How We Build Community While Full-Time Traveling

How We Build Community While Full-Time Traveling

On this episode of TravelEssary, we’re talking about something that matters just as much as the places we visit: connection.

Living on the road doesn’t mean leaving community behind. In fact, we’ve found that travel has a way of opening doors to people we may never have met otherwise. From staying connected with family and friends back home, to forming friendships on the road, this episode is all about how we build meaningful relationships while full-time traveling.

We share how social media helps us maintain connections, how conversations with fellow RV transporters and campground neighbors turn into real connections, and why stepping into local churches and community spaces has been such a grounding part of our journey. We also talk about pushing past comfort zones, showing up in new places, and learning to belong, even when everything around you is temporary.

This conversation is a reminder that home isn’t just where you park, it’s the people you share life with along the way.

We hope this episode leaves you feeling inspired to reach out, lean in, and build community right where ever you are.

Transcript

  We're the Essary family and we're exploring America one destination at a time. On today's episode of TravelEssary, we are going to get into how we build community while traveling. Let's chat. Welcome and thank you for joining us on this episode as we talk about how we build community while traveling. Now, before we kick this off, and there is a lot to go through for sure.

But. This is 2026. Yeah. And this is the first time that I've been back in 2026. Y'all have done several podcasts without me.

. It's the first time you get to podcast with us for the year. I know. They just haven't worked out where we had time to podcast and then I wasn't on the road. I am super excited, super thrilled to be back behind a microphone. Talking to all of our wonderful people, and it is going to be a great 2026.

So many things to, oh man. We can spend a whole episode just on the things that are coming up because there's going to be a lot, and we are super pumped for it. But if you wanna know more information about what's coming up on 2026, there's one place you can go check it all out. And that's on Patreon? Yeah, we do have a lot of information on our Patreon, I highly recommend going and checking that out. We do give a seven day free trial of two of our tiers, so if you're unsure of what we have to offer, then. Go check that out.

I cannot wait to get into what we're going to talk about today, because we've only been on the road now. We've been travelers for a while, a long time. That's why we started the podcast. Yes. But we've only been full-time travelers on the road for around three months. Because you can't count the holiday season.

No. 'cause we were back home. So about three months, and we've started learning ways of how to build community around us, a circle of friends and family. I think that's, to me, that's what a community is. People around you that you can fellowship with, that you can depend on that you can. Share life with, and I'm really excited to put these into motion moving forward, these things that we've learned in the short few months that we've been doing this.

I'm really excited to really implement this in 2026 and. Some of this stuff we've already been doing, some of this stuff we've already talked about, hinted at in some of our other episodes. As far as like how to stay in contact with, your friends and family while you're traveling.

You know how to stay safe while you're traveling. Make sure that, you're sending information back to someone who's, keeping tabs on you kind of thing. But this is more like how to. Get more friends how to get more friends. You don't wanna be lonely. You definitely don't wanna be lonely.

Now, if you're an introvert, which some of us are introverts, I am not, but some people are. This may not always apply to you. But it is a community that you can go to. If you have a situation if you're running against, into a problem or something, these different communities and you know how to build these communities are here to help you.

Yeah. And I think that will probably surprise people. If this is a foreign concept to you and you have not done full-time travel, you might not even realize that you. Can build a community while you're on the road. So yeah, let's get into this. One thing I will preface this with is this is not full-time vacation.

We are not on vacation every single day, which I think we say every other podcast episode, but I don't think it's gotten through to everyone yet. Because it's just one of those things where people are like, oh yeah, you're on vacation. You're out. You're doing all this other kind of stuff. Yes.

People still say Vacation, we're not vacationing. It would really be nice to be full-time vacationers, not have to work at all. But even those guys that you see traveling the world or are doing what we're doing, and they're making content and everything, they'll tell you it's not a vacation.

It's not there. There are days that it feels like a vacation. Like yesterday for us felt like a vacation. But today it. It feels like work. It feels like work. We're just traveling. That's all.

But one of the biggest points that we wanna make definitely not the biggest, but one that the most obvious. The most obvious is you wanna stay in contact with your family and friends. Yeah. Just because you're traveling doesn't mean that you suddenly disconnect from your friends and family and your circle group and your community back home.

Yeah. Now, if you're one of those people that you want to leave a certain situation and you don't want to. Talk to people back home, then don't just cut those ties and move on. Just don't, that is not the case for us. No, . We miss them already. There's already certain situations that I'm like, oh, I really wish that I had my brother or, the pastor or whoever, my friends and family back home. . They're so easy to talk to because you've already built that relationship to 'em. We're in contact. Every other day, if not daily, with, your mom and my dad and our family back home. We're talking with them all the time.

Yes. They check up on us, we check up on them. 'cause we're not back home where we're getting all the tea all the time of Hey, what's going on? And we're trying to make that contact, trying to keep up with everyone that's back home. And I think that's just one of the most.

Super obvious ones, yeah. You stay connected with friends and family. You wanna stay connected to your core community with friends that you've built. Relationship. It's a community built over a lifetime. A lifetime. Yeah. Misty still has her best friend that they haven't lived in the same city 12 years, 13 years, longer than that.

Like 2020. But they're still super friends. And like super friends. Super friends. They're one of those if they even get around each other or even in the same neighborhood, like they totally changed to like how they were back in high school 'cause they're super friends. And so you, you build those relationships and you build that community.

And so stay with, stay in contact with your friends. Yeah. I don't think, and your family don't think much needs to be said about that because it's so obvious. It's common sense. It's just Yeah. Stay connected with who you're already connected with. So that's not so much as building community, that's just ensuring that you maintain that community.

Yeah. For your peace of mind and for their peace of mind. Yeah. It, it goes both ways and it's. Really helpful, really nice for everyone. And that really goes into the second one that we wanna talk about, which is social media, , which, 15 years ago wasn't that big of a deal, but now it's massive.

Yeah. Now everything can happen on social media and it doesn't matter what platform you're on, that's the great thing. It doesn't matter what platform that you're on. So not only is social media great for keeping in contact with the community that you have built, but it's actually a good way to build community.

So one way that I have built community through social media is by. Following several full-time travel family Facebook groups, and then you become a part of that community. And a lot of these people actually get together a few times a year for a couple weeks out of the year and they travel together.

Yeah. And I'm really looking forward to being able to do that with people. Mainly Facebook, because it's the one that's probably the most diverse of all the platforms right now. Is with Facebook, they have so many groups, so many pages that if you want to know about something or you want to, like Misty said, we do the traveling thing.

So we get in contact with those families that, they go through. It's Hey, we have a problem with our RV and this is what it's doing. How do we solve this? And them. Hundreds, of people are making comments going, oh hey yeah, do this, and this. And then there's just different ways that you can handle the situation depending on, how much knowledge that you have.

And for those who have grown up online, you really understand this concept. For those of you who have not then pay attention, you can build friendships online with people you have never met. True? Oh, absolutely. Friendships. Jeremy and I had a friend that we met online, gosh, somewhere close to the beginning of our marriage that we would play games with and stuff.

And this person became a friend, not just on. The game we were playing, but through our social medias. And then it was like we were getting, pictures from his wedding and all this other stuff. Like we kept in contact. It was like, Hey, happy birthday. Through cell phone messages or through emails, things like that.

Like we actually. I consider him a really good, true friend. We had long conversations with him and yes, you can absolutely build a community online and, but my hope and my dream is that a lot of the ones that we do build this community with one day we'll get to actually meet in person. Absolutely.

We would love to, to really meet, in person, get the shake hands type ordeal. For sure. It just builds that community, builds a relationship that, a connective point between two people that maybe because of either a language barrier or an actual border barrier, you'll never be able to.

Yeah. It's so cool to, to reach out and be a part of those groups and be a part of those pages and meet those people that, may be in Australia or in Europe somewhere. And, get to build that relationship. And so my biggest thing is Facebook or even a lot of the other platforms.

Yes. It's really cool just to get on and just to look through and scroll and not really do anything with, but whenever you become interactive with them, and it's gonna be a lot with a lot of these other ones, whenever you become interactive with them, it's really cool to hear the perspective and then hear, what.

People go through in their lives and to build that relationship. Yeah. Which brings me to, I really love our Travel Esri family because it goes across several social media platforms and 22 different countries. Yeah. As of right now, we have reached 22 different countries of us building this little community within the travel Ry, and I really enjoy, it's a small but mighty community.

I really enjoy the feedback we get through private messages and emails. I really enjoy the interaction that we get on our Patreon pages and our Facebook pages and our YouTube comments, and . I do love the community that we are building just within TravelEssary not even within our personal social media profiles.

With the pages in the communities that, that we're developing. Yeah. And to be honest, really nice. I am on TravelEssary. Social media way more than I am personal. Yes. I have social media for TravelEssary way more than I do. Yeah. I will comment, way more TravelEssary than I will my personal because I'm, I am one of those people that.

It's cool to look through. But I get born on social media. For me it's, for me, it's just it's just time consuming. I like the community aspect of social media so much. That's really the main reason why I am even a part of social media, but I hate like the doom scrolling,

But Community is great, which this one actually goes into number three. Which is the transporters community. Yeah. So Jeremy's fellow RV transporters, several that he has met unofficially through social media. Yeah, just the different the conversations that we can have that help each other out or.

Multiple people can become more knowledgeable in either doing this or how it's done or, where's the best to save money. Or what kind of issues are you gonna run into, that are going to happen type thing. Yeah. I can't tell you how many men have messaged Jeremy from either our YouTube platform or our Facebook and.

If they have questions or encouragement or, Hey, next time you're in Indiana, let's hang out. Things like that. And so that is a community that he is able to build of a circle of men that are doing. The same job as him. So they'll have a lot of the same struggles and people that can relate with him through things like that because no one else in our family has ever done a RV transportation, and I think only a handful have done transportation in general, which none of them are currently doing it.

And so it is a nice thing for him to be able to have that community of transporters. Not to mention when you're in Indiana.

Yeah. Whenever I'm in Indiana there, there's what is called the Lounge where us and another company get together and it's just a, it's a big room that has a big screen, lots of tables and I know over, 'cause I was down there for New Year's that a lot of people came in.

There was. There was probably 20, 30 of us inside of it. We were all telling stories, we were all, talking about, how life is going, what's going on with, with everything that's going on. And actually someone made everyone chilly while we were there. It was really good. Nice. And we just, we had a really good time of just conversation.

I'm talking about our trucks and talking about where we like to go and what trips are profitable and which ones aren't. And so it was really nice just for that community to get together and to have those opportunities to get with people that do the same work as I do on a continuous basis to either.

Get with them personally or to build that community on social media or through text messages or emails or any of the other social media places that, that they message me on. Yeah. So it's really awesome. This last time Jeremy was like, Hey, I saw So and so from that YouTube channel that also works that way.

Yes. And I was like, oh, that's so cool. So that's like through social media, that's like through transportation. It's several different categories all in one. So I think that's neat that it's like. All of these are connected, like they're all connected of how to build community and it turns into one big circle that you have.

Yeah. And so the one thing I will talk about social media and the transporter part is, you. You kinda have to put yourself out there, you kinda have to like Yeah. Join the conversation. You do pretty much in all of this. Yes. And I was talking with guys I'm probably one of the newest ones because I haven't been doing it very long.

And then right after you signed up, they stopped accepting for a little while. Yeah. They draw back a little bit as far as how many people that they were hiring., So I'm dealing with a lot of people that have a lot of information, a lot of, a lot more experience. A lot more experience.

Some of them have really good stories, some of 'em have horror stories that I hope I never run into. But you. If you never talked to anyone, if you never open your mouth and introduce yourself and just let them talk and just absorb as much as possible, it's really hard to build community.

So sometimes just opening the door, opening that dialogue will open up doors and so much information that whether you ask for it or not could be something that is gonna be super helpful. The time to come. Yeah. Like how to handle a breakdown in the middle of Chicago like that. Absolutely. That was definitely one of them.

Or how to get around Chicago so you don't have to go through it. And what's the best routes? Anyways, there's a whole bunch to it, and we'll probably have another podcast where, we talk about a little bit more of the transportation and kind of the horror stories that I have. Oh yeah, that'll, that's like a whole series right there.

But even if you're not transporting. I highly encourage that if you are religious and you're full traveling go to church. . For us, we are in a location for usually three weeks at a time.

And I will say this is probably like one of the biggest forms of community for myself since we've been traveling. And I'm sure it'll continue this way, but that is building community within the local church that we attend. So every stop that we are at, if it's more than a day stop, basically we find the local church within our organization that we want to visit.

And that has been. A great source of fellowship and people that are extremely reliable. Every single place we have been to so far, someone, if not multiple people have said, Hey, if you need anything while you're here's my number. And I think that it's just, it's so heartwarming. So humbling. Yes to be able to walk into.

A place, and it doesn't matter what place, it's, but just walking into a place and, they're greeting everyone and they're talking and then they find out a little bit about you and they're like, that is super cool. No, they do usually have a lot of questions. That's a lot of questions.

And then you get to tell them, you know your story and you open up that dialogue and it just builds that, that base foundation. And then they're like wait a minute. You're away from home. You may not know anyone around here, you may need help. You may find yourself in certain situations and it's a great place for information.

Information out the wall too. Yeah. They know their local community better than a lot of the other ways you're gonna try to get information like from Google or something. So being able to have someone who has that firsthand experience with the town that you're visiting, that's really nice. A vast majority of them are gonna be working in that town.

So they're gonna know when's the best time for. Traffic, they're gonna know what activities are happening and where to go. They're gonna know the best eating places. Yeah. The first stop that we went to, the pastor's wife gave me a whole list of events within an hour and a half of the surrounding communities, like within an hour and a half driving distance.

And I went through and I was like, okay, let's do this and this. I didn't even have to do a lot of research 'cause she was like, Hey, let me help you out. Let me give you all these places that you should go see. I'm like, fantastic. This is great. I mean it's. It's extremely helpful

it also brings in a little bit of normalcy. Yeah. Jess and I were saying on our last week's episode that it's actually the only set schedule we have in our day to day lives. Yeah. Is a church schedule, which again, that's not even the same because from church to church, they have different schedules.

Schedules, but like that is, things are totally different. One consistent thing we have in our life as far as scheduling and. What we're gonna go do is we are gonna go to that church and then we revolve all of our schedules around their church schedule. Whenever we make that stop, because that's another way of building a community inside of a church, is more than likely they're gonna have an activity or two while you're there, while you're there, if you're there for an extended, attend those activities.

Attend them. Yeah. You'd be surprised about how fun it is. . The church is probably one of the main things for the kids too, is because that gives them a community as well, because they're not really on social media.

They don't have anything to do with Jeremy's job. They have their, friends and family that they keep up with on their cell phones. But other than that, like the church is. A great way for them to build community with other young people. And of course, what does that do? It goes back to number one.

Now you have friends. Yeah. Now you can stay in contact with some friends. Yeah. And because we do plan on repeating a lot of the places that we go to, we're gonna see them again, know. Yeah. There's a good chance we're gonna, we're gonna see, we're gonna them again.

We're gonna make this. Circuit again, we're gonna do this again, and we're gonna get to see these people that we have built this friendship with. So we've met them and we built that community and had that fellowship during the three weeks we were here. We kept in contact over social media and now we're visiting them again.

So that's how we do that. That's how you build the community. Number five, and this one varies. Because you never know. Seasons change. People, holidays change staff changes so much stuff changes.

But the actual community as far as the actual town or city that you're in, are close by. Yeah, so we had a very interesting little situation where we're at here in Columbus, Texas, and that is when we went to the visitor center and the Chamber and all of the visiting information places that we could find in town.

There wasn't a single person to talk to, and we were so disappointed because that's one of the ways like, it's like that's the first thing we want to do when we go into that community to build the community within that community, is to talk to the people who help run that community and know what's going on.

And so being able to have someone. You can go and talk to and be like, Hey, what is going on? What can we do while we're here? That's another person that we're handing, a card with our social media contact information and we're talking to, and when that's not there it's very disheartening and it makes it very difficult 'cause then you're relying more on Google which steers us wrong a lot, which.

May not always have the best information and will definitely not have the hidden gems that we're looking for. But getting someone who knows the ins and outs of their community and what events are happening, because that's gonna be a massive thing depending on where we go.

Like our next one is gonna be Martin Luther King. Is gonna happen. What kinda activities that got going on at that point in time? Yeah. And then, and Valentine's Day, Valentine Day, Memorial Day, all these things. Oh, super. All these holidays are about to happen. Super Bowl. The co where can we go for a Super Bowl party while we're in your town?

Yeah. The college the college championship is happening. All this kind of different stuff is coming up and it's Hey, do y'all have watch parties? Are y'all doing this? Do y'all have rodeos that are coming up in the spring and the summertime? There's gonna be so much activities that are gonna.

Happen throughout the city farmer's markets. We love farmer's markets going just the different flea markets and stuff of that nature. Where are they at and building that community within the community. Yeah. Not just community, but like more like communication with that community. Like you wanna establish a communication between you and.

Whoever it is that you're talking to, that's representing that community because opening that line of communication with them really does open up. Your possibilities to build more community while you're there. Yeah. And they're gonna know the ins and outs. They're gonna know, like your church group of, where's the best places to eat.

Where's the activities that. Or the must see type things. One time we literally stopped at a city hall because we were looking for a very specific. Food truck. We were looking for a breakfast burrito and we couldn't find, we drove around the city for, we got lost like 30 minutes and it wasn't a big town, but we were driving and we could not find it.

And Jeremy pulled over at the city hall, had this nice little repertoire with the people that were there and we went straight to where we wanted to go. So that was really nice. Yeah, so you know. All those tools, all that information, all that stuff is open to the public. Yeah. And then it's super easy.

And then again, when you come back through, you go back to these people that if they're still staffed there again, staff is a big thing that are still staffed there , that you've already built community and relationship with and you're like, Hey, we're here again. Tell me what's new. What, what's new, what can I do?

What's going on? And they're like, Hey, I know you and you already have that community and that communication that's already been built. And if you want to go above and beyond and kinda do what we're hoping to do , is whenever they have activities, either at the church or at the town.

Volunteer. Yeah. Be a helping hand, which can be scary in places that you are unfamiliar with because we just talked about this in our bonus podcast for January, but, it's intimidating going from place to place because they're so different and things are ran very differently. Yes. And you're gonna do things one way and they're like, we don't do that here.

We do it this way. Yeah. You wanna see the backside of a parade go volunteer to like direct traffic. You want to be a part of, a Super Bowl party or something like that. Be like, Hey look, I'll show up and set up tables or whatever and just help out because that gives you that little extra time in the community to build those relationships, where you're not just sitting around. And then what you do, then you can be contacted with each other on social media. There are actually two cities now, three cities that I have a personal relationship with on social media from being. A part of that community at some point. Yeah. Or visiting that community at some point in that we have talked with people and we have developed that community and that relationship with them.

And we are maintaining it on social media right now. It's beneficiary for everyone to build a community and to be a part of the activities and the things.

And what we always say, and we always preach probably the most is. Shop local, eat local.  you're able to do that by going to those mom and pop places and having those conversations. We're actually we're getting ready to go to one. And I'm probably gonna do a whole video of it, but it's because of nostalgic for me.

'Cause it looks like what my grandpa did. And so I'm not gonna get into a whole bunch of it, but. I'm literally looking forward to it because I know that place has a history. And I want to know what that history is. Yeah. And then be able to share those stories back and forth. So with us, , going off of that on the social media aspect of it, because we're, we are not just full-time travelers, we're.

Full-time content creators too, that whenever we do go to a restaurant, it's if it's one we really love, then a lot of times you're like, Hey, compliments the owner, compliments the chef and then they come out and they talk to us. And we get to, create this relationship with them.

And then again, we're like, Hey, you know what? Here's our card. Here's our QR sticker. We'll add you on social media and we'll make sure that we collaborate with you guys. And I'm like, fantastic. And that is we've created that little community within the community. Yeah. And then, they're sharing on their social media what we have made.

And then they're getting. Free advertisement and they didn't have to do anything except for not just them. It works both ways. It makes both ways, yeah. Because we're getting, their, people are seeing our content and so yeah, it definitely works out. So for us in the content creation community, that's great too.

And so building those relationships with just people that not the times where you just bypass someone and be like, Hey, how's your day? Or Hey, how's it going? Small little conversations like that aren't going to, which, that's just normal day to day in half the places you go in Texas Yeah.

You're not really gonna, or in the south, you're not really gonna build anything there. Yeah. But those conversations where you get to sit down and carry on a conversation

it's even whenever you're full-time traveling, the community and the campground. Yes. The RV community or even just the full-time traveling community of RVs, it's. It's unique, and it's so easy to create and build a community because 90% of them are extremely outgoing.

They're wanting to build their community as well, and they can relate with you in your lifestyle. And they probably have some really good information. About whatever you want to ask them. They've been to campgrounds you've never been to before. They've went through situations that you haven't had the opportunity or the chance to go through that you need to be prepared for so you're not caught unawares and.

Just the stories that they have, especially with the places that we've gone so far. Yeah. Maybe in the summertime it's gonna change a little bit, I to say. I do wanna make sure that people understand we're being very specific. Yes, you, we did talk about RV communities that you can build on social media, but we are very specifically.

Ending with campgrounds physically being in a campground. And it's been a great way for us to build the community around us. And this is the biggest point, whether you're in an RV park, you're in a campground you're in places that. Are gonna have activities or things to do outside of your camper or your own personal bubble.

Building that community is so massive and so great. And there are so much, there's so much going on. Every place that we've gone to has had activities of some sort, and we've been a part of a vast majority of those activities and I know that whenever we go to other campgrounds, because I've already had conversations of, the hotter it gets, the more up north everyone starts to go.

So I know we're gonna run into several of these a whole lot more often. And then being able to build that relationship that whenever there is a Super Bowl. That I know where the Super Bowl party is. We know where the tailgate party is or whenever there's a big activity or something like that, maybe, maybe they're going to that campground during 4th of July because they know this is happening and this is where they always go.

And now we have someone that's seasoned, go into an event that we're not having to try to feel everything out on our own. We literally just heard someone the other day talk about how they have like a group of friends that sometimes they travel together and sometimes they don't.

This few handful of couples will go off here and these few couples will go off here and then they'll all meet together here. Oh, that is right. Yes. , But I think that's so awesome. They have built such a tight knit community and sometimes they travel together and sometimes they don't.

But that is really what it's like here on these campgrounds is because you meet each other through these different activities or sometimes just because you're like, something happens and you're the person that's next to them. When something happens and you're like, Hey, what can I do to help you? And you've built this friendship and you've built this relationship and you get to talking.

You're sitting around a campfire in your baseball chairs or lawn chairs. Or whatever we're calling 'em these days, we're gonna call 'em camping chairs. Okay. And then you are like, Hey, you know what? We're about to go hit so and oh, we did that last month. Let me tell you all about what that place is. Or, yeah.

You're gonna wanna stay away from this area because you're not gonna be able to get your fifth wheel in. Or they're like, don't hit Florida in the winter. That's what they were telling us. Yeah. The other day. Don't hit Florida in the winter. They're, everyone's down in Florida. They're waiting for them to get outta the way just like we are.

It's unique because every park that we've gone to has been totally different. Yeah. So different. But the community is still tight, in all of them. Yes. And that's the coolest part. And so here is my biggest tip for anyone that is full-time traveling in an RV and is in. Some type of campground,

something that , you can stay for an extended period . Get out of your rv. Don't just do your own personal thing all the time, but be a part of the activities that are going on in the campground. Yeah.

It may be good for you, or you may go, I am never getting outta my RV again in this campground. These people are crazy. So we've had a few of those. We've had a few we've had a lot of fun. But the camping world. Campground community is absolutely amazing in most places. I'm gonna say it's a general rule.

General rule is they're very friendly, very outgoing, very helpful. Yeah  they're very nice. It's a strong community. Be a part of it. All of these communities can be built upon if you're willing to just step out of your comfort zone a little bit and be friendly. Yeah. So true.