Thoughts on One Full Year of Full Time Travel

Preparing for full time travel is harder than full time travel itself.

It took us six months to downsize from our 2800 square foot home in Washington to living in our 33 foot travel trailer. We sold, donated and purged most of our belongings, only prioritizing the necessities to bring with us in the trailer.

Living in a small space requires constant maintenance.

There are no closets to stuff unwanted things. There is no extra storage space for a "maybe" pile. We tidy throughout the day, clean daily and purge at least monthly to keep our tiny home neat and organized.

One misplaced item can render the whole space unusable.

Sounds like an exaggeration but one large bowl placed on the kitchen counter can make cooking nearly impossible.

Cooking on the road can be just as good as cooking in a house.

Our kids say we have made the best meals in our travel trailer. We still bake sourdough daily, we make homemade birthday cakes and pizzas, and cook nearly all our meals in our tiny kitchen.

Plan in advance AND plan to be flexible.

We can book most of our campgrounds 6 months out so we book them 6 months out to the day to be able to get the locations we want. We also move bookings around and make changes at the last minute when necessary. Full time travel requires a balance of planning and flexibility.

Organization is key to planning locations.

I don't know what we would do without spreadsheets and our new Trip Planner tool to plan our locations and bookings. Sam created a spreadsheet months before we even started traveling to track our booking dates and the date we can book them on.

3-4 hours is ideal for travel days.

We occasionally have travel days that are a little longer, but most of our travel days are only about 3 hours of driving. This means we don't have to rush in the morning and we get all set up in our new campground in time to make a late lunch.

A travel day checklist makes travel days much smoother.

The first few times we moved the trailer we compiled a travel day checklist of every single thing we need to do on travel days. This includes everything from double checking window latches to securing the pantry doors to dumping the tanks. Even if it's obvious, it's on the list.

Living small inspires living smaller.

Now that we are circling back to Washington and revisiting the small amount of things we have stored with our friends here, we are inspired to getting rid of anything that is not absolutely essential. We buy less and are always thinking about the fact that everything you buy one day needs to be gotten rid of.

Traveling all over the west coast has enabled us to see most of our family and friends in the past year.

We have had friends and family visit us in cool places and have visited many of our friends and family members at their homes by booking nearby campgrounds. We have seen our parents and siblings, met our new baby niece, spent time with aunts, uncles and one grandparents, and visited old friends all over the west.

Meeting new people is one of the best parts of traveling.

We have met so many cool families on the road, both other traveling families and families who live more traditionally in one place. The kids have become pros at making new friends and we all love meeting people from all over who have amazing stories to tell. We have learned so much from the new friends we have made and hope to see them all down the road.

Life on the road makes it easier to say yes to new opportunities.

Downsizing from a house to a trailer was a lot of work and took a lot of time and effort. Now that we have already downsized, saying yes to new opportunities is much easier, no matter where they take us. Stay tuned to learn where our next adventures may take us!