When I climb into the Class C with my family you never really know what’s going to happen next. When the kids were younger we liked to pretend that the trusty Class C recreational vehicle was in charge of the trip and we just went where it took us. They thought it was a blast. We instilled the love of spontaneity at a young age, that’s for sure. 

Now that the kids are a little older they’re fully aware that someone is in charge of each and every choice no matter how spontaneous. We often take turns. I get to pick a city, Nick gets to pick a campground, Julie gets to decide how long we stay (within reason), etc. But there’s one thing that I had to take over for good and that’s the menu in the RV. 

My husband starting having digestive issues a couple years back and we were afraid it was going to halt our Class C recreational vehicle excursions for good since he often felt the most extreme symptoms when on road trips. This is logical due to the extended periods of sitting and lack of activity and the types of food that are often accompanying such a trip. But since we loved a good road trip more than most we weren’t ready to simply write off our love of RVing and sell the good, old Class C. Instead we decided to alter one major habit that we tended to embrace while on the road. We decided that we were going to get healthy while on the road. 

We didn’t eat extremely poorly in general, but we weren’t extremely healthy either. And when we hit the road in the RV our positive eating habits tended to disappear and fast food/junk food eating rose drastically. We decided that we would eliminate this particular element of the typical road trip for our family and see if that would allow our favorite Dad to continue to enjoy his time on the road with us. 

And it solved the problem. Now when we are headed out we stop at the grocery store and we stock up on ingredients for a few days of simple, easy, healthy and light dinners. The best part is that it’s almost easier on me than the clean up of the meals we used to engage in on the road. We aim for a lot of raw fruits and vegetables. We avoid pasta and sauces and large amounts of meat. We do grill chicken and small steaks on the outdoor grill that came along with our Class C. And we avoid the sugary start to the day that came with our favorite cereals. Instead we turn to a blender (fruit smoothies) in the summer and easy and tasty oatmeal in the winter. 

We learned that with the right accommodations, a road trip could be just what the doctor ordered. And we learned that while traditions are nothing short of grand…there are times for change and change can be just as grand.