Thought I would share some of our experiences. Attached below are a couple of pictures, one of our site at the KOA and the other of the countryside from the hill above the campground. We are at Herkimer Diamond KOA in Herkimer NY at the base of the Adirondacks along the Erie Canal. Have been here since May 10 and have been asked by owner to stay as long as we can. Depending on water supply, will probably be here till around first or second week of November. That also depends on SNOW !! After that, home to the Baltimore area for a couple of weeks to see family, kids, friends and grandkids and then we think we're going to the Outer Banks for a few weeks before coming back to Baltimore for the Christmas holidays. From there, as long as they are back up and running, we have reservations at Sunshine Key RV Resort on Big Pine Key in Florida for the first two weeks of January. After that to Tampa for th RV show and finally to the Savannah area for the rest of the winter.

The journey in this new lifestyle has already taken some twists and turns. We originally came up here for me to run the big Tour Boat. In early July it became obvious that there just wasn't any way I could work with / for the owner of the company and we parted ways. Tracy had been working at the campground and was asked by the owner to take over managing the restaurant. Wasn't what either of us had in mind but she has now gotten it headed in the right direction and we have been asked to come back again next year. We have become very friendly with the owners and she assures me that I won't be bored next year. Not sure yet what that means ! It does mean that we will need to put off traveling west till thefollowing year though.

As others told us as we were packing the coach - we have way too much "stuff" with us. There will probably be 500 lbs of "stuff" coming out of Tilda when we get to Baltimore !!

All in all, a great ride so far !! Oh, and all the hookups are done for the Focus. Have done a short trial pull and the only way I can tell it's back there is to look in camera or get a glimpse of it in a tight turn. No issue on turns, as others told me, it tracks in the truck footprint so as long as the trailer makes the turn, the Focus will. I'll post pictures of the rig when we leave in November.

If anyone is in th fence about fulltime, just pm either of us. We will be in the Redwood booth at Tampa also.

Vaughn, too bad about the Captains gig, but fortunately sounds like Tracy put you right to work, from captain to bus boy?
We would also welcome any fulltiming questions, we are into our 10th year.
You also got the Baltimore visits just reversed, grandkids, grandkids, grandkids, kids, family, friends, or that's the way we feel.

Happy to hear that life is cruising through the transition well. We are getting ready to retire in a little over a year from now. I was wondering how the campground situation is with all the baby boomers packing up and hitting the road? Does one have to plan months in advance to get a spot? We have lived in our old SOB 5 of the 10 years we owned her but the whole time I have had my career going so it has not been a problem with cash flow. Being on a fixed income which will not be that bad I still wonder how much the average cost of staying at places is? Look forward to hearing some of your experiences and thoughts on cost factor per month to live in this lifestyle.

Thanks,
Tom N Gina

Hi Tom
For us, we knew we would need to workamp to make ends meet. For a number of reasons I won't go into, neither one of us wound up with a bunch of $$$ at retirement. I also know that I couldn't just sit around, I'm the type that has to be doing something. The park we are in is a KOA Resort, one of only 9 in the system , so it's pretty pricy. On the weekends we are full, actually almost 85% booked on weekends for next year. During the week, for the most part, maybe 20% full.
There are a lot of reasonably priced places, when we travel we use Passport America a lot and travel mostly during the week when we can.

Will update this thread more as we move, but so far, it's been great ! As. I write this, I'm looking out the back window where the desk is (we pulled the couch and had a custom desk and workstation made) and watching a couple of chipmunks playing and scavenging. Couldn't do that in Baltimore ! I think cost would be pretty much what you want it to be. The workamper job market is huge, I know we are looking for 3 more couples for next season with skills everywhere from gardening to office and front desk. The KOA workamping site alone has spots open in every state. Some you get site plus pay and some are site only. Typically for the site only trade off, you are working 3-4 days per week and maybe 6-7 hours per day.

Tom n Gina
When started 10 years ago you could get a spot most anywhere without a reservation, but since then it's gotten a little more difficult, I usually try to reserve next couple stops in advance, if I book more than that something usually comes up to mess them up. If we decide to stay longer we do, I have a friend that already has next summer's itinerary planned out, if I wanted that much structure I'd have stayed working.
As far as cost, that to has gone up also, but there are clubs\memberships that will save you, Passport America, Good Sams are a couple, also they wouldn't work for us but there's Thousand Trails, Coast to Coast memberships which you pay up front with annual memberships.
We've found that either stay a week, pay 6 days & get 7 or stay a month which is the cheapest. We then travel all around that area to see the sites , possibly a couple hundred miles in every direction & return to our site, so far has worked great. Traveling/stopping everyday will wear you down quickly & gets very expensive. My BIL (real tight wad) travels to Cheyenne to the rodeo every year & doesn't pay for a park all the way up or back, they stay in Wal-Mart's mostly unless they come across a free city park somewhere, not because they don't have the money but he's too cheap. There are books/websites of free parks all across the country. We like to stay a casinos, they are usually inexpensive, nice parks with good food close by & entertainment if you're into that.
If you want there's always opportunities to workkamp all across the country usually for free site & electricity, some do offer other incentives depending on how hard you want to work. One friend pours beer 3 nights a week, that's the job I want.
Feel free to pm me anytime with anything I can help with in your great adventure.
Enjoy & safe travels!