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huntram's avatar
huntram
Explorer
Jun 01, 2013

One year and counting! :)

We have made it one year! Today June 1st starts year two of our full timing adventure.

We decided not to sell the house but instead rented it to a nice family that is friends of our kids. We gave them a one year lease with the knowledge that it may ONLY be one year. Who knows if this is going to work out for us??!!

A couple days ago we signed a new TWO year lease with them. It gives them a little more stability for them and their kids, and it solidifies our love for this lifestyle!

The good:
My lovely bride of 38 years and I have grown closer than ever! We love doing stuff together again. It is so much fun wherever we are finding the petroglyphs, or caves, or waterfalls, or lighthouses to hike to.

We had a first grandbaby this year!!

We've gone to Supercross, Endurocross, Concerts, the best bbq in Texas, the biggest casino in the USA (Winstar in Oklahoma), hiked in Fern Canyon near Klamath, CA which was on my bucket list. Visited so many different churches and was blessed by so many people.

Met up with people we haven't seen in so long, some as long as over 30 years.

We are from SoCal where we do not have weather. We love that we have experienced weather on our travels.

The bad:
We are really close to our kids and miss the heck out of them. Although we either talk to or text to them every day it's not the same as seeing them. Add that we have the new grand daughter Gracie as much as we love traveling and having new experiences we do love coming back and seeing them.

Weather is also on the bad side. Although we love the hots and colds we have experienced (our coach is truly 4 season) we are afraid of the severe weather like they just had in Oklahoma. Thunderstorms are fine, but tornados and large hail are not!

The final word:
This is the final word after one year. :) It may change by next!

We have decided to be gone for about 4 months at a time, and then visit back home for about 8 weeks. We have an RV park near home we can stay in when we are back. We maximize the time with our kids and grandbaby when we are home. This makes the wife happy, happy, happy!

Also we will stay far away from the severe weather. We were about a day away from some tornadoes in April near Lake Texoma and that was too close. No reason for that. For now we will probably stay more west unless we specifically make a trip to the east coast which we still will.

We are so excited for the next year and what it is yet to come! We both took early retirements (55 and 56) and we are so glad we did!!!

God Bless,
Brian
  • I can begin to imagine how your DW feels about the kids and grandbaby, since mine are far away too. At least you guys are retired and fulltiming, my DD and SIL are expecting my first grandbaby and they are far away. I am still working and am having to try to buy my airline ticket to visit based on best guess as to whether the baby will arrive on or near due date. Flying is the best option, since I have limited time off and the drive in car is 2 hard days (and would take me 3-4 with RV since I travel alone). Enjoy your time traveling and keep those of us that are still dreaming informed as to the wonders of fulltiming.
  • Thank you all for the kind words! We just can't believe how fast this year has gone, DW said that the year before when we were working did not go this fast. Lol.
    We are looking forward to what the next year brings. My hope and prayers is that everyone gets to follow their dreams. No regrets! :-)
  • Congrats to you! Can hardly wait til we are able to make the same anniversary posts!
  • Congrats on your 1 year anniversary!! It goes by pretty fast. Next month will be our 1st full year anniversary as well.
  • Terrific report. we are hoping to join the Full Timers next year, so hearing all the positive and negatives up front is a great aide to us. Thanks for reporting your findings and how you're dealing with the timing for family visits. Great info!
  • Hey, bad weather is bad weather. Get a weather radio and know that you can hook up and move whenever needed. That is the beauty of being on the road. We have many friends and family that are there, and we feal for them, but we have the ability to move elsewhere. We are about 14 months into our adventure and love every minute! We don't have any kids or grandkids so we just go, go and go some more!! Congrats to you.
  • Sounds like you're having a great time. That is how DW and I envision it, but we're still a few years away. Hopefully it will come to pass. Best wishes for continued wonderful adventures!
  • Yeah! Congratulations on the past year and the discoveries you've made and many more to come.