Why Answering “When Will You Arrive?” Is Harder Than You Think
When your house has wheels, visiting friends and family takes on a distinctly unconventional flair. As Kacey Musgraves so wisely croons, “If I can’t bring you to my house, I’ll bring my house to you.” And that’s precisely what we’ve done. RV life has given us the gift of reconnection: old friends, scattered across the country, finally met my dog (who has opinions about their dogs), and I finally met their kids (who had none about my dog). We’ve lingered over dinners, toured their homes, and turned fleeting catch-ups into real, shared moments.
But here’s the catch: while I can bring my house to you, I cannot, for the life of me, tell you when it’s going to arrive. And I don’t just mean the time of day. Sometimes we’re uncertain about the day—or, if I’m honest, the month. Sounds absurd, I know, but that’s the reality of life on the road.
It’s not that we don’t try. We understand our hosts are attempting to plan their own lives—coordinate schedules, defrost a roast, or simply figure out when to expect a giant rectangle rolling into their driveway. But RV life is not an exact science.
Why It’s Impossible to Plan
Unpredictability is baked into the experience. On paper, a day’s drive might seem simple—say, a tidy 200 miles. But reality has other ideas. Maybe the GPS optimistically assumes Wyoming doesn’t have wind. (Spoiler: it does.) On one memorable day, the gusts were so relentless that Chad white-knuckled the steering wheel at a steady 50 mph for 100 miles. By the time we hit a rest stop, we weren’t just tired; we were defeated. A nap was non-negotiable.
Or consider the time Arizona decided to snow on us. There we were, blissfully rolling along, only to reroute entirely to avoid the storm—because sliding an R-Pod 192 RV across icy highways is not on my bucket list. And then there’s the Jeep. When you’re towing up mountain passes, your Jeep occasionally develops opinions about its working conditions. We’ve spent more than a few roadside moments letting it cool off while we stare into the distance and calculate how far behind schedule we’ve just fallen.
And don’t even get me started on the smaller interruptions: traffic jams, rainstorms, bathroom breaks, and the siren call of roadside diners. No matter how many miles we plan to drive, GPS estimates are a fiction. We’ve learned to automatically add 30% more time to any drive—and still, it’s a gamble.
And, of course, there are the true wildcards: the midday nap in a Subway parking lot because the exhaustion hit out of nowhere, or the Walmart parking lot in Tallahassee where we both felt like crap and needed a few hours off the road to recover. These moments don’t make it into Instagram reels, but they’re an unavoidable part of the story.
The Upside of Uncertainty
What makes RV life chaotic is also what makes it magical: the freedom to adapt. If we’re tired, we stop. If a place surprises us, we stay longer. Take West Texas, for example. We found a quiet county park that was so peaceful we turned a one-night stop into two. And then there’s the Keweenaw Peninsula, which seduced us entirely—what was supposed to be a three-week visit somehow stretched into eight.
These moments of spontaneity remind me that the best parts of travel rarely go according to plan. Yes, it can be maddening when a work meeting pops up and I need Wi-Fi while Chad makes a grocery run, or when we’re both so fried we can’t keep driving—but it’s also the beauty of this lifestyle. It forces us to slow down and take life as it comes, even if it’s in the parking lot of a big-box store.
How We Manage Expectations
When friends and family ask when we’ll arrive, we’ve learned to be honest—and vague. “We’re aiming for Tuesday, but maybe Wednesday” has become a standard line. Realistically, we can’t give anyone a firm answer until we’re about an hour away.
It’s not that we don’t value their time or effort—it’s that RV life is a constant negotiation with the unexpected. Early on, I worried about annoying people with our lack of precision. Now, I’ve come to realize this lifestyle is its own kind of lesson: a chance for all of us, myself included, to let go of rigid schedules and embrace the unknown. Of course, it also means accepting that our friends and family have their own life going on, and sometimes, our timelines simply don’t align—and that’s okay.
Trust & Patience
At its core, RV life is a study in trust and patience. Trust that you’ll get where you’re going, eventually. Trust that the journey will offer more than the destination. Trust that the people waiting for you will understand—or at least accept—why you’re not exactly on time. And patience—for the wind, the traffic, the unexpected stops, and for yourself when the day doesn’t go as planned.
So when we finally roll into a driveway, text “We’re an hour out,” or set up camp nearby, we’re bringing more than just ourselves. We’re bringing the stories of the road, the lessons we’ve learned, and a reminder that sometimes the best experiences happen when you leave room for the unexpected. And if we arrive a little later than planned? Blame the wind. Or the Jeep. Or that incredibly necessary nap in the Subway parking lot.
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