Neither my wife nor I can see the appeal to RV-ing at all. Driving in traffic down roads someone else laid out, staying in RV parks or, at best, campgrounds with designated sites surrounded by other RVers and campers, and looking (if you're lucky) at a nice view.
We would rather be part of the view instead of just looking at it.
RV-ing is certainly better than sitting at home watching the grass grow. But compared to boating, well, we don't see any comparison at all. The water environment is so constantly alive and changing and challenging where the RV environment is, well, boring from our perspective, at least.
True, you don't have to worry about dragging anchor or docking in an adverse wind or dealing wth bad weather or all the other things that can add an element of risk to boating. But to us, it's that very element of risk that makes boating so "alive."
If one is no longer able to boat for whatever reason, RV-ing is a great way to keep moving and keep seeing and experiencing new things, no question. So in that respect I can see the value in it. But as long as we are able to boat, an RV will not even be a consideration. And even after boating, if we're still able to travel around, I think we'd rather do it by car rather than have the hassle of dealing with an RV, self-propelled or towed.
Friends we used to boat with on occasion sold their sailboat a few years ago and bought a new pickup and a 30' trailer. These are people who took the small sailboats they've owned to Desolation Sound and the Broughtons and up the Inside Passage to Alaska and back. For the past two years they've been taking the trailer to California and Arizona from November through April as well as taking one to three week trips in Washington and Oregon during the summer. And they've had a good time doing this.
Last weekend we invited the husband (the wife was out of town) to go with us on the boat to Anacortes. It was interesting to see how much the husband clearly missed boating even though he had been the one pushing so hard for the RV. By the end of the trip he was even starting to talk about the notion of getting a small powerboat and getting back into boating.
Not that this means he's sorry they got into the RV but I think it indicated that he, too, is seeing the difference between the dynamics of being on the water and the predictability and "same old, same old" of being on the road.
Very well said Bob
