A month ago I set out on my first trip out west. Many of you have probably seen this on the Facebook group. I had never driven across country or camped more than 3 days in a row. This wasn’t a full overland trip, actually far from it. I took 4 days and drive out to Phoenix camping along the way and then worked remote from a hotel all week. This was primarily because I can only take a max of 10 days in a row off, I got a great deal on the hotel , it had a kitchen to save on eating out and honestly I didn’t finish my interior build so it would have been a bit of a mess to work from.
My wife flew out the following Saturday and we took a full 2 weeks off for the first time ever (we’re 50 so that’s insane). We did a mix of camping and bougie hotels all the way up to Salt Lake City. I did some trails, we took a train, we rode horses, we stargazed, had the best food along the way and went to 4 national parks. The highlight of the trip were the 4 days in and around Moab. I spent 4 years planning this trip, building the truck, watching hundreds of hours of YouTube and reading posts on forums and nothing and I mean NOTHING PREPARED me for the scale and beauty of what we saw. If you haven’t been please stop whatever rat race bullshit you’re doing (like me) and just go. It’s life changing.
My wife flew home the following Wednesday from SLC and I took another 4 days to return home, camping along the way again, returning on Sunday exactly 3.5 weeks later. I took 64 & 40 west cutting through TN, AK, OK, TX and NM. On the way home I took 80, 70 & 64 mostly through WY, CO, KS, IL, IN, WV with a quick stop in Fort Collins, CO to see a friend.
The drive out was exciting and new. The drive home was painfully boring from about Denver to WV. We had amazing weather and the only thing that went wrong on the entire trip was I snapped a CV Axle being dump in AZ. 100% avoidable but I found a shop in AZ on Saturday right before everything shut down for Memorial Day weekend. I could have repaired it myself but it was 1pm, 99° outside, my wife was flying in the next morning and if I failed or ran into an issue in some parking lot it would have ruined the rest of the trip.
I took a lot of photos with my Wolfbox mirror to capture some amazing moments but sadly the SD card wasn’t large enough for everything and the camera dumps older material for newer when space is needed. I took almost 2,000 pictures on my phone from thought out shots to quick selfies with my wife. Here are some of my favorites with the truck/camper.
This trip would have totally sucked last year with my RSI and ground tent. The GFC was/is life changing. It absolutely fucking ruled rolling into camp at 6 or 7pm and setting up in under a minute and getting right into a fire and some bourbon. The next morning I was back on the road 10mins after making coffee so I made amazing time. My wife hates camping but she actually didn’t mind the GFC. It gave here a sense of security and she liked how flat it was. Once the interior is finished it will be even more amazing to use.
If you have questions or are planning to do this or have done it before and have advice I’m all ears and happy to share details.
