Red
Roads Fulltiming
Family
Slow
down. Simplify. Prioritize.
Applying
the Red
Roads Motto
I first read about Red Roads in the
context of RV traveling. It was in a book titled Movin'
On: Living and Traveling Full-time in a Recreational Vehicle by Ron and
Barb Hofmeister. In her writing and speaking, Barb talks about traveling by U.S.
highways, which are usually indicated in red on road maps, instead of driving
the Interstates. This way, she and Ron get to visit small towns, with
their interesting restaurants and stores, and sometimes even take in a local
parade or festival. The Hofmeisters have written some wonderful articles about
RV traveling. You can read some of them on their web site. Here's one about
their interest in red
roads and small towns.
Loren
Eyrich has a great web site about traveling on red roads. It's called Two-Lane
Roads: a nostalgic backroads adventure.
As we travel, we try to
practice what we preach in our motto.
“Slow down.” Our attitude toward time is, “Have an agenda but not a schedule.”
An agenda is a list of things to be done, while a schedule is a detailed and
timed plan. We usually have a general idea of things we want to do and places we
want to visit, but we don't write a timetable. Of course, we have to check days
and hours of operation, so we're not disappointed by finding doors locked. But
if we discover we won't have time today to tour a certain museum, we can find an
overnight parking place and go tomorrow.
“Simplify.” Our attitude toward
things is, “More
is not always better.”
It's a constant challenge to keep our possessions under
control. With four people living in four hundred square feet, there is not much
room for individual, personal "stuff." When we break camp, the length
of time it takes to pack the rig is directly related to how long we've been
parked. That's because we get our "things" out of their cubby holes
and use them. We've learned there's a good reason for guidelines like, "For
each item brought it, take one item out." and "Make items serve two
purposes." We also try not to drag around with us seasonal items (Christmas
decorations, beach toys, etc.) that we can buy new then donate to a second-hand
store after we've used them.
“Prioritize.” Our attitude toward events is, “Avoid vacation mode.”
When David was employed and our travels were limited to week-long vacations, we
tended to drive long days on the Interstate to get to and from our destination.
Then we ate three meals a day in restaurants and visited as many attractions as
we could. By the time we got home, we were usually exhausted and ready to get
away from each other to our own private spaces.
During our first year of fulltiming, we knew we were still
traveling in vacation mode. We wanted to spend the summer in Alaska and
September in Ohio with family. Although we did travel some long days, we spent a
week or two at most places we stopped. We want to gradually work toward
traveling by "the rule of twos" we heard from an experienced fulltimer:
travel no more than two hundred miles in a day, stop by two o'clock, and stay
for at least two weeks.
