Englishtart

Hey guys,

Spent the last couple of days catching up on the threads, old friends, new members etc and just wanted to say 'hi' and bring you up to date on what we have been up too since I last posted.

In August last year we finally went off the deep end and bought our 'new to us' RV, it's a 40ft Alfa Seeya diesel pusher, I will post pics soon. We moved into the RV full time within a month of buying it, we got rid of pretty much all our stuff, 3 yard sales, craigs list and finally a goodwill pick up for a garage full of leftovers! 25 years of collecting 'crap', when it came down to it to be honest! We have a storage unit that has some of the things we are saving for Nathan for when he moves back to the mainland from Hawaii.

We now live on Charleston AFB in the family campground, they have long stay spaces that you can stay in for up to 3 years, Jay is still working fulltime on base while we pay off the last few bills. We are planning (hoping) to pull the plug on Jay's career by the end of this year depending on how much will power we have in resisting all the trips we really want to take.

Once we are free to go, we will be making our way from East to Western USA and stopping at every State along the way, we really want to spend a couple of months in each State, more/less in some. We have joined a few RV forums, mostly fulltiming RV info ones, but we found one called "Workcamping", which is like an employment forum for people on the move, it's seasonal jobs mostly at places like Amazon, theme parks, RV parks, or volunteer positions at National Parks/forests etc. Most jobs have free spaces for your RV (savings of between $350-$600+ per month) some pay a wage for hours worked on top of free space, usually you work about 20-40 hours a month for the space, then extra hours worked are paid. The volunteer ones are only free space for 22 hours a month working in the park/forest. We think it will be a blast to see the Country with no schedule, no commitments. We are not independently whealthy and with just Jay's military pension coming in, we will take workcamping jobs if we need too, but even that will be fun to do!

We have met so many people that have stopped in here on their way to/from somewhere else, not all of them 'fulltimerrs', but those that are telling us how they wished they had started earlier. Our new mantra is No Regrets, we don't want to wait until after Jay retires from his civilian job (which was the original plan) only to find out that we can't do it then, be it for health reasons or whatever else can happen, we all know how quickly our whole world can be shattered!

I look forward to catching up with everyone here, I promise I will keep you all updated on our goings on and who knows, maybe we will even get to meet some of you guys along the way
Huggies Kim x

Jerseygirl

Hello...welcome back.

Englishtart

Thank you sweety!! good to be back

I added a pic of the 'new rig' in my gallery, if anyone wants to see our new home...
huggies Kim x

SultanOfSwing

Ah, you did it, then? Great stuff. Make sure you come on regularly to gloat about all the places you get to see on your travels

Englishtart

Yeah, we took a leap of faith!!....no worries, I will let you know when we cut that last rope and start our adventure 'proper'. We already did our first trip to the space coast in FL over Thanks Giving, stayed on Patrick AFB and loved every minute of it.

Jerseygirl

Looks like fun?

I'm envious...we keep talking about taking a road trip around the US...but haven't got around to it yet.

Englishtart

We can't wait to get started, now we have made the decision I just want to GO!! Jay however is the sensible one and wants to make sure we have all our ducks in a row first!

We are fortunate that we have the option of staying on military bases during our travels, it won't always be possible, but will save us some money if we do the monthly hook ups, there is also the option of 'boondocking', this is anything from parking in a wallmart carpark overnight or a rest area, to parking in any public land, there are also lots of State/national park or forest areas that have 'dry camping', just means anything without facilities...We can only do that until we run out of propane, deisel for the generator or we need to 'dump' the tanks, but we could go at least a week doing that if we want too.

Don't put off anything you really want to do hunni, if you can make it happen, go for it...

Oh, almost forgot I quit smoking in Nov last year too

joto

Happy travels to you. Would love to do that, but hiring a RV to visit various areas we would like, rather that having a RV full time.

Bob

That's so awesome, really envious of the plans!

I know some folks up the road from me who were looking into doing something like this, but at converting the engine to run off veg oil etc to make it a bit cheaper to travel the country...don't know how far or much planning they've put into it though

Bob

Another option is parking up in log country. Well I know up where the folks live and plenty of the logging land in Maine, you can ask for permission, or it already given to park up on log trails for x amount of time for free.

The ones near the in-laws have a 3 week maximum stay and no dumping of waste into the river, nor during certain times of the year when they're actively logging the land, but there's plenty of sites with a view that would make great stopping off point to make as a base camp for day trips out of. The folks are up near Sugarloaf

Englishtart

Cheers Joto! That's a great idea to find out if you like Rving, pretty expensive though, we could never afford to do that.

Thanx Bob It's amazing how many people in the US own an RV, even more surprising to see how many actually live and travel in them full time, most of us have heard of the 'snowbirds' that follow the nicer weather, but there are lots more that run businesses or do casual work from their RVs while travelling.

Englishtart

Oh yeah, lots of options for 'free' parking, there is so much of the US I have been wanting to visit, especially up in the North West/East area, Montana has been top of my list for a long time!

lansbury

I'm very envious. Have wanted to do something like you are planning but the wifey isn't interested. Good luck and I look forward to hearing about your adventures.

Rete

Hey ET. Wow it is certainly good to see you. And the impending change of life style is just awesome. We were hoping to do something like that in two years but Mr. is not all that well these days and needs to be near his doctor for his monthly check ups.

So glad you and family are well and enjoying life. WTG Girl!

Englishtart

Thanx sweety, to be honest I wouldn't wish what pushed us into doing this (now) on anyone, we have come to accept that we are 'lucky' enough to be able to start living our dream 15 yrs earlier than we planned and concentrate on going forward.

As to your wifey not being interested in doing something similar, I am not encouraging you( )but, we have met plenty of guys doing this on weekends etc and leaving the wifey at home!