By the end of 2018, our family was just about fed up with hotel stay costs. Jessica was a dedicated synchronized swimmer with many competitions being out of state forcing us to take costly weekend trips. Because of this and because of our new found love for road trips, we began our quest for a home on wheels that would fit our family needs. We decided on a RV that was small enough to fit in our driveway and small enough to be our main mode of transportation around town. It also needed to be big enough for us to comfortably maneuver around it while on the road, and it needed to have actual bed sizes with minimal set up time. God Blessed us with our current rig we found just 20 minutes away from our house in March 2019 and we have loved wholeheartedly and fully utilized it ever since .
June 2019 after a long hard working synchro season, Jr. Olympic Nationals were being held in Tonawanda, New York. And that was the birth of our very first long road trip. Can you say nervous and excited at the same time? We thought we would go to Zion again but no… completely across the country we go. How do I even begin?? This and many other questions are going through my head. Can we even do this??
The doubts started to get replaced with excitement as I began to create a plan and to map out the entire trip there and back. Google maps became my favorite app. After creating the map and seeing how far this really is, I began to look up what other places we could see while we are “way out there already” and the first place that came to mind was: New York City. After that, my mind went wild and I looked up all the places we could go while we were there too. Niagara Falls was just down the street so I was thrilled about that and since we were close to New Jersey, we just had to go see Carlo’s Bakery in Hoboken since the kids loved watching the show with grandma. The Statue of liberty was definitely a must and of course Central Park and all the others must see in the N.Y.C.
We had to decide how far south we would go before making our way back west and we opted to go as far down as Atlanta, then across to Dallas, and back home.
After looking at the overall map and seeing how many miles we will be traveling, I separate the map into driving days and activity days to come up with the overall length of our trip. Based on the number of days we needed to stay for the competition plus the number of days we wanted to spend visiting, this trip turned out to be three weeks long! (*scream*)
How can we even do this? Will we be safe? Can we afford this? All these big questions and more began to overtake my mind and fill my heart with fear. Prayer and planning is what calmed the storms inside of me. I began to read a lot of articles online so I was able to gain some knowledge and ideas from others that have done this RV life deal that helped this trip go from impossible to when are we leaving?!
One of my favorite tips learned that I still use to this day is finding safe parking lot spots to spend the night to help offset the overall cost, specifically during full driving days. Our trips include some overnight stops in Cracker Barrels, Truck stops, Gas stations, some Walmarts, and some hotel parking lots. Our first choice is always Cracker Barrel and as a token of appreciation, we either grab dinner or breakfast on nights we are there. Once we planned to sleep at one and when we arrived, we did not feel safe so we went with our instinct and we just kept driving until we found a gas station with a well lit parking lot and we ended up staying there instead. Ever since that trip, I now zoom in google map and I see what is around that specific Cracker Barrel first and I filter the google reviews to RV so I can read up on any notes taken before adding that spot on our map for the night. Thankfully we have had luck with that ever since. Truck stops are also a great place but it’s often loud near the trucks running their engines all night, if that doesn’t bother you, you can find those right off the roads. Walmarts are often a hit or miss- we found that we often miss more than we hit so now we try to avoid those if possible but I have to say that the one in Dallas across from the Cowboys Stadium and the one in Cody, Wyoming just before the Yellowstone entrance are great!
Now that we have some of our nights set out, I find these places to stay based on how many miles we decide to drive that day. On full driving days, we aim for anywhere between 500-600 miles. We found that more than that is really too much so after the 500 mark on the map, that’s when I start to look for a place to stay the night (Cracker Barrel’s or others listed earlier) When driving to a campground where we will have an extended stay, I look for a place where we can arrive by no later that 7 PM because we need the extra time to set up camp (plug in). On just driving days, we can go as late as 9 or 10 PM if needed.
Another tip I learned and I use when planning our trip is to plan our meals: know when you will “eat in” and when you will “eat out”. You would be amazed at how much extra it cost if you just “eat as you go” especially when you have to feed four people. Planning meals based on knowing where you will be and what you will be doing has saved us hundreds every trip. My Aunt Grace has graciously gifted us a Nespresso machine and I have to tell you: that alone has saved us hundreds! We LOVE our daily coffee when traveling and because we don’t have that machine at home, coffee on our trips alone feels and tastes like a vacation and we save a lot of money not having to stop at Starbucks. Most days, if possible, I plan to have two out of three of our meals “in”, that way we can still enjoy one meal wherever we are visiting without breaking the bank. Depending on how long we will be out on an activity or sightsee or what type, I pack lunches on the go as well. It’s hard to plan meals per meal so far in advance so I tend to do this part while on the road but I label our mealtime in my notes when I am creating our travel map as eat in or eat out.
Last tip I want to share with you that I learned from experience is to make sure you know where you will be spending the night and if it’s a parking spot kind of night, have a second place already picked out with the address just in case. You never know if the little towns you will be driving through will have a festival or a big event of some sort and you can’t find a spot, or your intuition doesn’t feel safe so I try to book a place in advance as much as I can and sometimes I even call to make sure they have my reservation on file before we even leave (some places are still not online ready and you call for your reservations). On parking lot nights, I find our main spot and I look and have ready to go another possible spot just in case; it’s not a good feeling to be somewhere you are not familiar with, late at night, with your kids who are tired and cranky, and you don’t know where or when to stop to rest. I learned this the hard way many years ago so I don’t leave unless I know where we are going to sleep. Along those lines, safety is a always a big concern for us so we do carry baseball equipment on board, we try to park in well lit spaces (we have black out curtains inside) and we use an added lock on the door when we are on the road to help ease our minds a bit so we can actually rest. The best rest is when we are in an actual campsite that we paid for so we book those at least every three days to stay sane.
Going back to this trip, I mapped out our routes and I began to book places for us to stay. Found our free over nighters too and I made all the reservations for the attractions we decided to include on this trip.
Heading out to New York was a mission. Our goal was to get there as soon as possible so we did not do any sightseeing until after the competition. Our first night was in a Gas station that advertised free RV parking somewhere off the road in Utah. We were the only ones there for quite a while so we were very skeptical at first so we prayed a lot! Finally about an hour later, someone else pulled in so it helped us feel a little better.(this is our first night ever off the road in another state) Our second night we made it to Colorado and just pulled into a spot to rest. There aren’t too many places close to Denver so we had to stay farther back then we wanted to. Next day we made up some time by driving over 600 miles ending near Omaha, Nebraska where they were having the college world series. The town was lit, people everywhere. We ended up staying the night at a Camping World, this one allowed us to stay but years later I called others and they said no so I no longer look for these as an option anymore. The fourth night I found a spot for us to stay somewhere in Indiana; the thunderstorms were scary! Thankfully we didn’t have any leaks and we made it to our destination by late afternoon on day five.
Jessica stayed inside the hotel with her team and the three of us stayed in the hotel’s parking lot the four days we were there. This is when we discovered that Hotel parking lots can also be a good option although nowadays many have security guards roaming around to prevent just that, a lot has changed since covid. Thankfully we did not have a problem and our first week lodging on the road was basically free. The competition went great, girls did well and they created great memories.
After the competition finished, that’s when our trip really began. First stop was Niagara Falls. A friend told us we just have to do the Maid of the Mist Tours so we did! Your hair and face will get soaked! You will wear a poncho that will help a little but you will love it because it’s just that cool to get that close to the waterfalls so be prepared for that. After this wonderful experience we headed south to the N.Y.C.
During the planning process, I learned that there are slim to none places to park your RV in New York so I did a google search and I found Liberty Harbor RV Park right near the water on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River, literally across Manhattan and it worked out great! It is just a parking space but you are able to select your site so I booked an end site facing the water (B02) so we had a clear view of the Marina and a short walk to a beautiful view of Manhattan. We spent three days here so on the first day we took the ferry to go see Ms. Liberty. There are many vendors to choose from but we decided on this one. We departed to Ellis Island from the New Jersey side and we returned from it to the New York side to sight see. We walked around town and marveled the beautiful tall buildings until we made it to the 911 Memorial. We did not go to the museum as Jacob was still too young at the time so we just paid our respects at the fountain instead. After a long day of walking around, we made our way to the World Trade Center Station. This is our first time experiencing the subway system; we looked like total tourists so we asked for help and thankfully we made it back to the RV park and we survived 🙂
Next day we took the subway across the river again, we followed the signs and this time we exited near Central Park. We met up with some long time friends and had a lovely picnic and reminisced about old times.. It was wonderful. We still could not believe we were actually in New York and couldn’t believe how big this park really is! People everywhere: running, walking, biking, and even horse riding. Before we headed back, we walked a little more and saw Rockefeller, Empire state building and others before taking the subway back home; today we felt like pro’s taking the subway… just kidding. When we returned, there was another RV just like ours right across from us 🙂
Day three we stayed on the New Jersey side and rode their above ground subway system to visit the town and to visit Carlo’s Bakery. We didn’t get to see him or anyone else from the show at the time but we took a picture outside the shop and sent it to grandma along with some yummy treats we brought back home. We enjoyed some true New York style Pizza before heading back home. The only thing we missed was trying a Junior’s cheesecake but it was too far from us for this trip so it’s on the list for next time.
Day 5 we are back on the road heading to our next destination: Washington D.C. Our main attraction we wanted to experience on this trip was the Bible Museum and the Monuments. We found a great campground that has a bus stop right in front that takes you directly to the subway station so we needed that as we knew that there was no way we could get around D.C. in the RV. We stayed two nights at Cherry Hill Park and had a great time. This is where for the first time we felt small, we were placed next to a rig that was 40 feet long! We are extremely happy in our 25 footer but it was a funny sight to see.
Since we are now pro’s with the subway system, just kidding again, we asked for help and we figured out we needed an actual pass to ride the system. We made it to the Bible Museum first and what a wonderful, well created museum. I truly wished we could have spent another day just to see it all but we had one day to do both attractions so our time was split this time around. We gratefully met up with another family we’ve known for many years to take us around to the different monuments. Summertime weather there is blazing so we did our walks and some drive around before making our way back to the RV park to enjoy their wonderful pool.
Heading out we attempted to drive past the White House but the whole area was blocked off so thankfully being up higher than most cars, we were able to get a small glimpse of it from a distance. Heading out of this very congested town, we made our way back to the highway and headed south. Part of this trip was a working trip so the rest of this trip was collecting machines from various stores along the route back home. We made our way as far down as Atlanta before heading west. The first night we stayed at a Cracker Barrel in Concord, NC, a pretty busy area so it was okay but it was free.
Another long driving day again with quick brief stops to pick up machines but when night time came around, we originally planned on staying at another Cracker Barrel near Monroe, LA but as we arrived there, there was a motel close by with a lot of activity happening so we did not feel safe, it was already late and we decided to just keep driving instead. Thankfully not too far ahead we found a Pilot Truck Stop and we parked in the regular parking lot for the night. This is when I learned you should always have a “backup” plan when sleeping off the road somewhere.
Last night was loud and busy but hey, we are already heading home. We stopped in Dallas to see another old friend and her family and enjoyed reminiscing about good times. Continuing our road back home, we had a great quiet sleep in Santa Rosa Campground before making our way to visit another family we haven’t seen in a while in Gilbert AZ. We spent one last night at another Cracker Barrel and this one was great! This one had a lot of RV parking spots but many of them were taken up by cars… thankfully we found a spot in the back so we stayed there. Up early in the morning, we enjoyed a delicious breakfast on site before hitting our final stretch all the way home.
This was our first long RV experience and it was magical. This trip allowed us to feel all the emotions humanly possible so we learned a lot and it opened the door to many possibilities we didn’t know we could experience. This trip allowed us to be a tourist and see places we have never seen before only in school books. We were able to “learn the ropes” and how to do life in a confined space; I did not mention that our water heater actually broke on this trip so we had to order a part and have it shipped to the hotel the girls were staying in New York. We learned to pay more attention to our surroundings and listen to our inner spirit not only in places to sleep but anywhere we are. We laughed a lot, enjoyed spending time with friends that moved away, and the icing on the cake is how much we grew closer as a family. As I’m writing this now six years later, I can say without a doubt that my kids have a close knit relationship because of these summer trips we take and that alone is worth it.
Thank you for reading, if you would like to see this trip’s day by day outline, click below. Til next time!
Safe travels,
Brenda Fabbro
