Remember those days, back in High School, when we looked forward to Driver's Ed? Some kids in the class had already been driving. Some never sat behind the wheel. All so exciting!
One of the commitments we made while researching and subsequently
purchasing a motorhome, was that we would go to driving school.
Well, today was our day. Frank was the experienced one (with at least a full hour and a handful of test-drives under his belt). I, on the other hand, have barely spent 5 minutes in the passenger seat, much less the driver's! Needless to say, I was VERY anxious about the driving part of this class.
There are two parts to the class - classroom and actual driving. The classroom part was great! Our instructor Barney was terrific - very informative, humorous and patient. We really learned a lot of tips and tricks to make our driving, turning, reversing and parking experience so much easier.
No only that, he authorized permission for the passenger to advise the driver of things coming up, like brake lights, emergency vehicles, lane drifting, cars in the right-hand lane. Finally! Someone who recognizes the importance of being a D.C.P (Diligent Co Pilot)! (Or as he called it Nag-igator.) (In all fairness, he did express the importance of switching drivers so there was equal time of being the DCP.
The classroom part was good, but as mentioned before, I was anxious (ok, downright nervous) about driving this huge loaf of bread on wheels. We had a few hours to kill before the driving part so we ventured to camping/RV Mecca a.k.a.
Camping World. (This place is to camping what BassPro is to fishing/boating/hunting.)
The time came for me to get those butterflies in order - the road part was about to start. And it was for real...no simulators!
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| One of the two motorhomes we would do the driving portion in. |
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| Barney was showing us how the "dots system" works. |
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| Barney getting things ready to doing a three-point turn to back the motorhome into a space. |
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| I bravely volunteered to be the spotter. And yes, that RV will eventually be in the spot behind me. |
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| No toes or cones were crushed during this demonstration. |
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| Frank in the driver's seat of our motorhome. |
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| Frank in the driving school RV. |
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| "Student Driver" |
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Keeping it between the lines!
(Unfortunately, there won't be any orange cones laid out for me in the "real world".) |
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| We passed! |
After all is said and done, it wasn't as bad as I built it up to. I guess the experience with the boat trailer helped. I can now say I have an hour's worth of time in a motorhome, 20 minutes driving.
Looks like we'll be looking for the nearest WalMart, church or school parking lots to do some practicing in. (I know I would feel a lot more comfortable!)
