Go With the Flow (Until Your GPS Tries to Kill You)

We spent 15 years planning the summer my husband would retire, we fantasized sell it all get the fifth wheel and see the country. Well last May 2025 we got that chance. We spent almost a full year on the road with a few trips home to reset in between (about 7 weeks total ). The biggest lesson we learned in our first three months of RV travel? "Go with the flow" sounds amazing… until your GPS confidently tries to kill you.

When we first planned our trip out west, we had this dreamy vision in mind. Freedom. Open roads. Wander where the wind takes us. No strict schedules. No overplanning. Just us, the camper, BMX nationals, and a whole lot of adventure.

Sound familiar?

To be fair, it started out pretty well. Leaving Florida spoiled us a little. Flat roads, wide highways, easy driving, plenty of fuel stops, and some of the most RV-friendly roads you can ask for. We thought we had this figured out.

But years ago we had already learned one very important lesson about blindly trusting GPS systems.

That lesson came courtesy of West Virginia.

What started as a "let's get off the interstate and explore the scenic backroads" kind of day quickly turned into climbing the side of a mountain with a sharp 90-degree turn and a straight drop into a ravine so steep you could almost make out the oil pan of the car below. Nothing quite wakes you up like dragging a camper around a mountain curve wondering if this is how your story ends.

Then there was Cherokee.

Twisting through gorgeous mountain roads, feeling pretty confident, until we came around the final turn and saw giant white letters painted beside a DEAD END sign:

"YOUR GPS WAS WRONG."

Honestly, fair enough.

Over the years we've backed sixty feet of truck and camper down dirt roads Google apparently hadn't discovered yet. We've rerouted in a panic after realizing our GPS had way more confidence in our rig than we did. And after upgrading from our smaller Momentum 28G to our much larger Alliance Valor, nearly 40 feet long and pushing 14 feet tall, we quickly learned you start becoming very protective of things like your roof, solar panels, and air conditioners.

A good trucker GPS app becomes worth every single penny. Probably cheaper than your insurance deductible too. Maybe even cheaper than marriage counseling.

So there we were heading west with four different apps open, a rough plan built around BMX nationals, and absolutely no idea what we were getting ourselves into.

The first few weeks were manageable. Florida, Georgia, Nashville… where we learned leveling a giant toy hauler while boondocking on a steep grade deserves its own Olympic event. We crossed through the Midwest dodging summer storms and tornado warnings through Tennessee and western Illinois. More than once we tucked in the slides, kenneled the cat and dog, and ran for shelter while storms rolled through.

(Shameless plug: we use the MyRadar app constantly while traveling.)

But somewhere around Sioux City — or maybe all the Sioux Cities because they seem to exist in every state out there — the excitement started turning into anxiety.

Fuel stops got farther apart. Campgrounds became scarce. Even our beloved Love's Travel Stops truck stops seemed harder to find. And when you're traveling with a full family, animals, sore backs, empty stomachs, and a giant rig that cannot just "pull over anywhere," the adventure starts feeling a little less romantic.

With our little 22-foot Jayco years ago, we could sneak into state parks and random campgrounds pretty easily. But with the bigger rig, slide-outs, and size restrictions, things changed fast. I found myself desperately calling KOAs and private campgrounds only to realize everyone else had either planned ahead… or the office staff had gone home for the night and we were officially out of luck.

Eventually we found a Harvest Hosts location and pushed through a few more hours to get there.

The people were amazing. The setting was beautiful. Everything felt perfect.

Then came the storm.

Not just a storm. One of the most violent storms to hit the Dakotas in decades.

This time there was nowhere to run. No shelter nearby. No escape plan. So we hunkered down inside the camper and rode it out while the sky exploded around us.

The next morning we woke up buried in mud.

The soft milled ground underneath us had completely soaked through overnight and our massive camper sank deep enough that the ruts next to us reached the running boards. But if you ever have to get stuck, get stuck on a farm. Between tractors, chains, prayers, and some incredibly kind people, we eventually got pulled out and back on the road.

But mentally? I was done.

More storms were coming. My nerves were shot. And my carefree "let's just see where we end up" attitude was starting to get replaced with a much more realistic version of myself asking important questions like:

"How narrow is this road?" "What's the weather doing?" "Is this campground actually accessible?" "And why are all the scenic campsites apparently located on cliffs?"

That was the moment things changed for me.

I finally pulled up our RV routing apps, checked weather radar constantly, and realized the cliffside campground we planned to stay at in the Badlands during severe weather was maybe not the best idea for someone terrified of heights.

We made it to Wall, South Dakota, grabbed lunch while the skies suddenly opened up like someone flipped a switch, and wandered the shops while floodwater rushed through the streets outside. Looking across the road, soaked and overwhelmed, I spotted a campground and made a decision right there.

The rest of this trip was going to look different.

Not less adventurous. Just smarter.

I realized that if we were truly going to enjoy RV life long term, we needed better planning, better tools, better weather awareness, and honestly… a better community of people who had already learned these lessons the hard way.

The struggles didn't stop after that. If anything, they kept coming. But every breakdown, reroute, storm, wrong turn, muddy campsite, and terrifying mountain pass taught us something valuable.

And that's exactly why we started sharing our journey.

Because some lessons are easier to learn from someone else's mistakes.