HGTV’s Chris Lambton shares his favorites from RV 2014.
Chris Lambton talks his favorites from RV 2014 and doomsday preparation with MyFixitUpLife’s Mark and Theresa.
Mark: We’re back inside MyFixitUpLife with my wife, Theresa.
Theresa: My husband, Mark and I’m so excited about what we’re going to be talking about right now that I can’t stand it.
Mark: Do you want me to sing?
Theresa: I can’t stand it because the RV culture is something that I’m fascinated by.
Mark: My wife’s totally fascinated by it.
Theresa: I watch the show every year and all of the tricked out RVs that you can buy and it’s a whole culture. It’s like tailgating or something. I don’t know I can’t describe it. It’s like watching the Mummers in Philadelphia on New Year’s Day. I can’t stop watching it and I’m fascinated.
Mark: Maybe our guest, who’s host of the RV show on HGTV.
Theresa: Yes.
Mark: Chris Lambton can help you out with that. Chris, did you stay here or did you drive off in an RV?
Chris: After a week of exploring RVs, I wanted to buy every single RV I saw. I got totally immersed in the RV culture.
Theresa: Yes, fully immersed. This is what I want to know about because …
Mark: Immersion.
Theresa: Because when I was growing up, I thought of RVs in like campers and stuff and you can sleep in them and then there was the weird shower or something. The thing folds out and it becomes something else.
Mark: Which I love.
Theresa: Now these RVs are so tricked out that they’re nicer than our house.
Chris: Yeah, I got to say we went to this as a novice with RVs. I never stayed in one, I’ve only seen a few and so when I got to Hersey, Pennsylvania and got to explore all these RVs, I was completely blown away. I went into this Class A RV that was twice the size of my apartment when I lived in New York City and it’s on wheels. It was ridiculous.
Theresa: Wow.
Mark: Now what was the most over the top, wild feature you saw in any of these?
Chris: Oh my God, I don’t even know where to start. This one tricked out Class A, so a Class A is gigantic, this thing is 50 feet long. It had three TVs over 40 inches in the thing, three.
Theresa: Wait, wait, wait. Three over 50 inches and it is, how long?
Mark: It’s a car.
Chris: It was over 45 feet long, it had three inside and one outside. It actually had four.
Theresa: Oh my goodness.
Mark: Four because that was almost disappointed when you said three.
Theresa: What is …
Chris: Yeah, when I said three, I couldn’t live with three, Mark. Come on now.
Mark: I mean come on that’s bogus.
Theresa: For an RV that has four televisions … What’s the setting like in there? It’s all built in and then it becomes a bed or something too?
Chris: You walk in and it’s got all these slide outs and it just gets bigger and bigger. It’s like a Transformer and all these slide outs roll out and there’s tons of seating. Every seat transforms into a bed at night so it sleeps eight to 12 people. It’s got a master bedroom, two baths. It’s really mind blowing and then when you walk outside, it’s got the outdoor TV and then you push a button and this awning rolls out another 20 feet so you’ve got an outdoor entertainment area. It’s absolutely ridiculous.
Theresa: Now when you were hosting the show and you’re walking around talking about the RVs, did they have trouble getting you to leave each one and where you just like setting up and relaxing and chilling and enjoying the whole thing?
Chris: At times, we had trouble having me talk about them. I’m walking in this thing and My mouth would be just like slack jawed. I’d be like, “What, I don’t even know what to say.” This is ridiculous.
Mark: Did you actually get angry at any RV manufacturers saying, “Look, that’s enough. It’s too nice, my house isn’t this nice and you can drive this thing to the gas station. I’m mad at you.”
Chris: They would be like, “All leather interior, we have granite countertops.” I’m like, “I don’t even have granite countertops in my kitchen.” “All stainless steel appliances” and I’m looking at it and I’m like, “Okay, this kitchen in this little RV is better than in my own house that I live in every day of the year. This is just an RV that you ride around in and it has top notch everything inside.”
Theresa: Now I have to ask this question and it’s very random, it’s very unusual for me to ask a random question, right honey?
Mark: Yeah. Chris, in fact, I’m so surprised right now that I don’t know what to do next.
Theresa: I’m just starting to think about the whole RV culture and the whole pet culture and do those things … is there a place in one of these RVs where they sort of smack together and there’s an RV that ha
s an area for a dog, that’s tricked out?
Chris: Theresa, are you ready for this one?
Theresa: Yeah, yeah.
Chris: In one of the RVs I saw, right? In the passenger’s side door, so if you’re sitting there and Mark’s driving the RV and you’re sitting in the passenger’s side door and you know the little dog that likes fresh air, at the bottom of the door there’s a little slide you slide and there’s a screen so the dog can sit by your feet and have fresh air coming in through the screen.
Theresa: Oh my goodness, they do collide, the pet world and the RV world.
Chris: Theresa, you thought that was a far out question, it’s really not. It’s a valid question that all these RV guys get. Like, “What about my dog?” “Don’t worry, there’s a doggy door and a little doggy vent for fresh air for your dog.”
Theresa: Now is there like doggy chair that then folds into a doggy bed at night too like the people chairs do?
Chris: Believe me, I’m sure they have everything for dogs, it’s ridiculous.
Mark: Now did you see the Airstream kinds of aluminum trailers, did they have that kind of fifth wheel?
Chris: Yeah, the Airstreams are my favorite. Those are like throwbacks. They had Airstreams by … They had an LL Bean version of one. They were almost too nice like if you have kids, you don’t want one of these because the interior … it’s so modern and sleek and beautiful. You wouldn’t want a kid dropping jelly or peanut butter on these seats, man. It’s almost too nice.
Theresa: Wow.
Mark: Ah man and that’s the kind of thing that pulls behind if you have a van or a truck or something?
Chris: Yeah, yeah. That’s one of those towables so you need to have either a big SUV or a big person F150 in order to pull one of these bad boys.
Theresa: Oh wow.
Mark: Right, right. If you park it in your yard and how many people did you ask, “Would you mind if you parked that in my yard?” People just live in it.
Chris: Yeah, man. It would be like Cousin Eddy. There’s an RV.
Theresa: Oh yeah. That’s true. Are there RVs that are especially designed for tailgaters too?
Chris: I’ve been doing FCC callers beforehand and those tailgaters, they take their tailgating seriously and almost all of them have the RVs with the awning that goes out, the outdoor TVs and they throw out couches. Most of those big RVs have a lot of storage in these and that’s where people store, literally store couches so when they go to these big football games, they pull the couches and they roll out fake sod and they literally have an outdoor entertainment area on the side of their RVs.
Theresa: Wow.
Mark: I’m passing judgment with every word that you say in an East Coast, Northeastern guy and I’m trying to find a way to make fun of this and I can’t.
Theresa: He can’t.
Mark: Because I’m drowning in envy.
Theresa: Yeah, it’s just too amazing. I can’t get over it and I kind of want to go on an RV trip now.
Chris: The one thing that Patton said to me before I left was don’t buy an RV because she knows how spontaneous I am and I was really close to. I’m like, “All right, what do I need to do to drive off the lot with one of these today?”
Mark: Was it like the cheesy used car salesman guy, “What can we do to put you in this car today?’
Chris: “An RV today?” Yeah.
Theresa: If you could buy an RV or if they’re going to give one, which one would you pick of all the ones that you saw?
Chris: I got to drive a Class A and I was nervous driving that thing, it was huge. I think I would go with a little smaller size and I think the best thing for your money is a towable, that way you can still have your truck, you can park it, you can tow it and you get a lot of RV space for your money. I thought the towables were really cool.
Theresa: That’s cool.
Mark: Did they have really small ones, like micro RVs that one or two people can fit in?
Theresa: Oh like the pop up ones?
Mark: Yeah, you could tow with a coop or a mini or something.
Chris: Yeah, they make something now that actually if you have a motorcycle, you can tow it behind a motorcycle.
Mark: Come on.
Chris: They make some other cool ones. Yeah and Mark, you’ll like this. You know the end of the world people who build all the bunkers and stuff, well they make an end of the world little mini RV that if you have a little car. You can load this little end of the world RV thing up and just drive with it. You can pull it behind a car or a motorcycle.
Theresa: The end of the world RV.
Mark: Because you know damnation alley, you’ve got to be …
Theresa: You’ll be protected in an RV.
Mark: No, you’ve got to have a motorcycle and a shotgun and strap it across your back
.
Theresa: Oh my God, that sounds so romantic. We’re going to do that, we’re planning our summer vacation right now and I think that’s where we’re going with it.
Mark: Chris, is what you’re trying to tell us is you’re a prepper?
Chris: I am definitely a doomsday prepper. I’m going to buy one of those mini RVs and call it a day.
Theresa: Oh my God, that is so good.
Mark: What’s in it though?
Chris: What’s in it is radio, A/C, they have a mini kitchen, all on propane. A lot of solar panels. They tacked a ton and it’s a little doable RV.
Mark: Wow, unbelievable.
Theresa: Wow, unbelievable.
Mark: We can pack as much as we can into segment.
Theresa: We did.
Mark: We have to go, so check out Chris on Twitter @ChrisLambton13.
Theresa: Check out the RV show on HGTV and we’ve got to go to break.
Mark: We’ll be back with more MyFixitUpLife.
