John and I will be heading out in a few days. We’ll have Willow, our long-coat chihuahua; Charlie, our cockatiel; and our musical instruments. We’ll be driving across the country with many stops along the way. We’ll spend more than a week with my daughter, Kelly, and her beautiful family in California. Our return trip will again be punctuated with lots of sight-seeing.

We’re staying at some nice RV parks (in Branson, Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, and Reno). You can find their websites in the “Links” area on the right side of this page. But we’ll also be boondocking quite a few of the nights. (Boondocking is when you camp for free. It’s often done in parking lots, rest areas, etc.)

We can’t see paying camping fees when we’ll be pulling in after dark and hitting the road at dawn. At those times, we’ll pull into places that allow overnight parking: Walmart, Moose Lodges, or as a last resort, Flying J Truck Stops. (Flying J’s are popular with long-haul truckers who run their big rigs all night so they are horribly noisy.)

We are planning to travel 6,000 miles over five weeks. We’ll take Hwy40 for the most part as we head west and Hwy80 as we come back. We plan to stop at Branson (2 days), Petrified Forest Nat’l Park in AZ, Grand Canyon (3 days), Las Vegas (2 days), and stay 10 days in the Monterey, CA, area parked in my daughter’s driveway.

Our more northerly return trip will be by way of Reno, NV (2 days), Salt Lake City, Rocky Mountain Nat’l Park (3 days), and then home by way of Lincoln, NE; Davenport and on home to Michigan.

Our vehicle is a 2003 charcoal gray GMC 3/4 ton Duramax diesel. We’ll be pulling our ten-year-old 28-foot Jayco fifthwheel with a dining room/living room slide. Our set up may not be “top of the line” but it has beautiful oak interrior and provides a wonderful home away from home.

I’ll post lots of pictures and keep this blog as a diary.

If you recognize us from our rig with Michigan plates, or because we’re playing our hammered dulcimer music, with our little black and white dog and bird, please say “Hi.”

Packing is a pain. I sure don’t want to forget anything critical. I am an over-organizer. I make lists and then lists of my lists. Plus I double-check them. But I have been known to forget and leave my list at home. I hope we’ll be well-prepared. We purchased Microsoft Streets and Trips with GPS so we can find our way; added a Wilson Trucker cell phone antenna so we can stay in touch; and I have it all figured out so I can wirelessly email and go on line whenever we get a signal. Unfortunately I’ve discovered Verizon coverage isn’t solid from coast to coast, but we’ll get by.

Lots of last minute stuff to do: today Willow had her vacinations updated, tomorrow John gets new truck tires. We hope the weather improves ’cause it’s rainy and cold, but rain or shine, we’ll be hitting the road April 8th.