Prepping to say goodbye.
As soon as we got back from our weekend in Bandon, we set about getting Bessie ready to sell. It took us a day to unload all our last possessions from her, including the artwork and knick-knacks we’d added along the way. I took photos as we depersonalized our coach, and it was kind of sad. All the things we’d lovingly put in place before we left: the tapestries Kate had made to cover the TVs, the Then/Now photos us posing 34 years ago and reposing now, the prayer flags our son had given us, photos of my Mom whose estate had made this journey possible for us, and the flying cat who witnessed every mile of it.
Dancing Women by Carol Grigg.
Then there were the special things we’d added during our travels. The Motawi art tile I’d bought for Kate’s birthday in Ann Arbor. A watercolor done by a friend we met at a campground near Santa Barbara. Prints we’d picked up at an art fair in San Diego and at the Ohio Lesbian Festival. Plaques from the Moose Festival in the Adirondacks. It’s best not to acquire much when you’re living in an RV, so the purchases we made were well-thought-out and meaningful.
It took us another 12-hour day to clean the interior and outside bins. We’re pretty clean to begin with, and I think we did a good job of keeping Bessie in good shape. But Kate was a housecleaner for years, and a little OCD to boot, I think. So her standards are Q-tip HIGH, and I had no choice but to meet them. We washed down every possible surface in that coach. Ceiling fans, air vents, window runners, above and under the slides. Kate scrubbed that floor on her hands and knees until it looked new. I vacuumed and scrubbed all the outside bins. Washed windows, sanitized the fridge and oven, toilet and shower. By the time we were done, I swear that coach was spotless.
Goodbye dancing rainbow people.
The next day we tackled the outside, washing the roof and the whole exterior, and the windows in and out. The day after that, Bessie went into the shop to get her windshield replaced. So now she really does look brand new.
I put an ad in the Eugene paper on Saturday, and up on Craig’s List. On Monday I bought a listing on RV Trader, which is the main national online market for RVs. On Sunday, we had our first showing. A middle-aged couple came with their daughter-in-law and a friend. They stayed for almost an hour and seemed very interested, but we haven’t heard back.
Legend of a journey-maker.
We’re asking $85,000. Its original list price was $117,000 and we put in over $2,000 in extras. NADA, the online tool for determining RV “bluebook” puts it between $90,000 and $108,000.
Blog Reader Discount: Any of my blog readers get an automatic $5,000 discount. So if you want to scoop up this well-loved, well-cared-for beauty of a Bessie, this legend of a journey-maker, click on the Contact tab and shoot me a message. Hard as it is to say goodbye to her, we’d love to see her go to someone who has followed our journey and knows her history.