TRAVELING ACROSS COUNTRY IN A VAN

 

A recent CBS Sunday Morning show segment focused on van life featuring millennials with kids to retirees who chucked it all to travel across the United States in a van.   I will admit that there is much of the United States that I have not seen from Mt. Rushmore to Yosemite (yes, I know). Certainly, there are beautiful destinations in Utah and Arizona where I would love to visit just to stargaze and then keep on driving to the next destination.

 

Every year, a mom friend tries to convince me to buy an RV and take the kids across the country rather than flying and staying in hotels. But would I chuck it all to live in a van, dragging my teen daughter along to explore this great country of ours?  Emphatically NO!

The idea of cooking, going to the bathroom and being cooped up in an RV with three other people for weeks on end does not sound like my idea of fun. And what do any of us know about changing a flat tire or fixing an RV?

Sure I guess we could learn along the way or call AAA but isn’t the purpose do it all on your own. I can barely go camping without complaining. Once I  spent one night (just one night) in Monument Valley and I barely survived the experience.  Of course, we were in a tent in the middle of a sand storm.

Don’t get me wrong, during my younger nomadic, I don’t have any money years, I  traveled throughout China and Thailand and I did not stay in nice hotels.  I stayed in what most people would call hovels. I even stayed in the infamous ChungKing Mansions in Hong Kong which is known for being the cheapest place to stay in the city. Just to be frank it’s a place you sleep with one eye open because it’s filled with drug dealers, scammers, illegal immigrants and I am sure criminals hiding from the police.

But I am older now and certainly have no interested in roughing it anymore.

So would you chuck it all to live, work and travel across the U.S. in a van? 

 

Disclosure: NYC Single Mom was not compensated for this post. #vanlife