A new chapter in my life begins. For the next several years, I plan to spend about half of the year on the road with my new Airstream trailer for our big humanities initiative, Listening to America.
My plan is to get out on the open road, see the vastness of America, visit historic sites, national parks and monuments, interview all sorts of people, and above all listen: listen … in the hope that I can learn something about the mood of America as we approach our 250th birthday on July 4, 2026. And report my findings to you.
Just how does one do this? Well, first you must have the Airstream and a vehicle strong enough to pull it around America. Thanks to the almost unbelievable generosity of a family in the lower Chesapeake of Virginia, I now have a 23-foot Flying Cloud Airstream. I already owned a GMC Sierra pickup. Today I registered the rig at the North Dakota DOT.
Picking up the Airstream
In mid-August I was speaking for the Vail Symposium in Colorado, and the Airstream was parked in Silt, Colorado. When the work was done, I drove my pickup over to Silt (79.8 miles), where I met my co-conspirators Dennis and Frank. Dennis is the brains of the outfit and Frank the intrepid scout. The woman who sold us the Airstream met us and explained the systems: water heater, awning, toilet, the typically persnickety refrigerator, the stabilizer bars on the hitch, storage bins, stabilizer struts, etc.
We said goodbye and eased the rig out of the holding pen, found a big parking lot across town, and did some pirouettes, backed it up, checked its turning ratio, fiddled with the hitch. Then we drove it to a nearby KOA campground. After we registered, we backed the trailer into our designated slot in just under 45 minutes of pure Keystone comedy — now back, now forward, in and out of the driver’s seat, cursing under the breath, “I said left, not right,” cursing openly, “not that much left!” weeping, gnashing teeth, glaring with wrath and utter frustration. And then we were parked. A good start.
My colleagues asked me if I needed anything and then they sped away like rats from a sinking ship. My plan was to spend the night in Silt and then — after a good night’s sleep — wend my way to North Dakota. A shakedown cruise.
Fortunately, this was not my first rodeo. I owned a pickup camper for a couple of years. This gave me the opportunity to learn the essentials. A: Everything inside needs to be battened down before you move. B: You are working with new height restrictions. C: If you think about the cost of gas, you’ll lose your joy. D: Take advantage of public facilities whenever possible.
Day One: Rifle, Colo. to Casper, Wyo.
My goal for the first day was to drive more than 300 miles, to see how the rig performed on the road, to see how I performed on the road. I drove north from Rifle, Colorado, up some backcountry highways towards Wyoming. I needed to see how quickly this bulky little convoy can accelerate and how long it takes to slow it down at stop signs and crossroads.
Luckily, I chose a road with frequent passing lanes. Nothing is more frustrating to other motorists, including long haul truckers, than the geezer in the RV driving 57 miles per hour when the speed limit is 65 or 70. I did not want to be that guy. I spent a lot of time looking through the rearview mirrors and looking for places to pull over to let the traffic pass. I don’t intend to spend my road years on the interstate highways except when necessary, so I want to get into the habit of being a courteous driver.
About 5 p.m. I pulled into an RV park in Casper that was in the drab industrial part of town. Every community of any size has that district on the edge of town, where you can buy a hitch, weld a strut, rent a U-Haul, buy a tractor tire. The industrial-quarter RV park was all that was available, but I am glad I stayed there. Once I found my slot, it soon became clear that this was a place where most of the occupants were renting space for a long period of time — workers temporarily located in Casper, or couples desperate for work and hanging out at this camp until something turned up.
I had made a rookie mistake when I left Silt that morning. I had closed the refrigerator door but I had not pushed the door hard enough to latch. Therefore, when I opened the rig I found a large fruit salad smashed all over the floor, plus five broken eggs. It took about 45 minutes to clean all that up. Raw eggs are sicky things. While on my hands and knees I found several new gauges and panels to try to make sense of. The episode reminded me of several comic scenes from the 1954 film The Long, Long Trailer starring Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. Just imagine. Anyone who is thinking of renting or buying an RV should watch this film, and of course the 2006 movie RV, starring Robin Williams and Cheryl Hynes. Or Nomadland (2020), starring one of my favorite actors, Frances McDormand.
Day Two: Casper to Devils Tower, Wyoming
By now I am an Airstream veteran. I know at least how to shower and shave in the rig and work the fans to avoid the air conditioner when possible. I was able to batten up the rig and get on the road in less than half an hour. I have a checklist. Refrigerator: latched! Shower door: locked. Entry steps: retracted. Hitch: double checked. Brake lights and turn signals: checked.
I drove 187 miles from Casper to Devils Tower National Monument. Now the real adventure began. Devils Tower was America’s first National Monument (September 24, 1906), established by America’s greatest conservation president, Theodore Roosevelt. I’ve been there many times and yet every time I get my first glimpse of it, rising 867 feet above the surrounding plain, I am so filled with wonder and love of America that I almost burst into tears. When I lived abroad, the thing I missed most was the American outback. No such thing in England.
Our intrepid scout Frank had reserved a pull-through slot for me at the Devils Tower KOA (Kampgrounds of America), which is located almost directly outside the entrance station of the monument. He insisted upon a slot with a view of the tower. I checked in at the gate.
From my road journal:
I’m all aflutter worrying about the daily itinerary after I was checked in by a truly friendly white-haired woman in a yellow polo shirt. She warned me that I would have to make some tough choices. Miniature golf is free, and you can play as many rounds as you want. There will be a hay wagon ride for those who wish to view Devils Tower from a perfect location. There will also be an evening showing of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, starring Richard Dreyfus. Lest I might shrug that off, she reminded me that the movie was about Devils Tower and it was partly filmed here. And there will be a campfire. As with Disneyland you cannot do it all.
The KOA corporation must have profited mightily from the pandemic. I’ve met several people who bought a rig during the pandemic, seldom used it then, and now feel less eager to drive around the country looking for full hookups. All this to the tune of “At the time, it seemed like a good idea.” In the old days, you could just show up at a KOA campground and get a slot. These days you need to make your reservations well in advance. When I called one a few days ago and asked if it was full, the woman on the phone snorted and said, “Oh, honey. …”
Note — I do not intend to explore America by way of KOA campgrounds. I’ve had two previous sustained RV experiences in my life and what I’ve concluded is that what you want is either a state park campground or possibly a National Park campground (hard to get these days), or — better yet — a National Forest or BLM campground. Some of my happiest experiences have been at lightly populated National Forest sites next to a stream in the high country of Colorado. I don’t particularly want to be all alone in the outback, but I don’t want to venture through America from trailer park to trailer park either.
More from the road journal:
I write this at a perfect time of night. The sun is about half an hour from setting over the very top of Devils Tower. It’s cloudy enough to diffuse the sun’s light, and the campground is now mostly in shade. It’s quiet. My hope — soon to be dashed — is that everyone is here who is going to be here tonight. Nothing worse than the rig that pulls in at 11:15 p.m. and disrupts everything as the couple tries to do the many logistical things in the dark, often with a little domestic tension thrown in.
The wind comes and the wind goes. There is a peacefulness here, strangely, that I don’t think you can expect at a National Park campground. Maybe it is just the comparative quiet of Sunday night at the base of Devils Tower.
I’ve got to cook pretty soon, but I hate to break this spell.
I cook outside on a lovely little tabletop grill not much bigger than a hot plate or a cigar box. Spaghetti. A wee salad. A couple of glasses of white wine.
After I settled myself in early afternoon, I walked to the KOA shop to buy some Tabasco sauce. As I walked by a giant RV the size of a country music star’s tour bus, I saw a man sitting outside on a camp chair watching Wheel of Fortune. (Ok, just stop for a moment to think about this. At some appalling cost, in the $400k range, he and his spouse have turned up in a luxury coach RV at one of the most beautiful places in America. Where he is watching Vanna and Pat chat up three average Americans who are trying to solve word puzzles, on an outside television array that deployed electrically from a side panel on the coach. At Devils Tower.) I asked him how he liked his rig? Loves it of course? I asked him if there is a television inside. Four.
Four, five with the outside home (away from home) theater. I said, “Do you mind if I ask what kind of mileage you get in that thing?” He said, “Six, well, five if I step on it.” Step on it to get to the campground in time for Wheel of Fortune?
From my journal:
Well, Devils Tower looms over me at dusk on a Sunday night in August in America. From a KOA campground it doesn’t feel sacred. It feels like Item 46 on the Must Tour of America’s Scenic Wonders. If your question is whether to buy your firewood from a convenience store down the road or to pay the higher price here at the campground store, or whether it is worth seeing Close Encounters of the Third Kind in situ, as it were, you are probably not thinking about the sacred traditions of the Cheyenne or the need to protect the sublimity of the American West from those would privatize it in one way or another.
No wild music in camp. Nobody is annoying everyone with campsite country rock blaring around the camp. Everyone is exquisitely polite, which I’m guessing is why we come to the Number One corporate campground brand in the country.
The Moon is magnificent tonight. Setting just to the south of Devils Tower with high gray clouds half obscuring its brilliance. To be here at all is glorious. To know that America has chosen to preserve and protect some of these landscapes. Thank you, Theodore Roosevelt. To see the new moon setting in all its serenity, entirely unconcerned with the little dramas of humankind. To breathe the fresh air. It’s redemptive. You want the person you love to be beside you, or to find a person to love who shares your values and principles.
I’m sitting at my picnic table sipping box white wine, and one RV’s lights after the next blink out. Probably my new friend down the road is watching the 9 o’clock news and then plans to climb into bed.
I feel blessed to be alive. I love that I live in a nation that has kept some of its primordial landscapes for seed. When I have lived abroad, it is the American West that has most called me home. I would not be happy with better wine. But conversation …?
Day Three: Devils Tower to Bismarck
The only drama of this day was when my Google app sent me on a 43-mile shortcut north of the Black Hills on a gravel road. I wasn’t ready for gravel or cattle guards or tire ruts and the washboard effect. I gripped the wheel and drove at 40 mph hoping, almost praying, that I would not meet anyone on the road. But I did — a huge 18-wheel grain truck. I would say we inched past each other, but it was more like centimeters. By the time I got to Camp Crook, South Dakota, I was a nervous wreck. I bought gas (ruinously expensive) and drove the rest of the way home without stopping. When I got home at last, I was half afraid to open the door to the trailer. Sure enough, even though it is new, and Airstream is famous for tight window seals, there was a film of Great Plains dust over everything.
So, what have I learned? Well, I didn’t total the rig. I wasn’t arrested. I managed to drive 838.5 miles without incident. I slept well. I wasn’t killed, mugged, roughed up, or flipped off. I listened to a whole audio book on the American South, and I caught up on the latest national political news. Indictments, innuendoes, idiocies, interviews. I averaged 15.6 miles per gallon, which is not quite as appalling as I expected. I’m comfortable hauling the rig, sleeping in the rig, reading in and out of the rig, typing at the dinette table.
My only regret is that I cannot right now begin my big journeys across what Steinbeck called “this monster land.” But it was a very good start. Time to take off the training wheels. Here I come, America in my shining Airstream in the dark!
