Introducing South Route 2023

Tanks a Lot!  We're already found two hidden small town gems* on South Route 2023.  

Each year's South Route choices are always an adventure.  We always travel much slower and farther traveling South to Arizona than we do heading back North to Idaho.  Two of the primary reasons for this disparity are time and wind.  Let's face it.  Spring is always much windier than fall, sometimes extremely so.  Likewise, we typically have the "horse back to the barn" mentality and want to get to our Idahome as soon as possible.  That's why the North Route is so predictable.  It's pretty much always the same.

Meanwhile the South Route allows for a lot more creativity.  Time is not a factor.  "We'll get there when we get there" is sort of an unofficial timeline for each year's South Route.  We tend to look at the South Route like a vacation.  More often than not, we will tend to spend ten days or more meandering South while perhaps 3-4 days going North.

Back before we moved to Idaho, our South Routes were as direct as they could be and we didn't linger or meander.  We just boomed south and began life anew in Arizona.  Once we retired for good in 2010, the South Routes slowly began taking on a character of their own.  At first, we were reticent about spending inordinate amounts of time on The Road.  By and by, we got with the program and now we truly look forward to each year's South Route and the interesting adventures we're certain to have.

Our South Route 2023 marks a major Life Milestone so it's going to be even yet more different than previous South Routes.  Why?  Well, we sold our beloved straw bale home in February.  We no longer have any physical ties to Rimrock, Arizona.  Rimrock is no longer the destination.  Roosevelt, Arizona, is our new Snow Bird destination.  As a result, we no longer have to funnel ourselves through Flagstaff, Arizona, to drop down off The Mogollon Rim into The Verde Valley.  Nope.  We're free to roam far and wide.

Hence, our South Route 2023 implies a new level of flexibility we've never before experienced.  Time is no longer of the essence, as they say.  The upcoming South Route will be as close to a taste of full time RVing as we've ever had before.  That's why we call it a Life Milestone.

Initially, our South Route 2023 was constructed almost just like every other South Route over the years--down the spine of Utah.  One day we woke up and realized we weren't bound by that paradigm.  So we started from scratch and came up with a new South Route that takes us as far East as Colorado for a brief stretch.  We're going to see some new places and faces and ponder some new points of interest.  We're both really excited about the new South Route 2023.

We have no clue when we're leaving to head South.  That's always up in the air, blowin' in the winds of seasonal change.  Generally, we tend to think we'll head south in October so we might catch a glimpse of some leaves changing colors.  Since some of our new South Route is high elevation, we definitely want to get ahead of the inevitable snow storms.  After all, this is an El Niño Year so we KNOW we're going to get some early, cold, wet storms..and maybe even a lot of them.  So, odds are our departure will be earlier rather than later.

In the meantime, we're enjoying one of our favorite Road Trip planning activities: studying small towns.  Yep.  There are LOTS of small towns on our South Route 2023 and we're going to study each and every one of them.  Most small towns are so small the old adage applies: blink and you'll miss them.  Typically EVERY small town has something to be proud of and something for a visitor to see and ponder.  That's why it is important to study small towns in ADVANCE, long, Long before we put the pedal to the metal.  We want to know what lurks in the small towns along our route.

The only way to discover hidden small town gems is to take the time to delve deeply into each little community along the way.  This is a time consuming, tedious ritual that simply can't be rushed or taken lightly.  If you're going to do it, you have to do it right.  That's why we start planning our South Routes months in advance.  When we pull out of our Idahome we really want to feel comfortable knowing what to expect and look for each step of the way South.

South Route 2023 takes us out well into Wyoming on our way to Green River.  Then we head down to Flaming Gorge, Vernal, Dinosaur National Monument and into far Western Colorado.  We'll be camping at Colorado National Monument before catching the river road to Moab.  Then we're in far Southeast Utah.  We camp beside the San Juan River.  It's our jumping off point to cruise The Rez down through Chinle and Ganado.  We travel Far Eastern Arizona through St. John's to Showlow and then drop into Apache Land to Salt River Canyon and on to Globe--The Center of Our Universe.

In the days and weeks ahead we will create many posts showing what we've found in some of the small towns along South Route 2023.  Thanks for reading and Thanks for traveling with us.  Happy Trails Forever!

*The seemingly ugly, bland water tank is a world class acoustical resource located in Rangely, Colorado.  Rangely itself is far off the beaten path and The Tank is even farther off Rangely's main road.  The old WWII Sherman tank is located in La Barge, Wyoming.  Sherman tanks are a fairly common roadside artifact throughout America.  In fact, there's one nearby in Rigby, Idaho.  We enjoy stopping at Sherman tanks to pay homage to our Nation's Veterans and ponder the incredible sacrifice of those who won World War Two.