How did we choose the right RV?
Neither of us had any experience with RVs! But part of the intentionality we practiced during those transitional years was finding online resources to learn about RVing. There’s an overwhelming amount of digital content that focuses on glamorizing RVing and selling an aesthetic, but it didn’t take long before we found helpful resources with real information.
No amount of reading or initial assessment will translate fully into reality, but it did help guide us until we could gather real world experience. What we learned was there’s an infinite number of ways to RV! You can travel in a large RV with residential amenities and large square footage or you can enjoy the simplicity of a smaller RV. You can camp off-grid and utilize resource conservation or park in RV resorts to enjoy unlimited resources. You can travel to new destinations every week or month or season or stay parked in the same spot for half a year or more.
A good starting place for us was visualizing both what we wanted life to look like and what we needed life to look like. We were primarily interested in off-grid camping in the wilds, but starting out with zero RV experience made that something to work towards rather than something to jump right into. We planned to follow a slow and steady learning curve by sticking to parks and campgrounds while learning how to use the RV. We knew we wanted to visit friends and family so having the option to park in driveways was a must. And we definitely wanted to camp in National Parks, many of which have size restrictions for RV length. The most important consideration of all for us? Our pets! Their quality of life and travel safety was a priority. With that in mind, we had a direction to head in for RV selection.
We looked for RVs that were previously owned, but gently used so we wouldn’t invest too heavily in something we didn’t know much about yet. Once we found one that was large enough to accommodate our life while still being small enough to fit almost anywhere, we committed to the adventure and settled on a 30′ Class A Motorhome.