One of the first things to tackle when you consider hitting the road is the budget. There are so many things to consider...sell or rent the house, what type of rig will you travel in, how long will you stay in one place, etc. And then there are the things you might forget to add, like annual membership fees, fulltimers insurance, attraction fees, etc. After scouring the internet for months, we found a budget worksheet at http://www.hometownrv.com that we feel is pretty thorough (we'll see once we hit the road). We used it to plan our trip, with a few modifications. It is offered here free to download. Once we've been on the road for a while and have real data, we'll give you ballpark figures for some of the categories. Until then, this should get you off to a good start.

Go here to download...

Christmas morning came early at our house. The kids, whom we had taught to use the cordless intercom, called us from upstairs at 3:30am to ask if Santa had been to our house yet. As we were about to answer, "No, go back to bed," I heard my oldest child whisper to his brother, "you have to pretend like you didn't see a thing!"

The first Tuesday of every month our homeschool support group meets to share insights, frustrations, and encouragement.  It was at one of those meetings that I first heard this idea for determining God’s will for your life when faced with major decisions.  We found this advice profound, and used this process to determine whether or not to go on this trip.  I have been amazed at the results.  If you too are facing major life decisions, try this…

Since we knew from the beginning that this tour would focus on American History, I researched major history events from colonization through the Civil War.  I put the list in chronological order, then tied a city to each event.  I threw in a few attractions just for fun (at least 1 water park and 1 amusement park), added 7 of the top 10 children’s museums in the country, and tried to include as many national parks as possible.  We also added a few factory tours because our boys love that stuff.  From that list I developed a route, trying to keep the events in order without zigzagging all over the country.  In the end, some of the sites had to be eliminated because they were too far out of the way, but most of them remained.  To help decide which cities to bypass we kept in mind how much “bang” we were getting for our buck.  Some cities have 1 or 2 history attractions.  Some have 15.  Those are worth driving a few extra miles to see.   Because we have so many places to see, most of our stops are about a week long.  Some are shorter, some longer.  We are scheduled to stay overnight at 52 cities and are expecting the trip to take about 14 months.   Also, timing is very important because we don’t want to get caught in the north during the winter months.   The rig we plan to purchase is not really set up for that kind of weather.  So it’s either stick to the schedule or get really friendly with the space heater!

Most people want to know how we’re able to afford to just hit the road for a year.  They may not come right out and ask, but they want to know, and it’s a legitimate question.  This is not something that most people our age can typically afford (I'm in my mid 30s and my husband's in his early 40s).  The answer is really threefold.  First, we have very little debt and some money saved to help finance part of the trip.  Second, we’ll have my pension.  Lastly, we’ll have to find a way to earn some money on the road to cover the shortages. 

We’ve made a detailed budget (which we’ll share in a later post) so that we know exactly what we’ll need.  Now all we need to do is make sure we get the income and expenses to balance.  Sticking to the budget will be very important.