The 11 things you must have when you pick up your travel trailer
- Outdoors Made Simple
- Jan 25, 2022
- 7 min read
Updated: Jan 29, 2022
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Once you’ve decided which travel trailer you are going to buy and have made your purchase it seems like the hard part should be behind you, But wait! You now have to pick up your trailer and figure out how to actually use it! Today we are going to focus on the things you absolutely must have in order to pick up your trailer and head right to the campground and set up camp. If you are transitioning from a tent or a pop-up camper, there are some things that your trailer needs in order for you to have all the features functioning at your site. As a reformed pop-up camper owner, some of these were obvious but some were not and some were more nuanced than we had previously experienced with our relatively simple pop-up camper.
We picked up our camper many miles from home and headed directly to a campground. We bought our trailer from a Canadian manufacturer (you can read about it here) and because the US/Canadian boarder was closed, they had to bring it to us and basically drop it off in a parking lot!
We knew we would have to have at least the basics to tow the trailer and set up camp with us but I found the lists of things you “need” to be incredibly overwhelming and dauntingly long! In this blog post we will cover the 5 categories of things with 11 items total you are going to have to have to get connected and stable at your campsite.
To cover your bases, you will need to think about Driving, Stability, Water, Power, and Sewer. You can just skip to the list here or read on to see more detail about each.
Or watch the video:
Driving
We will assume that you have your hitch figured out (but we will do a post on that in the future). There are 2 things you need in the driving category: a brake controller, and towing mirrors.
Brake Controller
While not true of all trailers, generally a trailer over 1500 lbs dry weight will come with brakes on the trailer itself. This is very helpful in controlling your trailer speed and stopping safely. The brakes are connected to the car via a 7-pin power connection that connects from the trailer to your car. You have to get this installed on your car prior to towing your trailer (it also controls the lights on the trailer). The brake controller, sets the power level of the brakes and allows you to activate them in an emergency. They come in a lot of variety and options from wired to wireless.
A wired brake controller is mounted into the dash of your car and wired into the car directly. This is nice if you want to have something seamlessly integrated into your car dash and don't want to have to plug something in each time you tow. These have to be installed at a mechanic or at least someone knowledgable about your car.
A wireless brake controller lets you control the brakes via a small device that sits between the trailer and the car. You control the brakes using a device you will plug into your 12V outlet in your car. The device will sit on your console or dash. Like the image to the right of the Prodigy wireless brake controller.
We were intending to get the Prodigy brake controller but the dealership we bought our Alto from forgot to install it. Because they delivered the trailer across the boarder, we had no way to get back and have them fix the error.
We could have bought and installed the Prodigy ourselves but instead we bought a Curt Echo wireless brake controller that doesn't require any installation. It connects between the 7-pin plug of your trailer and the tow vehicle. Instead of something extra attached to your car dash (we already have a backup camera connected), you use an app on your phone to connect to the device. There is a small emergency button that sits on our dash we can push to activate the brakes without the phone app. We were a little nervous about this at first but it has worked well so far. We will do a full review of this specifically in a future blog post.
Towing mirrors
Much simpler than the brake controller discussion! Towing mirrors allow you to see more of your trailer and the road around you. They are required in the US so you will need to get these. We got a simple kind that clips on. They work great and do allow much better viewing.
Trailer Stability
Once you drive yourself to your campground, you will need to make sure your trailer is stable and level before you do anything else. In order to do that you will need 3 things: chocks, leveling blocks (maybe), a level.
Chocks
Once you get to the camp site, the very first thing you need to do is chock your wheels. This prevents your trailer from rolling away once you unhitch. Please buy good chocks! We have often seen packages from RV stores that include light plastic chocks. These are probably fine but there have been cases of those slipping and not doing their job. We have heavy rubber chocks so we don't have to worry about this problem. Also, don't forget to buy 4 total!
Leveling Blocks
You will also need to have leveling blocks in the case you are at a campsite that is not level side-to-side. You can use your tongue jack to level you front to back, but you will need to drive onto leveling blocks to counter any side-to-side unevenness. There are a couple of styles of leveling blocks. A lot of people love the Anderson levelers because they are easy to use. We didn't get those because we like to make our lives difficult - just kidding!
We got the Camco lego style leveling blocks because you can use the blocks for under your tongue jack or under your stabilizer bars and we only wanted to have one set of things to bring with us. You do need both the blocks and the wheel chocks. So far they have worked fine and been easy to use but we will update this if we decide otherwise in the future!
A level
This was probably the least obvious thing to us when we were first setting out. In order to know if your camper is level, you need to have.... a level! We bought these handy stickers so that we could have a side and front level without having to carrying one with us. But guess what you need in order to install those?? Yep, a level! Bring a decent sized level (not the tiny little one we brought the first time!) and once you find a level site (it took us 3 camping trips to find one we thought was perfect) install your stickers. Then you can leave the big level at home.
Stick the level stickers on both the front and the side so you can easily tell how level you are when you roll into a spot.
Power
Hey you made it to the campsite, you are level and stable! Good job! That is the hard part. The rest of this is easy. Assuming you are camping at a campground that has power hookups, you will need 2 things: A power cord and a surge protector.
Power cord
Your camper should probably have come with a power cord appropriate for the amperage your trailer uses (30 amp or 50 amp you only need one or the other). If you need a longer one or your's didn't come with one, just be sure you get the correct one for your type of trailer.
Here is what the 30 amp looks like (this is what we have for our Alto). It has 3 prongs.
Here is what the 50 amp looks like. It has 4 prongs.
Surge Protector
You will also need to buy a surge protector. Technically this falls into the category of nice to have but we've put it into the need to have category because repairing your electrical is expensive and RV power connections in campgrounds are notoriously unstable. We learned this the hard way by blowing our converter on our pop-up camper. This was an expensive repair! While the surge protectors are also expensive, they are a lot less expensive than fixing your wiring. Again, this is specific to the amperage your trailer uses.
We have an older version of this one.
Here is the 50 amp from the same company (again 4 prong vs. 3 prong is your cue!)
Whatever you buy, be sure you plug in with the following sequence.
1) Plug in the surge protector
2) Wait for the green light that it is working
3) Plug in your trailer power cord
Water
Power done! Water is next (again assuming you are at a campground with water hookups). This is also pretty easy, you need 2 things: a RV grade water hose, a pressure regulator.
RV Grade water hose
We have this one which folds up really easily (they also make a longer version).
Pressure regulator
Like the surge protector, you don't HAVE to have this but it's inexpensive and could prevent an expensive repair so we would highly recommend it. Like the power, water pressure at campgrounds can be unpredictable. It can be a trickle or it could be 100 psi, which is way too high for your water tubing. Installing a pressure regulator on the end of the water hose means you don't have to stress about high pressure damaging your trailer.
Sewer
Everyone's favorite part of their RV! The black and grey tanks will need to be dumped after you are done using them.
In order to dump your tanks, you need a sewer hose. Many RV's come with one including ours so you may not need this on your first outing. We did buy another one though because the ones that come with the trailers are often not super high quality and no one wants a cracked sewer hose.
This just seems like common sense.
That's it! Those are the 11 things you need to have to get to and set up your new trailer at a campsite. Stay tuned for 12 things that are nice to have when you first set up.
Here is a quick list recap in case it helps:
Tire Chocks (Buy 4!)
Power Cord (This is the 30amp, you need either 30amp or 50amp not both)
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