I hadn’t been in an RV since I was a kid. This year seemed like the perfect year to renew that RV excitement. For obvious reasons like no hotels or air travel, and lots of social distancing. Plus could there be a better way to travel than in a moving living room and bedroom? Especially with an infant who just wants to be in your arms all day, and a 3 year old who can’t complain about movies and naps on the couch for the entirety of our travel.

So I started on my 3am (while up nursing) adventure of learning about RVs, road trip coordinating, and researching RV parks.

I’d always heard the Oregon Coast is spectacular. We have a home on a lake in Idaho which was my destination. That narrowed down the route a good bit. The direct route from LA to Coeur d’Alene, Idaho is a 19hr drive. 1200 miles.

I started researching RVs and talking to a few friends. I decided RVshare.com was the plan. It’s basically airbnb for people who own RVs and “Rigs” of all sorts. It’s great because you get insurance and everything directly through them. Just make sure you pack multiple credit cards for gas!

Cruise America is another option, but they don’t have the type where the cab and trailer are all one. Which means you can’t be in the trailer as you’re driving. As 2 adults that wouldn’t be a big deal. But with kids that would defeat the whole purpose of the RV. I did look a little into the California (and Oregon/Washington/Idaho) seatbelt and carseat laws for RVs. Either my sleep deprivation got the best of me and I was clueless, or there really wasn’t anything too definitive to be found. I concluded that you don’t even need seatbelts as long as you are in an RV, and not a cab pulling something. On the first trip I kept the carseats in the RV thinking I would use them when I could. That never happened. I think I was still traumatized from driving from LA to Sacramento in one day, alone, with an infant and 3 year old. Yes, I don’t make good decisions/let my optimism get the better.

Back to finding an RV . . . Initially I was going to book a beautiful new huge 40ft class A RV. It slept 12 people. I realized that might be a little overkill for our little group. Me, my dad, a 2 month old baby, and a 3 year old. Driving a 40ft long house around the winding mountain roads likely wouldn’t be the best idea. We settled on a 30ft Class A RV. It was a Thor and had more than enough room for us. A queen size bedroom. Bunk beds. A lofted bed. And a pull out couch. 5 TVs including outdoor (we only used 1 - the indoor main while we were driving - it made the drive time fly by since we very rarely watch movies at home). It also had a very useable kitchen, Keurig, Satellite TV and a bunch of other stuff we never used.

On our return trip we rented a brand new Tiffin. It was highly luxurious! It even had a fireplace. And it drove much smoother. My dad liked to say that in the Thor “we were bumping and rattling down the road!” I learned the pricing on RVshare doesn’t necessarily reflect the quality of the RV. To get a better idea of the actual quality of a rental I started looking up sales for comparable RVs.

For our drive north the itinerary was a follows:

Day 1 - Drive from LA to Sacramento in my SUV. Up the 101. It was a mess with the baby. The 5 had accidents so I thought I picked the better route for nicer/safer stop options. I think either option in 1 day would have been hell. It took us over 12 hours. (It should have only?! been 6 hours of drive time)

Day 2 - pick up the RV. I thought that would be relatively quick. It wasn’t. It’s not just paperwork. Most owners have you do a driving test/lesson. Also a full tutorial of the RV (generator/slides/kitchen/grey and black waste disposal and etc). Then you’re basically moving into the RV. So that takes time too to stock the fridge and pack all the strollers and crap under the RV. Let’s just say we didn’t get an early start on the drive! We had to rush to get to our first destination and it was pretty much dark when we got there. That didn’t exactly make for the most fun first set up. Basically don’t travel the first day of your rental unless you want to start off a bit stressed out.

We stayed at Ancient Redwoods RV Park in Redcrest, CA. It’s on the famed Avenue of the Giants. We loved waking up under the huge redwoods and there were lovely walks and hikes super close.

This was a 5 hour drive from Sacramento. Very doable.

Day 3 - Another 5 hour drive from Avenue of the Giants to Coos Bay in Oregon. We parked our rig (just sounds so silly and kind of fun to say) at Bay Point Landing in Coos Bay, Oregon. This RV Park was pretty much the Aman of RV parks. I highly recommend it and Coos Bay! I wish we had stayed 3 nights. I booked a spot right on the bay. We loved waking up 5 feet from the water and making s’mores on our campfire right there on the beach. We didn’t have much time to explore since we only stayed 1 night, but we played in the sand, took a beautiful beach walk, walked around the marina, and got some yummy clam chowder. We even managed to go for a swim in Bay Point Landing’s indoor pool. The whole place is very trendy. Lots of amenities and I’m not kidding that it looks like an Aman RV park. They have a bunch of airstreams you can stay in as well. And a game room!

Day 4 - Nehalem Bay State Park in Oregon. This was just over a 4 hour drive. It was slightly out of the way, but the beach is huge and looked so fun to play on. Of course we really got to see Oregon weather that day and it was pretty old, windy and rainy. We still explored the beach but the 3 year old was pretty mad about it. The coolest part was the park has a whole horse camping area so you’ll have horses coming by your campsite. It was lovely to go walk and visit all the horses. I loved seeing them galloping down this huge natural beach.

Day 5 - Mt Hood Village RV Resort. 3 hour drive. I added in this stop after we were already on the road. Otherwise the drive from Nehalem Bay to Coeur d’Alene was going to be over 8 hours. I definitely wasn’t feeling that since the 5 hour drives were taking us a fair amount longer. Between stops to explore, and gas stops, it seemed like I had to add at least 20% on to get accurate travel time. We were rushing at the last minute to get to these places before it got too dark. Doing more than 1 night at each stop would have definitely made things more leisurely, but I really didn’t mind the way we did it. It was am amazing family adventure and I loved the excitement of waking up somewhere new every morning with so much newness to explore (hmmm could that maybe have something to do with the fact we had already lived through months of Los Angeles stay at home orders?!?).

The Mt Hood Village RV Resort was huge. We didn’t see most of the amenities, like the pool since it just seemed like a bad Covid idea. There was a yummy dinner restaurant. And my personal favorite was the “Tiny House” village. If you’re over the RV sleeping you could always rent a Tiny House. Not sure how logical that is but just a fun thought.

On the way to Mt Hood we stopped in Portland since we were driving right through. I had never been and it just seemed silly to miss a good lunch stop. After we were there we realized that was another slightly dumb/optimistic idea of mine. Portland was still a hotbed of riots every night. The town looked pretty scary. A friend did recommend one great street in downtown and a delicious lunch spot that was actually open and felt safe. I even got to do a little shopping while we waited for a table.

As we were heading out of the Mt Hood area we stopped at Trillium Lake. The lake is at the base of snow capped Mt Hood and is gorgeous. I hopped out of the RV and took a quick little dip in the lake. It was worth the stop. Next time I would stay 2 nights in the hope of seeing a gorgeous sunset or sunrise on Trillium Lake.

Day 6 - We arrived to our destination in Idaho! This was a 6 hour drive to the Coeur d’Alene area, but a much easier drive than we had been doing since it was a big highway and not winding mountain roads.

On that RV driving experience I obviously did it again and would more times still, but it doesn’t seem like the safest thing I’ve ever done. You do feel a bit like the house you’re bumping around winding highway 101 cliffs in could tip over and go sliding down into the Pacific. If you’re someone who gets nervous or you dont have a driver who is comfortable driving huge vehicles I would recommend sticking to the bigger freeways like the 5. We took the 5 almost all of the return trip and it was a much more leisurely driving experience. There were a few times on the drive up the 101 where I was laying on the bed with the baby and was pretty sure we were about to tip over. Staying in the front seats is much less anxiety provoking. Its also important to keep EVERYTHIHNG in the RV secured as you’re driving.

For our return trip from Idaho back to LA our itinerary was as follows…

Day 1 - Depart Coeur d’Alene, Idaho and drive 4 hours to Boardman, Oregon. Our camp site was directly on the banks of the Columbia River at the Boardman Marina & RV Park. Sunset was gorgeous. The spot was super peaceful and even had a playground across from our site in the RV park. I found a fun little brewery and pizza spot. It was a great walk along the river to get there and made for a leisurely first day.

Day 2 - Diamond Lake RV Park in Diamond Lake, Oregon. We did this 5 hour drive earlier in the day so we would arrive at Crater Lake in time to do a hike. Crater Lake felt like we were on another planet. I found it kind of fascinating and couldn’t stop reading all the trivial facts about it. There are so many hikes that looked amazing, but I figured we should do the crazy one that’s super steep vertical down inside the crater and the only one that goes down to the lake. We were a 4 year old, 72 year old and I was carrying the 4 month old baby in the carrier. We had to move pretty quickly to get back up before dark and before the RV park checkin closed. Again I think I was crazy optimistic to think this was a good idea. Thankfully it was such a great experience and everyone made it happily back up before dark.

I had planned for us to stay 2 nights here. It was the first time we were going to spend two nights anywhere, but I was excited to be in one place and see more of Crater Lake.

When we woke up the first morning I was so happy to not be rushing to pack up and we went on a leisurely walk to Diamond Lake from our camp site. It was very remote and peaceful. As we were walking back we noticed smoke getting bad. I wasn’t into breathing smoke especially for the baby and 4 yr old. We quickly got ready to go explore more of Crater Lake. By the time we got there the smoke was so bad you wouldn’t even know you were on the rim of a volcanic crater or that there was a lake below. It was gross! I felt so bad for all the people just arriving and so disappointed. The smoke was blowing into Oregon from the bad fires in California. There was zero point in being there so we bailed on our 2nd night RV park reservation and drove back to Sacramento.

It’s funny to think what took us 5 days of driving North only took 3 days to return South. But we took the direct highway route back and it was a lot easier. Hardly any winding roads and much more direct. Missed all the spectacular Oregon coastline, but saw some other great stuff.

After returning the RV in Sacramento I was much more sane this second time around. I decided to make the drive back from Sacramento to LA leisurely. I stopped and saw friends in the Bay Area. We then spent 2 nights in Carmel at La Playa. Carmel is always lovely.

2 nights in San Luis Obispo at the newly opened Hotel SLO. The hotel was great. My mom took us to a spectacular hike in Montana de Oro State Park and to some great restaurants (sure glad we got that in while we could since restaurants in LA have been closed again for what feels like a lifetime). I considered even stopping for a night in Santa Barbara if the drive was rough. But I was over unpacking and repacking a precisely packed, full to the brim, SUV all by myself while trying to keep the baby safe. Plus now that she was 4 months old she could tolerate a more manageable stretch of driving without screaming her lungs out (poor thing basically screamed herself hoarse on the drive up).

It isn’t seeming like air travel is going to be much more appealing by this summer. I still picture trying to convince a highly meltdown prone 4 year old to keep her mask on for an entire flight and a 1 year old baby licking every surface she can reach. Soooo I’ll be looking forward to another RV road trip adventure for summer ’21!!! I am genuinely looking forward to another adventure, finding so many beautiful spots to explore, and actually leaving the house after a minimal amount of that has happened in the past few months.

Glamorous Pandemic Travel Details (AKA RV Road Trip)