Thanksgiving marks 6 months in Mz Dazy

Martha and I sat down and wrote a little about our thoughts on the first 6 moths traveling full time in Mz Dazy. We kept them from each other until were done so as not to influence each other. When we started we said 1 year, then it quickly changed to 18 months, now we just want to keep going!

Martha’s favorite photo- just hanging out with a couple of friends in Roswell

Martha 6 Month Thoughts.    Nov. 26, 2021

Wow! Hard to believe Michael and I have been on the road for 6 months already! What a ride it has been. Seeing parts of Alaska before we departed was such an awesome experience with sites and experiences I will remember and cherish forever. Getting to the Arctic Circle is something I never thought I would do. 

Going through Canada at a slower pace, but not too slow will be something I will never forget. We met some great people there and hope to meet up with them again. They are Canadian but we don’t hold that against them. Lol

Getting down in the the lower 48 has been so enjoyable. I have really enjoyed the warmer weather for sure. Along the way in our travels we have not only met some amazing and friendly people, we have actually ran into a couple of them at different locations and shared our stories on where we had been the last time we saw them.

 I have loved every place we have been so far. Ruckus has shed his thick Alaska coat for a much cooler by the beach coat. He is enjoying all of the walks he gets and loves the ocean as much as me. 

As we start off on our next 6 months I will fondly remember the people I have met at Padre Island National Seashore on our 14 day stay and hope their future travels will be as fun and awesome as our last 6 months have been .

Mz Daisy has not disappointed one bit. She has run like a top with only a couple of miner things having to be repaired. Everyone we have showed her off to, loves what we did to the inside.

It was nice to see all of our family along the way and hope they are enjoying reading about our travels that Michael has kept up with on the blog  and hope they can work out meeting us somewhere along the way. 

Cheers to the next 6 months! Thanks honey for helping make it fun!

Michael’s favorite photo- just hanging out with a couple of fishes in Alaska

Six moths into traveling full time and certainly not ready to stop! We have traveled all around Alaska, down the Alcan highway, through several western states, and arrived at the the Gulf of Mexico at Padre Island, Texas. We visited friends and family along the way and visited as many National Parks as we passed.

I was thinking that there would be more of a change to the way I think and feel living like this, but I don’t seem to have changed much. Not going to work every day is definitely different and I am starting to adjust to that. I have filled the void with planning the next move and of course keeping our 30 year old bus moving down the road. The other day we were walking on the beach at about 3pm and everyone was packing up to leave. I thought this mass exodus was odd and then I realized it was Sunday and they were all heading home to get ready for the week ahead. One of my biggest challenges is knowing what day of the week it is. Instead I know “drive day” or “stay day”.

We have covered over 9 thousand miles so far. When we first got going in Alaska, the first 500 miles took us 5 weeks. The next 600 took a month. When we headed south, we did 3 thousand miles in 9 days. Being a goal oriented person, I am finding it best if I don’t have a plan on where to go next unless it is only a few miles away. My thought before we started, and the way we built Mz Dazy was to hold still for one to two weeks at a time. So far we have stopped once for 3 weeks at my sisters house in Idaho and for a week at our son’s house in California. Other than that we have moved most every day. We have had some two nighters and a few 3-4 nighters, but mostly move, move, move. Moving on to the next place on the way to visit someone. Now we are going to slow down. We are staying at our current location for 2 weeks, when we leave here the day after Thanksgiving we will only move a few miles and stay for a minimum of a week.

When we started, we said we would spend Christmas in Key West, now we are not sure if we will be as far as New Orleans. This is not a bad thing, just a realization that we need to slow down and take in our surroundings. In my defense, I was trying to beat winter to the Gulf.

We have made the acquaintance of a lot of great people. Some have just been out for the weekend, some travel about half the year, and a surprisingly large number of people are traveling full time. We jokingly call each other “Rubber Tramps”, but everyone seems well funded. Some are currently working remotely and some are retired, but I think so far I have only experienced a few people that look to be struggling. We spend as much time as possible on public land to keep the cost as close to zero as possible for staying places. We have only spent time in 1 city, Austin Texas, to eat BBQ. Every National Park we have been to has been packed with people. Over the years my experience has been that it is like that only around the holidays. Some parks have even required a reservation just to get in! Camping in a National Park? Forget about it unless you book it MONTHS in advance. National Forests and BLM land have been our savior and a lot of that has been crowded in places near National Parks and accessible by large RVs. If you want to be alone, I suggest you travel in a capable 4X4 so that you can drive deeper into the public lands than those of us in large vehicles.

Thanks for reading our thoughts and I hope you are all enjoying following us in our travels on this blog or social media. In 6 months I will read this and ponder what is different and let you all know. I have on a few occasions several years apart written my thoughts and plans for life. The next time I pick up the journal years later, I usually get a good laugh!

Ruckus living the good dog life!