Wow! What an amazing trip Randy & I had — consuming ~1,030 gallons of diesel while traveling ~10,400 miles around the western part of the U.S. for 67 days (May 13th – July 19th, 2026). It’s hard to believe how well all of the reservations and travel plans worked out. We had 24 different campground reservations, staying no more than 4 nights in one place. We stayed overnight in 14 different states and explored 13 National Parks. Our schedule included rest days, so we didn’t get exhausted. I thought it was funny that I felt more tired from our last week of visiting family and friends than I did the previous couple of months of traveling. We packed as much in that last week as we could, but it was worth it!! I’ll definitely take a break before starting to plan our Northeast US trip — maybe for fall of 2028??
We only had a few issues with the new RV. And most minor enough for us to fix ourselves, so it was well worth the last minute decision to downsize! We never said that we wished we had more space, but DID say we were glad for the shorter RV while going around switchbacks in the mountains. (AND with getting in and out of our driveway, ha.) While there’s no extra space for company to hang out with us in this RV, it’s very comfortable for the two of us.
I was pleasantly surprised at how each National Park had something different to offer so that we did not get bored with driving and hiking through them each. I really enjoyed listening to the Guide Along App while driving around all the parks, too. He was the next best thing to having a tour guide in the car with us — telling us interesting facts about what we were seeing as we drove and making suggestions on which places to stop or ignore, depending on time constraints.
I’ve been asked which park was my favorite, but I truly cannot narrow it down to just one! Here’s my short(ish) list of highlights from the entire trip:
- Finding and climbing through the Hall of Horrors at Joshua Tree
- Driving the Kings Canyon Scenic Byway — breath-taking views!
- The huge Sequoia and Redwood trees — both in diameter and height
- Biking around Yosemite Valley and watching Rock Climbers through binoculars on El Capitan
- The expanse of deep blue water at Crater Lake
- The tide pool aquatic life at Olympic
- The stunningly bright turquoise water in North Cascades
- Biking through long tunnels and across high trestle bridges on the Route of the Hiawatha
- The incredibly powerful water after several days of rain in Glacier
- The countless waterfalls we saw in most of the parks
- Spotting wildlife: black bears, mountain goats, elk, black tail deer, marmots, banana slug (Sadly, no moose, though)
- Connecting with new people and catching up with old friends
And here is a list of all the posts I made during this trip:
- We downsized our 5th Wheel
- Little Rock, AK
- Sayre, OK
- Milan, NM
- Petrified Forest National Park / Winslow, AZ / Homolovi State Park
- Las Vegas, NV
- Armagosa Valley, NV / Death Valley National Park (CA)
- Yucca Valley, CA / Joshua Tree National Park
- Sanger, CA / Kings Canyon National Park
- Sanger, CA / Sequoia National Park
- Groveland, CA / Yosemite National Park
- Redding, CA / Lassen Volcanic National Park
- Klamath, CA / Redwood National and State Parks
- Prospect, OR / Crater Lake National Park
- Mineral, WA / Mount Rainier National Park
- Port Angeles, WA / Olympic National Park
- Marblemount, WA / North Cascades National Park
- Coeur d’Alene, ID / Route of the Hiawatha
- West Glacier, MT / Glacier National Park
- Missoula & Stevensville, MT
- Arco, ID / Craters of the Moon National Monument
- Moran, WY / Grand Teton National Park
- Rawlins, WY
- Monument, CO
- Wilson, KS & Olathe, KS
- St. Peters, MO
Whew! I guess that’s it for now! Until the next adventure…
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