The Good Life: Six Months on the Road With the Whole Family

On a rainy day In the spring of 1999, we pulled away from our suburban Atlanta home in a noisy '84 Chevy Suburban with an eleven-year old Mallard travel trailer bouncing behind us. Words cannot describe the excitement, or the trepidation we felt. There was a plan, a very flexible one at that. The first major stop on our itinerary was a week-long visit with family friends in Denver, Colorado, but our trip became an adventure long before we reached that destination.

Our budget allowed us $1,000 per month that had to cover diesel fuel, lodging, entertainment, and some food expense. We had leased our house to a tenant to cover the mortgage payments, and I had shopped grocery store sales, 'double and triple-couponing,' for months before we left home. Our RV was chock full of non-perishable, lightweight items like ramen noodles and granola bars, and the fridge was crammed with perishable necessities such as milk and eggs. My coupon box was handy so we could stretch our dollars as we picked up items to replenish our stash along the way. Tourist guides with directions to free and low-cost camping areas, as well as our Wal-Mart directory, and a bulky road atlas, were stacked in the middle of the front seat.

Our sons, 14, 16, and 18 years old, were torn between emotions generated by having to say farewell to buddies, girlfriends, and their electric guitars, yet their eyes were wide open with anticipation of unknown places to explore and people to meet, somewhere down the road. My moods fluctuated. I felt suspended between enthusiasm for opportunities that lay before us, and worry that realization of our lifelong dream might culminate in a less than happy ending. Our dogs, April, a yellow lab mix, and Shakespeare, an Australian shepherd mix, gazed anxiously out the window with their tongues hanging out, and seemed to sense that this 'vacation' was going to be different from the many family road trips of the past.

A National Park Pass dangled from the rear view mirror. Our travels had taken us to most of the sites east of the Mississippi, but the thrills of the American Wild West lay ahead. We had been accepted by the U.S. Forestry Service to work as volunteers on two archaeological projects conducted by rangers as part of their "Passport in Time" program. The first project involved excavation of a prehistoric Native American village in Arizona. Later, we would join a team that was painstakingly unearthing a 19th century copper-mining town on top of a mountain in northern California. None of us had any idea, as we ventured westward toward Alabama, that the friends and knowledge we would acquire at those sites would become the highlights of our journey.

Fear of the unknown and curiosity about the mystery before us co-mingled in the humid air as we forged ahead, at times silent as a multitude of thoughts raced through our minds. At other moments, our navy blue, slightly rusty SUV, was filled with laughter and singing as an incredible energy circulated, almost frantically, around us. Where would we find ourselves when night fell? Who and what would we discover at our first campsite? Would we awaken tomorrow under sunny or stormy skies? Little did we know at that point, there would be lessons to learn and memories to cherish, no matter where God and the open road would lead us.