After spending about 6 years on the road, COVID hit, my work situation changed, and we moved closer to my husband’s parents in the Pacific Northwest. We are currently “parked” in a home without wheels in Oak Harbor, WA.
Our Lives on the Road
My family and I lived on the road full time in an RV named, Harvey. I worked on the internet, and my husband, Ed, home schooled our son, Edison.
We bought the RV and started traveling in 2014, but became officially full time, once we sold our home in Ohio, December 1st, 2016.
Why did you decide to travel full time?
Years ago, they closed the school in our town, leaving us with the choice of home schooling or sending our son on a bus for 90 minutes each way to get to a school in the middle of nowhere.
We bought a little time by putting him in a private kindergarten, but we needed to figure something out before 1st grade.
One day, on a 20 minute drive to Edison’s school, we started talking…We had already decided to home school and it occurred to us that if we’re doing it remotely anyway, we didn’t need to stay in one place.
Ed had already started selling off his rental properties, and I was already working remotely. Suddenly, our dream of traveling full time was a possibility.
On my iPad, I found out that there was a huge RV show, the following weekend in Cincinnati. We had a decision and a plan before we finished the 20 minute drive into Columbus.
How do you get internet?
Every RV park says they have WIFI, and some actually have it…If we are lucky enough to be in a park with decent WIFI, I use it for bigger downloads and site migrations (sorry neighbors!) But, normally, I tether to one of 4 devices from 2 different cellular carriers (AT&T and Verizon), and Ed has a Google Fi plan that covers T-Mobile and almost everything else.
But, you’d be surprised how much of the country doesn’t have decent cell phone coverage. We have had to cancel reservations at the last minute because we couldn’t get a usable signal from any of our devices.
How does school work?
We started homeschooling in 1st grade with k12, a free virtual public school program, but it didn’t really meet our needs. Now, use an internationally accredited curriculum from Calvert Education.
Ed spends 6-8 hours a day as Edison’s teacher, and I do “Mommy School” enrichment projects whenever I can.
How do you get your mail?
We use a service called Dakota Post. All of our mail goes to an address in a building somewhere in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. They scan the envelopes and we have the option for them to open and scan time-sensitive mail. Then, they forward it to whatever address Ed gives them as we move around the country.