, you have to switch out & heat some water as the fuel burns out. that way you can have your cup of coffee or cocoa after dinner. some meals will take up the entire burntime though. contrary to reports, you cannot put it out & relight it because what's left of the fuel after you put it out takes too long to light & doesn't get up to the temperature as a straight burn. also, the esbit hexamine tablets are much better than the cogland brand. it took 2 cogland tablets to boil the same amount of water. avoid the trioxane tablets you get at army surplus stores. they are toxic & i couldn't get them to boil the water with 1 tablet. all my tests were done at home : 1780' altitude, 78 degree temperature (didn't get the humidity reading). your actual results will go down as you rise in altitude & drop in temperature. tablet / burntime / practical cooktime / 20 oz water boil time esbit hexamine / 12 minutes / 10 minutes / 8 minutes cogland (2 tablets) / 13 minutes / 9 minutes / 9 minutes trioxane / 5 minutes / 4 minutes / did not boil water a bit more information than i you wanted, but as you can tell i like to test my gear so i can pack efficiently. campers tend to form opinions on gear based generally on only what they own or what's offered at walmart. i try to look at all gear & try to accumulate gear that works efficiently & has been tested in the field. the 3 worst things that can happen are gear that works great at home or in the store, but fails in the field; carrying bulky gear only to find there was a more efficient gear out there or getting a newfangled piece of gear that does many things mediocrely and then going back to your old trusty piece of gear you've camped with for years. Here is a link that might be useful: how to choose a backpacking stove

Elaine - my first popup was a '96 Coleman (really a Fleetwood) that had the front storage trunk and that was a continual leaking problem for some of those models (up until maybe 2002). Anyway, there were some posts over on www.popupexplorer.com where repairs were made and some got into detail on how they made them. Anyway, had never heard of a leak problem in the front wall of a Palamino before - may I suggest - (if you have not already done so), go over there to popup explorer and make a post with your problem and see what kind of response you get. There's a gazillion popupers over there and someone might have just had the same problem and have some detailed information you could use. Some years ago a friend had one of those orginal popups that had come out in the late 1960's (Apache?) and for some reason he had some wall problems that also affected the bed rail on one side of the camper. What he did was to cut a length of 2 X 4 to fit for a brace which worked for him until he found the time to repair it right. Could that be something that might work for you until the end of this camping season? Dale