An Honest Review of Long-term Road-tripping

Q: Living on the road for a year? What a DREAM! You must be having the absolute BEST time, right?

A: Yes!! But also… no?

It’s March 5, 2021, and I’ve been living on the road since May 1, 2020, i.e., almost a year. I can’t believe how fast the time has flown by! I’ve racked up a LOT of travel tricks from my time on the road. If you’re interested in taking a road trip in the near future, you should definitely check out my top road-tripping tips before heading out, and make sure you’re fully prepared!

So far, my long-term road trip experience has been life-changing, liberating, inspiring, and downright AWESOME. And yet, like anything in life, some cons offset the pros. This write-up provides my personal, honest review of what it’s like to road trip for an extended period of time. While there are many parallels to what I imagine backpacking around the world would be like, I’ve never done that, so I can’t confirm!!

Here’s what my experience has been like and what advice I’d give to folks interested in a lifestyle of full-time travel.

The pros and cons of a long-term road trip lifestyle.

The sense of freedom can’t be beat.

Go wherever, whenever. Seriously, you don’t even need to schedule a flight!! For my wanderlust soul, this has been the greatest gift I didn’t know I needed. I get to follow my every whim! For an ex-banker who felt handcuffed to her career for a *decade*, it’s tough to express how much this sense of freedom truly means. I can’t emphasize it enough; this is the ultimate pro on my pro/con list.

Flexibility is mandatory and inevitable.

If you’re doing the long-term travel thing right, you don’t have a strict itinerary. You allow different places to move you and move through you. If your soul falls in love with a particular location or its people, you stay longer. And vice versa when you’re not feeling it. But even if you’re the type of person who craves structure, at some point, there will inevitably be a storm or shortage of hotel rooms or a fantastic person you meet who will wreck all your plans. For me, I learned this lesson tenfold. I quit my job and planned to travel the world for a year. I didn’t have concrete plans, but even that incredibly loose framework tested me. Within my first month of travel, I met my now boyfriend, and countries around the world closed their international borders (for Coronavirus). Suddenly, I couldn’t travel and I had someone else to consider in my plans (who I didn’t want to lose). If it’s not a global pandemic that crushes your objectives, it may be something else. Hopefully, something less impactful! Still, the sooner you’re able to accept and internalize a flexible mindset, the better!!

Your car becomes your home.

I’ve never considered myself a homebody or the type of person who craves a lot of structure or routine. If anything, I would’ve said that I’m the total opposite! While living in NYC for the last decade, I avoided repetition however possible, mixing up my morning commute, rotating between workout classes and times of day, etc. But now, as someone who hasn’t owned a house key in over a year, my perspective is shifting…

First, there is a reason people find joy in creating their own “nest.” In psychology, Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs dictates that for a person to grow into higher-level feelings of fulfillment, belonging, love, and self-actualization, some basic physiological needs must be met — things like shelter, warmth, food, and safety. While traveling full-time, I seriously struggled with a feeling of homelessness for the first six months of my trip (and still do, sometimes). It feels like HEAVEN to rest my head in the same spot for five consecutive nights. I unpack all my things into drawers even when staying somewhere for just a single night. These things I used to take for granted have become little luxuries.

Ultimately, I’ve found this basic-level need for “home” and “security” in my car. Every time I jumped back into that driver seat felt like walking into my front door and settling into my own little house. Suddenly, I could breathe again. As you can imagine, it’s also important to regularly clean that “home,” inside and out. It feels just as good as your typical type of spring cleaning, except BONUS — it takes much less time to tidy up!

My car has become so important to me that I’ve found myself using pronouns as if it’s a person… like “she” is running low on gas… or “she’s” been acting up lately. We’ve become best friends, in it together! For me, this experience has taught me that home can come in many forms, be it a house, a car, a person, or something else entirely.

Second, I MISS some of those mundane chores that I used to LOATHE doing at my apartment! I would give *anything* to be able to do laundry or cook dinner for myself on-demand. What used to feel like domestic responsibilities have transformed into little acts of self-care.

Look, my wanderlust soul will forever crave and need the freedom of travel, but I’m *finally* starting to appreciate the comforts that come from settling down.

My thoughts on minimalist living: the jury’s still out.

Since I’ve been living out of my car, I have more room for “stuff” than I would if I were backpacking around the world. Still, there’s only a certain amount of stuff that can fit in a teeny Volkswagen Jetta! Minimalist living has felt both liberating and burdensome at the same time. It’s freeing for all of the reasons you read about, but after having DONE it for a year, I can attest that it’s also veryyy challenging. Our culture puts a significant value on *things*, and that’s not a narrative easily changed as an adult.

What I like about minimalist living:

• Budget saver: I think I bought about five articles of clothing this entire year. In NYC, I probably purchased that amount in 2 months. Quick savings!

• Re-prioritizes your values: Have you ever put ALL of your belongings in one pile in front of you? Marie Kondo-style? The only time I’ve ever done that was during various apartment moves and that feeling only lasted about a week. To see my (large) amount of stuff in front of me, every day for a year — WOW. The best way that I can describe that feeling is one of excessive bloat. And I knew in the back of my mind that I still had MORE items back in my storage unit in Brooklyn, including a human body-sized bag of MORE CLOTHES!! How could I possibly NEED so much crap?!?! My introspective brain traveled deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole… am I actually deriving self-worth from this stuff?? Yikes. It gets heavy pretty quickly.

What I dislike about minimalist living:

• Limited outfit options makes me feel trapped: I’m not the type of person who finds it freeing to “not have to put an outfit together.” Curating an outfit is something I REALLY enjoy!! I love the creativity of it all. I love that small moment of self-care where I focus solely on making myself feel confident and beautiful. And I love how I can express my personality and mood with my outfit. Missed my alarm and late to work? A cozy turtleneck soothes my soul. Birthday night out with beau? A new dress and heels puts an extra special pep in my step. There’s a power that comes from being able to curate your daily mood… even if it’s through clothing.

Slowly but surely, day-by-day, I’ve started chucking items from my car. With that comes a newfound lightness of mind, body, and soul. It’s getting easier to live minimally as time passes. But am I never going shopping again? No way, I miss having that closet full of options! But will I ever own as much clothing as I did before? I sure hope not, because I’ve found some real beauty in living without it.

Maintaining relationships can be a real challenge.

I think it takes a particular type of person to endure a long-term travel experience. You have to be INCREDIBLY independent, to the point where you can go a *significant* amount of time without hugging your family or grabbing drinks with your best friends. This pandemic has forced us all to be a little more independent than we were pre-Covid. As you can imagine, maintaining a romantic relationship presents even MORE challenges while traveling. If you’re apart or traveling separately, both people must be fully committed to making extraordinary sacrifices and compromises towards a longer-term goal. If you’re traveling together, both people must be fully committed to setting and accepting boundaries that create room for personal space and growth. Every relationship has its challenges, but a travel lifestyle (whether apart or as a couple) will manifest cracks in your foundation much quicker.

Wait, why am I such a pessimist?! It will help you grow closer and strengthen your bond as a couple much quicker too!!!

Travel is exhausting. Really exhausting.

Whether you’re enduring international layovers or 5+ hour drives down the Pacific Coast Highway, anyone who’s traveled long-term will tell you it QUICKLY gets tiring. The cities start blending, and you lose a bit of that “spark” that makes you excited to travel in the first place. If you want to be on the road full-time, make sure you cushion in some periods to stay put and recharge your batteries. Otherwise, you’re gearing up for burnout; running around like that just isn’t sustainable!!

Most things aren’t what they seem.

Truth be told, I’m getting a little jaded. Do I really NEED to visit the red rocks in Colorado? I’ve seen red rocks in Arizona, I’ve seen red rocks in Utah, I’ve seen red rocks in New Mexico. Is Palm Springs really as epic as its reputation suggests? What makes it so much “cooler” than the neighboring town of Palm Desert? Hell, why is it cooler than Ohio? Admittedly, some of this is my burnout talking. But the more you travel, the more you realize that most things aren’t what they seem.

Instagram hype has created false hope. There’s a reason that “Instagram vs. Reality” is such a prevalent theme. Those coastal cliffs that appear “in the middle of nowhere” are crowded with tourists that were photoshopped out. Look, this country has some incredible beauty and rich culture that is *absolutely* worth exploring. But, for those of you who’ve been stuck in lockdown while I’ve been traversing it all, please please please remember that you’re never missing out on as much as you think you are; it’s only a curated, photoshopped “highlights” reel of reality. Cheesy but true: Authentic and enduring happiness comes from within.

So… after weighing all these positives and negatives, has my long-term road trip been worth it?

For me, the answer is a resounding YES. Still, this lifestyle probably isn’t for everyone! And that’s OK! In either case, I’m hoping this article sheds some light on the various perspectives you should weigh before embarking on a long-term travel adventure.

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Have you ever thought about pursuing a full-time travel lifestyle?