Thinking of buying a bus... [Archive] - AmityMama.com

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Mountain Mama
03-16-2006, 04:37 PM
....and doing the festival circuit in the summers, selling my goodies and meeting new people. Has anyone done this with their kids? I think my 10 yr old dd would thrive in this enviroment.

noeyjeanne
05-15-2006, 04:47 PM
what are your living arrangements now, will you have to still pay for your home while you are away? Is it just you and dd or will they'll be another adult to help watch her? I think it sounds like great time just make sure you take precautions so it is a safe summer.

back2thebasics
06-07-2006, 01:43 AM
A dream of mine!!!!!!!!

One thing that I would look into is gas mileage. We have looked at several different vehicle living situations. We had a Volkswagan Vanagon and we absolutely loved it!!!

What types of things would you be selling?

~Meeshi~
06-07-2006, 08:17 AM
In my opinion, the festival scene has been changing a lot (at least in the NE) in the past few years, and for the worse. There are very few festivals that I feel comfortable taking our girls to these days. Too many teens, too many different drugs, shady behaviour...

I *loved* the festy scene when I was 20 something and single without kids, but I have seen and heard of too many scary situations going on as of late. I wouldn't feel comfortable just going from fest to fest anymore.

mamasky
06-12-2006, 12:20 PM
In my opinion, the festival scene has been changing a lot (at least in the NE) in the past few years, and for the worse. There are very few festivals that I feel comfortable taking our girls to these days. Too many teens, too many different drugs, shady behaviour...

I *loved* the festy scene when I was 20 something and single without kids, but I have seen and heard of too many scary situations going on as of late. I wouldn't feel comfortable just going from fest to fest anymore.

I agreewith Meeshi. I took my DS to the first 2 bonnaroo festivals and they were fine. It was pretty child friendly and a lot of the hard stuff happened during the night (or out of plain view if it was during the day) so we didn't witness a lot of bad stuff. I'd be ok with taking my kids to smaller local festivals but I wouldn't be ok with taking them to most of the big national festivals. Too many hard drugs have come into the scene and even 6 years ago, when I was doing Phish and Furthur Fest tours, there was lots of stuff I wouldn't want to expose my children to.
I was very, very close to taking Skylar on Dead tour in 2003 and the day we were supposed to leave, our plans got changed. I'm glad we nevre went because I was a single mom and I know it wouldn't have been a good thing for him.
I think it would be awesome to travel around with my kids and let them see the country though.
If you're comfortable with taking him and having him heavy into the scene, then go and have fun. It will be quite an experience for the both of you :)

elsie
06-12-2006, 09:33 PM
We don't live on the road, but Abel and I go to 5-6 festivals a year.

As others have said, I'd be very choosy about which festivals you attend. We only go to small festivals where we know we'll have friends. Most large fests these days (wakarusa, bonaroo, for example) are way to crazy for us now. Too much illegal activity and fighting.

Stick to small folk fests, or bluegrass/americana, those are still going strong, and famiy friendly.

elainat
07-10-2006, 08:35 PM
We live in a travel trailer and move every 4-6 months with my husbands work. He does golf course irrigation. I cant say that I regret doing it. its been fun for the most part. We have three kids, 8 yr dd, 3 yr ds and 1yr ds. I dont think that we would have done it though if we had to pay for gas. Right now dh uses the company truck to move the trailer and company pays for gas. They even pay a small percentage of living expenses because its so much cheaper for them than a hotel.

We get to travel to new places, meet new people. I think its forced us to be more friendly and adventerous. Also need to be very concious of where you go. We go to rv parks and some are better than others. There are a lot o other things to take into consideration. Some roads are better than others for hauling a trailer or driving and rv. Laundry, privacy, neighbors and then the cost of traveling, living out of a trailer. We paid more for propane for heating than we did for electric heating living in a regular house. There isnt room to store up food so I cant buy in bulk like I used to and so food budget has gone up at least 50%. Also we had trouble findind family friendly parks. If you are not going to live in a park you should check out dump fees and city laws about where you can park overnight. Theres a lot more thought going into it than I initially realized when we diecided to sell our house and live on the road but I would do it again. Not everyone has the opportunity or courage to.