Meandering

[FastEagle]

Our full time traveling years were a meandering event. That’s about all we did for nearly 5 years. No agenda, just point in the morning and go. We didn’t boondock or park free in someone’s parking lot. Our budget allowed us the opportunity to stay anywhere there was FHUs.

This covid-19 has us grounded – so to speak – and I’ve started a lot of forum threads to share some of our experiences with this community. We are both shutterbugs and always had cameras ready for the unplanned things that just happen on the road.

I’m going to call this thread Meandering. There is no rhyme or reason for the way the pictures will be posted, or a time line.

I was born in a rural town in southeastern Maine called South Berwick. On one of our trips up into that section of the country we were staying at Beaver Dam CG in Berwick, ME. Because I still know all the country roads in that place we were taking a short-cut that took us through South Berwick. We were heading for the outlet malls in Kittery. Linda says “did you see that yard”? Yup, and we went back for pictures. I hope you enjoy them, we do.

[Xmcdog]

One of the joys of travelling is to photograph things that catch your eye.

[JFXG]

I want to know who does all the grass trimming!

[G Schulz]

Originally Posted by JFXG

I want to know who does all the grass trimming!

That’s for sure! Trimming would be a nightmare but it is pretty.

[FastEagle]

These pictures were taking during a colorful ride through the Uinta National Forest, including a ski lift ride about half way around.

[jrs]

Envy how you full timed!
When first looking into the full time lifestyle 17 yrs ago, I recall reading books where others wouldn't make reservations and advanced plans either other than reservations for the busy holidays.
Now a days with the popularity of RVing and our large rig (which we chose to buy vs a smaller rig) we unfortunately feel advanced reservations are required.
Covid has limited what we can do. Just one example is we would love to visit the USS North Carolina in Wilmington (currently nearby) but don't want to take the chance. Unfortunately we find we're saying next time maybe too often. Hey fortunately we're healthy and it's still a great life style choice for us.

[docj]

IMHO everyone decides how to tailor full-timing to best match their personalities. My wife and I have been full-timing for 10 years and only during the first year did we meander somewhat in the manner described by the OP.

In each subsequent year we decided, in advance, on where we wanted to go for the season and developed a route of how we were going to accomplish our objectives. One year it was to go to the PNW. Another year it was to go to Atlantic Canada, etc.

We're far too "goal-oriented" to be happy just meandering. It's simply not us. Until COVID caused us to pause this year we've traveled >65k miles in our 10 years and have enjoyed it immensely. We've seen more bucket-list things than we ever had on our list!

As I said when I started this post; full-timing is a very individualistic lifestyle. No one can define it for anyone else, nor should they try. When we started we heard lots of people pontificate on "this is how full-timers do it!" We soon learned to tune them out! We've enjoyed " trulyfinding our own way!"

[FastEagle]

Originally Posted by docj

IMHO everyone decides how to tailor full-timing to best match their personalities. My wife and I have been full-timing for 10 years and only during the first year did we meander somewhat in the manner described by the OP.

In each subsequent year we decided, in advance, on where we wanted to go for the season and developed a route of how we were going to accomplish our objectives. One year it was to go to the PNW. Another year it was to go to Atlantic Canada, etc.

We're far too "goal-oriented" to be happy just meandering. It's simply not us. Until COVID caused us to pause this year we've traveled >65k miles in our 10 years and have enjoyed it immensely. We've seen more bucket-list things than we ever had on our list!

As I said when I started this post; full-timing is a very individualistic lifestyle. No one can define it for anyone else, nor should they try. When we started we heard lots of people pontificate on "this is how full-timers do it!" We soon learned to tune them out! We've enjoyed " trulyfinding our own way!"

I should have pointed-out that we are a retired military family and moving about was the norm for us during my 31 years of active duty military service. The USN set our travel destinations and we "meandered" to them and in the area we were they sent us. And yes, we did travel inland while stationed at Memphis, TN, Dallas, TX, Fallon, NV and Lemoore, CA.

[FastEagle]

The CA Imperial Sand Dunes Recreational Area is located just west of Yuma, AZ on I-8. It’s a very popular winter retreat area for sand dune-buggy enthusiasts. There are large areas for dry camping.

These pictures were taken from I-8 and a frontage road near the I-8 rest area.

[Old-Biscuit]

We FTd for 7 yrs and 'Meandering' WAS our choice of traveling
Secondary/Back Roads and never took the same route twice

Stay a week or 2 at most then move on.....we Hit The Road to travel and enjoy small town USA

A 2 week stay was out of the norm and caused 'itchy feet'

[Barbaraok]

The first few years we did a LOT of meandering. That's how you get to find the First Breeder Reactor just outside of Arco, Idaho. And the Potato Museum in Idaho. Plus literally hundreds of others. As we found we liked settling for 2-3 months in the winter to recharge, we looked at all the places we had been and realized that the Phoenix area had every thing we wanted for an extended stay. We've wintered here for the past few years.

Still sort of meander in the summer, but mostly stay on the West Coast - the older we get, the more seeing family becomes important because none of us know how much longer any of us will be around.

[FastEagle]

We wintered at Yuma three times. We like Yuma because there are lots of things to do there and you don’t have to travel very far in heavy traffic to do them. The population increases by a staggering 150,000 visitors at its peak. There are numerous RV Parks to choose from, many cater to the 55+ age group without children.

We found Yuma during a rainy year in the southwest. We had reservations at the Naval Recreational area in downtown San Diego. It rained so much, there was a good probability there would be mud slides at the RV Park. So, we moved over the mountains to the Naval Air Facility CG at El Centro, CA. Again we got rained-out. Their water drainage facilities could not handle the heavy rains and they had to rent huge tankers that could vacuum water from the streets and flight line. So, we made a day trip to Yuma hunting for a high and dry RV Park. We found a site at a centrally located senior’s RV Park that met all our expectations for fun time winter parking.

Here are pictures of areas we frequently used. The Huge, paved, covered flea market with live entertainment on the weekends and lots of places to snack. Another is the Desert Hills GC right down town. Great 19th hole facilities.

[docj]

Originally Posted by Barbaraok

The first few years we did a LOT of meandering. That's how you get to find the First Breeder Reactor just outside of Arco, Idaho. And the Potato Museum in Idaho.

There are lots of fascinating things to do around the country. To your list of unusual places I'll add the National Musical Instrument Museum in Vermillion SD.

[Barbaraok]

We were given a copy of the Readers Digest "1001 Little Known Places In The USA To See"!
As we went into each state, we would check and see if anything in the book was nearby. We found loads of small, interesting places that way. In Brewer Main there was a park (with a geocache) that was dedicated to Joshua Chamberlain and the Maine 20th, along with being the end of the Underground Railroad - Chamberlain Freedom Park.. We saw it about 3 months after we had been in Gettysburg - sort of put an endpoint of our Civil War inquiries that year.