Jane Daly- Living the dream in her RV

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Jane Daly and her husband sold their home and chose a life on the road.
It's been an adventure.
She tells about their decision to sell their home, choosing their motor home, travel
connecting with old friends.

Subscribe to the Women of the Northwest podcast for inspiring stories and adventures.
Find me on my website: jan-johnson.com

Transcript

[00:03] Jane: One of the things that was on my bucket list was to see Mount Rushmore because I'd never seen it.

[00:16] Jan: Do you ever just want to get away?

[00:18] Jan: How about a road trip?

[00:20] Jan: Welcome to women of to the Northwest. I'm your host, Jan Johnson. Jane Daly did just that. She and her husband sold their home and are living their dream in their motor home. Let's listen into their adventures.

[00:38] Jan: There we go. Hi, Jane Daly. So nice to see you today.

[00:45] Jane: Thank you to be here.

[00:47] Jan: Jane, I know this is going to be fun to hear all about your adventures. I'm wondering, you have sold your house and now you're just living in your RV. Is that true?

[01:02] Jane: Yes. My husband and I had had this dream of like someday, you know how you do the Sunday I'm going to whatever it is, someday we are going to buy a motor home and travel around the United States and that was kind of like out there. And then the dream kind of changed because our daughter had moved up here to Oregon and we were still stuck in California taking care of my mom. And then after my mom passed away, we decided to move up here to Oregon to be near our daughter and our grandkids. And then of course, COVID hit and the kids were not able to go to school and it was super frustrating for my daughter and her husband. Then he ended up getting a really good job offer in Tennessee. So they up and moved to Tennessee in 2021. And so my husband came home from work one day and he said, what do you think about let's rethink this whole dream thing of buying a motorhome and selling everything. And so I said, absolutely, let's do it. So we sold everything. Everything. And we are now living full time in our RV.

[02:22] Jan: So where was your husband working?

[02:25] Jane: Well, he was working he is actually retired, but he was working down in the Sacramento area for a friend who has this business where he makes he puts together wallpaper pasting machines.

[02:40] Jan: Really?

[02:41] Jane: Yeah, I know, it's so random, right? But he was down there working. He'd work for about ten days to two weeks and then he would come back just to get some inventory up. And then when his friend needed more inventory, mike would go down and he would help him and then come back.

[02:59Jan: So it wasn't a hard job for him to leave?

[03:01] Jane: No, not at all. And he is actually still doing it. So when we left here in February, he ended up going down to Sacramento area. We stopped and stayed there so he could build the inventory up. And now we're back in Oregon. We'll go back down to California so he can help his buddy again before we take off again.

[03:23] Jan: I see. Did you guys do a lot of traveling beforehand?

[03:27] Jane: No, not really.

[03:29] Jan: It was just a dream.

[03:30] Jane: It was a dream.

[03:32] Jan: Yeah.

[03:32] Jane: I had this bucket list thing that I wanted to visit the capitals of all of the 50 states and at least the lower 48, because I've already been to Hawaii, but I wanted to visit the capitals of all of the lower 48 states. Now, I have to tell you that that has changed a little bit, because since we've lived here in Oregon, and when we've been traveling, I decided I really hate cities, and so I don't really care to see the capitals because they're generally in a city center, and traffic is making me crazy. So we're basically just saying, okay, we're going to camp in all of the lower 48 states.

[04:14] Jan: Maybe you should change to going to each of the national parks.

[04:19] Jane: Yes, I know. I talked to somebody today who said that was their goal was to visit as many national parks as they could. So we may end up putting that on our list. Right now, we're trying to visit all of our family and friends who are kind of flung out around the United States.

[04:38] Jan: Very good. That sounds it's kind of nice to have a destination, something that to look forward to seeing somebody yeah, it is.

[04:48] Jane: It's really fun because we have friends and family. My husband there's five of them, and so they're all in different states, so we've had a chance to visit all of them except for two, which we are going to do on this next trip. So that's been really good people that you haven't seen for years. It's so nice to just be able to hang out and not be in a rush, because you have got to get back yeah.

[05:13] Jan: After water the flowers, right? Yeah, exactly. Have you found anything you really miss about living in your house?

[05:23] Jane: I miss kitchen counter space. I have 3ft of counter space, and part of it is the stove top. So if I'm cooking stove, I have no other real space. It's a challenge to cook. So yeah. I do miss having lots of counter space and lots of cabinets and drawers.

[05:46] Jan: Yeah. But then maybe you can just save your cooking time for when you visit your friends and family. Can I make dinner tonight for a treat? For me?

[05:57] Jane: Yeah. We do a lot of crock pot. I've got stuff on the Crock Pot right now because it's just easier to put it all in one and not have to deal with cooking.

[06:05] Jan: Yeah. Adjustments there. How did you decide which motor home to get?

[06:12] Jane: My husband loves to do that kind of research, so he did a ton of research. He watched a bunch of videos. There was one maps, RV reviews, and they would review a new, different RV every single week. He read a lot. We did some shopping. We ended up finding a salesman who was a Christian who really understood what we wanted to do and pointed us in the right direction with what would not be super expensive, but would meet our needs as a living full time.

[06:53] Jan: Yeah. And of course, she did this right when the gas prices went way up.

[06:59] Jane: Oh, my goodness, chanda, you can talk to me about that.

[07:03] Jan: I can't even imagine how much it costs to fill up.

[07:07] Jane: Well, so you figure we've got an 80 gallon tank and to fill it. Yes. What was funny, so when we left, we left here and we spent it was a total of about four weeks in California, and the gas prices were high. I mean, they were high, not as high as they are now. And then the further that we got east, the lower the gas prices went.

[07:35] Jan: I noticed that, too. On my trip back east, we were.

[07:38] Jane: Like, oh, look, we're in New Mexico and gas is one dollars 59, or whatever it was. And then within the last several months since gas prices have gone up, they've just been crazy. And it has just made our budget pretty tight because we were not expecting four and five and $6. Galling yes.

[08:00] Jan: Well, you just stay longer in one place for a little while, so you get more reserves.

[08:08] Jane: That's the plan. Once we leave here, we're heading back. We'll be in Tennessee to visit our daughter for a few days, and then we're going to stay the entire winter, six months in South Carolina. And there's a thing called work camping. And so as a work camper, sometimes you get paid and sometimes you don't, but you get your space free. So we're going to spend our winter there at a Koa campground, and we'll each work about 15 hours a week, and then we get our space for free, and we won't have gas except for just our little get around car.

[08:49] Jan: Right.

[08:49] Jane: So we will able to save some money.

[08:51] Jan: Yeah, that sounds delightful. Did your kids grow up in the house that you sold?

[08:59] Jane: No, because my kids grew up in Sacramento.

[09:03] Jan: Okay.

[09:09] Jane: My son graduated the same year that my daughter got married, so they both left the house at the same time. My daughter lived in Sacramento for a few years until her husband got a job up here in Oregon. And then my son went to Colorado, and he ended up living in Colorado until he passed away. He passed away twelve years ago. Because then we moved up here to Oregon and lived in our house for a little over two years before we pulled it.

[09:41] Jan: Right. I was trying to picture if in the imaginary world, my husband and I did, that there's no way my kids would just have a fit if we sold their house that they lived in forever.

[10:00] Jane: Well, yeah, there's a lot of emotional attachment to your home, and especially.

[10:07] Jan: If.

[10:07] Jane: That's where they grew up, I can see how they would not want you to move. I get it. How dare you move, mom, that's our place. It's it like a safety net, just in case.

[10:21] Jan: And it's not like they visit that often. And I have ten kids scattered all over the place, but it's like, well, yeah, but that's the farm that we grew up on, and that's where I was born, and that's where I right my kids at home. I don't know, it's just kind of funny that they have those attachments even though they're not here all the time. Well, I tried to answer. Okay, I'll cut it out in the editing. Okay, so tell me about the places that you travel.

[11:14] Jane: So I was talking with somebody yesterday about what was your most favorite place, and I was trying to explain that there's been some amazing places that we've seen, but the biggest thing, the treat for me is the people that we've met and the people that we've been able to hang out with. For instance, my husband and I lived in Montana for three or four years way back in the 80s. We pastored two small country churches and made some friends with a couple there. And so to be able to just hang out with them, we went and haven't seen them for years and camped near them and saw them every single day. It was so awesome. Like, time had not passed, like, exactly.

[12:10] Jan: It was.

[12:13] Jane: One of the things that was on my bucket list was to see Mount Rushmore, because I'd never seen it, and I've lived here. Yeah, it was almost like a huge emotional thing. To hear the story of why those four presidents were chosen to be on the monument, the story of the monument singing of the national anthem while they lit up the president's heads. I said, oh, we saw the president's heads. That, to me, was incredibly moving. As an American, it made me so proud to be an American, and just to see all of the people that were there from all over the United States and different countries just coming to see this incredible monument to our history, that was really cool.

[13:07] Jan: And it's not just off the you know, it's way off the beaten path. So it's not something you just happen to drive by.

[13:13] Jane: Right, yeah, that is so true. And the other amazing thing that we went to was Glacier, and we lived in Montana, but we never made it to Glacier National Park. So to be able to drive through and see how gorgeous that was, it's.

[13:33] Jan: Almost like being in the Alps.

[13:37] Jane: Someone said, oh, I've heard that the Swiss Alps are more amazing than Glacier. And I've been to the Swiss Alps. So I went back and reported to them, and I said, I would say it's on Par. They're both different, but they're both spectacular. You can't say one is more beautiful because they're both gorgeous.

[14:00] Jan: Yes.

[14:01] Jane: And they had just opened Glacier when we got there. I think it had just opened around the first part of June because they still had tons of snow on the road and it was impactful. And I think they'd even had some either rock slides or mudslides because they'd had such a rainy spring and so they had just opened it. We were really blessed to be able to get because you have to buy a ticket, which is so bizarre. You have to buy a ticket to drive through. Okay, yeah, but those are two places that were amazing.

[14:37] Jan: Are you guys hikers?

[14:39] Jane: No, we don't do my husband golf and I write, so I've had a lot of time to sit at my computer and writing.

[14:51] Jan: And you have new settings? Settings for your books.

[14:56] Jane: Exactly. My husband and I keep talking about we should write a series of cozy mysteries of a couple who's on the road in their motorhome who, every place they go, they find a dead body and have to solve this mystery. I mean, it would be perfect, but I haven't quite wrapped my head around that because I've still got too many ideas of books that I need to get out before that comes around.

[15:22] Jan: Before that comes around.

[15:23] Jane: Kind of like what is it, murder she Wrote. Except for Murder She Drove or something.

[15:29] Jan: That'd be perfect. That would be great. What other places have you been? Kind of to the north, a little to the south, yeah.

[15:37] Jane: When we left here, we went down into California and then we headed east into New Mexico and then Arizona and then Texas, because we have family in Texas. And then there's a gal who lived there who my husband had donated kidney, too, and she lived in Texas. She just passed away yesterday, but not because of the kidney. Texas. And then we headed north. We went to Oklahoma and then up to Missouri and then down into Tennessee and stayed in Tennessee for three months with our daughter. Not with, but near.

[16:25] Unknown Speaker: Right.

[16:26] Jane: And then we headed back up we went to Illinois, then across we cut through Ohio I think my geography is not the best. And then South Dakota and then Montana and then down Idaho and now here. So we made this big loop and then we're going to make another loop, but we're going to go across the middle of the country to go back down to Tennessee and then over to South Carolina.

[16:56] Jan: Did you go through Yellowstone?

[16:59] Jane: No, not yet.

[17:01] Jan: Because I think that was when I took my daughter back just two weeks ago. We decided to go the Southern little bit more southern route instead of going through that way because it was all flooded and there was all kinds of landslides and things that you couldn't get through.

[17:18] Jane: Have you been to Yellowstone?

[17:19] Jan: I have, yeah.

[17:20] Jane: I was there as a kid and my husband's never been, so that is definitely on the bucket list because that's amazing.

[17:28] Jan: It's worth staying a fair amount of time there, so you really get to see everything.

[17:34] Jane: Yeah, we've learned so much about this little subculture of permanent full time RVs that you don't really realize exist because you don't really run into them.

[17:49] Jan: Right.

[17:50] Jane: If you're a casual camper, there's a bunch of people out there, not just people our age, not just retirees, but we've met families who are living full time in either their fifth wheel or their motor home homeschooling, driving around the country, teaching their kids and having them learn real history. So like the signing of the Declaration of Independence, they go to Philadelphia. Right. So there's another even subculture of these full time. They have a group called Full Time Families and they travel together and they teach their kids together. And it's pretty cool. That's been really fun.

[18:39] Jan: Yeah. So much to learn. I suppose there's probably groups too, like these groups or whatever to join us, to have community sharing. Yeah.

[18:54] Jane: I'm in a couple of different Facebook groups. Full time RVs over 50. And then there's another one I can't remember, but you'll put in there, here's where we're staying, and someone will pop up and say, oh, I stayed there last week. Be sure you see this or we're going to be there next week. How is the campground? And so you can share information and get good tips on where's a good place where's a really bad place? Don't go there.

[19:24] Jan: Right. Do you have a physical map that you're marking up?

[19:31] Jane: Yes, we have one of those sticker maps on our door. And every time we go to a new state, we have to spend at least one night in a state in order for the sticker to go up. But we peel the sticker up and put it on the state. So we still have a lot of blank, especially along the East Coast. The Eastern seaboard is going to be probably not until like 2024 because we've got all these friends and family we want to visit first.

[19:59] Jan: Right.

[20:00] Jane: And so it will eventually get filled in, but yeah, we do. And we also have an atlas we are kind of old school in that we like to look at the physical map of where are we going instead.

[20:14] Jan: Of like one tiny little square on your phone that you're trying to see where everything goes.

[20:19] Jane: Exactly what highway are we on now? There's a lot of really good programs to help plan your trips. I pretty much exclusively use one called RV Parky and you put in where you want. Like we want to stop in say we're going to stop in Bedford and then it'll bring up places to stay. It'll tell you how long it's going to take you to get to Medford and how many miles it is. And then at the bottom, it'll tell you you put in the average gas price and it'll tell you how much it's going to cost you.

[20:52] Jan: Oh, very interesting. Yes.

[20:56] Jane: That was a little eye opener when we put in the five and $6 gas were like, wow. But I mean, those maps, you can look at those maps and they'll help you get where you're going.

[21:13] Jan: So you mentioned that you're an author. What was the first book that you wrote? You've written several, haven't you?

[21:19] Jane: I have four published, and I'm under contract for one more. So the first book I wrote was a nonfiction, and it was called Because of Grace, and it is the story of how I dealt with my son's death. And I really wrote it to offer hope to other mothers who have lost a child, because it doesn't matter if it's a miscarriage or even a newborn or if your son, like mine, was an adult. It's difficult to lose a child. I mean, it's like the worst thing that you can have happen. And then the second book I wrote is called The Caregiving Season, and that I wrote while my husband and I were giving for my dad and then for my mom. And then I really love fiction, so I jumped into the fiction pool, and my first novel came out last June, and my second novel just released last month. And then the sequel will be coming out next month. Next year.

[22:23] Jan: Next year. Okay, so let's go back to your son. If you could do, like, just a couple of nuggets for someone who's lost a child, what will they be?

[22:39] Jane: It sounds trite to say, but it will get easier. The first few years are brutal because there's all of those first Christmas, first Thanksgiving, first birthday, first anniversary of their death. All of those are extremely emotionally wrought. And then the second year is a little easier. I would say probably year five and six is where you can feel like you can breathe during those specific times. I mean, our son moved out when he was 19 and he died when he was 30. So he had already been on his own in Colorado for a number of years and was married, didn't have him at home, which I think might have been harder if he was younger and living at home, because then you've got room in their things, and that, I think, would be a lot more difficult. But his birthday and his death date are within the same month. And I used to just dread the month of March. Like, February would start getting a little panicky. I knew March was going to be horrible, and it was. And now March is not horrible. It's just okay. We usually just have a toast to body.

[24:16] Jan: It's just not easy anytime. I think it's not so bad when your parents have Alzheimer's and they're ready to go and you're ready to let them go. That's a whole nother story. But one of your kids is the whole.

[24:34] Jane: It'S something that you shouldn't have to do as a parent, you expect your parents to pass. My mother was 94. She was like, Please, Lord, why am I still here? Somebody passed away when they're 30. Why does that happen? And as a Christian, and hopefully your listeners will understand that knowing when your child passes, knowing that you will see them again in heaven, is a huge comfort. I mean, that's probably the biggest comfort. And as a parent, just knowing, okay, I know where he is. I'm going to see him again, and I don't have to worry about him.

[25:21] Jan: Right. Yeah. There's all of that. When my husband died, I was 32, so I was a widow at that point. And you're just thinking, oh, boy, this is like crazy times. But you get through it, and you get through one day at a time, and you keep moving.

[25:47] Jane: Yeah. My son and his wife were both 30, and she had been taking care of him because he was sick. He was diagnosed with terminal cancer. He died, I think, 14 months later. So during the last several months, she was caregiving him, giving him his meds and making sure he ate right and just really hands on. And then to have that taken away, like, he's gone, oh, now what do I do? That, I think is probably more difficult for parents who have a child at home because your whole life is revolving around this sick child, and then now what do you do? They're gone.

[26:29] Jan: It's part of your identity, in a sense. Right? Yeah. And then, so we share tips to your parents, and that's something that a lot of us that are a little older become the parents or parents.

[26:46] Jane: That's an interesting role switch, isn't it?

[26:48] Jan: Yes. When you have to say, it's time to eat, and let me help you go to the bathroom.

[26:57] Jane: Yeah. And let me take the keys because I don't think you should be driving.

[27:05] Jan: Instead teaching them the driver, right? Yes.

[27:09] Jane: Instead of, dad, can you take me for a driving lesson? It's, dad, give me the car keys because you're not going to be driving anymore.

[27:20] Jan: Yeah.

[27:20] Jane: And mom, let me pay those bills because you're having a hard time writing those checks out. Let me take over.

[27:31] Jan: How does your book address some of those things?

[27:35] Jane: Each chapter I talk about a different it was written very memoir. This is our story. These are the things that we went through with the car keys and the finances and the food and all of that. Just totally spaced on what your question was.

[28:00] Jan: Well, I'm just thinking because of that, that sounds like a book that would be great for people who are just on the cusp of taking care of their parents and knowing what to expect, what they could possibly expect.

[28:13] Jane: That's the thing, Jan, is that you don't know what you don't know.

[28:18] Jan: Right.

[28:18] Jane: So you step into this role, but you don't like it's not like one day you're not care giving, and then the next day you are. It's a very gradual slide into this role, and all of a sudden you find yourself, like, really in the center of the situation. And for me, I didn't know where to look. I didn't know that there was resources. So I thought, well, I'll just write a book because I don't know what's out there. Now. I found that there are a lot more resources, and mine is just another resource. It's just a way to help other baby boomers who are kind of like not thrust, but gradually sliding into this role like the frog in the spot. You look around and go, oh, I'm having to take care of all my parents needs, and I didn't expect to have to do this.

[29:17] Jan: Right. And I don't know, I guess we're just kind of oblivious to that. We should know that that's going to happen. But it kind of speaks up on you, right.

[29:27] Jane: Because we think in my mind, my dad was still, like, 40. I always pictured him as being this young man who was taking us to Disneyland and going on road trips and that my mom was cooking and cleaning and all the stuff that she did. I just didn't expect to turn around one day and find out my parents are super old and now I got to take care of them.

[29:57] Jan: Yeah.

[29:58] Jane: And I think that happens to most of us. Jan as we age, we look at our parents. If we're lucky enough to still have our parents alive, is, oh, I wonder if they need help, because they probably won't ask, right.

[30:13] Jan: Or they may not recognize that they need it if they get dementia or something else, they don't necessarily recognize that, either.

[30:22] Jane: I have a monthly newsletter, and it's called Rigsby On the Road because we named our Rig Eleanor Rigsby. And so I call it rigsby on the road. And every month I post a story about something either horrific I'm going to say horrific with air quotes that's happened. Let's say unexpected. How about unexpected that's happened?

[30:44] Jan: Opportunities.

[30:46] Unknown Speaker: Yes.

[30:46] Jane: An opportunity to see God works in a miraculous way. An opportunity for spiritual growth. Or I post something really funny that happened. It's called Rigsby On the Road, and they can access my newsletter by going to my website, which is Jane S, as in Sam Daily. Daly.com and there's a place on there to sign up for either the blog or the newsletter. But the newsletter is fun, and I post pictures of places that we've been.

[31:23] Jan: Well, Jane, that sounded pretty fun, but I'm pretty sure my husband would not sell the farm and take off in a motorhome. I put links in the show notes for work, camping, full time families, and RV parking. There's also to a link of Jane's website where you can find her blog and RV adventures, as well as links to her books. Have a wonderful week and we'll catch you next time. Bye.