Now that we live in a Travel Trailer you might think we are all about getting to our next destination and traveling long distances. Recently a friend was shocked to hear how far we typically drive between campsites.
Before we owned our travel trailer we traveled great distances and saw all fifty states. We might drive 200 miles before lunch, take in a local attraction, then put in a few more miles after dinner before arriving at a motel. On the last day of a vacation we have been known to drive well over 500 miles so we might sleep in our own beds. When we visited Utah in two weeks we saw four National Parks and a state park by staying in a different motel every other night.
Now that we tow our own beds behind us our travel days are very different. First we prepare our own breakfast, pack a lunch, and clean up. Then for the next hour or so we stow everything we got out during our stay. Dumping sanitary tanks, disconnecting from water, electric, and sewage and then hitching the trailer to our pickup truck might take another hour. We use a long checklist to avoid missing critical steps. Arriving at our destination reverses our departure steps with another checklist. The most time consuming steps for arrival all end similarly: “Reposition as needed.” We have spent as long as an hour repositioning our trailer a foot or so in one direction or the other to achieve level while being able to connect to utilities and put our steps down.
Thus departure and arrival chores take up what we might have done before lunch and before dinner. We avoid setting up in the dark or during a rain squall as those tasks are hard enough when there is plenty of light. If we have any extra energy at the end of the day we shop for groceries.
Many RVers travel much further than we do on a travel day. We have chatted with people who boast of driving as much as five or six hours at a time with only a day between travel days. We typically aim for two hours driving or about a hundred miles them we may stay in a campground several days.
Travel is no longer our object. Now we visit an area. While our fast tour of Utah felt like an introductory course, now we take time to appreciate each place we visit more deeply. We chat with our neighbors to learn what local attractions they found. I might spend an afternoon doing routine maintenance.
Currently we are timing our trip north to keep pace with the arrival of spring. Our slower pace allows us to walk trails we would have missed, to listen to the birds, to read the morning news, and to watch the stars come out at night.
With a slower pace, what might you have time to notice where you are today?