So this was the first time we had travelled in an RV together. 20 years ago in my backpacker days I drove a 4 berth from Perth to Melbourne across the Nullarbor, but this was going to be different. This thing was 32 feet long, 12 feet high and an absolute monster. To be honest, it was pretty easy to drive and comfortable at the helm (slightly different story from the back), It had to be though as, we had the best part of 2,000 miles in front of us.
We planned on an anticlockwise loop, leave LA headed north west for 350 miles into Yosemite for a night before a few days in Tahoe and another 150 miles on the 80 via a massive shop in Sacramento. Pit stop in Reno for bikes taking us over 600 miles and 10 hours driving before disappearing into the desert for Burning Man. The return would see us head south taking the east side of Tahoe and Yosemite before returning the RV in LA, completing the two week trip.
It was a little surreal at first finally picking this thing up with Justin as we had booked it all the way back in January and made umpteen changes to the booking, and it signified the beginning of our Burning Man adventure which we had planned and paid for well before finally getting tickets! (Thank you Ernie). This year has been insane, essentially starting another holiday as the previous adventure finishes. In stark contrast to my year as a backpacker, where I lived from paycheck to paycheck for the last 6 months travelling on less than shoe string. This however, has been an epic travel experience, and now we get to have a little RV fun and hit the American highways. Our good friends and Burning Man compadres; Justin & Lou and Rebecca arrived in LA from Sydney a few days before we had to hit the road, so a night out in LA before we jet?…sure! Dinesh shows us more of LA’s great food at EP&LP and made sure we were safe on the streets as we were accompanied by his good friend and total badass, Rigan Machado. And wait for it, let's have a nightcap at the Improv to see Joe Rogan and friends…crazy good.
So we’d planned the route and booked the RV parks ahead of time. Pretty impossible not to have a good plan with Lou and Lou Lou on board. After 6 hours we got to Yosemite and left the highway for the mountain roads. For Justin and I in the front cabin it was all good, but for the rest in the massive box in the back, the windy roads weren’t much fun. It's a strange feeling essentially sat in a lounge room whilst moving side to side like in an earthquake simulator. Anything over 60 mph was greeted with a "too scary".
Before we hit the RV park we all wanted to see the spectacular 3,000 foot granite monolith; El Capitan and wow it was impressive. We were also lucky to see the waterfalls as California has been treated to more rain.
We all mucked in as we backed the million tonne monster into our RV spot, taking care to use the spirit level and chocks to make it level. Deployed it into campsite mode as we; extended the sides, plugged the water, electricity and the poo pipe in before finishing it off with some fairy lights over the awning . Time for a homemade curry & shiraz :)
It was the following morning where I started to get a feel for RV life taking a morning run around the campsite. The yanks have this holiday experience down pat. You buy a massive RV, then tow your truck behind it. Some nutters had stuff like bikes in the back of the truck, and motorbikes on the front of the RV. Just imagine what that looks like driving down the road. Hilarious.
A quick round of mini golf, dip in the stream, breakfast burrito and we are “on the road again”
Headed for Snowflower RV park just north of Lake Tahoe a few hours away to meet my sister Jo and have a birthday party for Dex, and me :) On the way we just had to pick up our food shopping we had diligently done online…. only to find out the payment hadn’t gone through and so we had to split up the list between us and attack Walmart, Lou had a shocker and lost her trolley at the end of her shop so had to start again, they had run out of 5 litre water so we improvised to make sure we had our 40 gallons (yep) on board, the boys (well Archie) had a melt down, everyone was happy once we had made it through the shop and on our way again! Snowflower was a great site with plenty to get stuck into, a clubhouse with plenty of games, a movie night, swimming pool and most importantly a lake. Dexter has been talking up his desire to fish constantly. This was also going to be when we really tested the RV as we were full of loads of luggage, food and with my sis 5x adults and 2 kids. Plenty of space…kinda
We missioned to Truckee with the goal of finding Dex a fishing rod - bingo! A hardware store straight out of the movies with everything you need for the great outdoors. With a $20 fishing kit and a bag of worms we were in business. We bumped into a couple at the lake when we arrived who said they caught nothing in 3 hours - but someone had a bite with worm bait instead of pellets. As complete novices we took this on board making sure we got worms and it was so cool to see Dex pull out seven fish and of course Archie, who had been declaring just how easy fishing is to catch two in as many minutes. Let’s be clear here, the fish were all about 5cm big, although Dex will tell you a totally different size! Later in the afternoon was BBQ birthday party time, we had a piñata, party hats, birthday cake and presents. Good times by all and hilarious finish to the day with a party in Bec’s yurt playing games in the dark with fluro sticks, dancing around like nutters.
Now the big day had come, still hard to believe the logistics and planning to get to this point and of course my amazing sister, Jo, had flown from North Carolina to Reno, drove to Tahoe for the party, and now will take the kids back to NC whilst we head to the burn. It was so cool to spend my birthday with my sis and super sad to see the kids go after 9 months of 24/7. Honest.
The kids had an absolute ball with Jo, Rich & Jack. Bikes, scooters, skate parks, fishing and animals, all there favourite things. Thank you sis xx
And now, after picking up the bikes in Reno we take on the road to Black Rock City, Argh! it was so cool heading into the dust. Goosebumps now thinking about it…
You’ve read Lou’s BM post so the RV story continues after we left BM. We had to get the RV cleaned before we drove to Tahoe > Yosemite > LA. No one would clean it inside and out, then an offer of $30 a foot. $960…bore off. $30 dollars in the self serve and 2 hours later we had done it. Smashed it.
We took a different route back around the east side of Tahoe and stayed at Zephyr Cove after dropping Lou off at Reno airport to head to NC to get the kids. Thanks honey! Zephyr was a great camp site, sadly no fish were caught where ever we tried. I got my outdoors cooking on over the wood fire and we even had a meal in a restaurant, but Archie had a complete melt down as Justin & Lou furthered their education on the joy of parenting.
Setting off for Bass Lake RV park in Yosemite we took the Gold Rush scenic route 49. Wow, windy as hell with switchbacks, sheer drops, no safety barriers as we passed through Coulterville on a 5 hour mission. We were all happy to make it one piece to the RV park, a little more modest than the others but Korn's epic tour bus was parked next to us to raise the standards. We took a look inside and it was like something from the movie Tron with it's total black finish and strip lighting.
The final push back to LA felt like it went on forever but it was so good to finally get the RV back and spend a night in a real bed. If we do it again I’ve got my eye on one of those A Class RV’s, super cool! We got to catch up with a good friend from Sydney Katie, who was passing through - Lou managed to offload more of our luggage to her, seems like everyone travelling back to Sydney took a little bit of the Francis family with them…. We had a lovely few days at Santa Monica and then back with our amazing friends Dinesh and Nicky’s home to recuperate and get ready for South America…..
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