Above: Walking the dogs through the used luxury RV lot.

We knew this week would be busy and we didn’t want the dogs underfoot during the entire process. We did some research on Tampa dog daycare locations beforehand and decided on Fuzzie Buddies due to a lot of positive reviews and all the vaccinations that were required for every dog. We put the dogs into daycare early each morning and picked them up in the evening during most of the week. It worked out great for us and the dogs—during our second day’s drop-off, Opie charged into the place and didn’t look back!

On Monday, a Lazydays service technician came over to our delivery intake area to go over Rover with us. Some RVers state this is usually the inspection checklist time when the technician will test everything with you, and also use this time to explain how it all works. We didn’t find this to be the case. Our technician did some explaining but didn’t do a lot of testing or checking. It was more of a “this is how you fill up the water tank, this is how you flush the hot water tank, this is how…” Good thing we spent most of sunday evening going through our own checklist. We did tell the technician the various issues we found and he documented them all for when they would take the coach in to do the work. After he left, we continued to explore the inside and outside of the coach (including the roof).

We spent Tuesday at the new Tax Collector’s office in Lakeland (Jason warned us to stay out of Tampa) to get our Florida driver’s licenses and get our vehicles registered. The building was originally the headquarters for Publix supermarkets, and the Tax Collector’s office kept most of the original structure and styling. It was surprisingly comfortable in the waiting area although I can’t be certain since our wait was all of five minutes. We worked with the nicest person I have ever encountered at any DMV office EVER. It did take a while since we had to get FL licenses, register Red, register Rover, pay sales tax on Red since we moved it into the state less than six months after buying it, and register to vote. After about 1.5 hours, we were officially Florida residents!

The nicest DMV we’ve been to in our lives.

Wednesday was our RV Driver’s Confidence class. If you buy from Lazydays or stay at their campground, they offer a free driver confidence class, with classroom time in the morning and driving time in the afternoon. It’s a good class that takes a lot of guesswork out of driving, turning (without clipping corners), and backing into camping spots. It helped assuage some of my fears about driving such a big vehicle.

By Friday, Lazydays had finished most of the work on Rover. We only reported a few major issues, and they fixed them all: the bedroom keypad wasn’t working, one leveling jack was leaking fluid, and one basement storage’s lock popped right out (the entire lock). The majority of the other items were pretty minor: a small area around an antenna wasn’t completely caulked, some cabinets didn’t lock into place properly, some paint scratches on the outside, staples sticking out of the carpet, and a few other things. I don’t feel like it should have taken them a week to finish all the work but they do seem awfully busy and a little disorganized. Often we were told they would start work by 9am but nothing would get started till at least noon or later.

 Sunset over the 220 Lazydays service bays.

Since they finished most of the work we wanted, we decided it was time to take this puppy out and test our skills at the nearby Lazydays campground.

Also on Monday Lazydays set up Red for flat towing—that involved taking apart the whole front-end, installing a tow base plate, a supplemental braking system so that when we hit the brakes in Rover, Red’s brakes activate too, and a kit to sync Red’s brake lights and tail lights with Rover’s. On Friday we hooked up the two vehicles for the first time and tested everything out before driving across the street to the Lazydays campground.Mike

Our new tow bar and umbilical cable set up to tow Red.

At the Lazydays delivery area, Seffner FL.