We had a terrible first time out in our new RV. When going into the campsite, Cedar Breaks Park in Georgetown, Texas, I had my doubts about some of the trees we were going under. Still, with the abundance of other fifth wheels traveling the same paths we were, I figured we were pretty safe.

After setting up the trailer, going inside, and getting everything organized, it began to storm. Since I was a little worried about some of the trees we had gone under, I walked through the trailer to make sure we didn’t have any leaks. Sure enough, we had a major leak in the front right corner of the trailer!

I started at the leak I found and started tracing my way back along the wall where I found it, and found it ended about ten feet down. Got out and went up on the roof, and found about a 10′ perforation down the door side of the trailer where a tree branch (or branches, because there are several) grabbed the roof and ripped through it like a fingernail scratching down a trash bag. I tried to find a local source of Eternabond, a roof patching tape that can be used in emergency like this, but couldn’t find it. We opted to pack up and take it back to the covered storage lot, to minimize water damage to the brand new RV. I’ll definitely be purchasing some Eternabond and adding it to an emergency repair kit I’m putting together.

Some water also got on my laptop, and now the keyboard isn’t working properly. Everything else checks out fine with a USB keyboard, so the damage was minimal. It has six months of on-site repair left with accidental damage protection, so I filed a claim and Dell is sending out a new keyboard for it.

Leaving the camp, we found the first stages of flooding, with water 3-5″ deep over the road, deep enough so that going through them at 20mph threw water up over the hood of the truck and onto the windshield. Luckily we didn’t have any problems getting back to the storage lot, and it was a good test of how the rig handles in adverse conditions – which fortunately it did very well.

Back at the storage lot, we pulled it under the covered awning and spent some time drying off everything with bath towels, and then going over things again with paper towels to get everything as dry as possible. We’re going to go back in a couple hours and set up some box fans to circulate some air and hopefully dry out any remaining water in the walls and ceiling before any mold starts growing.

We called the insurance company on the way home and started a claim, and they said it should be covered under our comprehensive plan for a $790 deductible, but they could not tell us for sure until an adjuster comes out and takes a look. That should happen on Monday. I sure hope they cover it, because I don’t want to dish out $10K for a new roof.