Been There, Done That...

We rolled back into town Friday afternoon. We're all glad to be home , but sorry that such a GREAT vacation had to come to an end.

Here are a few stats for those who are interested:

• The total length of the trip was just shy of 8 weeks
• We covered about 11,000 miles
• We crossed 19 states
• We visited 19 national parks (plus a handful of destinations that weren't national parks)
• We burned approximately 1100 gallons of diesel fuel
• Total number of Nutter Butter cookies consumed was about 500

While it's still fresh on my mind, I'd like to make a few observations:

RV vs. Hotels - I'm not going to claim that one is better than the other. I believe that traveling around the country in a camper is a totally different experience than flying (or driving) and staying in hotels. We had a great time in our camper... no regrets.

To Plan or Not to Plan - When we pulled out of Georgia on July 1, we had made NO reservations. We made a conscious decision not to have a set schedule for this trip. All in all, we believe this worked out well for us. With the exception of the 4th of July weekend in the Rockies, we were always able to get a campsite when we wanted one. We did eventually settle into a routine of making campground reservations only for the next two stops. There were several of the campgrounds that were completely full when we got there, so the practice of calling ahead a couple of days probably saved us some hassles. We did change our plans several times during the trip. We only had to make a couple of calls to cancel and/or reschedule reservations.

Although I think we did about the right amount of planning, we realized early in the trip that we did not do the right amount of packing. We over-packed. Neither of us realized what a different use of the camper this would be compared to our short haul camping trips. We could have probably gone 1000 pounds lighter by leaving home the camping chairs and campfire cookware. We used the awning and the bicycles so rarely that it would be difficult to justify dragging them along. Our camper was mainly where we slept. During the daytime we were out at the park, seeing the sights. Next time, we'll cut back on the amount of stuff that we bring with us.

Navigation - We had several tools that we used to navigate. The most important was our GPS Navigator, backed up by a good old fashioned paper Atlas. One without the other would have been frustrating, but the two of them together worked well.

We also had a national directory of RV Parks and an Interstate Exit Guide; both of which proved invaluable. We also used this website to get reviews of RV Parks.

One disappointment was a wireless rear-view backup camera that I installed on the back of the camper before the trip. Great idea, and it would have been extremely helpful had it worked. I don't know if we just went too cheap or if the whole concept is flawed, but I'll look at this again before another trip.

Communication - This was probably our biggest challenge. In all my preparation, I did not think to check the coverage map of our cell phone carrier. Changing carriers is not an easy thing to do, but since we've been planning this trip for 3 years I probably could have switched to another carrier had I thought to check.

Internet communications was also difficult. I had added a data plan to my cell phone in hopes of using it as our internet connection but, guess what ... if you don't have voice coverage you also don't have data coverage. Having said that, there were a few occasions when the cell phone internet connection was all we had, and it was better than nothing.

Almost all private RV Parks now have WiFi service (some charge extra, but most are free). The problem is that almost none of them have the equipment they need to provide WiFi to the campsite. That means that you will have to go hang around their office to use the WiFi.

Also better than nothing I suppose, but I really don't enjoy going out in public in my Winnie the Pooh pajamas.

When we passed through Las Vegas, I went on a shopping spree and bought the right gear to allow me to get WiFi at our camper no matter how weak the campground's signal. By adding an external network adaptor, a WiFi Amplifier, and a directional Hi-Gain antenna we were able to get a good signal in most places.

Didn't you get homesick? I really expected this to be more of an issue than it turned out to be. I even installed a web camera in our house so we could go online to see that our home is still there waiting on us (of course this quit working two weeks into the trip).

The truth is that we stayed so busy that no one had a chance to get homesick. The worst part was the drive home after we had seen our last national park. Other than that, we pretty much had fun the whole time.

What was your favorite part? I expect to hear this question a lot. I'm not sure that I can answer it. It was all good. We live in an AMAZING country. I've been to a few places outside the US, and I haven't seen anything that even comes close. God bless America!

In closing, I'd like to give a special thanks to our neighbors the Huff's who looked after our animals and brought in our mail while we were gone. Also our daughters for not getting too mad at us for not taking them with us (and for handling some time sensitive mail for us).

Also special thanks to our son-in-law Robert who mowed our lawn. Is there any way we can extend this arrangement? :-)

Thanks to all of you to followed our little adventure and offered advice or words of encouragement along the way. We're already thinking about next summer... how does Maine sound?