Roaming Free In An RV

We have gone another 365 days around the sun in the RV marking this our 7th year on the road. We didn’t travel to any new states this past year but we went to many new areas. Last year in August we were working at Grand Teton National Park and went on new hikes in that area along with multiple trips to the backcountry of Yellowstone. After leaving Grand Teton, we made a detour to Devil’s Tower, our first time there. We continued on to Minnesota where memories of growing up in the Midwest flooded back to us as we were surrounded by fall colors, the crunch of fallen leaves and perfect, crisp autumn days.

We were in Florida for the winter and we were lucky enough to see friends who lived there and visited with family who traveled there. We went to beaches on both the Atlantic and Gulf side, kayaked in a warm spring, swam with manatees, went sailing and saw a rocket launch. We definitely made the most out of time in Florida and we will be returning there this winter.

After Florida, we returned to Minnesota (again, visiting family and friends along the way) and are working here until October. Being 2 hours north of Duluth seemed so far away at first but we have done so much: Voyager National Park, driving to Canada (going to Tim Horton’s of course!), seeing the North Shore and the South Shore, canoeing in the Boundary waters and kayaking to the sea caves at the Apostle Islands.

Buckley is going to be 2 this August and has been a joy to have. Except for when he wakes us up at 4 AM to play, scratches at the bedroom mirror to get our attention or gets out of his harness (that happened once and the harness was returned). Buckley has been to 14 states and has lived in 4. Though he is still not much of an adventure cat on his leash, he has played in snow and we have taken him to the desert, the beach, a lake and the mountains. He seemed to enjoy the mountains the most (just like us, lol) as he gazed at the Tetons while relaxing on a stone wall (at the beach and Lake Superior he just wanted to hide).

Our top activities:

Brad: The employee scavenger hunt at Grand Teton

Jen: Taking Buckley to Snake River overlook at Grand Teton at sunset and swimming with the manatees in Florida

Both: Sailing in Florida!

RV/truck fixes:

*The normal truck maintenance 

*The normal RV maintenance (cleaning the roof, sealing rubber on slides, ect). 

*After a road trip, the back top cabinet door in the RV opened, spilling all its contents. Luckily, nothing broke and just a couple of screws needed to be tightened

*A long wood piece from a cabinet fell off and needed to be screwed back on

*While putting up Buckley’s new cat tower in the RV, we noticed the bottom strip of screws along the back wall were loose so they all got replaced

*Being in hot weather has caused some of the rubber stripping to melt so that was replaced

*We still have the water leak in the one storage area….an ongoing frustration

Our future plans:

You heard of the 7 year itch? Well, we have a version of that. Sort of. We want to keep traveling but we are currently living in an employee apartment and are really enjoying apartment living (no black tank emptying, regular shower water pressure, no waiting for hot water, an oven that actually bakes, Buckley having space to run around like a crazy cat…) so we are unsure of what this feeling means. We will be back in Florida for the winter as our RV is being stored there for the summer. Brad is almost done getting all his paperwork in order to be a boat captain (he passed the test back in March) so maybe we will be living on the water, like we are in Minnesota. Whatever it means, we’ll keep you all posted and only time will tell what the future holds. 💕