Birdy Goes West

Our Family’s Cross-Country Adventure

5,524 miles

150 square feet of living space

25 days

12 campgrounds

8 national parks/monuments

6 states

4 HAPPY CAMPERS!

 

In 2015, our family took our first big, cross-country road trip with our travel trailer, Birdy. Here’s a list of all of the blog posts, sorted by state:

Missouri

• This post describes the first day of our journey, as we left our home state.

Oklahoma

• A roadside BBQ joint is described in a post about Texas.
• I complain about the toll roads in a post about the lessons we learned on our trip.
• We stayed overnight on our way home at the Elk City KOA, which I haven’t reviewed.

Texas

• Interesting stops along Interstate-40 were mentioned in the post Texas: The Real Gateway to the West.
• More roadside attractions were pictured the post Route 66 Roadside Attractions.
• The Cadillac Ranch outside of Amarillo was a BIG hit with our family. Read about and see a video of it here.
• We stayed at the Amarillo RV Ranch, reviewed in this post.

New Mexico

• We really loved Seeing Santa Fe.
• We enjoyed a short hike at the Petroglyph National Monument
• Some roadside attractions are shown in this post
• We stayed at the KOA in Santa Fe, the USA RV Park in Gallup, and the American RV Park in Albuquerque. I reviewed the three campgrounds in one post.

Arizona

• We spent two days exploring the beautiful city of Sedona, which became one of our favorite places.
• While in Sedona, we stayed at a beautiful RV park, Rancho Sedona.
• We drove through the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest National Parks, describe in this post.
• We took a hike on the Keyhole Sink trail in Flagstaff, but I am not sure it ever made it into any of the posts.
• We loved the beautiful and interesting roadside attractions shown here.
• Of course, we visited the Grand Canyon! We especially loved the Star Party astronomy night.
• We stayed in the Grand Canyon Trailer Village and reviewed it in this post.

California

• We spent two days exploring Sequoia National Park. One post is mostly about the beautiful trees and a hike up Moro Rock. Another post describes a hike to Tokopah Falls.
• While visiting Sequoia, we stayed at Sequoia RV Ranch in Three Rivers, CA. You can find my review here.
• We spent four days exploring Yosemite National Park. One post describes some of the greatest hits of Yosemite Valley. Another posts focuses on a trip up to Tuolumne Meadow.  One of our favorite experiences in Yosemite was floating the Merced River.  Finally, there’s a post about Glacier Points and tips for planning your visit to Yosemite.
• While visiting Yosemite, we stayed at Yosemite Ridge RV Park near Groveland, CA. You can find my review here.
• We spent three amazing days in San Francisco. One post focuses on Fisherman’s Wharf, the Golden Gate Bridge, and a trip downtown. Another post shows the Pacific Ocean and Haight-Ashbury.
• Just north of San Francisco is Muir Woods National Monument, which was one of my favorite places of the trip.
• While visiting San Francisco, we stayed at San Francisco RV Resort in Pacifica, CA. Find my review of this lovely campground here.
• Of course, there were plenty of roadside attractions in California, too.

Podcast Interviews

• The folks at the RV Family Travel Atlas podcast interviewed me about our trip on episode 48: Dispatches from Glacier and Yosemite. Check it out here.
• I’ve also contributed to their Campground of the Week podcast. This episode includes a full review of the Rancho Sedona RV Park in Arizona and a discussion of our Sedona favorites.

Travels with Birdy YouTube Channel

• Find videos of Moro Rock and Cadillac Ranch on our fledgling YouTube Channel.

25 Lessons Learned

• When you take your first cross-country road trip with your RV, you’re bound to learn plenty of lesson. Here are my reflections of lessons learned on our 25-day journey.