Living in the wilderness in a RV

Are you talking about being a “hermit” or just getting away from the crowds? And how do you anticipate accessing the internet well away from any form of civilization. If you just want to get away from the crowds get a small TT, maybe less than 20’. A real 20’, not the box. Then you can get well back in on the forest and other unimproved roads. The hunters, tent campers and PU’s will pass you, but it will still be pretty remote.

Forget the idea of a shack or other sort of “permanent” camp. We get squatters and pot heads on the national forests here and the prevalent attitude is to run them out on a rail. As said, if you can work something out with a local rancher to squat on his land you might be able to pull that off. An uncle on my mother’s side did just that. He came to AZ in 1926. He made friends with a rancher in the White Mountains and was allowed to build a cabin on a secluded area of the ranch property and lived there quite a few years. And there’s a little story behind that.

He visited when I was a little boy and I hardly talked to him but felt a very attraction to him. He smoked a pipe and I saved his wooden matches for quite some time. I didn’t see him again for decades until my mother passed away in the early 80’s. When we met again he was totally taken with my little red headed Irish wife and it came out that she looked just like the girlfriend he had broken up with when he was young and that was the reason he came to AZ in the first place. Then I heard the full story of his trip.

He was able to describe the ranch and cabin so well I told him I’d find it for him and try to send him something. And in fact I did find the ranch and cabin. What was mind boggling was the ranch was still there, owned by the same rancher and with the same foreman, who was then in his 90’s. I couldn’t salvage anything that I could send him but some nails, so I just sent them to him with a note that said here’s the nails you put in 60 years ago.

Now if you want a place totally to yourself, forget the RV. There are a lot of opportunities for that, but you’ll be on foot. I don’t want any blacktop, pavement, development, vehicles or very many people around me. But I don’t want to be a hermit, either. If I did, in wandering the western mountains for 50 years I’ve found countless places where I pull that off. And I’m sure you could do that in the Appalachians, too, I used to wander them as a teenager. Again on foot.

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How can you live off the grid and still, expect to have modern conveniences? You will need access to clean drinkable water --- good luck in America these days! Even the survivalist television shows warn about drinking water right from the ground in places so far off the grid, it's crazy! What about power to run your computer, photos, and internet connection? Personally, I have a hard time seeing how you can have both worlds.

You are correct in finding a location. "Only in America?" Maybe not so much any more,except for Larry the Cable Guy!

caliguy35 wrote:
And since I'll have a well-stocked RV with me too; watch movies, play the guitar, read, listen to music, photograph nature, surf the internet, make videos for Youtube.

Sounds like you want to get away from it all but, take it all with you. :)

There's always Alaska: The Last Frontier.
I don't know if you would have internet service out in the backwoods.

I think all if not most of the " home stead acts" have been repealed

It must be private property, If you intend to stay beyond normal camping period of time

With what Naturist has said it reminds me of seeing where people care take large properties to prevent timber theft, rustling or B&E on barns and out buildings.

Shoot, all you need is the patch of land somewhere remote. You are in luck: North America is not so densely populated that such places no longer exist, although they are hard to find. Lose the shack part of the idea, and you open up vast stretches of the western US, as well as a fair amount of mid-western and even eastern land.

The local newspaper here carried an article just a couple months ago about a guy doing exactly that out in the county here in Virginia. He was living on private land, with permission of the land owner. He'd picked a lovely spot way back on the back of a substantial holding, where the only access was on foot, and had carried in what he needed. If he couldn't carry it, he didn't have it.

You, with an RV, would need a place to which it is possible to drive. I recommend private property, with owner permission, rather than public lands simply because you don't want some hotshot forest ranger running you off spoiling the vibe. If you have the owner's permission to stay on private land, you are golden.