Full-time RV life: the good and not-so-good
July 2021
Enjoying a peaceful evening at the green oasis that is Welcome Station RV Park in Nevada, of all places! Our RV is in the background.
Full disclosure here: the not-so-good isn’t really BAD; it’s just stuff we’ve had to adjust to and deal with. And the surprise non-issue: the small square footage we live in!
First, the good:
The small square footage means it’s quick to clean up! The slides increase the space when we’re parked, so it feels roomier, and we don’t get in each other’s way. Plus, when the weather’s nice and bugs aren’t bad, we can sit under our awning and have an outdoor room! Also, the small space means we can’t buy lots of nonessential souvenirs and other stuff, because we don’t have a place to put it.
But often, we’re not even in our RV. We’re out exploring our beautiful country. We’re getting more exercise than we did when we were living in one location.
We can stay as long as we want and see everything we want without running out of vacation time. Our days are not as busy and stressful because we don’t have to cram a lot of sightseeing into one day.
We don’t have to travel many hours in one day to get to our destination. In fact, we usually travel only 2-3 hours to a new location, and we enjoy the journey more, and see things along the way.
We use our own bathroom when we’re on the road instead of nasty public restrooms!
On travel days, we stop for lunch at rest stops or beautiful pull-outs along the side of the road. We’ve eaten lunch beside streams or other quiet settings, such as the one in the photos below. Plus, we don’t spend money on fast food, so we eat healthier.
We’re retired! We say, “What day is it? Where are we going?” If we decide we don’t want to go somewhere one day, we can be flexible and change our plans, especially if the weather isn’t cooperating.
Campgrounds are cheaper than hotels.
The biggest blessing: being able to see so many beautiful wonders in the U.S., (and hopefully next year, Canada), and meeting so many nice people from all over the U.S.
IMO, one of the best things we brought with us was a small, portable fan for the white noise to drown out the noise from trains, highways, and yapping dogs (I love dogs, but not some of their owners!) We’ve even had to drown out the noise from military jets in a couple locations!
Above and below: We stopped for lunch on the way to Glacier N.P. at this unexpected find.
Our journey from mid-April through the end of September: I didn’t include Florida on this map because we went there only to establish domicile. The route was planned with the help of the Roadtrippers app, taking into account weather conditions at different times of year.
View from our campsite outside of Glacier Nat’l Park, near Essex, MT. Our RV was under shady trees, as the other side of our rig faced the woods.
Below are photos of the living area/kitchen. In a future post, I’ll explain more about our storage space, and what we decided to bring, and what we are doing without.
This is what it looks like with the slides open. Not a fan of so much brown, but we had other priorities when we were looking for an RV, and our choices were limited, because so many people are buying RV’s right now. Also, we wish we had recliner chairs. The love seat isn’t long enough to stretch out on comfortably. The couch folds down into a bed but it’s best sized for kids. Same for the table. The narrow, deep pantry is next to the fridge. It was a pain to pull stuff out to get to what I wanted in the back, so I did some rearranging. Stuff I use less often is now in the back of the pantry, with tall things that won’t fit elsewhere in front, and I moved packages of food we use more often to a different cabinet.
The kitchen area has a decent amount of counter space, thanks to the pull-out drawers, and the covers for the double sink.
Now, for the not-so-good:
View from the back of our RV in Torrey, Utah. The only way to see it was through the back window, or outside at the picnic table. We were crammed into our campsites like sardines with other people’s RV awnings almost touching our rig.
Campgrounds are not always as nice as they appear on their websites, (if they show pictures and maps at all) and reviews don’t always match up with reality, either. We’ve been in some really tight spots—hard to get into, and VERY close to neighbors. Sometimes the sites are nowhere close to level, and it’s a challenge, even with automatic levelers and blocks, to adjust the RV.
The reservation process is a pain—much more time-consuming than just getting on hotels.com. First, I look at several websites (Campendium, RV Parky, etc) to see what’s in the area we want to go, then I have to check each campground’s site to see if there’s availability. State parks are easier to check for availability, but often state parks sites are unavailable or the sites are not long enough for us to fit our rig plus toad. Some private campgrounds’ sites don’t show availability. They require that I have to call them or email them a request and wait for them to respond. (We haven’t gone the route of finding a place to stay upon arrival without reservations, because with so many people camping right now, it’s been hard to find places to stay ahead of time.) The few times we’ve boondocked, we’ve pre-arranged it through Harvest Hosts.
Poor wifi connectivity and sometimes no cell service, either. We have Weboost, which is a cell phone signal and cell-based internet amplifier. But, if there’s no service, there’s nothing to boost. We have back-up Verizon hot spot, which we pay extra for and that has a limited data plan. Also, there’s usually no TV, except for a few over-the-air stations. We hardly ever watch TV, anyway. We didn’t want to pay for satellite service or streaming. Some RV parks don’t want you to stream, as they don’t have good enough wifi to support that.
Lack of community—we miss our friends and church. On the road, we meet lots of nice people, but you see them once or twice, and then they’re gone.
We don’t mind the small space, as we turned the cab-over bunk into additional storage space, but the small fridge and pantry means we can’t stock up much on food, so we have to grocery shop more often. Every time we go into an unfamiliar store, we spend half our time trying to find what we want, if the store even has it.
Minor inconveniences: a tiny oven that is a pain to light, so we rarely use it; no disposal or dishwasher; having to get rolls of quarters and then lug dirty clothes to the laundry (although I can do several loads at once and get it done quicker!)
We have to be careful to plan our routes ahead of time using an app that will make sure we don’t go on any roads with low clearance, and basically so we go only where big trucks can go. We even plan where we will stop for gas, since we have to make sure we have room to maneuver a combined 50-foot-long rig-plus-toad around the pumps.
Emptying the tanks—yuck! Disposable gloves are essential!
Flat tires and other unplanned mishaps: this tire on the tow dolly was totally shredded!
While there are definitely negatives to full-time RVing, we are glad we decided to do it. We are seeing places we’ve always wanted to see while we are still healthy enough to be on the road. Eventually, we’ll decide where we want to settle down, but right now, we’re enjoying freedom!