Enjoying a cottage on wheels on an RV trip in America

The past few years my boyfriend and I have been traveling together. Especially many different kinds of trips; motorhome tours in Australia and New Zealand, a round trip by 4X4 in Namibia and island hopping in the Pacific. Traveling is our passion!

Lara: "Our daughter was born and we thought, can we still travel with a 1-year-old child?"

Soon we thought back to all the trips we had taken with an RV and that way of traveling seemed only more ideal now with a child. With our own home, a familiar bed for our daughter and having a beer every night in front of our own door while our child is asleep.

So the choice was easy - we decided to go to America with our 1-year-old daughter!

Cruising across America by motorhome gives a wonderful feeling of freedom and adventure: the most beautiful views, widest highways, stops at the biggest Walmarts and hiking through the most impressive natural parks!

We saw and did a lot during this trip but still there are a few places that were real highlights for us. For example, Death Valley is highly recommended. With its bizarre landscapes, sometimes it felt like we were on the moon!

In addition, of course, the Grand Canyon cannot be missed. Unfortunately, it was raining very hard when we arrived so we couldn't see anything of the canyon. Fortunately, we slept in the park and the next day the weather was beautiful. In the morning we quietly enjoyed the amazing sunrise. Of course it's not called Grand Canyon for nothing, but I never thought it would be so big. I found it really very impressive, perhaps the most impressive of the trip.

Horseshoe Bend in Arizona is perhaps the most beautiful stretch of river in West America. Especially the view of Horseshoe Bend is really beautiful, we could stay here for hours looking at it.

For us, this was our first time traveling with an RV and a child. During our trip we found out practical things that we could address/do better for next time. Therefore, for parents who are going to travel with kids in an RV (which is highly recommended!), I have some tips so you won't run into the same "problems" we did!

Lara's tips for traveling with a small child:

• Bring a travel-cot from the Netherlands, then you can be sure that your child will sleep well in the camper. We couldn't find one in Walmart.
• Everything else is for sale in America so only bring the essentials from the Netherlands.
• Take a spacious camper so you don't have to change everything every night, after so many great impressions you are sometimes too tired for that.
• If you book an RV from Cruise America, go for the early pickup (EBDS service). You pay a little for it but it is well worth it. Kids have jet lag just like us, only they don't understand much of it ;-), so the earlier the camper the better and you really need transportation to the depot anyway.
• Be prepared for jet lag because it can be harder than you think or are used to.
• Don't plan too much, an extra day of rest is also sometimes nice so you can fully absorb the freedom of RV travel.

Freedom, a private home and comfort - that's what an RV is all about! An RV trip with kids is highly recommended and personally I think it is also the most relaxing way to travel.