It’s Been a Year, Our Travelversary!!

Our family celebrating Christmas 2021 in beautiful Costa Rica.

At times it’s hard to believe we’ve been on the road for a year already. 

However, when we are sharing our memories of the people and places from our travels, it seems like this has been our lifestyle forever. 

While this path is not for everyone, we are grateful we found it and after committing initially to a year, we have both decided we are not ready to quit!

We will be spending 2023 traveling around the southwest United States and maybe…. Mexico. 

To celebrate our year travelversary (yes, I am sure that should be a word 😊) we thought we would share some of our favorite lessons learned. 

Hardest Part of Full Timing

The hardest part of this lifestyle was missing our people.  It’s easy to take for granted the communities you have built over a lifetime and that seem like they will be there forever.  When you become a community of two with a new place to call home every few days, life can get lonely.

Traveling quickly to get from Idaho to Florida ahead of winter storms and for a work deadline taught us this valuable lesson.   Not staying anywhere long enough to meet or get to know our fellow travelers let us learn that we prefer a slower pace of travel.    

Thankfully, when we returned from Costa Rica in January, we had three months to spend in central Florida.  Staying in just two spots for that time, allowed the universe to bring to us the community we had been missing.  

Campfires, thirsty Thursdays, and group dinners let us share stories and experiences with our new friends from all over the world. 

Biggest Learning Moment

We are far more flexible in our planning than we ever knew.  While raising our three kids and juggling all of our schedules, we had to be pretty regimented. 

Going on the road, we initially brought that same mindset with us.  Researching every spot thoroughly, booking our travels ahead of time, and for me stressing about many details that came with the learning process of towing your home. 

About 3 months into our new adventure, we realized that we actually enjoyed a bit more freedom and less structure in our new life.  While we still planned routes and researched the dirt roads that led us to some of our favorite spots, we relaxed about having the whole month planned out.  This change has allowed us to enjoy those small moments more deeply than before.    

Staying a night in a rest stop at an overlook in Texas, was something we would have never done before, but it is one of our favorite memories as we look back on the year. 

Our million dollar view from a rest stop in west Texas.

Favorite Place We Stayed

This is a question we get asked all the time and it’s almost always the same answer.  Our favorite place to stay is the next place we are going. 

We have been consistently amazed at the beauty of our country, and the friendliness of the people in the places we have visited. 

Small towns and state highways over big cities and the interstate system is our preference for travel as it allows us to see those places that would appear to be just dots on the map but are actually full of culture and history.    

Andrea and Jerrod hiking Black Elks Peak, South Dakota,

Summer 2022

Biggest Discovery

After 23 years of marriage, raising three kids, 21 years as a police officer, and a variety of other adventures, we are still best friends!  Hitting the road, living in a small space, and adventuring alone, honestly, we were not sure how we would do. 

However, after a year, we are better than ever. 

More honest, open, and loving than we have been at any other point in our relationship. 

We believe it is this lifestyle that allowed us to open new doors, and the small space that forced us to confront issues we may have buried in the past. 

Thanks so much for joining us in our journey and we can’t wait to share year two with you!