Twenty-Six: August/September 2021

ROVA

The magazine for epic road trips

ROVA2 min read
From The Editor
If there’s something that’s consistent with every kind of travel, it’s that you should always expect the unexpected. Travel is not predictable, no matter how much you plan or how hard you try to stick to an itinerary, because there are so many variab
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Rova In Your Words
My husband and I and our two kids usually travel to Europe over the summer months, and we greatly missed our vacation in 2020. This year, we decided that we’d try RVing as a way to get away and see more of our country. We found ROVA when we were rese
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Gemma Peckham gemma@rovamag.com Abby Schmidt Giulia Heppell, Kate Hutcheson, Eden Cox Kate Hutcheson, Thomas Brentwood, Mary Beth Syklis, Eden Cox, Greyson Ferguson, Drew Penner, Nadja von Buseck, Teddy Horowitz, Ching Fu, Alice Kenneally, Katy Sprat
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Rova Recommends
Summer: it’s the season of fun! Enjoy all that summer has to offer by spending a few days—or weeks—by the water, and indulging in some adrenaline-pumping water sports. There are tons of lakes that offer perfect conditions for all kinds of waterborne
ROVA2 min read
Gear Up!
Staying on top of your laundry is a chore at the best of times, and when you’re on the road it only becomes more arduous. Well, it’s time to stop googling “Coin laundry near me” and spend that pile of quarters on something a bit more fun, because all
ROVA2 min read
Why The Road?
We got married in June, around the same time we finished our DIY van build. Our wedding featured van tours and homemade van cookies! We then set off on a 17-day road-trip honeymoon, which took us to Northern California, Oregon, and Washington State.
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Middle Of The Road
The middle is sometimes the receiver of short shrift—the middle child, the middle seat, the middle finger. It’s overlooked, undesirable, and offensive. But as Goldilocks would surely tell you if you ever happened to meet her, sometimes the things tha
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Mid-sized Trailers With The Goods
We love the Lance 1475 for a few reasons. At just shy of 20 feet long, it’s light and maneuverable, and the newer models have the option of a couple of comfy swivel chairs with a small table, rather than a dinette—space-saving and comfort-focused. It
ROVA6 min read
Navigating Heartbreak On The Road During The Pandemic
Late one winter evening, my partner tossed my heart in a blender when he told me: “Maybe we shouldn’t do this anymore.” He didn’t have a reason. Nothing had happened to spark this completely unexpected utterance. There was no logic to the words that
ROVA8 min read
Off-grid Power That Suits You
Going off-grid is the dream, isn’t it? Packing only the essentials, leaving the city lights behind and disconnecting from calls, notifications and alarms! Perhaps you’d enjoy a secluded forest hut, hand-hewn from the trees around you, a bed of leaves
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A Plan, Its Demise, And The Kindness Of Strangers
It was the perfect end to a long day. Plans were originally to set up camp in southern Utah, but, as any avid boondocker knows, plans often change. Snow and plunging temperatures swallowed the Utah countryside; nothing the two dogs and I hadn’t seen
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HIGHEST HEIGHTS Life, Love + Mountain Climbing
The turning point for Anna and Dustin Swanson came in 2018, after maxing out their vacation allotments at their jobs to head out on a thrilling mountaineering adventure in Colorado. “We had a trip planned to climb Longs Peak in the Rocky Mountains,”
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Objects In Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear
Have you ever thought of a well-designed car as a piece of art? For most of us, our vehicles get us on the road to explore the culture and wilderness to be found nationwide, but for some, the car is an emblem of modern art. Sure, there are beautiful
ROVA6 min read
GAY AND AWAY The Adventures of First-Time Queer Road Trippers
My boyfriend and I are both based in the Washington, D.C. metro area (affectionately known by locals as the DMV), but neither of us had ever taken much time to explore our own backyard. This is surprising, given that we are both well-traveled and hav
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Brew With A View
A drive across the United States is a lesson in landscapes, with unique vistas appearing through the windshield on the regular. Surveying the scenery from an overlook or a mountain peak is great, but don’t you wish you were doing it with an expertly
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THE UNEXPECTEDNESS OF WASHINGTON’S COULEE COUNTRY A Photo Essay
About 135 miles southeast of Seattle, a straight shot down I-90, is Washington’s Coulee Country. Central Washington sits in the shadows of the urban escape of the Emerald City, the obvious grandeur of the Cascades and the coastal beauty of the Olympi
ROVA6 min read
BEARS IN THE WILDERNESS A Wild Alaskan Road Trip
Our trip through the 49th State was a last-minute decision, born of my friend and I wanting to relocate our families out of the South and, on a whim, deciding to see if Alaska was a contender. We packed up supplies for a girls’ road trip, skipped acr
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A Treasure Trove High In The Rockies
Colorado Springs, sometimes called Olympic City USA, has long been a treasured Rocky Mountain locale, as the home of both the natural majesty of the aptly named Garden of the Gods, and the storied Broadmoor property that is steeped in history—among p
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THE MOUNT IS CALLING, AND I MUST GO Oklahoma’s Unexpected Elevation
In the middle of the totally flat “fly-over state” of Oklahoma, it seems like you couldn’t be farther from the mountains. It takes more than 10 hours to drive to Pikes Peak or the Appalachian Mountains in either direction. What is a landlocked travel
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LUCY SULLIVAN AND HER BALDWIN CITY LEGACY 132 years and counting
In the heart of the heartland lies the picture-perfect community of Baldwin City, Kansas. Celebrating its sesquicentennial in 2020, the city has no shortage of small-town charm along the aged, brick streets of its downtown area. At last count, 835 ma
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WILD APPALACHIA A journey through West Virginia’s Monongahela National Forest
The landscape changes conspicuously as I leave West Virginia’s knobby Eastern Panhandle and steer toward the heart of the Mountain State. Along the road, cattle wade through chest-high grass in pastures nestled against thickly forested mountain slope
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Go Wild In Florida
Sometimes, going wild is just what the doctor ordered. When we say ‘wild,’ we mean it in both senses of the word—in the Sunshine State, you can escape to wilderness waterways or whizz down them at high speed. Whichever definition of ‘wild’ floats you
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Small (down) Town In South Jersey
Burlington, New Jersey might not be on every traveler’s radar, and that’s a real shame. This small city has a ton to offer both passersby and those who want to stay a while. Founded by William Penn’s Quakers in 1677, Burlington, New Jersey was built
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Picture This...
YOU FEEL THE TEMPERATURE DROP AS soon as you step into the cool, mossy chasm, and the sounds of the surrounding wilderness are muffled by towering stone walls. The light filters into Portland, Oregon’s Oneonta Gorge, and you’re suddenly aware that th

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