Author Archives: roger

4 years down

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May 2, 2021, marked the completion of four years of full-timing in our trailer. This is us heading away, on May 2, 2017, from our home of 23 years prior:

We didn’t really have any goals for these 4 years other than seeing what is out there! We stopped to see family when we were near, we came back numerous times for birthdays, holidays, etc. We didn’t know where our travels would take us, which was the most fun. Our 4-year ‘anniversary’ was spent with my sister and her family in Bishop, but there were no celebrations. Here is view of Bishop from the hills:

I have been keeping statistics of our trailer since we purchased it in Jan 2013. I track every trip via Google Maps, keep track of mileage and nights spent in locations (the app MapMyRide is most helpful with this). I also track every fuelup of our current truck and previous truck. This allows me to belch out some numbers to bore you with.

YearTrailer MilesNights in TrailerTruck Miles
20171009824017311
20181096932720437
20191128436325327
2020545536614271
202112941224959
Total39100141882305

2017 and 2021 were partial years but we really piled on the miles that first year. 2017, we went to Texas to establish our domicile, continued on to a wedding in North Carolina, and completed the circle by coming back a northern route. We hit 21 states on that loop. Our average nightly stay per location was pretty low, something we would remedy. That year our grandson had his first birthday, which we were able to get to. Sadly, Roxie’s cousin died but we were able to assist his daughter in straightening out his affairs. This would have been hard to do if not retired. This was also the time where our black tank leaked and it took 43 days without our trailer to get it fixed

In 2018 we got our trailer back from repairs then headed to my mother’s. She was getting out of rehab after a hip replacement and we were going to help her at home. We met our friends George and Marcia (www.yinfeng.info) and travelled to Banff and Jasper NP in Canada. We then headed to CA to leave for a trip to Hawaii, getting ready for the 2nd birthday of our grandson. Fate intervened and we went back to my mother’s just before she passed away. We, along with my sister and her family, put her affairs in order. We still did over 10K in miles that year.

Back to Texas in 2019. Roxie had a medical procedure to do in Austin and I was looking to get a new truck. The 2017 truck did fine but we really missed having 4 full doors so we got on there. We were in the Austin area for almost 4 months doing all this, and more. While we were in Texas we wondered what we should do after leaving there. Roxie had joined a group on Facebook that discussed RVing to Alaska. They were having a get together near Anchorage for the 4th of July. We signed up, giving us a target date to get there and we were off! Alaska was great but we headed back to CA and helped Roxie’s sister with some personal issues.

COVID was the theme for 2020. We were traveling around CA until mid-March and WHAM! Shutdowns began. We hunkered down at our son’s place until mid-June and had to get out. We headed to the Oregon and Washington coasts to keep cool during the summer. Around mid-September we headed to Idaho and the weather ended up chasing us down to Nevada. All-in-all we were not that impacted by COVID other than some campground bathrooms were closed. Also two of the things we like to do, dine-out and watch movies, were much more difficult. We made it back to CA for the holidays.

The birth of our third grandchild, second granddaughter, started off 2021. We next headed to Arizona and Nevada, checking out possible locations to move. Arizona was not very locked down at this time, Nevada only slightly more.

Just under 40K actual trailer miles, more than double that in truck miles, 33 states, 4 provinces, 1418 nights in the trailer (just 43 nights shy of a perfect record)!

We will probably be slowing down our travels as we are looking for a home now but we won’t completely stop!

Scoping out Arizona

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We are still looking for a home base. The criteria is close to California but not IN California. I would like a decent sized town, with a WalMart, a movie theatre and some restaurants, or we could be within 20 miles of such a location. Arizona seems to be a bit better than Nevada just due to more population areas that meet the criteria.

We left our extended hiatus in Visalia and head to our first stop in Arizona, Lake Havasu City for a week. This area meets the criteria but with all the retired and recreational people there, the home prices are a bit more than we are looking for.

The next week was just north of Wickenburg, near Congress. Prices were a bit better here but Wickenberg is a bit too small for my tastes. We could drive to Surprise for anything we could want but I think we would get tired of that drive over and over.

We had heard good things about the Cottonwood area and went there for a whole month. The RV park had a pretty good monthly rate and there were a lot of areas to check out there. To the south is the whole Prescott/Prescott Valley area, a very grown up area with accordingly priced homes. To the north is Sedona, very nice but VERY expensive. You can also get to Flagstaff and Payson in a decent amount of time. The Cottonwood area is a real possibility, pretty much the right size and lots of area to find housing. The prices are not too bad.

We are looking for a home that is not necessarily in a subdivision, has room for the trailer on the lot and is not too big. We are not against a mobile/manufactured home. We can also just get some land and put something on it over time. All these options are in the Cottonwood area.

Here are some photos from our month in the area:

The remnants of a cold storm passing through
Towards the Sedona rocks.
Toward the mining town of Jerome.

Since we were there for a length of time we went to see some local sites:

Montezuma’s Castle NM
Tuzigoot NM
Montezuma Well

Since we were staying in the center of Arizona, there was one more thing to see. The Geographic ‘center’ of Arizona. We have done this type of thing previously with the Geographic center of California and the Geographic center of the contiguous US. This was just a memorial to the center being that nearest town close to the center. The center had no roads to it, alas:

We finished our month in Cottonwood and heading to another locale to checkout, Kingman AZ. We have been through Kingman many times but never really considered it as a ‘home’. This was our chance to give Kingman a chance. It turns out that this size of Kingman is very good and only about 90 miles to Vegas. The altitude tends to make the area run cooler at times even with snow sometimes. It is in the running but it would have to be the right place.

We are currently back in Fort Mohave (we were here in November) which is just south of Bullhead City, and Laughlin NV. We are here for more than our normal week due to a scheduling issue. We received our first Covid vaccine in Cottonwood, primarily so we can see our grandson sometime when we get back to California. The scheduling issue was due to having to get the second shot in 4 weeks. Since we have already left our initial dose location we had to find a different location for the second dose.

The logistics on this has been very interesting. The first dose was at Walgreens, but when I tried to change the second dose for a different location, I could not do so until the day BEFORE the scheduled second dosage day. In the interim I setup second doses that were given by a women’s health group at the local community college. When they verified our appointment, they stated a need of proof of residence in this county (Mohave). However, the state of Arizona says that residence does not matter. More issues to deal with. It is now the day before so I try Walgreens, but I cannot change the location of the 2nd dose. I tried Safeway, they don’t have an online way to schedule the second dose. I try Smith’s grocery (Kroger) and we were able to schedule both second doses. Whew!

After Fort Mohave, we are heading to Vegas for a week, then to visit my sister in Bishop and back to California for some medical appointments. We are also now very close to putting our house on the market to sell, so that will be yet another adventure for us!