Planning Our Year - 2018

How do we plan our travel? The owner at BBs Po Boy Seafood and Sandwiches asked us that question when she learned that we are full time RVers. I've asked myself that question, too, and sometimes it's a bit of a challenge. Before I can decide where to camp, I first have to determine what we want to see and do. Usually I start thinking about it well before it's time to move. But not always. On rather the spur of the moment, we decided to go from Joshua Tree NP to Park of the Sierras so we could visit Yosemite, Sequoia and Death Valley NP (which was having a super bloom).

After two years of mostly paying for camping, Lon and I had already decided that our focus for 2018 would be on free camping, boondocking. We are still thinking about some sort of specific goal such as less than $500 on camping fees for the year or something like that. I'm anticipating that we'll hit a few SKP parks to do laundry, dump tanks, etc. If we boondock, it's a reasonable $7/night and the laundromats are super affordable.

We also decided to take our chances with Border Patrol and go WAY far south in Arizona. When we were in Benson in December 2015 and driving south to Bisbee and Tombstone, I found myself really wanting to return.

It's October 21 and we're on the Mississippi Coast at the Gulf Islands National Seashore. We don't have an exact departure date, but we do know that we will start heading west to Quartzsite after Christmas. We want to be in Q by January 11 for the Xscapers Annual Bash Part I that starts on January 12. Then on January 19,  we will move over to American Girl Mine in Cal. near Yuma. This BLM land gets excellent reviews and is the perfect spot to visit Los Algodones for dentist and optometrist appointments. There's a 14 day limit that I'm sure we'll max out, between doctor's appointments, walking a half marathon in Yuma, and visiting with Xscapers, We have also committed to being in Slab City, CA on the east side of the Salton Sea on April 20. So, the question has been, where will we go and what will we do for the three months between AGM and Slab City?

A trip to the Gulf Islands National Seashore visitor center provided a bit of inspiration. I took my National Parks Passport in to get a stamp for this National Park System area. Only then did I realize that I had missed a few opportunities for passport stamps: Cape Lookout National Seashore and the Blue Ridge Parkway. There's a wonderful map of all the National Park areas in a convenient pocket in the front of my passport. I obviously hadn't looked at it in a while. So, when we returned to our campsite, I pulled it out.

Given all of the above, I focused on southern Arizona and immediately my eye was drawn to Organ Pipe National Monument. The next step was to open Campendium.com and Google Maps. Yes! Immediately north of the main entrance are several free camping options for big rigs. I then spent some time looking at the locations for the various National Park areas in the southern part of Arizona and free camping within a reasonable drive. I believe that using national park areas as the anchor, we can design a three month loop that will be free, or very nearly so, scenic, and novel and have us back in SoCal by April 20.

More research showed that the north entrance to Grand Canyon opens May 15 or so. Is May 1 too late to be camping near Lake Pleasant north of Phoenix? When do we want to be in Idaho, our destination for the summer (inspired by Kelly and Marshall and a Amazon Prime video). On the back end of the fall season, we have already committed to the 1st Annual RV Nomads convergence in the panhandle of Texas Oct. 18. The ABQ Balloon Fiesta in earlier in the month so I'm thinking we can go from ABQ to Wellington Tex. Lon and I have already decided we want to visit Yellowstone NP again and Grand Tetons in September.

So, my point is, we have a skeleton of a plan and I have plenty of time to flesh out the details. We are anticipating that we will have the opportunity to buy into the Jojoba Hills SKP park by the fall of 2018. If so, after RV Nomads, we will work our way to Aguanga CA.

Obviously, there's no right way to decide your route. Time is on our side and, eventually, we really do want to hit every state and every national park. At this point, we are taking it one season and one year at a time. All the while, I'm reading my favorite blogs and FB pages and keeping notes. Other RVers have been our best source of information!

Boondocking Sites We Want to Come Back To

Our first two years on the road were all about "where do we want to go?" Out West! National Parks in California! National Parks in Utah! Glacier National Park! Colorado! And then, secondary to "where," we asked "what's the most economical way to do it?" Lon and I have decided that our third year on the road will be different from the first two. The first question will be "what are the most economical, i.e. free, places to go?" and out of those options, decide "where?" And along with "free," is it a location worth staying at for several weeks. Is hiking, walking, and bicycling immediately available? Oh, and it has to have relatively fast internet through our Verizon hotspots. We want to slow it down. Find a wonderful place. Stay there awhile.

We've already been to a few places that meet the criteria.

Buckeye Regional Park in Maricopa County, west of Phoenix, AZ.

We spent the entire month of February, 2017 at Buckeye Hills and really enjoyed every day. We found a terrific pull through site almost exactly one mile down Robbins Road, on the right. The weather was perfect, our closest neighbor was a quarter of a mile away, it was beautiful. The park is patrolled daily by law enforcement and there's trash pickup. The town of Buckeye, with water, dump, grocery stores, Walmart and lots more is about 10 miles away. Cell phone coverage is fast.

We went on bike rides almost every day (as in dirt bike). After the hard packed and oiled roads stop, there are miles and miles of jeep roads. The scenery is so varied and beautiful. Cactus, the Gila River, Buckeye Hills. And the riding is really fun and technically challenging enough to keep it interesting for Lon. We went up and down washes, up hills, through damp flood plains. It was so much fun zipping around on the dirt bike.

At least a couple days a week, I rode by bicycle on and off the paved roads. I never had any safely concerns out walking by myself.

Rockhouse Trail Road near Borrego Springs 

I was excited to visit this area based on the excellent campsite review by Wheelingit.com It's the desert and the actual camping area is pretty nondescript. But there are mountains in the distance and hills worth hiking up almost outside our door. Borrego Springs is about 8 miles away with a good, surprisingly well supplied grocery store. Anzo Borrego State Park is all around this area with a variety of hiking. We didn't have our dirt bike when we were here, but it's well known for its bike riding. Water and dump are available at ABSP for a small entrance fee.