Thank you for doing this. I would like to see how someone plans a trip in the eastern part of USA to a area they are not familiar with. Why do they chose the area they are going to and where are they going in this area when they get there? Hope this makes some sense to you we have never planned a overland trip ourselves and just wonder how others do it what resources they use that I maybe unaware of.
For me, it starts with a conversation. My 16 year old son is my camping partner. His retention of the things he learns in the garage, on the trail, and around camp is amazing. He has often showed me a better way to do something that he picked up from one of our standard compatriots, or at an event we attend. One thing he doesn't do well is speak his own mind or tell me what he wants to do. In contrast, I am generally the first to share my opinion. This is something he gets from his mother, which is one of the reasons she is an excellent lid for my pot (belly). My son and I always have a great time together, but I am always wondering where he wants to go or what he wants to do. After several failed attempts on the conversation, I switched it up to asking which would you prefer, desert, mountains, forest; is water important? Finally he opened up. So, how am I picking my next adventure, we're going to drive through forest to get to a huge lake. Where is that, not really sure. But that is where it starts. It also worked on my wife, the whole family is headed to Nova Scotia in early July this summer. This will be her first time camping.
I love to plan. I've got google maps to Nova Scotia that are 8 months old, and the trip isn't for another 6 months. I have a folder of internet bookmarks that includes campsites, national parks, hotels, and attractions between Philly and Nova Scotia. I have 4 different itineraries. Which one will we chose? Probably something from each. One of my wife's stocking stuffers was a tour book of Nova Scotia, she just found something that interests her today. Will it take me off course from my old plans? Absolutely! Do I care? Not even a little. She just started being engaged in the trip. Part of the benefit with my obsession with planning is getting information out and being discussed sooner rather than later. So much easier to adjust now, rather than while we're actually headed North, and someone wants to be headed East.
Once it starts getting firmed up, I use a combination of Delorme Gazetteers and Purple Lizard paper maps, with Google Maps, Maplets, and Gaia apps on my iPad for planning and real time navigation.
At the end of the day, it doesn't matter where you go. It matters who you sit around the campfire with, and the memories you create.
Swalkertunity. An opportunity to swim and walk around, through, in a body of water. Coined by my youngest daughter while exploring an inlet near the Galway Bay.
