I really want it all. There are things I get from the RV life and others from Life Abroad. Besides taking the Airstream to Puerto Penasco, our first non-RV adventure abroad was almost two months this year in Italy. And that experience changed my perspective on how I want to travel and live. There's so much out there and so much right here in front of me. It's challenging to decide how to experience it all, when to do what and how to get the most out of each moment and place. Love the article and thanks for the inspiration Karla!
I really want it all too haha! I love that you had that experience in Italy and that it planted a seed for you on what you want. The same thing has happened to us with Mexico (we want more international and slower travel), although given Noah’s job, we are facing some big decisions in the next few months that will possibly take us back to the U.S. and maybe even to settling down for the foreseeable future. We’re still thinking through our options, never a dull moment with this life haha. Thanks so much for your kind comments, Bert!
Loved this article Karla ! Such a very good question. Thank you for the extra links to explain things like pulque and xscapers, good thinking, I learned a lot :)) Now I must go and decide what my own definition of Adventure actually is, and armed with that, I can make a better decision as to whether I should get my camper as soon as I land in Europe, or travel light for a while first before finding my dream home on wheels :))
I'm so glad you found this article useful!! I was hoping that especially up-and-coming nomads would get some good use out of this one. I would LOVE to know how you define adventure for yourself and what decisions come out of that definition! Keep me posted, will you?
Great writing, Karla. You really bring us along with you in your articles. I really enjoyed this one specifically as I'm preparing to move to a more mobile lifestyle myself. I have to admit my trailer is a little bigger than your Casita. All the best to you and Noah!
David, thank you so much - your words encourage me to keep writing! I didn't realize you were becoming a nomad yourself! Ooh, I'm excited for you and really hope we can meet on the road sometime. Us RVers gotta stick together (no matter the size of our RVs)!
I say life abroad…I don’t know how you did 3 years in that tiny camper but now you’ve had that amazing experience and at no better time than the past 2 years when travel has been so restricted!
I know! I don't know how we've managed to love living in such tiny quarters, but we're gonna do it again! We'll be headed back to the U.S. in mid-April to pick up our tiny home and head back on the road, but are now thinking of maybe taking it into Canada and Baja California so we can begin to combine both the RV life and life abroad bit by bit :)
Quebec City and Montreal in the French province of Canada are also fabulous cities to visit…you feel as if you are in Europe…I have good friends in Montreal I could introduce you too who would welcome you with open arms🥰
Thank you, Bob! I completely agree with you - groceries are cheaper and produce and even meat too taste better. Things are much more fresh! I think we spend just as much as in the US not cause of the daily food at home but how much we eat out 😂. Our insect meal last night in Querétaro (which I'll write about this coming week) was delicious but not cheap haha. It sure made for some interesting memories.
It was so good to catch up, even if briefly last week!
I was so hoping you would get around to this topic, and maybe like you (?), I'm finding it HARD TO CHOSE JUST ONE! After almost six months, I'm on my out of Mexico in a few weeks. I'll start the search for a bigger "rolling house" to live in. One big bugaboo for me here has been the noise. Mexico tends to be a noisy place, but the place I landed this winter is particularly bad. My bad for always choosing the cheapest place I can find to stay down here, but my finances are an issue. I may try to find some seasonal work to make that a little easier.
A comment/question about community: You live in your trailer, and you are visiting SMA. How different would it be if you settled and lived in Mexico for years, then visited places on vacation in your trailer? My thoughts on that are that I haven't felt like this particular place could be "home", but I still wonder if some other place in Mexico could. Since one of my highest values is peace and honest-to-goodness quiet, I tend to think nomad life will be it for me, with seasonal visits to Mexico. But... the very real flip side of that is I know I will miss the more social aspects of finding a place to settle into and live. That's more of an issue because I'm out there solo and I'm basically an introvert. I've had a good long taste of most of the good things you mentioned about being here. We'll see how it feels going back to traveling, but I know I'm first going to head for the most silent place I can find for a while. I want to hear nature and nothing else for a while. ;-)
So, I'll go back to nomad life with at least a small level of focus on - just maybe - finding a place that I might settle into and be part of a community where there are people and activities that I can enjoy. New Mexico is next on my list. Never been there, and I have friends there. It'll be great no matter what, and I'm looking forward to the next chapter!
Ah, Rich, I love your comment and you sharing what's next for you. I imagined your current home in Mexico was it for a good long while. Maybe us nomads are just never meant to be confined to one place!
It's an interesting question you pose about being in Mexico as more of a home base and traveling in the camper for vacation. I'm intrigued by that idea when I see a beautiful home for sale in SMA and as we're meeting great people too, but if I'm honest with myself, I know I'm too restless for that (and Noah even more). Maybe some day we'll have a place in Mexico but we envision regular travel to a lot more places right now, not only in Mexico (Puebla, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Yucatán, and more of Baja are on the list) but also internationally. Getting a place at this point in our lives would be counterintuitive to that, but it doesn't mean it will never happen. For me, especially, it's gonna be really important that we regularly spend time in Mexico as we get older, so you never know!!
I'm so glad you mentioned New Mexico. It's a state we've been thinking of spending more time in, perhaps early summer. We've been really liking this slower pace of travel lately, letting us really sink our teeth into a place and not rush so much. Santa Fe and Taos are on our radar. It'd be wonderful to meet up if our timing coincided. It's been too long!
Maybe it's because I'm already older 😳 that I'm thinking a bit more in terms of finding a place to settle. Sounds funny to me because I don't really think of myself as "older". My first two years were very mobile, with moving frequently the primary agenda. And I mostly loved it. Heck, I met you guys! But for the last two summers I have basically parked myself in an area for three to four months. I expect that will continue be my mode of nomading now.
I don't feel like I'm on the hunt for a stationary place to be, but I will have my eyes open for that. I have two good friends in NM. One in Santa Fe, and the other in Taos. I have open invitations from both, so I have a little extra motivation.
I have always thought of myself as a homebody. That view of myself has definitely been challenged, and it's still a bit surprising to me. Some of my friends haven't figured the "new me" out yet. 😉 Not totally sure I have, but I'm good with the change other than the social aspect I still need to work on.
It would be very cool to see you this summer. I feel like I've gotten to know you guys much more even though I haven't actually seen you since Colorado!! I'm yet to figure out how urgent the rig change will be. Maybe it can wait through the summer when I can be outside more. I'll see when I get back to it in a few weeks.
I was just thinking that it's hard to believe that we haven't seen you since Colorado, which was our first summer as RVers. And here we are, almost three years into this lifestyle! You were a big influence behind that part in my article about community, by the way. You took us to that Xscapers event, where we met a few people who then introduced us to others we're still friends with today. So thank you! Also, on the "new you", don't you just love keeping people guessing? I do haha!
I really want it all. There are things I get from the RV life and others from Life Abroad. Besides taking the Airstream to Puerto Penasco, our first non-RV adventure abroad was almost two months this year in Italy. And that experience changed my perspective on how I want to travel and live. There's so much out there and so much right here in front of me. It's challenging to decide how to experience it all, when to do what and how to get the most out of each moment and place. Love the article and thanks for the inspiration Karla!
I really want it all too haha! I love that you had that experience in Italy and that it planted a seed for you on what you want. The same thing has happened to us with Mexico (we want more international and slower travel), although given Noah’s job, we are facing some big decisions in the next few months that will possibly take us back to the U.S. and maybe even to settling down for the foreseeable future. We’re still thinking through our options, never a dull moment with this life haha. Thanks so much for your kind comments, Bert!
Loved this article Karla ! Such a very good question. Thank you for the extra links to explain things like pulque and xscapers, good thinking, I learned a lot :)) Now I must go and decide what my own definition of Adventure actually is, and armed with that, I can make a better decision as to whether I should get my camper as soon as I land in Europe, or travel light for a while first before finding my dream home on wheels :))
I'm so glad you found this article useful!! I was hoping that especially up-and-coming nomads would get some good use out of this one. I would LOVE to know how you define adventure for yourself and what decisions come out of that definition! Keep me posted, will you?
Great writing, Karla. You really bring us along with you in your articles. I really enjoyed this one specifically as I'm preparing to move to a more mobile lifestyle myself. I have to admit my trailer is a little bigger than your Casita. All the best to you and Noah!
David, thank you so much - your words encourage me to keep writing! I didn't realize you were becoming a nomad yourself! Ooh, I'm excited for you and really hope we can meet on the road sometime. Us RVers gotta stick together (no matter the size of our RVs)!
I say life abroad…I don’t know how you did 3 years in that tiny camper but now you’ve had that amazing experience and at no better time than the past 2 years when travel has been so restricted!
I know! I don't know how we've managed to love living in such tiny quarters, but we're gonna do it again! We'll be headed back to the U.S. in mid-April to pick up our tiny home and head back on the road, but are now thinking of maybe taking it into Canada and Baja California so we can begin to combine both the RV life and life abroad bit by bit :)
Come to Calgary… begin July is good for Stampede…and of course Banff…the Rockies
Ooh, that has been on our list for a while! I'll definitely let you know when/if we're on our way there!
Quebec City and Montreal in the French province of Canada are also fabulous cities to visit…you feel as if you are in Europe…I have good friends in Montreal I could introduce you too who would welcome you with open arms🥰
I really enjoyed this article. Perfect. For me, I spend less in Mexico especially groceries plus the produce is generally better
Thank you, Bob! I completely agree with you - groceries are cheaper and produce and even meat too taste better. Things are much more fresh! I think we spend just as much as in the US not cause of the daily food at home but how much we eat out 😂. Our insect meal last night in Querétaro (which I'll write about this coming week) was delicious but not cheap haha. It sure made for some interesting memories.
It was so good to catch up, even if briefly last week!
I was so hoping you would get around to this topic, and maybe like you (?), I'm finding it HARD TO CHOSE JUST ONE! After almost six months, I'm on my out of Mexico in a few weeks. I'll start the search for a bigger "rolling house" to live in. One big bugaboo for me here has been the noise. Mexico tends to be a noisy place, but the place I landed this winter is particularly bad. My bad for always choosing the cheapest place I can find to stay down here, but my finances are an issue. I may try to find some seasonal work to make that a little easier.
A comment/question about community: You live in your trailer, and you are visiting SMA. How different would it be if you settled and lived in Mexico for years, then visited places on vacation in your trailer? My thoughts on that are that I haven't felt like this particular place could be "home", but I still wonder if some other place in Mexico could. Since one of my highest values is peace and honest-to-goodness quiet, I tend to think nomad life will be it for me, with seasonal visits to Mexico. But... the very real flip side of that is I know I will miss the more social aspects of finding a place to settle into and live. That's more of an issue because I'm out there solo and I'm basically an introvert. I've had a good long taste of most of the good things you mentioned about being here. We'll see how it feels going back to traveling, but I know I'm first going to head for the most silent place I can find for a while. I want to hear nature and nothing else for a while. ;-)
So, I'll go back to nomad life with at least a small level of focus on - just maybe - finding a place that I might settle into and be part of a community where there are people and activities that I can enjoy. New Mexico is next on my list. Never been there, and I have friends there. It'll be great no matter what, and I'm looking forward to the next chapter!
Nos vemos!!
Ah, Rich, I love your comment and you sharing what's next for you. I imagined your current home in Mexico was it for a good long while. Maybe us nomads are just never meant to be confined to one place!
It's an interesting question you pose about being in Mexico as more of a home base and traveling in the camper for vacation. I'm intrigued by that idea when I see a beautiful home for sale in SMA and as we're meeting great people too, but if I'm honest with myself, I know I'm too restless for that (and Noah even more). Maybe some day we'll have a place in Mexico but we envision regular travel to a lot more places right now, not only in Mexico (Puebla, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Yucatán, and more of Baja are on the list) but also internationally. Getting a place at this point in our lives would be counterintuitive to that, but it doesn't mean it will never happen. For me, especially, it's gonna be really important that we regularly spend time in Mexico as we get older, so you never know!!
I'm so glad you mentioned New Mexico. It's a state we've been thinking of spending more time in, perhaps early summer. We've been really liking this slower pace of travel lately, letting us really sink our teeth into a place and not rush so much. Santa Fe and Taos are on our radar. It'd be wonderful to meet up if our timing coincided. It's been too long!
Maybe it's because I'm already older 😳 that I'm thinking a bit more in terms of finding a place to settle. Sounds funny to me because I don't really think of myself as "older". My first two years were very mobile, with moving frequently the primary agenda. And I mostly loved it. Heck, I met you guys! But for the last two summers I have basically parked myself in an area for three to four months. I expect that will continue be my mode of nomading now.
I don't feel like I'm on the hunt for a stationary place to be, but I will have my eyes open for that. I have two good friends in NM. One in Santa Fe, and the other in Taos. I have open invitations from both, so I have a little extra motivation.
I have always thought of myself as a homebody. That view of myself has definitely been challenged, and it's still a bit surprising to me. Some of my friends haven't figured the "new me" out yet. 😉 Not totally sure I have, but I'm good with the change other than the social aspect I still need to work on.
It would be very cool to see you this summer. I feel like I've gotten to know you guys much more even though I haven't actually seen you since Colorado!! I'm yet to figure out how urgent the rig change will be. Maybe it can wait through the summer when I can be outside more. I'll see when I get back to it in a few weeks.
Hasta luego -
I was just thinking that it's hard to believe that we haven't seen you since Colorado, which was our first summer as RVers. And here we are, almost three years into this lifestyle! You were a big influence behind that part in my article about community, by the way. You took us to that Xscapers event, where we met a few people who then introduced us to others we're still friends with today. So thank you! Also, on the "new you", don't you just love keeping people guessing? I do haha!