When my husband and I retired from teaching, we sold our house and bought an RV. The idea of living in an RV and traveling around wherever and whenever sounded so exciting. We took off in June with our first destination of Mount Rushmore with no other plans after that. The trip was absolutely AMAZING! I loved EVERY minute of it, but here’s why I don’t want to do it full-time.
- Family and friends- We just can’t be away from our family and friends that long! 😫 We missed all of our family back home right away when we left. We were so used to traveling with family that we wished we could share the experience with them. We loved exploring, but always kept thinking about getting “home” to see everyone.
- “Home”- there’s just something special about having a home. Holidays, gatherings, decorating, cozy evenings on a porch, neighbors…all of things are just not the same in the RV. It’s not the smallness of the RV, it’s the non-permanence of it. There’s something about having family and friends over and gathering in your home, and in your HOMETOWN, that can’t be replaced. I missed my dining room table, my closet, and decorating a home the most.
- “Christmas every day”. When my son was little, he used to watch “Elmo Saves Christmas” over and over. It was all about Elmo wishing for Christmas every day, but after a while, the town began to hate Christmas because it had lost its specialness. It became work to always decorate and buy presents. Full time RVing is like that. When it’s an extended time, the “vacation” goes away, and it becomes normal life. It loses its specialness. We started to get “National parked out” meaning it started to get old. The specialness of a vacation as a break from normal life changed when vacationing becomes normal life.
- It’s tiring! Picking up camp and driving all the time is hard work. We went 10,000 miles in 2 months. We should have slowed it down, but see reason #1! We wanted to see as much as we could and then get home to see family!!
- It’s expensive! All of the driving we did was A LOT of gas. Campground stays are priciest in touristy areas. They’re also more expensive on short terms, so if you only stay a couple of nights everywhere, you’re paying the highest prices. $100 a night * 30 nights is $3,000! Full time RVers stay a month at a time at a discount, but we tend to get bored in the same place that long. We did stay in a local campground by our family for 2 months at a discount. This was fine though because we were close to family and friends!
- RV chores get old fast- doing laundry at a laundromat, having waste tanks get full and unusable, cooking in a VERY small space, always having dishes to do, limited storage, things breaking during the drive, 5 minute showers…Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the “adventure” of all this, but not forever!😆
- Church! —traveling around in an RV makes you church nomads. We watched our church’s services online, but it’s not the same as being there in person. I missed being at our home church.
Full time RVers say, “Home is where you park it”, but I think home is where your family is, so unless I can start a family caravan, I plan to use the RV for vacations of a couple of weeks at a time or as a “cabin” we can use on long weekends. I do love our RV, but I love home and family more!❤️
Leap of Faith: Our Retirement Adventure 
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