Hello! My hubby and I are early retirees. We recently moved back to our hometown of Minneapolis after 35 years in Chicago. We have spent the summer getting reacquainted with camping in Northern MN. We have been loving it, but geez, sleeping on the ground gets harder as you age!! We are seriously looking at the very cool QS 8.0, although we haven't seen it in person. I'm hoping to learn a lot from the experienced owners around here.
I have so so many questions!! Like, can we tow it with a Subaru Forester? How much do you think I can get a dealer to come down? Any tips on where we can find one used...there don't seem to be many available!
Thanks for for adding me to the group. :)
You just repeated our story, except ours started in 2010. We thought long and hard about an 8.0, but that year Quicksilver came out with the 8.1, which has an asymmetrical layout, queen bed on one end, not-quite-twin on the other. We bought one, named her Rose, and have taken her everywhere. We chose the 8.1 because we reasoned that the non-standard beds in the 8.0 seemed too narrow for comfortable sleeping for two, and my wife and I have never slept apart. She also sleeps cold so having the, um, hot body :P (rofl) alongside helps. There is a learning curve for getting in and out of bed because there's only the one exit, so if you don't mind or even prefer sleeping separately then the 8.0 might be perfect. Either way we LOVE our camper, although illness has seriously curtailed our camping this year.
Rose has her own album on Flickr with FAR too many pictures, but you can get an idea of either an 8.0 or 8.1: https://www.flickr.com/gp/43619751@N06/78TG3c
Edit: YES you can tow with a Forester. Rosie's tow vehicle was a 6-cyl Ford Escape, but we now have a 2015 4-cyl Escape that tows the camper without breathing hard, and better gas mileage too. They have a very low profile on the road so there's hardly any difference. As to negotiating a price I don't even know how. Rose cost about $8,000 brand new in 2010. Used ones are advertised right here on the forum often. People upgrade. I should point out that Quicksilvers are VERY spartan! Not for everyone! We treat ours as a big tent in a box. All we really wanted was to get up off the ground, but once we did we camped and camped and camped and camped, which is why so many pictures. But from our viewpoint you have to accept that you are still basically tenting. We never cook inside , we have never even hooked up the sink. I do have an electric hot pot for coffee when it's raining and that's pretty much it.
Chuck, thanks for your reply! Yes, the Quicksilvers are bare bones, but I'm a minimalist at heart, so I would be really happy with that. My husband, well.... :-/ We are also considering the smallest Jayco pop up, Jayco Sport 8sd, but then we would have to get a new tow vehicle. However, I do like that the Jayco has a real door. I'm sick of zipping and unzipping our REI tent and our Colman screen tent.
Wow, love your Flickr album. Looks like you and your wife travel pretty light. How do you transport your fresh food when you are camping? If we get a QS, I think we would need an electric cooler of some sort. Is that what most QS campers use? Food storage and preparation is important for us, as my husband has numerous serious food allergies. That's our biggest problem with the QS--lack of refrigerator.
Can you put bicycles on your "back porch?" We want to be able to bring our bikes along wherever we go.
We will be tenting the rest of the summer, but we have a snowbird trip to Fort De Soto in Florida planned for Jan-Feb, and I want to be up off the ground by then!
[quote timestamp="1472279226" source="/post/24207/thread" author="@2ndwindcamper"]Chuck, thanks for your reply! Yes, the Quicksilvers are bare bones, but I'm a minimalist at heart, so I would be really happy with that. My husband, well.... :-/ We are also considering the smallest Jayco pop up, Jayco Sport 8sd, but then we would have to get a new tow vehicle. However, I do like that the Jayco has a real door. I'm sick of zipping and unzipping our REI tent and our Colman screen tent.
Wow, love your Flickr album. Looks like you and your wife travel pretty light. How do you transport your fresh food when you are camping? If we get a QS, I think we would need an electric cooler of some sort. Is that what most QS campers use? Food storage and preparation is important for us, as my husband has numerous serious food allergies. That's our biggest problem with the QS--lack of refrigerator.
Can you put bicycles on your "back porch?" We want to be able to bring our bikes along wherever we go.
We will be tenting the rest of the summer, but we have a snowbird trip to Fort De Soto in Florida planned for Jan-Feb, and I want to be up off the ground by then![/quote]There are multiple thoughts on using the rear deck on the QS for transporting bicycles. You can use the search function that is on the site for bike racks or rear deck mods or you can look at the Quicksilver section of the forum for ideas. You can find ideas in the subsection "10.0 rear deck", in the subsection "Quicksilver mods/upgrades" or in the subsection "Quicksilver popups". Plenty of ideas for you to steal shamelessly. Whatever you buy - enjoy the journey in camping.
Steve & Dana, thanks. You're right, I found some great ideas!
[quote timestamp="1472279226" author="@2ndwindcamper" source="/post/24207/thread"]Chuck, thanks for your reply! Yes, the Quicksilvers are bare bones, but I'm a minimalist at heart, so I would be really happy with that. My husband, well.... :-/ We are also considering the smallest Jayco pop up, Jayco Sport 8sd, but then we would have to get a new tow vehicle. However, I do like that the Jayco has a real door. I'm sick of zipping and unzipping our REI tent and our Colman screen tent.
Wow, love your Flickr album. Looks like you and your wife travel pretty light. How do you transport your fresh food when you are camping? If we get a QS, I think we would need an electric cooler of some sort. Is that what most QS campers use? Food storage and preparation is important for us, as my husband has numerous serious food allergies. That's our biggest problem with the QS--lack of refrigerator.
Can you put bicycles on your "back porch?" We want to be able to bring our bikes along wherever we go.
We will be tenting the rest of the summer, but we have a snowbird trip to Fort De Soto in Florida planned for Jan-Feb, and I want to be up off the ground by then![/quote]
I'm glad Steve & Dana talked about bikes since I can't answer that one!
The zipping and unzipping thing can be a nuisance, but everything depends on the bug population, and sometimes the wind. We always use the left zipper (as seen from outside, the one over the latch on the door). I've discovered that if the bugs aren't bad and there's little wind I can just let the flap fall back on the canvas and it covers enough, especially if given a pat. I also keep a fly swatter handy at all times. ;)
Food is obviously important, but we camp mainly to tour as opposed to camp-camping. Years ago we camp-camped and cooked and cleaned up and the whole shebang, but we tended to do it like backpackers, using a lot of dried stuff (even "army eggs") and canned (since car camping the weight doesn't matter as much). I hate dealing with coolers and ice, replenishing ice, but my understanding is that the portable fridges are very inefficient, partly because you can't control the ambient temperature and their insulation isn't as thick as a home fridge. My brother-in-law had one, and when it quit (early) he started just using it as an ice chest. We are very fortunate to have no food allergies! You have a challenge and we can't help much, because ---
--- the simple truth is, we CHEAT. We are touring anyway, so we eat out a lot. We're also old so we don't eat as much as we use'ta (which begs the question why are we still fat? (rofl) ). I carry a stove, often just a one-burner propane, and I have a hot plate and an electric pot just for boiling water. With those I can heat soup or beans or Dinty Moore, and I can make instant coffee (some people will drink any tamn thing :P ), but we have been spotted breaking fast at McDonald's ??? (oh so that's why) and dinner off the senior menu at IHOP.
I have a 10.0 and tow with my Subaru Outback. Haven't had any issue and I live in Big Bear, CA at about 7500ft up winding steep grade. No matter where we go we need to get back up our mountain. So lots of mountain driving and it's just fine. I think you'll be fine with the 8.0 and your Forester. Subie's are tougher than they seem and you'll enjoy the gas mileage you save over a bigger tow vehicle. As fro the back deck, if you even think you might want it then get it. Mine has the deck and it's great. I mounted J track around it and can pretty much strap anything I want down. Also amazon has a weatherproof bag barrier that is made to fit a rear cargo holder and it fits perfectly on the deck so you can leave all your gear packed and strapped on there and it's ready to go and protected. :)
We tow our 10.0 with our outback 2.5 CVT.
Just took our fully-loaded camper to the CAT scales to see what weights we were looking at. In full-camp regalia our camper only weighs 1460 lbs. and since my outback is rated to tow 2700 lbs it ties quite nicely, even through the Appalachian mountains on our last trip!