This month took an unexpected turn. It wasn’t supposed to be our last month on the road. We spent the second half of September, enjoying fall in Colorado and the beautiful, golden Aspens. The second half we planned to head back east, where we would hang out in Tennessee and North Carolina for the month of October into November. However, due to a multitude of events, our month didn’t exactly go as planned. More on that as we recap our last (and maybe final) month full time RVing across America.

Snowy Peaks RV Park; Buena Vista, Colorado 

Campground cost: $276/week

We finished up last month excited to be staying in the SAME place for 2 whole weeks. This is the longest we’ve stayed anywhere throughout our entire trip. It was nice to be able slow down and hang out around one of our favorite parts of Colorado – Buena Vista, Leadville and Salida. We were there at just the right time. It was almost as if you could just watch the leaves changing colors.

We took a day trip to Leadville, where we got to see their St. Patrick’s Day Practice Parade.

In September.

We had a hard time figuring this one out too, and then I overheard a local telling someone that they do it in September because the weather is usually nice and they never know what its going to be like in March. Who are we to judge? It was a fun event and cool to see all the locals hanging out downtown decked out in green and having a great time. On our drive back, we stumbled upon Turquoise Lake, which was just as beautiful as it sounds.

We then made a detour to Twin Lakes, which was even more of a surprise. The lakes are gorgeous. It’s incredible how crystal clear the water is, and with the mountains turning shades of gold, there is nothing more stunning. We ended up returning to the lakes later in the week to relax and enjoy the views.

We made a couple day trips to Salida as well. This is a place we fell in love with on our first trip to Colorado 4 years ago. We mostly just hung out along the river and soaked up some sunshine and some of Salida’s coffee culture at the Brown Dog.

Our last day of the trip we celebrated Charlie’s birthday by relaxing at the Cottonwood Hot Springs.

Boulder County Fairgrounds; Longmont, Colorado

Campground Cost: $25/night (for water and electric; $20 for water or electric; $15 no hookups)

Not the most glamorous of places to camp, but super convenient (and cheap) for hanging out near Boulder. Our friends made the journey to Colorado to hang out for a few days and we thought it would be the perfect place to show them around. We strolled around the charming Pearl Street Mall, visited the farmers market (a Boulder staple), took a drive up Flagstaff Mountain, and made a day trip to Rocky Mountain National Park.

We stumbled upon the Estes Park Elk Fest when we were driving through town, so we made a little detour before entering the park. People from all over flocked to Estes Park for the festival. It was slammed with people, food vendors, arts and crafts and entertainment. It was the perfect Colorado day.

Osage Beach RV Park; Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri

Campground cost: $32/night full hookups

After our friends left, we decided to start making our way east since rain was on the forecast for the next week, along with a significant drop in temperatures. We knew we wanted to hang out in Nashville for a while, so we looked at the map and thought the Ozarks would be a good stopping point on our journey to Tennessee (after staying one night in a Walmart parking lot somewhere in Kansas). We’ve never been to the Ozarks, or really Missouri for that matter, other than just driving through it. One more state to add to our list!

We stayed 4 nights but, unfortunately, it rained almost the entire time we were there. And not just a little rain but a full on downpour. So although we liked the town and it was cool seeing the lake, we really didn’t do much of anything. We spent most of our time just catching up on work and trying to figure out where we would spend the month of October and November, which was proving quite challenging.

Grand Ole RV Park, Nashville, TN

Campground cost: $32.50/day ($195/week) for 30 amp

As I mentioned, finding a place to stay near the cities we wanted to be (Nashville, Asheville, Maggie Valley) was a big challenge for the months of October and November. Most places I found near Nashville were upwards of $60/night. I must have called 15 parks near Asheville and Maggie Valley, NC and not one had any availability. Someone recommended Grand Ole RV Resort, which was about 20 minutes outside of Nashville, and almost half the price. We decided to book for a week, and then extended it two more nights when we bought tickets for the Grand Ole Opry. We were looking forward to spending more time in Nashville since the last two trips we’ve made to the city were pretty short.

We attended the Tootsie’s birthday bash, which was a free event on Broadway with performances by some of our favorites. I’m talking Montgomery-Gentry, Travis Tritt, Jake Owen, Randy Houser and Kid Rock!

The concert was great up until Travis Tritt left the stage. We were anxiously awaiting Jake Owen, when I start getting dizzy and end up fainting. -_- I went down pretty hard (luckily Charlie caught me before my head hit the concrete) and woke up to a crowd of people around me not knowing what just happened. Concert staff helped move me out of the massive crowds to a chair and got me some water. At that point, our night came to and end and we headed home before seeing Jake and Randy Houser perform. I’m still not sure what happened exactly, but I think it had something to do with not eating much that day and the heat and humidity were AWFUL (and no, it wasn’t alcohol related).

The next day things got worse. I got a call that my grandma was in the hospital and it didn’t sound good. After debating between flying home that night and driving, we decided to just hitch up and drive home to Florida. We didn’t know how long we would end up being in Florida (with the trailer in TN) and we didn’t have anything booked after Nashville so it seemed like it made the most sense. We drove through the night, and in the middle of the night, got the call that my grandma had passed. I kind of wish I got on that plane…

We arrived home exactly 1 day less than 5 months from the day we left in May. So what’s next for us?

The End of RV Life – For Good?

Needless to say, its been an emotional few weeks. That being said, we are happy to be home for a bit. We had an incredible trip up until this point and we’ve seen some amazing places. But to be honest, we were exhausted from constantly trying to plan our next move. We’ve been bogged down by work that we haven’t been able to keep up with the last 5 months while on the move. And we were happy to be back with our family and friends.

We planned to spend the holidays back in Florida anyways, so we decided to go ahead and rent an apartment for the next 3 months. We do still have a trip planned for the first week of November (that we planned with our family months ago) in GA and TN. We’ll get to enjoy a little bit more of the fall weather in the mountains which I’m excited about (because its definitely still summer here in Florida). After the end of our 3 month lease in Florida, we’re not sure if we’ll continue the RV lifestyle. We’ve been going back and forth about what we want to do, and we’re just not sure the RV life is for us. I’ll delve more into that in another post.

Full Time RV Expenses for Month 5

I knew this month was going to hurt. It seems like every month there is something that the truck or RV needs. This month it was new tires for the truck. On our drive east from Colorado, the truck was vibrating like crazy making the ride really uncomfortable. When we got to Nashville, we checked the tires and one of them was so far gone we couldn’t believe it didn’t actually blow on that long drive. We made it a priority to get new tires within a day after arriving. Good thing we got them when we did because we were able to hit the road to Florida when we needed to.

We also had some other big expenses this month – Charlie had to visit the doctor in Colorado and we both had blood work done (all out of pocket since we’re not covered in Colorado). 

I’m hoping to keep up with the expenses while we are back in Florida just for a comparison. It will be interesting to see the difference and compare the two lifestyles.