“Is there anything else I can help you with?”
“Yes, there is! How can I get your job?”
And so it began, at a campground at Yellowstone National Park. With a question I would have thought too rude to actually ask someone before it just flew out of my mouth. Rob and I were on a two-week camping odyssey for our honeymoon, exploring Yellowstone, the Grand Tetons, and Rocky Mountain National Park. In a tent. In the snow. In early May. And when we checked into our campsite, I immediately noticed that it was being run by what appeared to be—and was in fact—a retired couple, who had just started their jobs a few days earlier. I suddenly found myself in a conversation with one of them about how they wound up working in a campground. He told us about Xanterra, the concessionaire they were working for, and how we could find all kinds of seasonal jobs in the hospitality industry: managing campgrounds, taking hotel reservations, serving food and beverages, and more. We were dumbstruck. Turns out you don’t have to be a forest ranger to live and work in a national park. He said they were living in their RV in the campground for the summer. Which suddenly became my life’s goal. So he gave me this card, which I kept in my wallet for the next 10 years. And over that time, Rob and I dreamed and planned and periodically checked out the jobs available on the website. We learned that most of the national parks have concessionaires—some have more than one—and over time we got a sense of where we most wanted to go.
But why was I so struck by some guy and his wife running a campground in the middle of Wyoming, you may ask? After all, I had a great job in the counseling center at the School of the Art Institute, I had just gotten married to a great guy, and we had a great life in Chicago. What could possibly be greater than that? I suppose that at first, I was just thinking about things we might want to do down the road, like when we retired. But Rob and I were drawn to each other in part because we both have an adventurous streak that was formed in childhood and nurtured by years of family camping. We already had a history of traveling on a shoestring to exotic locations under all kinds of conditions. So our camping honeymoon was just part of our long-standing tradition of “roughing it,” and making the most of whatever nature throws at us. And everywhere we went on this trip, we found people like us who just seemed so happy. And so fit! And not stressed at all. Something just clicked. Now that we were starting our new life together, how could we find a way to go join them?!
For a time we looked into other possible options: Rob interviewed with a company that made awnings in Boulder, CO, and I checked out counseling jobs out west, but nothing really ever came of it. And so we went back to living our lives in Chicago. We changed jobs periodically, bought and rehabbed a three-flat, took care of our families, visited more national parks, and dreamed about that far-off day when we’d be able to cut loose and do whatever we wanted. And every single thing I’ve done since that time has been done with full awareness that I would one day willingly give it up to go live in a trailer in whatever is still left of the wilderness. We hope you enjoy our journey. And if you get the itch to do this yourself, check out the Resources page for information on how you too can make this your reality.
Happy Trailers! –Nancy