It’s that time of year again for me to put some thought and effort into travel planning for the coming vacation year that begins again for us on March 1. As always, I feel so blessed that Hubby has four weeks of paid vacation each year, and that we are both healthy enough to travel regularly.
In years past, prior to the time we purchased our first RV five years ago, I must confess that travel planning was not something we focused on in our lives to a large extent. We have always been blessed to take at least one lovely vacation each year for the most part, but we mostly planned our time away more at the last minute and certainly never considered trying to plan on a larger scale… a full year at a time. Our lack of planning caused us to actually lose some vacation days each year because we did not find a way to take them in the twelve month period when Hubby was permitted to use them… a sad situation, to be sure.
We planned for so many things in our lives… retirement planning, meal planning, budget planning and health planning (doctor appointments, etc.). So, why didn’t we put a little more emphasis on our special time away together? I have a feeling we were/are not the only ones that have come to this realization at the empty nest stage of life, but I’m grateful we realized how this could change for the better before too many years went by.
At this stage of life as we approach our 60th birthdays, I consider travel planning to be one of my jobs, but it is a labor of love to be sure. Hubby works (and travels) hard throughout the year to earn his time away from work, and he does not have time to spend on travel planning. He even has a travel agent that books his work travels, so my job is to plan our vacation days to use them all and use them in ways we would like to do within our budget. And if I say so, I think I do a pretty good job now.
I’m also challenged to be creative in our travel plans each year. Five years ago, I would have never dreamed that my little family would spend Christmas in our RV, but we just loved it! I enjoy the challenge of creative RV camping a lot, something that might be a good topic for another post sometime.
These days, it is necessary for us to plan our personal trips ahead of time so Hubby will know when he can travel for work without any conflicts. A few years ago, we had to find a way to “be on the same page” as far as overall travel planning, so I created a shared Google calendar for travel planning purposes. I take care of updating the shared calendar in a timely manner so Hubby can see both his own business travel dates and our personal vacation dates and a few other events all in one place.
Before we had this shared online calendar as a reference, we encountered some issues with date conflicts. The shared calendar has helped to largely alleviate those issues, as long as he sends me his business travel dates in a timely manner. I highly recommend this shared calendar solution if this is an issue for anyone else. How to share a Google Calendar
Purchasing our first RV five years ago was our first deliberate effort to try to change the status quo and to keep from losing vacation days each year, which happened all too regularly because we did not actually plan our time away like we do now. We stepped out of our comfort zone just a bit, mostly with our RV financial investment, but we both knew RV travel might actually be something we would love, making it an investment in ourselves and our time together. We always enjoyed camping in the early years of our marriage, and we were ready to start camping again.
Our desire to travel more conveniently and affordably was another reason for our RV purchase, and yet another reason was Hubby’s desire to not travel by plane for some of our vacations, since he has to do so regularly on business. Our reasons all proved to be good reasons to make the change, and we are most definitely happy with our decision and plan to continue traveling by RV for years to come. We both enjoy a nice trip by plane now, too, since we have another great option to do something different. Those trips are now a little more special for us.
I ran the numbers last week, and we actually spent 60 days away from home in our RV in 2016, something we certainly couldn’t reasonably afford to do without the RV. We did not take any non-RV trips last year, which was a little unusual for us but something we chose to do since we upgraded to a newer and larger RV back in May. We didn’t even miss a non-RV trip either.
Hubby was quite surprised to learn that we spent 60 days out in the RV last year… pleasantly surprised… just as I was after running the numbers. We had some great times alone and with family and friends, and we are once again grateful for the freedom the RV has given us to get away more often in such a comfortable and convenient way. We love having our sweet pups along for the fun, and it almost feels at times like we are semi-retired and enjoying life in ways some retired folks do on a regular basis, even though Hubby is still very much employed full-time.
Getting out-of-town once a month continues to be one of our travel goals, even if it is just for a quick weekend away nearby, and we also strive to have two full-week vacations each year. Getting away regularly to some beautiful state parks has helped both of us to “recharge our batteries” regularly and has also helped to keep us healthier, since we do a lot of walking and hiking when we are out. We have always loved camping together, and having a few nice amenities now just makes it all the more enjoyable for us, especially sleeping on our custom mattress that is so comfy!
Having planned travels for a full year in advance for five years now, we have found a basic travel schedule that works well for us. Planning our travels each year now actually requires a little less effort on my part, since I have a basic template to use as a starting point.
We tend to travel in the non-summer months to avoid the extreme heat of summer, even though we still venture out a bit in those months at times, too. We’ve also learned how far in advance we need to reserve most of the places we like to visit because without a site reservation for our RV these days, chances are we won’t be able to secure one closer to our date of travel because more people are traveling by RV, even more than what we saw five years ago. I continue to be amazed at how many of our friends have hopped on the RV bandwagon now, too.
This year, we are adding one non-RV trip… a special one indeed!
Over the next three years, we have three big celebrations that are worthy of commemorating in a memorable way….
…Hubby’s 60th birthday later this year,
…my 60th birthday next year, and
…our 40th wedding anniversary in 2019.
I hope we can make each of these occasions special and memorable, so I spent some time last week planning Hubby’s big bad birthday celebration… a non-RV trip that we will take in October. How blessed we are to have airline miles and hotel points to use for a special trip such as this, putting the total cost of the airfare and hotel with a full breakfast each morning at only $260 for six days and five nights.
I’m excited to finally take Hubby to a special place that I have visited three times in my lifetime but one that he has never visited. We may also be joined by some long-time friends, if they can arrange their work schedules to do so. In fact, this trip should be so special and so much fun that I may be fine calling it my 60th birthday celebration, too, allowing us to save up a bit for a special anniversary trip in mid-2019.
If our present travel plans hold for 2017, we will spend about 65 days away from home, with most of those days spent in our RV. Hubby has ten paid holidays this year, a few more paid days off than in previous years, bringing his total paid days off each year to 30 days. We certainly plan to schedule those new paid days off into our trips, too.
I’m ready to get this show on the road again… literally! 😀 Hopefully our advance planning will once again help to make this yet another memorable and fun travel year.
My Five Fs 