Holiday Weekend? Go RVing and Make Memories That Last a Lifetime

Even though it isn’t the greenest pursuit, I love travel. It is just one of the ways in which we can connect to our planet and come to love it in all its wondrous variety…by exploration! So even though travel might increase our carbon footprint it is one of those things that I happily forgive because I really do believe that you protect what you care about and exploring your city, county, state, country, and world can be part of that. As long as you do so mindfully, with some planning, and with a careful eye to wastefulness I heartily endorse hitting the road (or the skies) with your kids. They won’t care to protect what they don’t know intimately.

One of my favorite methods of travel or maybe my absolute favorite (because I hate flying) is travel by recreational vehicle (RV). I started traveling by RV when I was just a toddler because my mother, Aunt, Uncle, and grandfather all used to travel around the midwest participating in horse shows and competitions. The easiest and most comfortable way to bring the family along was by RV, or motorhome specifically. It was very much like bringing home along with you. For holidays such as Memorial Day or the 4th of July we would also hit the road and park at various camp sites where we would camp, explore, and swim in local watering holes.

Here is the interior of the motorhome I spent 100s of hours in as a child (same as above photo), I still get a warm fuzzy feeling of pure happiness when I look at it! I would sleep on that couch (it pulled out) with my little brother. I would sit in the passenger seat and play with the CB radio while my grandfather drove us around the countryside. I would play cards with my grandmother and my cousins at that dining table (bottom left) and eat her homemade tuna egg salad sandwiches. It made for many perfect summer adventures and memories.

Taking an RV for long weekends and holiday weekends is actually a quite perfect way to go.

• Stress free. You are taking “home” with you.
• Affordable. No $ spent on hotels or airfare.
• No sleeping on the ground in a tent, you have a nice comfy bed and a place free from critters.
• Kids sleep better in a familiar place with their own pillows and blankets.
• It is easy to plan a getaway on the spur of the moment.
• No fast food or eating out because you have a pantry and kitchen.
• Power supply for gadgets such as computers, blenders, and food processors.
• A comfy place to retreat when you want to rest.
• Toys and other personal items are easy to take along with you.
• On board bathrooms, no pulling over to stop every 5 minutes!
• You can take pets with you.
• Can get one you drive or one you tow behind the family truck or SUV.

We took many planned, longer trips in the RV but we also took spur of the moment trips. One summer we drove the RV a few hours north to Chillicothe, Ohio to see an outdoor play called Tecumseh. You sit in a outdoor amphitheater and watch the story of the legendary Shawnee leader as he struggles to defend his sacred homelands in the Ohio country during the late 1700’s. There are cannons firing, guns shooting, horses riding past you and it really feels as though you are there, living it. The show is several hours long so rather than driving home late at night we just parked at a nearby camp ground with RV hookups and we made a mini vacation of it. My childhood was filled with trips like this, big and small. It made me relish the coming of summer and our upcoming adventures.

Here is a photo of me with my mother, grandmother and younger brother on one of our many RV adventures. He was just a baby so I would have been about 5 years old.

Eight or so years later, nothing much has changed (below), except the RV is bigger… me, my grandmother, and brother.

I will always treasure those memories and these pictures. They were some of the happiest times of my life. I am regretful now that my own kids haven’t done as much RVing as I did. We are going to have to change that…