Having lived in a house all my life, it’s a unique experience to not know where we’ll be sleeping each night. In one way, it’s quite freeing as we often have many choices. We can pull up to a Walmart, or even find a spot of land somewhere. Or we can make a reservation at a park, luxuriating in the extravagance of hooking into water and electricity.
On the other hand, for someone who has always planned every square centimeter of her life, it’s light years away from my comfort zone. Well, comfort zone, smumfort zone I always say.
“Where are we going to stay tonight, Mommy?”
“I have no idea. I’m still working on it…”
They never seem to worry. I think they realize that I’ll figure it out eventually, because I always do.
I will admit to you that I probably spend too much energy and time exploring options. After all, some RVers just stop where they want to stop, park and go to sleep. But those folks probably don’t have three kids. Personally, I don’t relish a knock on the door at three in the morning asking me to move, so I like to park where I know I’ll be welcome.
Most Walmarts and Cracker Barrels will accept an RV for one night, but not all do. Reading others’ blogs, I’d learned that one should always ask first, just to be sure. I will call ahead when I have a good idea where we’ll land for the evening. Sometimes a little wagon circle forms, which is fun. However, the city that’s convenient for a route doesn’t always have a Walmart and some have policies against RVers camping out. It can seriously limit our choices.
I’m in love with Harvest Hosts, a group that allows you to spend the night at farms and other locations. So far our experiences with this network has been magical. I plan to explore more farms as we head west. It’s pretty ideal!
I joined another online group, Boondockers Welcome, but haven’t had the chance to try it out. So far the owners either haven’t been on our route or can’t accommodate our size. Still, I’m sure we’ll make use of that resource in the next few years.
And as always, I’m learning and welcome your thoughts and ideas!
Laura,
I loved reading this entry in which you express so many thoughts you’ve had while full time RVing.. I feel very close to all of you, again, as I read about half a dozen of the Shermans most recent blogs and talked to Dan, all in the last 2 days.
Every time I go to ROADSCHOOLING SHERMANS and find a new entry it makes my day.
Love to all,
Mom
Wow, thank you, Mom! I am striving to honestly record snippets of our activities, along with my thoughts and feelings. We’re finally ahead of the game and have entries scheduled ahead of time. 🙂