The RV Summer Slowdown: Why Fewer Rigs Are on the Road and Why That's Okay

SPEAKER_01 0:04

Hey, we are back. And I you know what I've noticed this summer, Tasha, is that more than any before, as we drive across the country, there's fewer and fewer rigs on the road. And it surprised me, I won't lie. You know, but rallies that we've been to this season, and yes, we've been still doing rallies. We're gonna hop into that in a little bit, but there's a little more room, or there's a few more cancellations. You know, we had four sites open next to us at the last event we went to. But campgrounds, also, I'm able to get last minute reservations, and I haven't been able to do that in like five years, six years, a long time. Wow, yeah, yeah. I mean, and then of course there's fuel prices. I mean, everybody's talking about fuel prices, and it depends on where you are, how bad they are. Like we were in Texas, we just came across the Missouri border in Tillano last week, and Frank was like over five dollars a gallon for diesel. So, you know, I mean, and I had already seen that because I'd been to Maine and back, you know. But I don't think that's the whole story. I think that a lot of us are just kind of tired. I mean, yeah, and maybe RV staying home isn't just because of gas prices. Maybe it's some of us are finally giving ourselves a much-needed break after 2020 and feeling like we had to do it all. So today we're gonna hop in and talk about that. The summer slowdown. What does that really look like? Why is it happening? And why might it be one of the healthiest things you do for yourself this summer? All right, so let's talk about the burnout. Let's start there. So, even for the rigs that are out there, yes, you know, it's a lot right now. And you know, if you're not like us and you're not used to being with your family 24-7, your kids are home all day, you know, and your activities, going to a campground, but the campgrounds aren't packed shoulder to shoulder. But I think what we really fall into is let's call it the comparison track. I mean, I'm guilty of it. Looking at Instagram and seeing the real and going, well, I'm not doing that this summer. Tasha, what about you? What do you think that, you know, why do you think people that are out there living the dream, you know, do they think they're doing RV life wrong?

SPEAKER_00 2:06

I think that it comes down to, you know, we talk a lot about you have this one life, you know, and you want to make sure that you are making the most out of this one life that you have. And you don't know if you are given tomorrow. And I think that's a lot of the reason why many of us are living the RV life, is that we don't want to miss out on those moments with our loved ones. We don't want to miss out on the opportunity to see and experience things. And so I think sometimes it can become a um a must do instead of uh an opportunity to. It can become more of a like a rush to instead of a slow roll into. And I think that's where it it can get a little mayhemy. It can turn into mayhem, it can turn into like a manic atmosphere if you don't keep an eye on it, you know? For sure.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

Yeah. So I mean, like obviously we are guilty of all of those things, but you know, our dynamics are very different owning our V-roofing solutions, you know. We have to be at rallies, we have to do some things, but even that, we're dialing back some of it. So we did the two big, big, big shows this summer, and they were kind of like big, big, big shows this summer. So they were way down in numbers from what we were used to seeing. So, I mean, we drove from Texas to Maine, and actually Frank and I never even saw each other. He was on a run out west and he came home the night I left. And so definitely like we went six weeks or so without seeing each other, no longer than that by the time we got back. But you know, those rallies were much smaller than normal. Yeah, and they had a lot more local people to that area, which is not something we always see. Yeah. Maine, for example, was Escapade, and Escapade is now owned by Harvest Host. And so that rally was one of those things where you could be a Harvest Host member or an escapees member or a Boondocker's Welcome member. And that's like the first time it's ever been that way. You could be any of those. But I met a lot more people from like Vermont, uh, New Hampshire, Maine, all of the Northeast area. I would say probably at least a third of the people that went were literally from that area. So that was definitely different.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

Probably people who had not been to the West Coast events previously because that's just such a trek for them. Right. And that's what they said is this was their first event.

SPEAKER_01 4:41

Two-thirds of the audience, this was actually their very first event. And so, you know, while it was a great rally, it was a much smaller scale, which was kind of nice in some ways. It meant that you got to meet some people, hang out with some people that maybe you didn't already know. And there were a lot of new people. So it was it was different, you know, kids being out of school for most people, unlike us road schoolers, that can change the whole rhythm of your life in the summer. And you know, we have to be mindful for that too. I know you just recently interviewed Megan and Pete from our captain's logs, and they are just part-timers, but their rhythm is so different than somebody that's maybe full-time. And so I think that that's important to talk about too. Because I mean, like you and I, we roll in and our lives don't really change much.

SPEAKER_02 5:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:27

Yeah. So, but I mean, like people that just do this for the summer, maybe it's one or two weeks a year that they're doing this. And so maybe they drop that back.

SPEAKER_00 5:36

I thought it was really interesting what they were, you know, Megan and Pete talked about how for them as part-timers, because they are trying to navigate this in a way that kind of maximizes their time, it it's something that blends into their sticks and bricks life too. So they hit the road, you know, when they're out of school or when they're on vacation, but they're planning like way into the, you know, the we're still at our jobs and schools, school time because they want to make sure that they are getting the most out of that. Whereas I think for us, you know, sometimes I feel like we are next week, you know, this campground opened up, you know, like you were talking about. Let's go ahead and move there. Well, what can we do there next week? And so I think there's also just this like difference in how scheduling happens and how that can affect even just the ebb and flow of your day-to-day life. And really, you know, like when I was talking to Megan and Pete, and they were like, oh yeah, we've got, you know, we've got daily, you know, things planned out, we've got everything, you know, he has logs, he has like things set. And I was like, man, I don't remember the last time I had that. You know, like Matt and I are gonna take a bus to go see the island where we are because like, you know, I'm like, I don't have time to plan a sightseeing tour right now. So we're gonna let the public transportation sightsee for us.

SPEAKER_01 7:09

We were in Texas for a good long time, and the heat definitely impacted what we were and were not doing, you know. So that's a whole thing, right? Across the country. It's hotter this year in some places than ever before. And so there's less that you want to do. For us, Texas is kind of one of those places where the home office is and we have to be there for the something, but there's not a lot of hiking. Like, unless we want to go to the mall and walk around, there's not that much to do because 90 miles away is the Gulf. And so, and yes, there's Lake Conroe when we're there, and yes, we have kayaks, and yes, we do that, but you know, that's all we do when we're there, if it's not seeing family. And so it definitely played a factor. Um, I think there's another side of this where we feel like I bought the RV, I paid for this lifestyle, I have to do it.

SPEAKER_00 8:00

Do you think that's part of it? I think so. And I think I think that a lot of it also comes down to, you know, like I was talking about, like you just don't want to lose that moment that you have, you know? And so it's like I've I've committed to this, I've made this decision. I really need to make sure that like I've made the right decision. And I have not wasted my time, I've not wasted my family's time, I've not wasted our money, I've not, you know, it's like really gotta make the most of it. You know, it's funny because you're talking about the weather, and we're in Maine right now, visiting Rosewood, and we literally had a day where it was in like the low 70s, and I was like, this is the most beautiful day ever. I am so happy. And then the very next day, it was in the high 90s with a heat index, and we had heat warnings. And I went in to go pick rosewood up to bring them out to the RV and to hang out for the day. And the traffic was insane in Bar Harbor. And I was like, I do not understand what is going on. And they said, Well, it's because the temperature's gone up. Everybody thinks that they should go get in the water now. But at the same time, the water, there are weather warnings for the water because the water in some places, the temperature is as low as 40 degrees. So you've got heat warnings, but you've got hypothermia warnings from the weather department for getting in the water. So, you know, I think you you have the, I don't want to waste the weather. I don't want to waste the opportunity to take in the sights, I don't want to waste the moments that we have, I don't want to waste the money that we're spending. There's so many like, but what if I blow this questions in the back of everyone's mind? You know, what if I waste this moment? And I think sometimes in that scurry of trying to make a moment something, you can miss what the moment already is. And I think that's that's where it gets dangerous of like trying to balance that. Yeah, no, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 10:21

All right. So, you know, let's go back to fuel economy a little bit. And, you know, I've been privy to some conversations that we haven't actually, we haven't actually people don't know this, but we haven't recorded in well over a month because of how crazy life has gotten. And so, but Ben Hirsch, the COO of Campers In, put up an article on LinkedIn about the industry shift right now, but it's been coming for a long time. And it's not just the fuel prices, it's the whole industry. The whole industry is down between 19 and 26% across the board. So if you're having a quieter year, you're really not just imagining it. It's actually real. And in the industry, we're seeing less people at rallies, we're seeing less buyers at rallies. And for those of us in business in this industry, that's definitely been an interesting problem. But if you're seeing a slowdown, you're not the only one. I actually have lots of friends that stayed in Florida to shuffle the Florida shuffle. It's what we call it in thousand trails this summer. Now I did that while I stayed in Florida one summer, and that was in 2020 when the rest of the world decided to hit the road. We usually decided to we decided to stay put to see what was gonna happen. And so we figured if there was a place we had to be stuck that's that was an affordable, not really, but affordable in that there's a lot of thousand trails parks in one area, and there was tons of things to do. We could flip from the beach to inland, whatever that looked like weather-wise at the time, and we still had the option to leave if a hurricane came in. So that was our logic back then. This is a different kind of logic, though. So, like this week, for example, we came out of the Family RV Association rally, formerly FMCA. And we were there for like 10 days. We had an install there. We met up with one of our other teams at that event, and then my my daughter had somebody she wanted to go visit. So we are in this little tiny park that has not full hookups. That's it's a little tiny park. But it's been great. But we're leaving tomorrow, but we've decided to pivot just a little bit and stay in the area of St. Louis a little bit longer because we found a coast-to-coast park. Now, could we have gone further? Yes, we could have, but we're not. We're just gonna slow down. And so this timing on this episode is 100% perfect. But it it's only 90 miles away, so it's not as much fuel as we'd be spending if we were going three or four hundred miles. And so the thought process is just slow down, take a week, make some decisions, directions. We obviously have to be in Hershey by fall, but how do we get there? My other show team is taking a lot of the heavy lifting on the shows for the rest of the season up in Indiana, which is something we normally do. So it's gonna be weird not to actually be at those rallies, but we might be close enough to pop in for a day to visit. Who knows? But we'll have to be able to slow crawl across compared to how fast we normally have to do it. Yeah. But I think you have to say it out loud. Like you're allowed to have a slower summer, like a boring one, maybe. Yeah. You don't owe anyone an adventure, not even on your Instagram reel. You might not get as many views and followers, but that's okay. And you definitely don't owe anyone an explanation for why you're staying put this season. Yeah. You know, you have to love people where you're they're at, and I say that all the time, but that includes you, you know. It's it's one of those things that, you know, we have to really stop and think about it. So on that note, you know, I Tasha and I have had some tough conversations about what the season looks like for us for season three. And we've decided we took out a little too much in season two. Just a little bit. Just a little. So, I mean, we're gonna dial it back in season three a little bit. And I know that's a couple months off at this point, but by the time we s set out again at Hershey, the podcast will still be here, but it's gonna be restructured a little differently. And so we don't know what that looks like quite yet. Maybe that means that we dial some of those community spotlights into regular episodes. I think that would be okay. It'll mean there's less of them, so it means that those community spotlight series are gonna be more limited and the application process might be a little different, but I think that's okay too.

SPEAKER_00 14:28

Yeah, I think that's good though. You know, it gives a little bit of variety to the content. It gives some time for rest, and I don't know. It's it's a lot. Putting on a podcast is a lot. It's a lot more than just sitting down and talking for 40 minutes. There's a lot that goes into it, and it's well, and it's a ton behind the scenes that nobody sees.

SPEAKER_01 14:54

Like that's the side of it that I think needs to be said out loud. Like what you see produced, you know, Tasha is mostly our editor for almost everything that we do. And, you know, it's it's exhausting. We we tried the three a week, and it was, you know, it was a way to get us some money coming in. I'm not saying beyond the brand's going away. I'm saying that there might be two or three spots a month for those beyond the brand episodes, maybe, you know, if we get them, you know, and I think that's important to say too. Those beyond the brand episodes are a paid episode sponsored by whatever company decides to do that. And so those are a specific situation, but it's been, I would say, very stressful to try and sell everyone every week. And, you know, we've dialed it back the last couple weeks, only doing a couple. And and it's because of that. And, you know, again, like the community spotlights, everyone loves doing the community spotlights. We we are usually booked out for that weeks in advance, and so when we record those, they're, you know, sometimes we'll have four or five in the can, which is wonderful for us on this side of things. But it also means that there's that'll be more limited going into season three. So, and and I think that's okay. Like, I think that we can still build the community this way. And who knows, maybe we'll throw an extra one in on the on the Patreon as it grows again. You know, I don't know. Patreon seems to have been the thing we've not been able to make work with the amount of content we're putting out. Yeah. Maybe we'll get back to like a special episode every you know week on Patreon. I I I or every month. I think it's every month. I think we're supposed to do a mini and a full full one. And I know we haven't done one in probably what four months now where we've done an extra.

SPEAKER_00 16:32

It's been a little it's been a hot minute. It's right. I think, yeah. And I think, you know, that's that comes down to like just it's there's so much. And it, you know, at some point you have to say, wait a minute, what's working and what's not working? And when there's just two of you, you know. Well, and burnout is real, you know.

SPEAKER_01 16:52

Yeah, yeah. So Tasha and I had a really weird conversation about well, I was in May, so it's been a hot minute, but it's uh, you know, she talked about possibly leaving the podcast, not in bad terms, just in attired terms. You know, Tasha, where are you sitting at that right now? I know you want to see the podcast survive and grow. I do.

SPEAKER_00 17:12

I love this community. I love what this offers our community, and I love the the opportunity that it gives people to tell their stories and to help others realize that they can do this if this is their passion, if this is what they want to do. But I also know that for me, you know, we haven't been on the road that long, and kind of going into what this episode has been about, you know, when you have been on the road for just a a couple years, and then you know, you're spending your your whole days working and then your whole evenings doing podcasting, there is no on the road with your family, you're you're just in your camper. And not that I don't love my camper, we're very, very blessed, but that also has a it carries a weight, you know, that there's a very physical and mental burnout that happens. And um, and so it's it's something that I had to heavily consider through a lot of tears, a lot of conversations with my family. It was very, very, very difficult to weigh. But I think that this next season I need to step back so that I can focus on my family, so that I can focus on myself and you know, taking some self-care time. And so, you know, I think what I would love to do is I would love to, you know, come in once a month and and you know, be part of the conversation, but I am gonna have to step back because I do need to spend a little bit of more time with my family and a little bit more time just breathing. And you know what?

SPEAKER_01 19:09

And that's okay. I've actually, you know, since we talked, I have a couple people in mind to come in and do some co-hosting with me. I think we'll have guests that will fill some of nothing will fill the gap of you. I you need to know that. But I am happy to hear that you at least want to come in from time to time. Like even if you came on once every six weeks or so, like we could build those rotations in at the beginning of the season. And so I'm super excited about that idea. And then those would be your episodes, you know, they would be stuff you're passionate about. So we do have a road schooling mom that's gonna be coming on, which I'm really excited about, and I can't tell you who it is because you got to come in for season two to find out. So season three, right? Season three. So productive rest, you know, what that looks like on the road. I think that's important. And you got us all teary-eyed, but I think it's important. I think it's important to talk about that because you know, we did have a co-host exit stage left in season two, and that's not how we want to leave this. And I did consider stopping the podcast altogether, and I want people to know that that's not happening either. I have no idea what it looks like for season three, so don't think that it's like all planned out because it's not, and this is the perfect episode for this. So, as we started talking last night, I had nothing prepared. Taj, I had nothing prepared. I'm like, we need to talk about, you know, just slowing down in the RV community, what it was look like, you know. So for that, us, it's meant, you know, booking an extra campground for two weeks up the road instead of chasing the next stop, or skipping a rally that we'd normally go to, or more pool days, or fewer drive days, and making sure that those, you know, worked out okay. So let's talk about some practical ways people can actually practice slowing down if they need to. You know, there's still gonna be people that are gonna go out and do do it all. Yesterday, the kids, well, the boys and Frank and I went out to City Museum here in St. Louis, Missouri. And would you believe we haven't been to St. Louis since 2013 when we hit the road? Wow. That's crazy, right? You know, we've been on the road, we celebrated our 14th nomad anniversary on July 3rd, and so it's a whole thing. But uh the kids were teeny when we went to the St. Louis Zoo. Yeah, and like teeny, like so tidy. Like Judah was like under two years old.

SPEAKER_00 21:28

You know, I grew up in Kansas City, and I don't think that I have ever been to the St. Louis Zoo.

SPEAKER_01 21:34

Interesting. Ever. Well, City Museum was that place that everybody told me we had to go, and the kids all played. Yeah. So it was really neat, it was very cool, but it was definitely a busy day. But we we don't do anything normal, meaning that we walked in at twelve o'clock and we walked out at six thirty. Yeah. And so we spent six and a half hours inside that location with the kids crawling underneath the floor. And I mean, it was, and I mean, you have to imagine this because Aaron is like what, six, three? And I mean, thank God he's super skinny. But he like goes down in this hole and he comes out the other side. Now, where did you do that? He goes, I'll show you, Mom, let me take my phone, your phone. And so I have a video of what it looked like as he went on. I would not have gone in that hole. I'm gonna say that out loud. I would not have fit in that hole. Like it's like Blair Witch projecty. I'm just saying. All right, so extending your than the inside of the hole. It's Blair Witch. All right. So one thing you can do is extend your stays, you know, instead of hopping sites as frequently, slow it down. Plan shorter trips is another one. You know, more weekend visits, or if you're if you're taking a week of vacation, go Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday. Number one, a lot of the places will have a reduced rate those days. Number two, there will be less people, even though because there's still people working during the summer. You know, even though the kids are out of school, doesn't mean that the the retirees, just so you know, they're waiting until all your kids go back to school to go back into certain places. It's okay. Yeah. I work camped for a while, they tell you that. They're not afraid to tell you that. In fact, you know, one of the things that happened as we're doing this, I'm just gonna co totally sideline this. I was asked to debut the Rolling Roots unit, the chapter for at Family RV Association at the rally that we were at over July 4th. And Danielle came to me, she goes, I saved you a table. And I was like, no one here is gonna want to see my family chapter. Because, you know, it was mostly retirees and very supportive retirees, mind you, but still they were probably not joining my chapter. But one lady comes up to me, tapped my hand very sweetly, and she says, Oh, honey, she goes, Good luck with that. And I was like, Oh, that's nice. And she goes, Honey, I I I went on the road in an RV part of the year so that I could get away from my grandchildren. Kid you not, she literally said this to me. And I was like, Oh, that's nice. I mean, what do you even say to that? You know, and and so I have I have some people that have been super supportive and super. So what I did was I made a front-facing Facebook page, and I'll have to get the link to that to you. I will put it in the show notes. Put it in the show notes. If you're a family on the road and you're not a member of Family RV Association yet, you can like and follow the page without having to join FRVA. Now, to do any activities with it, you have to join FRVA, which is $99 a year. But, you know, get in there and get some information. If we can get this thing off the ground, it's a viable way to do it. And so we would like to have a family area for Perry next spring going into Perry. I don't know what it looks like yet, but we're trying. And there's no guarantees that we're gonna do it because family RV Association for a long time wasn't family friendly, and so I think that a lot of people feel that, but I think it's changing. I'd like to hope it's changing. I'd like to hope it's changing for the next group of people coming in because the reality is is your oldest is done with school. Mine are phasing out of school. I mean, like I have a 14 and a 16. Well, they're gonna be 15 and 17 sooner than I know it. And so I'm my timeline's limited there too, in that capacity. So if we can get it going for the next generation of RVers, I'm all for it. And you don't have to be a full-time RVer to join the group, like you can be a part-time RV or you can just go to rallies. Actually, one mom reached out to me after the fact and said, you know, there was nothing for families to do. How can we change that? And so she's a member of another chapter. It's free to join our chapter. So the Rolling Roots chapter. So if you're a member of FRVA, you can join the Rolling Roots chapter if you have kids. If you have grandkids that you travel with, you not all grandparents are like the one lady I met. There's a lot of grandparents that travel with grandkids. All right. So slowing down, let's go back to that for just a second. Um saying no to a meetup or without guilt, you know, and and feeling that, you know, if if it's too much for you, it's just too much for you right now. I think that it's okay to say that. Uh what about cooking? Do you I you guys do better at this than I do? You do more batch cooking than we do.

SPEAKER_00 26:06

We do. And we in our new to us RV, we have we have to do batch cooking anyway, because we still have not fixed the so what people might not know is that when we had the pre-purchase inspection done, our our inspector said, don't use the stove and oven, because when he lit it, it did like this, it did a weird thing. And so we need to replace the stove in the oven. So we've been in the RV, but we've not been using that. So everything that we do is done in the Instapot. Now we do have an Instapot that's like the Instapot is also, yeah, it's massive, but it also has like the air fryer lid that you can switch it off with. And it's, you know, it's got all the it's got all the bells and whistles. But so when we cook in it, what we have found is that if we make small batches, it burns more easily. If we make larger batches, we have fewer burn possibilities. So we make the full batches and then we don't burn as much, and we, you know, usually everything turns out okay, and then that feeds us for quite a while. So that's that's typically what we do. And you know, and Matt actually invested in one of the burners the that you guys have. Oh, an induction. Yes, and I think it's actually the one that you guys have, just the single top one, um, because it works with our our pots and pans. Um, and so we now have that to kind of get us through, you know, when people want like scrambled eggs or something that's not Instapot of Instapot. But yeah, that's that's where we're at right now.

SPEAKER_01 27:56

Well, and what's crazy is we that's all we've used for years, like is that one single burner. And so I mean, it's doable. Um, and we do it with a big family. So, you know, the other thing I like to tell people is turn how far did you go, maybe into how good did today feel? Yes, you know, so yesterday was really good for us. It was the first time as a family that we've gone out and done anything together weeks, and I'm not saying we haven't done things in like one or two people, I'm saying that all together we haven't done anything together. And we still didn't have Gus with us yesterday. So Theo was we're where we are, she's seeing a friend, and so they had planned yesterday, so they didn't come to City Museum with us. And City Museum, it does cost money. I somehow thought it was free. Um, but it's if you play outside, it's free. But if you want to go inside and see all the other stuff, if there's more to it, but it was $37 for the day, or it was $37.99 for a pass. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 28:50

So we're going back. And is that is that for the whole family?

SPEAKER_01 28:54

So uh per person.

SPEAKER_00 28:56

Or per person. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 28:57

Yeah, but yeah, so it comes with, you know, a whole card and whole thing.

SPEAKER_00 29:01

But you can get rooftop at $37 a day or $37.99 for a pass. How long is the pass for? A year. By heavens, y'all. I'm hoping you spent the extra 99 cents per person. This we did.

SPEAKER_01 29:15

So the only person that didn't get one yesterday was Theo. And so we figured that gave us the opportunity to go back at least one more time. Because I'm sure we didn't see it all based on now because my whole Instagram feed is full of reels from City Museum because now I went there, you know. Facebook knows where I went.

SPEAKER_00 29:31

So now is this I need to ask, and I'm I'm really hoping that I don't have my cities mixed up, but I don't think that I do. Do does the city museum does it have a bridge that goes over a like a highway and you can stand in it? See, maybe I'm getting cities mixed up. There was one that we took the kids to when they were little, little, and you would walk through a bridge to get into the the museum area, but the bridge was like over the highway, and there were all of these.

SPEAKER_01 30:15

So this one has a bus on top of the roof that you can go on and you're hanging over the city.

SPEAKER_00 30:22

Yes. I want to go to there.

SPEAKER_01 30:25

Yeah, it it was super fun. You know, I you know, Frank and I even like the cave system that they have, they have this cave system built into the back side of it that I was like, oh, we won't fit in the caves, it's just for the kids. And I realized there was a whole walking path for grownups in the cave, too. So it's not just a kids' museum. I think that's there's a there's like a skate park section that has no skates, but you can run up and down all of them. And underneath them, there's like a tunnel for the littler kids, and then there's a giant pencil, it's enormous. And so, you know, and then there's they have fish, they have lots of fish. They have those fish you can stick your fingers in the water and have your hands cleaned. There's just so much to do, you know. So in there that, you know, I I would give it a discredit if I told you everything that we did there. Yeah. But it was it was cool, it was very cool. I know you and Matt have had a very different type of summer.

SPEAKER_00 31:16

You know, what was your summer like it's been really, you know, it's been slow, but it's also been a lot of focusing on work and also focusing on just getting, we were just trying to get to Maine to see Rosewood. We we did get to we went to Gettysburg and we did spend one day. Uh the two of us, we went out and we we did the full like Gettysburg, we went to all the things. Um that's heavy though. It was we did that very heavy. It was very heavy. But it's a lot of our a lot of our summer has been, I feel like it's been trying to recoup from um maybe overextending ourselves through the winter and just trying to also find what our new kind of life looks like or what our new yeah, I mean, because we don't have rosewood with us. And you know, they're looking at like what are they gonna do when their work camp is over come November 1st? Do they where do they want to go? What do they want, you know? And so right now, I don't think that they're coming back to the camper. I don't think they're coming back to the RV. And so And choose your first, so that's super hard.

SPEAKER_01 32:47

That natural progression is a whole thing, but at the same time, you gotta give it space to just get through it. So it's and you know, I I tell people all the time, you know, we have a lot of adult children at this point in my life. Raising toddlers was easy. I didn't think so at the time. I know, you know, but raising adult children that make their own decisions is so much harder because you have to trust that you did an okay job as a parent, right?

SPEAKER_00 33:12

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And they're doing great. It's being up here has been wonderful. It's been great to see how much they're thriving. And you know, I meet people that they're working with and you know, they're roommates, and to hear people say these like incredibly lovely things about my kid is just so um heartwarming. Like it's the best feeling. But um, but it's also this, you know, we have to find our new rhythm because I also know that like David is is, you know, he's starting to get interested in like what's next steps for him. And so, you know, that kind of means like what's next steps for us. And so it's it's been interesting. This summer has been interesting, it's been a lot of work, it's been a lot of just resetting, I think. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:05

Well, and I mean, you know, you we see so many families go off the road as their kids stage out of the camper. And so we're hoping that's not you because you just it is not us.

SPEAKER_00 34:16

It is not us. What it is going to be is how do we help them get to their next stage? Like that, I think is the part that we're trying to maneuver is like that's not easy. In between, yeah, you know, that's in between is just everybody. Right. Whether you're in an RV or in a sticks and bricks, when your kids are moving out, it's that like how do we help them get set up in that next stage?

SPEAKER_01 34:41

Yep. But at the same time, I think from RV life, you know, it it it is different, you know, because they they they want to successfully launch, they don't want to have to boomerang back. And so I think that's important to say, you know, and I don't know. I just you know, we did that this spring. We helped the boys move out and they ended up moving into our old camper for now. Yeah. Then we did the craziest thing ever in the downturn of events. We bought a truck because we couldn't leave them without a way to haul that camper. And so, you know, so we have a brand new ram for, you know, our old camper. So, you know, there's a few days between those two years. And so, but we had no intention of buying a new truck, not with the economy the way it is. And so, you know, but you know, sometimes you do things you need to do because your kids need it. And right, it's not to like say, oh, I bought a new truck. In fact, I don't think we've even talked about the fact that we bought a new truck online at all because we don't want to talk about it. It's a stretch for us. I mean, it means less eating out, it means less doing. And so we're giving and taking just like everybody else out there. Business is not up for us. It's, you know, it's just like everybody else, 18 to 22 percent less jobs this summer. And so we're just trying to dial it back and, you know, get through it. Uh but I also have to be honest, you know, I should be the last person out there lecturing about how not to slow how to slow down this summer because obviously we didn't until like three days ago. We did the opposite, right? So we drove 2,000 miles each way to Fryberg, Maine, uh, from Texas to escapade with Theo. So she was my alternate driverslash co-pilot. We even made an impromptu visit in New Stop in New York City on the way back because why not add a major city detour to, you know, already insane drive, you know. So actually, that was kind of a happy accident. My my kid loves American girl dolls. So there was this place in White Plains, New York that literally we left Maine that morning. There was less than 300 miles. It should have been fine. We should have been there at three o'clock. We would have had plenty of time. We pulled in at eight minutes till five before they closed. And the lady side-eyed her. I sent Theo in by herself and said, Hey, go look around because I don't think I'm gonna make it in by the time I find parking in White Plains, New York. Right. And so that is exactly what happened. And so once you're that far into the outskirts of the city, you have some choices to make. You have to go back to the highways that are all toll roads that are bumper to bumper traffic, or you can do what we did and drive the free roads through the city in bumper to bumper traffic because it seemed like a good idea at the time. So it takes you around the beltway, blah, blah, blah. Anyway, at eight o'clock that night, we were in Jersey City, and I said, Let's stop for the night, let's have dinner, let's make an assessment of the situation, we'll see how far we are from here. And she said, Can we go into the city? Now, what you don't know is last year we were supposed to go to New York City in the fall after her. And we did not, we could not. There was stuff that came up, we just couldn't go. So I called Frank and I said, Hey, I said, How do you feel about a really cheap date into New York City? And uh it's gonna crush our timeline. Like, I won't be back on Monday, I'll probably be back Tuesday. And he's like, Go for it. So we did American Girl, we went to Broadway, we went to Italy, like the little Italian area. She had gluten-free New York style pizza and that's awesome. A Caesar salad with gluten-free croutons. She didn't believe they were gluten-free. We went to Chinatown, we went to, I don't know, we went to a handful of places, we went to Central Park. None of these are in order in the way that we did them. But I mean, we did a whole adventure day. We walked, I don't know, it was like eight and a half, eight miles, seven, seven point eight miles, I think is what my my phone said we walked. And then, you know, the subways and all the things, because we took the subway from Jersey City over. And so everything was like that. And so I I can't tell you, hey, slow down. And then, but then I drove home, right? Because now we're still there. We still have three days worth of driving to do. And uh, we did. It was amazing. I don't regret it, but I also felt it. And so we got home. We had one day to unpack the truck, repack the camper, and get on the road to the FRVA event in Sedalia, Missouri, which we did. So, but it's it's also made me think a lot about a full summer that fills you up and a full summer that just empties you out. Yeah. Because they can look identical from the outside of people looking in. These bags under my eyes are very real. You know, do you have a trade-off story that you would say that you've done this year specifically?

SPEAKER_00 39:13

We so we um I don't know if you remember, but early, early, early on, I think it was in January, we my favorite podcast announced that they were going to be doing a live show at Radio City Music Hall. And I was like, Oh, I'm going. Like, this is I'm gonna see this. So I bought tickets for Matt and I to go see it because we were gonna be up that way. So um a couple weeks ago, Matt and I left David at the campground with the RV, and we drove. We were we drove from Maine, and Matt said, he said, hey, what if we left tonight instead of tomorrow morning? And right, and he said, he said, we're two hours from Boston, and the Red Sox are playing the Yankees at Fenway, and there are tickets in the cheap seats where we've not sat. And he said, I can get us tickets, and then we can drive an hour, stay at a cheap hotel, and that cuts an hour off of our drive time tomorrow morning to get into the city. And I had already gotten our hotel for the night after the podcast show, and I was like, Really? We can do that, and he said, Yeah, we can do that. So we got done working, we packed everything up, we jumped in the car and we drove to Boston. I got to yell Yankees suck at the Yankees in Fenway, setting next to the Green Monster. It was amazing. We beat the Yankees, it was amazing. Um, and then we slept in a little hotel, got up the next morning, drove the rest of the way in, got to the hotel in New York City after a lot of detours. I think the New York City police were practicing for Taylor Swift's wedding because there was no reason for all of these detours. Like I it made zero sense. But our hotel was literally less than five minutes of a walk from Radio City Music Hall. It was just down the street. We got, we finally got there. The parking garage was right next to the hotel. We parked, we go in, and the guy said, You've been upgraded. And I said, Excuse me, I didn't pay for an upgrade. And he said, Sometimes good things happen. And I was like, What? So we go in, we got a king suite, and it was beautiful. And then we needed to find a place to eat. We walked out and we were like, Well, let's try this Filipino place. We walked and found it. It was around the corner, and it was this huge, like you walk in, and it was just all of these. It reminded me of this warehouse place that I love in LA that has all of these different restaurants in this one floor of this warehouse, and you just jump around and pick what you want. We go in and it's all of this like South Asian food stands in this one building. We got the most amazing food, and then we got ready. We went to the morbid show, and then we went back and had the most amazing night of sleep. We got up the next morning. Breakfast was built into the bill. I had the most amazing breakfast. We got up, we walked the city a little bit, we drove back to Maine, and it was the best little like two-night excursion, just Matt and I, just going out and doing something that was just supposed to be like a one-night hey. Remember when I bought these tickets back in January, but it turned into just a really nice weekend that the two of us got to have. And Matt had never been like, you know, down in New York City. And um, I don't know, it was just really nice. It was very fast.

SPEAKER_01 43:18

And like my whirlwind day in New York City. I understand this. You know, we we spent two nights in the area. We slept that night there, then we slept the next night there. And so, like same hotel, we just uh, you know, stayed the same place. And there was a fire drill the morning we went into New York City. So we're getting ready. Oh, yeah, no. I mean, somebody pulled the fire alarm. So I mean, like it was stressful, but it was, yeah. But I mean, I think that, you know, what makes a trip like that worth the exhaustion is you do get rested in some ways that you don't get rested in other ways. You know, the New York City detour with Theo alone was something we'll remember for a very long time. Connecting in Sedalia, you know, versus, you know, what we'll do next time in Sedalia. Like Sedelia is not where FRVA goes every year. In fact, they announced that next year's event is going to be in Shawnee, Oklahoma, in the summer in August. And so I'm not sure that that's yeah. There's that. So the other thing is, is we have been playing because I am crazy that way, the Learn to RV Great American Scavenger Hunt. And so have you seen some of the pictures this week? They've been fun. Um, people have been posting their their postcards in there. So you have to like take a picture of yourself and make a postcard out of it. So we've done that this week. We actually put ours inside the group this week too. But it's the week three. When this airs, it'll be week three of the Great American Scavenger Hunt. And it kicks off with like flamingos and floaties. Like this is the pool and luau week. So it's gonna be so much fun. But here's the thing about this week doesn't matter where you are, right? All you have to do is register on RV, join the Facebook group, and the Facebook group's just for fun and shenanigans. You don't have to join the Facebook group, but it's kind of a connection spot. There's more prizes this week. We have over $4,000 in prizes that we're giving away the month of July at Learn to RV. And so that's enormous. And I think the more people we have play, the more people we'll have come on next year when we do this all over again. There's been some challenges with points the first week. We had some challenges with RV the first week. It's our first year using it. It's a great resource. And John was wonderful to come on board and say, hey, I can take this on. And so he sponsored that side of the hunt. So I mean, we're just grateful for that. But it's going to open the door to future hunts for us, I think. And I think there'll be a lot, a few more shorter hunts throughout the year now. Looking at it, we're looking at possibly the next one being like a three-day Halloween hunt, which could be fun.

SPEAKER_02 45:45

Ooh. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 45:47

So, you know, themed hunts kind of thing. And then, you know, the more people we get playing and registered for each event, the better the sponsors get. I was told by one sponsor that was an e-bike company, and I can't tell you who, but basically, if we got to a thousand players, they would sponsor an e-bike. We're not even close. I'm not sure we'll get there this year. But, you know, that's kind of the numbers that we have to have in order to get those bigger sponsors. So we do have some great sponsors, you know. Open roads is sponsored. The RBAC Silencer has sponsored, you know, we have lots of smaller brands uh and companies. And that's what makes this thing different, right? Is that, you know, smaller businesses are sponsoring and able to sponsor. We also have five two-night stays to different campgrounds, one of which is Firefly Hills, Kentucky. Another one is Southern Charm Campgrounds, and there's a whole series of campgrounds there. And then Sun Outdoors actually gave us two two-night stays, and one of those will be in play this week during the scavenger hunt. So Myrtle Beach, Sun Outdoors, Two Nights is on the line for one person this week. But what's neat about it is you can do it from wherever you are. And you can jump in and do as much as you like. So last week's pictures were fun. There was a made in America thing, and I actually had to go to my pots and pans, which they made in America, and show people this is what we mean. Not hang out. There's some people that hung signs around their children's necks, and we had to say creative. Those don't count. So because if those count, then there's no real winners, right? And so there's there's that side of it. We also had one player that had a super fun entry. One of the items on there is find a pinball machine or a jukebox. So I know both of those are difficult to find, but they are here in the United States, and it's 66 vibes last week. And so we thought, okay, we so somebody took a box and they wrote the word juke on it. Super creative. That is very creative. And like it's an honorable mention to the highest degree because I would have never even thought of that, but we couldn't award points for it because the people that do find it have to get the points. So it is a little bit harder this week. We we did we did modify one of them because we realized people are not moving states as often right now. So we said, well, if you're not near a state sign, go get your town sign or the closest city sign to you. And so we're making some modifications to a lot for the slower travel. And so that was kind of the heart behind, you know, what this like. But like this week, go find a floaty, find a flamingo, jump in, snap some pictures, put them in on RV, you could win points on the Learn to RV Summer Scavenger Hunt. And so we'll drop the link in the bio for that one right to the website. Don't forget to register on RV because that's where the points count. Yes. All right. Well, if you're listening to this and you're still feeling behind, that's okay. Or if you feel like you're guilty of wanting a slow week, or if you're one of the rigs that hasn't left the driveway this summer, you know, that's okay too. If you're more like me this year, chasing big trips and feeling it in your bones, that's also allowed. Just check in with yourself. Figure out what you're running on, you know. Tell us in the comments your permission to slow down moment. You know, this is what I did that was the opposite of what I thought I would do. Story. We'd love to hear your stories. And don't forget to like, follow, and subscribe. Learn to RV the podcast. You can catch us on all the channels on Spotify and iHeartRadio and lots of others, Apple, Apple Music and more. But also, you know, you can also catch the actual video on YouTube if you want to. So just hit the follow button so you don't miss one each week. And as for season three, we still haven't figured it out yet, but we will. And uh, we hope you'll be here for all of it. We've got a few more episodes in season two, but there's some good ones coming. We appreciate each and every one of you. Natasha and I, thanks for joining Lauren Carvey the podcast.