It Has Been Freezing Cold In The Treasure Valley

 

We have been enjoying some seriously cold weather here of late.  Definitely not the norm for our area, but not completely unheard of either.  Our next door neighbor was concerned about us on Saturday night and bundled herself up to troop over and offer us their extra beds to stay over at their place.  I was all showered and ready for bed and the RV was toasty warm inside.  I sure appreciated her offer, however. 

So how are we handling the cold weather in an RV?  Surprisingly well, I’d say.  Fortunately we've done enough camping, most of it dry camping, to be prepared for a cold snap.  The fact that our RV is arctic weather rated doesn't hurt either.  The entire underneath is enclosed and insulated. 

Because the RV is so air tight we do tend to have issues with humidity building up.  All it takes is to boil a pot of pasta or wash the dishes and we have moisture.  In the warm weather it isn't a problem because we open the vents and windows and there is plenty of air flow.  In the winter it's a whole different story because we want to keep the heat in.  Sunday morning I awoke to icy windows.  Once the sun comes out though it quickly dissipates.
 

-4 degrees that morning and icy windows

Our two little heaters keep us plenty warm inside.  We have all our winter blankets on our beds now and we wear our warm fuzzy socks and winter pajamas to bed at night.  I have an electric blanket on my bed so I direct my heater to the main portion of the RV at night.  The electric oil filled unit is near the girls end of the RV and heats that area plus the kitchen and bathroom. 

I have the thermostat set at 65° on the gas furnace but I don't have it turned on.  Sunday morning when I got up at 7:00 it was -4° outside.  I turned it on for ten minutes to take the chill off the RV and that was all we needed to bring it back up to a comfortable temperature.  After that I didn't need to turn it on again.  I am impressed with how warm it stays inside.  Sometimes even a little too warm.

 

Our heated water line.

Our biggest challenge is to keep our water running.  We have plenty of heat tape and insulation to protect our lines but I like to error on the side of caution so I turn the water off at night and when we are away from home.  I also drain the water out of the lines.  Just in case.  With the temperatures hovering around zero I noticed the fitting where the water connects to the RV got a little iced up and I added a heat lamp to keep it warm so that doesn’t happen again.  Up until then it hadn't been a problem.  The heated hose was keeping it warm enough. 

I keep extra jugs filled with water in our bathroom so we can flush the potty and wash up when the water is off at night.  I also fill my hot pot so I have my coffee water in the morning.  I've got to have my coffee or else not much will get done.  J 

We are supposed to get above freezing mid week so I'll be taking advantage of that and dumping the holding tank.  Hopefully we aren't going to have a full winter of this weather but one never really knows. 

So for those of you who were wondering, we are doing just fine.  How is your winter weather treating you?