Rootless and Portable: A Thought Experiment: Fulltimer Tenting

 

My Oliver Lee State Park campsite, outside Alamogordo, New Mexico. September 2012.

I've flirted with the idea of becoming a full-timer for more than 10 years, always in a modest arrangement. A smallish camper or, more recently, ChezP.

In the past five years, I've gone on innumerable video tours of folks living out of their cars. I've imagined how I might make it work for me at some future point. Over time, I concluded that full-timing out of my car was not a good fit for me. Too cramped.

But in the past year, I toyed with the possibility of full-timing in a tent (with ChezP as my back-up when inclement weather dictates). 

A tent is roomier. Living in a tent also frees up one's vehicle for transportation.  

What's out there to inform full-time tentfolk on the practicalities?

The resources I seek address my specific vision of tenting full time for up to a year: 

• Relocation every three to four weeks for new scenery, geographic interests, special events, or proximity to an expensive tourist destination
• Although wifi welcome, I don't envision tenting full time as a digital nomad who requires daily, robust internet access, as this would seriously restrict my freedom of movement
  
• Mild climate is a requisite
• I don't want to tent for three or more weeks in places where fear of bears (or mountain lions!) are going to keep me awake, like here (oh my!)
  

Below are some sources that give me actionable intel on:

• Practical realities of living full-time in a tent (power, water, location, weather, food, etc.)
• Gear (tents, kitchens, power, furniture)
  
• How to stay warm or cool; how to stay dry
• How to mitigate invasions from water, insects and other small critters, and wind

 Living in a Tent Full Time? - TMWE S4E22

 

On Wikihow: How to Live in a Tent (With Pictures). There are useful relevant how-to articles on the page, as well, along with references. Simple, clear, very practical. 

From One Crazy House: 15 Tent Hacks to Make Your Tent the Comfiest Place on Earth. (Note: Manage your expectations, of course, but there are some good hacks here that were new to me.)

From Mossy Oak: Camping in the Rain: 7 Tips for Keeping Your Tent Dry

 

Source: ScoutmasterCG

 

 

Rootless Movies: Without Bound - Perspectives on Mobile Living

There is "....a continuum of people who live in a vehicle." Source: Without Bound: Perspectives on Mobile Living.

I saw reference to this documentary about wheeled "full-timers" over on Good Luck Duck. The film is about mobile dwellers. Well, it's about some mobile dwellers with a certain perspective.

In order of appearance, the full-timers are: 

• vagabloggers dot com (which provokes a warning from my browser when I attempt to go there)
• Randy Vinings at Mobile Kodgers
• Laurie Theodoro
• arizonaexplorations.com
• Chris Carrington
• Steve
• Cheri

Randy Vinings was inspired by Thoreau's Walden: "Why would you work all of your life so you could have a little bit of freedom at the end of your life, when, if  you could live efficiently, you could invent your own life now?"

Laurie Theodoro also drew inspiration from Thoreau:  "[what is] the essential of things .. what [is] the real marrow of life?" 

I like the documentary in that it shows a viable way of living that many Americans may not know about. It's a way of living I could see myself doing some day. 

Some of the most useful information came toward the end of the film - how much it cost to sustain oneself as a full-timer who lives in a wheeled shelter:

• Steven at arizonaexplorations.com --> ~ $500 per month
• Randy at mobilecodgers.blogspot.com --> less than $600 per month
• Cheri --> $630 per month

But sheesh, there's so much smug talk about the people who "don't get it" - who are prisoners of their stuff or their ball-and-chain houses. Overall, the documentary felt very didactic. A pity.

There's also a MAJOR piece of information that is only alluded to - the cost of  purchasing and outfitting one's wheeled home. There was also silence on another important fact of mobile living - maintenance and repairs of one's vehicle-shelter. The cost of living like a turtle will vary widely, depending not only on the complexity and age of one's rig, but on the DIY abilities you have.

But I'll leave on a positive note from one of the full-timers: "Choose your life." Amen.

Portable: Full-Timers

Villanueva State Park, New Mexico

I have two agendas for this post - one is to talk about full-timers and the other is to insinuate some of my loose-end New Mexico photos into the conversation. Specifically, my photos from Villanueva State Park, off of Highway 3.

What is a full-timer?

I didn't hear the term "full-timer" til my New Mexico Year was almost finished. Before I had the proper handle, I referred to them as semi-permanent park residents.

I first heard "full-timer" at Villanueva State Park when I emerged from the pit toilet at the upper campground, shared a greeting with a gentleman there, who self-identified as a full-timer. His portable house was either a van or a smallish truck with a camper shell.

A lil rascal outside a pit toilet, Villanueva State Park, New Mexico

Like the folks at Oliver Lee Memorial State Park, this man was of a certain age. If I understood correctly, he was a scientist in the space industry in California before he retired.

Here's one definition of a full-timer from an RV perspective:  Full-Timing is living 365 days a year in an RV; Having an RV for a home.


RVs 

I can live with every part of that sentence except for the use of the word RV, which I picture as a medium-to-large-to-massive rig that has more than one living space. My mental model about RVs has me scratching my head when I see the author of the definition note that "full-timing is an opportunity to .. live economically." 

I just don't get the economy of these unless one's financial bar is set significantly higher than mine to start with. Many RVs cost as much or more than a lot of houses in the U.S., they suck gas, maintenance is a frequent expense, and site rentals are not cheap. If you've got to trailer a car behind your rig and have reliable internet access, then your costs rise even further. 

So either I've got to be more relaxed about my understanding of what an RV is or I need to drill down some more for the niche of full-timers that reflect a clearer picture of the people I've met. 

Villanueva State Park, New Mexico

Migration


The definition above leaves out a component that I think is intrinsic to full-timers - migration, even if only twice a year to follow the winter or summer season. If one lives in a home-on-wheels (to broaden the definition) in the same place year-round, is one really a full-timer? I don't think so. I think you're a person who happens to live in a home with wheels, not much different from someone who resides in a mobile home or a tiny house that is permanently sited on a parcel of land.

Villanueva State Park, New Mexico

Full-timer niches


Moving beyond RVs, there are people - by choice - living (and migrating) full-time in: 

• Trucks with shells
• Vans (Good Luck Duck has a blogroll of van dwellers here)
• Cars

I like the practical tips offered at Vagabond 101, which informs readers in a spare and straightforward way how to get started living a mobile life, whether by hitchhiking, train hopping, or car/truck/van dwelling. 

I don't rule out the possibility of some day living mobile in a van or a truck with a shell. I've ruled out car dwelling. I've already done a fair turn of sleeping in my car, and it's just too cramped. 

In the past, I've written about these full-timers (using the term loosely): 

• Homeless by Choice (on Glenn Campbell) (my use of the word homeless opens up a whole new line of discussion, but I'm not going there today)
• Houseless Not Homeless (on hobos)
• Modern Nomads

.... and about that Villanueva State Park

The park has two levels. The lower level is pretty - the upper level is a wow. Every campsite up there with a walloping view; each has a three-sided stone shelter with a picnic table inside, and grand open windows. Well-maintained pit toilets. 

The park is off the lovely Highway 3 and near the historic village of Villanueva.