[VAC] Re: Read it and weep

["Keith and Jean Williams" <kandjwilliams@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

First, thanks to Bill Worden for posting this.  I had not seen it.  But my
reaction was like that of Toby Folwick....why weep?

A year ago we sold our Class A motorhome - mostly because I did not like the
driving experience.  We went looking for a small, light, high quality travel
trailer that we could pull with a tow vehicle small enough to use
comfortably the "other" 330 days a year.  After quite a bit of looking we
concluded that "small" and "high quality" did not go together in the new
trailers that we saw.  The one exception we found was the Airstream Bambi.
But we balked at the $28,000.

We wound up fixing up a 1973 Argosy 22.  The article Bill sent sounds a
little like our Argosy.  Full of plastic, fake wood (vinyl) coverings on the
cabinets and drawer fronts, flimsy partitions, vinyl on the floor, no
gauges,  no built in stereo, no combo ceiling lights/air vents,  etc., etc.

The 28 year old Argosy looked pretty grim when we found it.  But after 28
years those plastic cabinets and drawers were all fully functional and the
vinyl overlays on doors and partitions still looked as good as they ever did
(not like genuine birch, but not all that bad).  With a fresh coat of paint
(yes...I know...its somehow wrong), new wheels, new tires and baby moon
hubcaps the old girl looks pretty good to us.  (And who really needs a
holding tank for the gray water?)

Don't get me wrong - I admire the restored and preserved "real" Airstreams
that I have seen - they are truly beautiful.  That's what we were looking
for when we came across the Argosy.

But I think it is possible to make a high quality well engineered product
using modern materials (plastic interior, formed metal chassis, strand board
floor, etc.) to save weight and cost.  I salute Airstream for trying.

But I don't appreciate the comment about how the sun plays on our graying
hair as we dawdle along the highways.

Keith Williams
Argosy 22