I was just reading Rae’s blog, and noticed that she referenced another blog which mentions her. I went to read this blog, and found a poster who writes after my own heart. He says exactly what I do, and that is not to let others determine what your life is going to be like. His blog is called goin’ RV Boondocking

One of my favorite quotes says that “I do not want to get to the end of my life only to realize that I have lived someone Else’s version of it”.  Author unknown

As I have stated before, our forefathers crossed the plains in covered wagons to places that had no stores, doctors, churches, or any other amenities. Now a days we are afraid to cross the street. What happened?

Well my best guess is that we are being swayed by well meaning but ignorant people who are trying to “protect us”. The trouble is we are listening.

I went through a lot of this same stuff when I was first starting into the Full Time RV Lifestyle, and am now getting it again since I am getting ready to head out Full Time on our sailboat to see the world.

I have come to the place where I have to tell them, that I appreciate their concerns, but this is my life, let me live it as I please. Then I tell them that driving a car is about the most dangerous thing that a person can do it their life time. So I will let them drive their cars, and I will do something safe like Full Time RV or Sail my boat around the world.

You can even keep you old house and rent it out so that you have an extra income to support your RV Lifestyle.

If you have a business or job that can be done over the internet, there are a number of options available today that allow you to have internet access almost anywhere. You can run you business or do your job from beside a beautiful fly fishing lake in Canada, or on a beach in Mexico.

As a Life Coach I try and show people that they are living in a prison that is based on their conditioning, beliefs and paradigms. You cannot escape from a prison if you do not know you are in one.

Peoples own beliefs are just one prison that people do not recognize. The other is what will my friends and relatives think. I went through this also, and you know what, the same people that told me I was crazy at the beginning are the ones that are now wishing they could Full Time RV just like I do. I did not let the prison of other peoples phobias hold me back.

I am now hearing the same things again about my sailing my boat around the world. But I know that within a few years these same people will be wishing that they could sail around the world just like I am doing. I know that for most of these people their paradigms will keep them in the “normal” lifestyle where they will retire at 65 and die at 66 and 1/2.

For people like me who coach we know the statistics say that only about 2% of the people will break out of their conditioning or paradigms. Well if I can help even one of my readers break out of the prison of their own mind, I will be very happy.

But I am a writer and not a marketer so the number of sales that I have been getting are no where near in line with the number of visitors I am getting. So I have handed over the website to my son in law who has a lot more expertise in this area than I do.

It is sales that allow me to go on and provide the book and the material in this blog.

I have been told by a number of readers that my book material is excellent, about the only complaint I have had is that my grammar could be a bit better. Well that part is at the bottom of the list for me since I am more of a technical type person. I prefer to give good information, and worry about grammar second. But with that being said I will have others go over the book and ensure that how I say it is going to be as good as what I am saying.

I also hope to have print on demand books available soon. If you really want a printed copy of the book, a file will be forwarded to a print on demand facility near where you live, and you will get a printed book in the mail.

It is actually quite easy to buy the PDF from me  and then forward that to a print on demand facility of your own choosing to get the same results.

Keep an eye on the Full Time in an RV site, and you should be seeing big changes in the next couple of months.

I also hope to have an affiliate system set up on the new site, allowing you to sell my books at a handsome profit. You may be a much better marketer than I am, and have much better results.

Enjoy

We did a six week trip to Mexico, and are now back. But since I have been back I have been getting ready for retirement which is only about three months away.

As some of you may be aware of my wife and I are switching to a new form or Full Time RV’ing when I retire. What we are going to do is move onto our 36 foot sailboat, and sail her around the world over the next 10 years or so.

I have been shopping for some of the final items that I need for our sailboat such as a radar, water maker, and wind vane steering.

This stage in our lives is just as exciting as when we made our decision to become Full Time Land RV’ers. Believe me this transient lifestyle is a lifestyle that grows on you and will not let you go when it has fully gotten its claws into you.

If you go back thousands of years you will discover that man evolved as a nomadic being. It was only when the populations of humans became large that mankind settled into a stationary lifestyle. But I do not believe that hundreds of thousands of years of evolution can be bred out of the human race so quickly. I found that when I started the mobile lifestyle, I could not get enough of it. Hence the switch to a sailboat to travel around the world.

As I noted a sailboat is just another RV. It just expands the horizons even more. When you start your RV lifestyle you will begin to appreciate what I am talking about. There is always another place to discover and explore. There are always new people to befriend, and new humanitarian projects to get involved in. Life is an adventure to be lived.

I do not want to get to the end of my life and say to myself, “Man that was Boring.” But rather I want to say “Man What a Trip.” I also do not want to get to the end of my life only to discover that I have lived someone Else’s version of it.

On our family website we have a saying that is partly a quote from Mark Twain, and partly my interpretation of it. The quote says.

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you did not do than the ones you did.”

Mark Twain

Our Translation of this is:

Twenty years from now when you are sitting in that retirement home, what are you going to remember about your life?

Will it be the houses, cars, and things you have owned,

or will it be the the places you have been, the people you have met and the things you have done?

Really think about this.

Our Other RV

In Mexico we do travel around a lot, it is not as if we are sitting still in one place and never see traffic.

On this last trip, we were only in Mexico for 5 weeks total. But we never saw any accidents at all. But on the trip down, and the trip back we probably saw at least a dozen. About 7 or 8 of these the vehicles being recovered looked so bad that we wondered if the people survived.

Now the reason that I am saying all this is that I have hear the objection a number of times that people are afraid of driving in Mexico due to the way Mexicans drive. But by my personal observations, an RV’er will be safer on a Mexican road than on a US road.

Now I am not saying that the Mexicans are not a bit crazy in their driving habits. The thing seems to be that they are so good at being crazy drivers that they seldom actually get into accidents. Where as we in Canada and the US have so much faith in our roads, and cars that we very seldom really become great drivers. We talk on our cell phones, talk to our passengers, look at the scenery, and just about everything else except keep our full attention on the road. Hence we have a lot more accidents.

In the USA and Canada we loose an estimated 50,ooo people a year to traffic associated accidents, and injure another 2,000,000. This is all for an activity that the average person only spends about 1/2 hour per day at.

Another good point to consider is the fact that people are afraid to travel in Mexico, because of being killed in some kind of violence. But consider this. There are about 5 million tourists that enter Mexico in a given year. About 5 get killed in some kind of Violence. (This number is much lower than tourists to the USA by the way.)

The average tourist spends about 8 days or 200 hours in Mexico.

Now compare this to drivers, where the average driver drives for about 1/2 hour per day, or close to 200 hours per year. About the same amount of time as an average vacation to Mexico.

Out of 5 million drivers about 700 will be killed and 30,000 will be hurt. The part of this I do not understand is that people will jump in their cars, speed, run yellow lights, pass on corners, and many other unsafe practices, many times with their children in their cars. Yet these same people will quake in their boots when travel to Mexico is mentioned.

Personally I would take the activity which is 140 times safer than driving, and that is traveling to Mexico.

For the full time RV’er Mexico is fantastic. The people treat you like gold, the prices are good. The main roads are in fantastic shape, and there does not seem to be near as many accidents. To me this is a no brainer.

See you in Mexico.

Yesterday I talked to a friend in San Francisco, and she told me that they were preparing for a week of storms and rain. Other people have told us about cold temperatures in the Southern USA and Florida.

All this tells me that there will be a lot of people wanting to get their RV some place warm.

If you are a full time RV’er then now is the ideal time to come to Mexico. Many of the RV parks are almost empty this year. The US dollar is at about 13 Pesos. And with the lack of tourists due to the so called recession, there are deals to be had everywhere.

If you are new at this you really do not have to worry. You can cross the border at Nogales and within about 4 hours be ensconced in an RV park in San Carlos. This is the Mexican RV gateway. Here you will find other RV’ers that are either just learning, or experienced Full Time RV’ers that will help you to learn the ropes.

The highway from the border to San Carlos is in excellent shape, with the only hitch being that you have to drive through Hermosillo. But the roads through the city are in great shape and are easily traversed with an RV. About the only thing to be aware of is that you know the names of the upcoming cities so that you will able to recognize the direction signs. There are 2 places in Hermosillo where you have to turn left, so it is prudent to try and stay in the left lane whenever possible.

There is a Costco store in Hermosillo, so if you need a place to stock up on food and liquor you can do it here. There are directions on the Costco website to get to the store.

As you travel south from San Carlos there will be a few more towns that you have to go through, but most of them are easy to navigate. As before just be aware of the names of the town further down the road. This would be exactly the same as driving into San Francisco from the north, and know that you have to watch for signs to Los Angeles and San Diego. Having a good map book like the Guia Roji (Red Guide) available from Amazon is a good idea.

Tolls and Gasoline are both paid cash in Mexico. For the tolls it is a good idea to have money ready, it does not have to be exact change, but you do not want to be sitting there holding up a line of other vehicles. The toll amounts are always marked just before the toll booths, so you know how much you will have to have ready.

Gasoline is always full serve. When buying gas, get out of the rig and watch what is happening at the pump. This is one area in Mexico where you will still find petty theft. Count your money into the attendants hand so they cannot claim that you short changed them. It is also common to tip the attendants. I usually tip 10 pesos (about 80 cents) For a large RV you may want to tip some more.

If you go into any of the large Mexican grocery stores you will find kids and disabled people bagging your groceries. These people are not paid. They are also usually tipped. The going rate is about 1 peso (8 cents) per bag.

Bartering is not commonly found anymore, except for in the village markets and tourist markets. But so many tourists have been paying whatever the vendor asks the first time around that the prices in tourist markets have gone through the roof. A short while ago a vendor tried to sell me 8 blown glass drinking glasses for $100 US. I found them later in the Wal Mart down the street for about $2. US each or a total of $16 dollars. Much later on yet we found a Mexican Restaurant Supply wholesaler who agreed to sell to us. We ended up buying a large box full of the same type of blown glass for about $40 US. So unless you really want to practice your bargaining, stay out of the tourist markets, and buy where the locals shop.

Most of these things are a learning experience. But the other experienced RV’ers that you meet will usually gladly take you by the hand and show you how it is done. They will show you where the American style stores are if you are uncomfortable with the Mexican markets. They will give you directions and suggestions. And in many cases you can find someone to buddy with who is going in the same direction as you.

So take the plunge, Turn south at Tuscon and find the jewel that many other RV’ers have already found.

We did not take the RV down with us this time since I only had about 6 weeks total to do this trip. Instead we took down our 4 wheel drive Mazda van so we could make some really good time getting here.

We have rented a bungalow in La Cruz which is on the south side of the bay of Banderis, and overlooks all of Bucerais and Puerto Vallarta. We have a million dollar view from here for about $25. per day.

View of Puerto Vallarta From Our Bungalow

The property we are on has about 6 RV spots also available, but they are all empty right now. You can see them in the bottom right of the photo. We also checked a number of the RV parks on the way down, and most of them were either empty, or only had a few RV’s in them.

For an RV’er a holiday in Mexico would be a real bargain right now. To give you a bit of perspective, it cost us $450 in fuel for our 20 mile per gallon vehicle to get here all the way from Vancouver British Columbia. In a 10 mile per gallon RV it would cost less than $1000. But most RV’ers would not have to come near as far.

Mexican Insurance for 6 months cost us $89. and in most cases you can get a rebate from your US or Canadian insurance provider for the time that you were in Mexico, and they were not covering you. The rebate is usually much more than the Mexican insurance cost you in the first place.

The only other real expense will be highway tolls, but that only works out to a couple of hundred dollars total for the round trip.

RV park prices are all over the map, but except for in the big cities are much more reasonable than in the US or Canada. Monthly rates of $300 or less are common away from the big cities. You usually are still more than close enough to go the the big cities to visit the Costco, Sam’s Club, or WalMart.

For the first timer traveling to Mexico in an RV it may be a bit daunting, but rest assured it is very safe. In fact it is statistically much safer than the USA and actually even Canada. Right now the USA is on the list of some of the most dangerous countries in the world to travel in.

If you are a first time RV’er I would recommend crossing at Nogales Arizona and taking the freeway down towards Mazatalan and Puerto Vallarta. Get a good map such as the Guia Roji which is available at amazon, and a copy of Mike and Terry Church’s book “Mexican Camping” which lists all the RV parks in Mexico along with directions to get there.

Cross at the truck crossing at Nogales and proceed south about 12 miles to the customs and immigration center. Here you will have to get a temporary import permit for any vehicles you are bringing into Mexico. You will have to leave a credit card imprint for any vehicle you bring in. Also one person cannot bring in two vehicles. If you are bringing in a Motor Home towing a car, each vehicle has to be in a different name, and the person who’s name is on the registration has to be present, with a credit card with their name on it. The name on the credit card has to match the name on the registration. This rule does not apply to motorcyles and quads that are under 250 cc.

The reason you leave a credit card impression is that if you do not get the vehicle out of Mexico within 6 months your credit card will be charged with import duty for the vehicle. You do not have to worry though since you will be given a receipt when you return out of Mexico to prove that you have taken the vehicle out of the country.

You will also have to have about 250 Mexican Pesos per person with you to pay for your tourist visas at this time. You can buy Mexican pesos in Nogales USA or you can go into Nogales Mexico and get Pesos from almost any bank machine. This is the best way to get money in Mexico since you will be getting the bank rate for that day, and not getting charged a commission by a money exchange. Do not even bother with travelers checks  since they are a real pain to cash in Mexico. Get enough cash to pay for your diesel or gas at gas stations, since most do not take credit cards.

I have gone into quite a bit more detail on what you need to know to enter Mexico in my book “Full Time in an RV“. To try and put down all that information here would make the post too long. There are also other good guides for entering and traveling in Mexico. Among them Mike and Terry’s book Mexican Camping which I have already mentioned, and also the website “On The Road In”

So if you have not done so before, take the plunge. The people are great, the roads are good, there are many good RV parks, and your money is worth a lot here right now.

Enjoy

We bought our rig because of how it was laid out inside, and how it looked. We wanted to be comfortable. We wanted to be able to sit and look at the scenery from inside our rig without having to strain to look out a window. We wanted room for our stuff, especially my tools. And one really important thing was the fact that my wife and I like to sit in bed in the morning, have a cup or two of coffee, and plan our days. We call these times our directors meetings. Now the reason I bring this up is the fact that for us it is great to be able to sit in bed and look out a window at the scenery. In our rig we can do this. Especially when we were parked on the beaches in Mexico, we just loved this time of the day.

So if you are going to get into the Full Time RV Lifestyle then you will really want to think this through. Will the rig allow you to do things that you really like to do. As I said in other articles the RV is your new home, you have to look for a new home, not an RV when you are making your choice.

Salesmen will tell you all the features and benefits of a particular RV, don’t let yourself be pushed into an emotional buying decision. Put yourself in the same position you would be if you are buying a brick and mortar house. What would you be looking for, look for the same things in the RV.

Remember flash and polish does not a comfortable house make. It is amazing but you will find that if you ask the salesman to leave for an hour or so, and then just spend some time in the rig imagining yourself doing some of the things that you do everyday, you will quickly see if the particular RV that you are looking at will work for you. Give yourself time to get by the emotion, and think practical. You can reform an emotional attachment to the outcome once the decision has been made.

Many people have made emotional buying decisions in regard to RV’s since it was a totally new field to them. They would not have done the same thing with a house since they have been around houses all their life, they know what they are looking for. Just keep this in mind when you are looking for that perfect RV.

Our RV When We First Bought It

The picture on the right shows what our RV looked like on the day that we bought it. Today it would seem outdated, but it has been a very comfortable home for us for over 10 years. We bought this unit for only $30,000 so our home expenses have basically worked out to $3,000 per year. To me this is an extremely economical price for a comfortable home that I can take with me anywhere.

If you had a hobby before becoming a full timer, you will have the same hobby after. If you loved TV and movies, you will still like TV and movies. If you loved to entertain you will still want to do that.

With that in mind you will have one more criteria that you can use when looking for that perfect RV for full timing. That criteria is can I still enjoy what it is I like to do in my new home.

If you were looking at a new house, you would be looking at it with an eye to continuing to do what you like to do. I would suggest that you view any potential RV’s in the same way. For example if you love to quilt, can you work around the table comfortably. If you love to watch TV and movies, can you comfortably sit and watch the TV without getting a crook in the neck. If you like to cook and entertain, is there enough room, and is the kitchen area set up in such a way that you can do this.

All The Comforts Of Home

In closing I would say that if you are looking at an RV to full time in, do not look at it as an RV at all but rather look at it as a new home. You will start to look at RV’s from a different perspective when you make that switch.

The perfect RV is out there. Arm yourself with your requirements and happy hunting.

When you talk to Full Time RV’ers about their choice of rig, you will find that the majority are quite happy with their decision except for one thing. And that one thing is storage. There never seems to be enough of it. As I mention in my book “Full Time in an RV” budget for at least 50% more space than you think you will need.

If you have hobbies or other interests that you now do in your fixed home, chances are that you are still going to enjoy them on the road. Look at how much storage space you will need for your art supplies, tools, or other hobby related stuff. You can get a good idea by looking at how much space these things take up now.

Moving into an RV Full Time is moving into a new home. An RV is nothing more than a home on wheels. Your interests and hobbies are not going to change. You may have to do them a little differently, but you will still want your supplies with you.

A word of caution here. All RV’s have a GVWR. This is a Gross Vehicle Weight Rating. If your RV is pulled into the scale by  the highway patrol, and they find you are overweight, not only will you have to pay a stiff fine, you will also not be allowed to continue until after you remove the excess weight. So with this in mind get a good handle on how much the things you want to take with you weigh, and then look for an RV that is rated to carry that much and more. You also have to put the weight of the water, waste water, propane, and fuel you will be carrying into this equation. In my book I give some information on how to calculate these weights.

If you are going to require a lot of storage space, then usually a motor home is the way to go. Most newer motor home have lots of basement storage space, and some of it usually goes right across and allows you to carry some very large items.

Second on the list is usually 5th wheel trailers. These usually only have one large storage compartment in them. Usually at the front underneath part of the overhang.

Regular holiday type trailers usually have the least amount of storage space, and these are really usually only designed for 2 week vacations.

There are also C class motor homes, while usually not being known for large amounts of storage, there are a few out there that are quite surprising in that respect.

If you look at the spec sheets of most modern RV’s you will usually find statistics for the amount of cubic inside and outside storage capability. This is a good place to start. But take a close look at the unit, and make sure it will work for you. If none of the storage bins are large enough to take your golf clubs or skis or what have you, then all that cubic capacity is not going to be any good to you.

Room For All Your Stuff

Our own RV is an older 36 foot motor home. In the picture you can see it parked on the beach in Chacala Mexico. As you can see in the photo there is a zodiac boat, plastic lawn chairs, a table, ladder, and various other items. We have room for all this and much more besides. We were also carrying a 7 and 1/2 horse boat motor and gas tank. It is the ability to carry the things with you that allow you to do the things you want to do, that makes this such a great lifestyle. Now you can have all your interests and hobbies, and travel besides. How much better does it get.