Current Location: Nashville KOA, Nashville, Tennessee

One thing we lost between the last trailer and this one is a back bumper. On the previous trailer, we had put a bolt-on 2″ receiver on the rear bumper and mounted our bike rack there to carry our bikes. With the new trailer, there is no bumper. There are brackets on the frame for a 1 1/4″ hitch for a bike rack (our rack has an adapter so it would still work), but we’ve heard it is rather flimsy and allows the bikes to bounce around a lot.

We contemplated other bike storage options, including a Thule or Yakima roof rack option. That was going to cost $700 to $800 more, though. Instead of spending that type of money storing our bikes on the roof of the truck, which would put the bikes back out in the weather, we decided to order a couple folding bikes from Amazon. That way, we can fold them up, put them in their bags and store them in the trailer or the back of the truck while we travel.

Boxes the bikes came in

Bike ready to ride

Malcolm looked at several different options and read or watched various reviews and decided on the Schwinn Loop folding bike. They only have one color – black – so we ordered two of the same bikes through Amazon. They were delivered to Malcolm’s office on Friday. He unboxed them and put them in their respective storage bags (that came with the bikes) and managed to put both bikes in the trunk of his rented Toyota Corolla. Not bad.

Bike bagged up

Bikes in the trunk

On Saturday, we made a round trip between Nashville and Wetumpka to our storage unit (9 hours of driving, total). When we were there a few weeks ago, we took a lot of our containerized items in the trailer and put them in the storage unit. We then loaded up a lot of items for Malcolm’s brother and Val’s sister and took them with us to Kentucky. We came on to Nashville from Kentucky. So, on Saturday we headed down to load up the truck with the items we had taken out of the trailer to begin with.

Truck loaded up

We rolled back into the campground here around 7:00 PM and decided to wait until Sunday to unload everything from the truck (and put a few items, including the hitch, back in the truck).

This morning we headed over to First Baptist Church in Hendersonville for morning service. Today’s service was a show that the 3rd through 5th graders were putting on. It was fun and well done. After church, we headed to Texas Roadhouse for lunch, then on back to the trailer.

Once we changed clothes, we unloaded the truck and put stuff away in the trailer. Malcolm put the stuff that normally rides in the back of the truck back in the truck. Afterwards, we decided to go shop for new bike helmets and seats for the new bikes (the ones that came with them are not very comfortable).

We bought new seats and water bottle holders at Target and found new helmets and water bottles (on sale) at Dick’s Sporting Goods. Once home, we replaced seats, put on our helmets and rode around the park for a bit. Malcolm grilled some chicken for dinner and we took another short ride after dinner.

Malcolm’s back to work in the morning (for another two weeks).