One Year as a Camper Family

Believe it or not, on New Years Day 2023 while on a day-date hike with Matt, I spent at least 3 if the 7 miles we hiked trying to convince him to get a camper. He was not a huge fan of the idea that we’d have to buy a new vehicle, a camper and still pay for campsites. Fair, I got that, it would definitely be an investment. But, I argued that the ability to wake up in the places we wanted to explore, even the ones close to home, would make it worth it – especially for weekend trips. Plus, it’s our own space. Our kids can be noisy, we can cook our own meals and it’s a home away from home. Not to mention, the amazing family memories we could make would be life-changing for us all. Ultimately, though, we drove back home to our kids with absolutely zero plans to purchase a camper.

A few weeks later, we were on a date to watch this amazing documentary about the Buffalo River at the brewery I work at. We love visiting the Buffalo River and its stunning surrounding forests and streams, so getting to finally watch this film was so cool. When the documentary was over and we got in the car, Matt turned to me and said, “Okay, let’s get a camper.“

Initially, this was going to be a 4-year plan. Then a 2-year plan. Then, maybe next year. But as staring at camper floor plans became an obsession, we put a plan into action to get one as soon as possible. We were lucky to be selling Matt’s car when used cars were going just as high as new cars, so we were able to sell his Outback for barely less than we paid for it. We looked into financing a camper and truck, mapped out payments and on the 5th of February – less than a month from seeing Undammed we were pulling our very own camper home.

That night, we started putting all the things we’d ordered for the camper in and making it homey. We found ourselves going out every week or so to just sit out there. We had to order a truck, so we pulled the camper home with my parents truck and we waited, honestly, very impatiently, for our truck to arrive. We had our first camping trip planned for the last weekend in March and nervously awaited the call that our truck would be ready. Luckily, 2 days before our camping trip we got the call that our truck was in, which meant we had to get 500 miles on our truck as quickly as possible, which meant, we took a spontaneous evening trip to Arkansas the day before going back down with the camper.

My parents came with us on our first camper trip and we fell fast and hard for camper life. After that initial weekend we were constantly trying to figure out any dates that we could get out as a family. Our first year as a camper family was just incredible. We learned a lot about camper ownership in general, about planning camper trips and about having a baby & a toddler in a camper.

Our First Year as Camper Owners at a Glance

Y’all know I love stats. So I wanted to do our first year in the camper by numbers.

Days Spent Camping (37): We spent 37 days in our camper in year-one. Felt like quite the feat considering we had an infant and a toddler the whole season. Year 2 will have 2 toddlers.
How Many Campgrounds Did We Stay At? (3) We only stayed in three different campgrounds. Our favorite was the Buffalo Outdoor Center RV Park followed by Big Spring River Resort and then Hog Valley Campground. They were all good and we have returned or are going to return to each.
Sates We Camped In (2): Just Missouri and Arkansas last year, but amazing locations.

Top Three Things I Love About Having a Camper

It’s a home away from home. I just truly love that we get to drive our little home away from home anywhere that we want to go. It opens up so many more opportunities to see our country and explore with our family. I love that we feel comfortable in this space, we can eat meals at “home” on the road and there’s so much more space for our little family.

It allows us to have more time in destinations. We often would take day trips different places in the Ozarks. We’d either leave at 4am to see the sunrise on a hike or we’d just have the mid-morning through sunset (on a good day) to explore. Instead we get a minimum of 48 full hours in these beautiful places. Sometimes more. We get to see more and do more because of the camper.

Our kids get to be kids. It doesn’t matter if our kids want to be noisy inside our camper. They can run and play and no one is below us to annoy. I love that many campgrounds have fun amenities like a swimming pool, an outdoor area, a soccer field or even a playground. I just love it.

What’s Coming Up in Year Two of Camper Life?

In year two, we have some longer trips, bigger destinations and a lot of new places, including a couple new states for Matt and the kids. We have just under 50 camper days away planned already, including our first 7+ day trip in the camper. Some of these amazing destinations include Big Bend National Park in Texas, Hot Springs National Park in Arkansas, Eureka Springs in Arkansas, Palo Duro Canyon State Park in Texas, Starved Rock State Park in Illinois and the Wisconsin Dells. Plus, even more!

I’m always dreaming of the day that we can be gone for weeks and weeks – hoping to be in outdoorsy towns that have co-working spaces for Matt to work remote while I teach the kids from the road. But we’re waiting for the kids to get a little older and independent for that, but I feel it getting closer and closer. I’m sure I annoy Matt with my daydreams of trips and itineraries of destinations planned taking weeks to get places. For now, my wanderlust is satiated by these amazing adventures that I am so lucky to get to share with my beautiful family.

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