The Great USA Roadtrip Update: 48 States // 49 National Parks // 653 Days

Oct 29

The Great USA Roadtrip (+ Canada:)

Just the other day, the kids and I explored a new hike near our new home in Washington. Naturally it was a hike to the coast, and we made ourselves comfortable on the rocks at the edge of the bay. I was chatting with one of the kids when suddenly I noticed something out of the corner of my eye, moving toward us in the water. Startled, I sat up straighter and squinted, hoping it was a seal or dolphin. The longer I watched it, the more perplexed I became until suddenly in a single moment it became obvious. The one thing I definitely did not expect to see - a snorkeler.

My first thought was how cold he/she must be. My second thought was - must get a hood and some gloves to go with my wetsuit and booties asap! If there’s a good spot to snorkel, I’m there. I don’t care how cold it is.

But truly, the level of caught off guardness I was at seeing a snorkeler approach us in this random, deserted cove was akin to how much I was caught off guard by the end of our full-time travel adventure.

For most of our two years on the road, we didn’t even think about the end of our trip. We were just so “in it” that to think about being done seemed so far off, almost absurd. But the first of September found us in the Dakotas, having just experienced our own version of the dust bowl for a couple of days and now broken down on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere North Dakota. We had six states left of the lower 48 and had planned that we would finish around the holidays. We had plenty of time to prepare for what I was definitely not feeling ready for - wrapping up our travel adventure and figuring out what was next.

But that week was a turning point that we didn’t see coming. First, we found out our transmission had completely given out (a story for another day) and had to be replaced, and we were stuck for several days, stranded in a tiny town with no car and no one we knew within a day’s drive.

At the same time, a big milestone for our business that had been brewing but uncertain for months began to take on a more definitive shape, and we realized it was not only definitely going to happen, but it was happening a lot sooner than we expected.

While there was no reason we couldn’t continue on the road through the business transition, the whole transmission ordeal and being stuck without half our home for two weeks had started to wear us down. That, combined with the fact that we weren’t super excited about the states we had left (we had already been to several of them, just not on this trip), began a mindset shift for Jon and I. While in a lot of ways, we were still thriving in our life on the road, still loving the adventure of being in a new place every week, still getting fuzzy feelings about living life in our camper, we were also tired.

For over 600 days, we had moved every single week (aside from a few exceptions of two weeks). Every week was a new grocery store to navigate, a new beautiful landscape to learn, a new library, and for the love of everything pure and holy - a new bathroom to shower in. This newness was both the adventure and love of road life, but also something that required constant vigilance and alertness. The fact of which had strengthened us in a lot of ways, but that also had our nervous systems a little spent. Being tired and ready for a stationary break was something that I knew subconsciously was rising up in us, but that I really hadn’t wanted to entertain or accept. Up until this point in time, I had felt like I could literally live on the road in our little airstream forever. But there was a sense in the back of my mind that we could use some stillness, time to process and just rest…and that it might not be so bad to do that in one single place, with a little bit more room than the airstream provided.

We had a family meeting (the kids are always involved in these types of decisions). Jon first suggested the idea of finishing early, and while we were all on the fence, the factors in favor of speeding things up, crossing off our last handful of states, visiting family and getting to a place to land sooner rather than later began to weigh just a little more heavily than staying on the road, although the idea of it shattered our hearts at the same time.

Once we went down that path + the kids got on board for the most part, Jon mocked up a schedule to make it happen and the whole plan began to transpire before I even fully realized what was happening. We experienced our last 5 states (made it 48!) and our last national park (number 49 until Hawaii + Alaska) in less than two weeks. It was a whirlwind.

On a Friday, Jon officially signed over the business as part of an acquisition + partnership with another company on the same day we visited our last national park in the lower 48, and it was all too serendipitous to even believe.

The closing date on the acquisition had been marked on the calendar somewhat suddenly, and when it lined up perfectly with our timing to visit national park 49, I had a feeling the universe was up to something.

Admittedly, we hadn’t been that excited to visit the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, mostly because it’s not natural and you can’t hike it, but also because we’d been there before. But I believe in finding meaning in and noticing miracles around the little things of life, so when Jon told me he looked up the meaning of the arch, I immediately got chills before even hearing what he discovered.

It turns out that the arch symbolizes strength, transition, and new beginnings, often representing a sacred gateway or threshold from one phase of life to another. How perfectly appropriate that we would land at the Gateway Arch on the same day that we sold our company and finished our last lower 48 national park and state.

It’s not lost on me that the Gateway Arch is also a symbol of westward expansion, and while there are lots of reasons to critique its original significance of white people expanding onto + stealing land that didn't belong to them, the symbolism for us that day was too sacred to gloss over. For years, we have known that the west coast is where our souls thrive and feel most alive, but it took us all this time, risk-taking, patience and work to finally realize our family dream of moving west (more on this soon!).

From waking up in South Dakota on Sept. 16 with 8 weeks still planned on the road, to waking up on October 1st, having finished this phase of our full-time road life adventure, was a complete whirlwind. Honestly, I felt so disconnected and in disarray…it was just too much to process, too quickly. But at the same time, the alignment of it all and the peace I felt inside gave me what I needed to keep going through the chaos. I still don’t feel like I’ve been able to process it; I need time to stand still, but it’s just not cooperating haha. But I know that will all come in time, and right now I’m just waking up each day with an acute awareness that this season is holding a certain kind of magic that I don’t want to miss.

After finishing up in Missouri, we visited family for the next 10 days, opened up our storage pod in Oklahoma for the first time in almost 2 years and also somehow decided on where we would be landing to start our next adventure of life off the road.

When things are aligning and clicking and just fitting into place, you know you’re on the right path, and there’s almost nothing more magical to me in life. I think sometimes the universe and God are working in our favor in huge ways, but we aren’t paying enough attention to notice. The plan of us transitioning off the road for this next season was not my plan. I didn’t formulate it and honestly couldn’t have dreamed it up to have happened this way if I had tried. But when we felt the nudge, when we saw the little miracles and signs, we flowed with the stream of guidance, kept putting one foot in front of the other and didn’t overanalyze or question too much.

And now (for now), my soul is at rest, despite my mind still wanting to find time to process through every emotion of the last two years. The one thing we can count on is that time will keep moving, and living in the present moment with both its gray skies and sunshine, is the only truly meaningful and fulfilling way to exist.