Here's The Plan, Stan

After many, many long conversations we've finally come to some kind of a decision about how we will proceed from here. Without further ado, here it is:

- We have decided that ultimately we want to live in Portland, Oregon next.

- We will be home in Fayetteville, AR for the holidays from Thanksgiving through New Years. 

- While at home we will start applying for jobs in Portland.

- If we get jobs quickly, then good, we'll move to Portland straight from Fayetteville.

- If we don't get jobs quickly, then also good, we'll pack the travel trailer back up and continue traveling until we do find jobs.

From all the places we visited on this trip, we really fell head over heels for Portland. I'm thinking this might have been made clear with all the entries I wrote on why Portland rocks. :o) We've picked Portland because of its location on the West Coast, its amazing outdoor opportunities, and the general lifestyle opportunities that are available there. The one aspect we've been going back and forth on though on whether or not we really want to move there next is of course the weather. At the end we figured since Portland ticked 9 out of the 10 criteria boxes for us, weather being the only aspect that we weren't happy about, that we would give it a try. So that's that.

As for getting jobs, I'd be totally OK if the job search stretched out a little. If we hit the road again in January we're planning on heading South to warmer weather, probably to San Diego, by way of Austin. If we're still on the road months from now we'll hit up the places we missed out on the first time around, like the national parks in Utah, Colorado and Idaho. 

Longer term we hope to continue traveling, but with a slightly modified plan. We'd like to get to where we have one central location and we travel from that location for extended amounts of time. Eventually we'd like to get to where we are self employed and we can afford to take a month off at a time, hopefully multiple times in the year. I have a big dream of driving up from the Pacific Northwest to Alaska and beyond. And of course exploring all the amazing places internationally is high on the list as well. 

Well, there you go, that's our plan for now. I say for now because there is always a chance that something more interesting will come along and sway us in a different direction. Life is kind of fun like that. 

Happy Decisions, 

M.