“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain (or not… Author unknown)
Katelyn enjoying the mountains near Silverton, Colorado. July 2014.
We want to sell most of our stuff, buy a truck and a fifth-wheel RV and travel the country. Crazy? Maybe a little, but we love the idea and our goal is Launch 2019! Update: We launched on 12/12/2018! We pulled away from our house in mid-Missouri for the last time and spent almost 3 weeks visiting family and friends in southwest Missouri. We finally left Missouri and headed west to begin our adventures on 12/30/2018.
Why? We’ve talked about it before, maybe when we retire we’ll buy an RV and travel the country! That sounds so amazing. So *US*. We’ve been on some big road trips in the past and spent countless nights camping all over the place and every time, neither of us has been ready for it to end when it was time to go home. Meanwhile, retirement is probably at least 25 years away. Hopefully we’ll be in good health and have the good fortune to follow our dream after we retire. Does anyone think THAT sounds crazy? I do. I don’t want to wait! I want to enjoy my time now. I want to enjoy my family and enjoy my little girl who is already growing up fast.
Ouray, Colorado. One of our favorite places for an “altitude adjustment”.
I have a good job but I certainly don’t love it. I can’t see myself doing this for 25 more years. What will I do? I don’t know, I’m still figuring that out. In the meantime we all wake up too early, Bryan and I commute to work, put in our 8-4:30, commute home. Try to keep up with the perpetual mess our house seems to turn into, the yard work and all of the things that seem to constantly need to be done, things that need to be fixed, etc. There isn’t enough time in the day. By the time we all get home it’s time for dinner, Katelyn plays a little (or watches TV because sometimes we just need a break) then it’s bath and bedtime so we can wake up early and do it all again. Weekends are mostly devoted to keeping up with our “stuff” and a little fun on the side if the weather is nice. Sometimes we go out of town and then it’s a game of trying to catch up everything we neglected to do around the house because we took a weekend away. Vacation is the best. When the stars align and we are able to go, we take a week and head west in July. The mountains are our home for a few painfully short days. We call it our “altitude adjustment”. Then it’s back to the grind until next year. Is there any worse feeling than the day you return to work after a vacation? I know there are some people who are ready to get back. I’m not one of those people!
Turquoise Lake in Leadville, Colorado for our tenth anniversary. July 2016.
What if we could sell almost everything, move into an RV and travel? We’d still have stuff to maintain, RVs require plenty of maintenance and so do vehicles. But we’d have LESS stuff. We wouldn’t have a commute or the “daily grind”. We could determine what schedule we want to set for the day. We wouldn’t have to worry about limited vacation time or whether we would be able to get time off to visit family for the holidays. We’d work from home and our home would have wheels. We would call a new place “home” every few weeks. If we found an area we loved, we could stay for awhile. If we ended up in a place we didn’t like, we could go someplace else. There are people who do this! Lots of people, it turns out. Google “nomadic” or “full-time RVing”
There is so much to learn about and do before this can happen. Some things we are currently working on are purging all the “stuff” we’ve managed to accumulate, saving money and reducing debt. We’ve started researching everything we can think of that we need to know about. We have a lot to do and we’ve set 2019 as our goal because we think 2 years is a realistic amount of time for us to be successful.
What do you think of our plan? Would you consider doing something similar?
3 Reids on the Road 
This is a great plan. Pretty much what my brother is doing. You are always welcome to stay at our place.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thanks! I’d like to pick up a good camera and hone my photography skills too! I’m looking at a Canon T6i, maybe. We won’t be buying anything soon but this seems to be a good base with options to upgrade. It’s not cheap but not obscenely expensive either, as far as cameras go. I’ve seen some used ones going for a good price. I’ve loved my point and shoot Canons. One is broken and one we re-gifted to Bryan’s dad so I’m currently without any camera except my phone.
LikeLike
This sounds like an awesome plan. I’m so happy for you to have a doable plan to live the life you want to live!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Your spot on in your thinking! Don’t wait! Live the life you dream of. It’s ok if it doesn’t work out (but it will) you can always go back … but you won’t know until you try. We did about 2 years of research, watching Youtube, following people, asking questions, learning before our launch date. So we are here for you. All of us! We want to help you succeed. The only question you’ll ask yourself is “why did we wait so long, this wasn’t as hard as we thought”. YOU GOT THIS!!!! I promise!!!!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you! I really feel this is our calling and we are going to find our “tribe” we’ve already noticed how supportive the RV community is as a whole. I’d also love to find some time for volunteering and community service and I saw you mentioned that. I just love that this has been such a great learning experience so far, even just researching different things and finding resources and I’m enjoying that!
LikeLike