Table of contents for Ten: December/January 2018/2019 in ROVA

People are wary of change. It means reassessing what you know to be true, it means throwing yourself outside of familiarity, and it means expending both mental and physical energy to come to terms with a new reality. Winter is perhaps the most bracing time of change for us. People dread this particular transition between seasons; being cold is no fun, the days can feel too short, and sunlight is sorely missed. But change is inevitable, regardless of how much you resist it, and this edition of ROVA is about both the change of seasons and changes of circumstances. And change can be so good. If you lived the same way all the time, you’d tire of it pretty dang quickly. For me, winter is a time of magic and…

Songs of love and contentedness The new Phosphorescent album speaks of what Matthew Houck has gained in the five years since his last record—a new home, a wife, a child… happiness. It’s an album of comfort and sweetness, with a lingering taste of the weirdness that we’ve come to love. Fun track “New Birth in New England” has a catchy beat, a singalong melody and a modern sensibility that still references the best music of yesteryear—Paul Simon and the Eagles come to mind. Play it loud, sing, dance. phosphorescentmusic.com Blades of glory There’s nothing more winter than gliding around an ice rink, the scherp, scherp, scherp sound of your skates accompanying your graceful strides. Or, if you’re like me, maybe you lumber around the rink like Frankenstein before skinning the…

While I’ve always known that my ancestors immigrated from France to Canada, a recent road trip and review of genealogy documents firmly set my roots in the Quebec region of Canada. Those roots perhaps explain why I’ve driven from my Walpole, Massachusetts home to Quebec three times in 15 years. A road connects not just places, but people and history, too. This New England to Canada road trip is an exploration of a family’s origins. On my most recent trip, I visited the places where my French-Canadian roots first took hold. As we drove north on the Old Canada Road National Scenic Byway, or Route 201 as it’s called today, the lovely spring day turned cloudy near Bingham, Maine. I was with my sister and parents, seeking Saint-Honoré-de-Shenley—the Quebec village…

As winter rolls around, most full-time RVers head south, but a few years ago for winter, we decided to go the opposite direction. After years of flying west in search of fresh powder on annual snowboard trips—and not always succeeding—my partner, Jerud, and I realized that the only way to ensure that we got the best snow was to live near a ski resort. So that’s what we did with our two dogs, Tybee and Tyki, in our fifth-wheel (the Toaster). We chose Crystal Mountain for our winter home because of its low-key vibes and excellent terrain, and also because it was Washington’s largest resort. Located 80 miles southeast of the “Emerald City,” and on the edge of Mount Rainier National Park, Crystal Mountain is a Seattleite’s favorite ski destination.…

For some, lighthouses are a lovely stop on a road trip, and for others they are a full-blown obsession. Pharologists (as lighthouse students or enthusiasts are called) cite endless reasons for the love that they feel for these illuminant protectors, but it seems that chief among them is what they represent in a metaphorical sense rather than a practical one. Lighthouses are often referred to as beacons of hope, guiding lights in tough times, and guardians whose sole purpose is to keep us safe. They are symbolic of the isolation of man coupled with our underlying connection to one another. They are humanity’s most altruistic constructions, designed merely to help, and nothing else. But to get back to basics, they are magnificent structures, alike in purpose and position, but all…

Meaghan and Matt We’ve always loved traveling, exploring the outdoors, and living a minimalist lifestyle. We feel our best when we’re exploring new places and gaining new experiences. Full-time RVing allows us to do all of this! Earlier this year, we decided to go for it, and we haven’t looked back! Instagram: @nomadicturtles Denice Sue-Ann I chose the van life for simply more freedom. I noticed when I had an actual house that I felt “stuck” in life. Having my little home on wheels allows me to be near nature as much as I want. It also allows me to figure out who I am and who I want to be, seeing all the beautiful places on earth I’ve never been before. Instagram: @denicesueann Jeff and Courtney Working our way…

Originally, the trip was meant to be from Alaska to Argentina. Due to visa issues and a lack of time, however, my girlfriend Sara and I ended up leaving California in the middle of winter, which kind of scratched Alaska and its prohibitively cold regions off our list of places to go. We looked at Canada and were not really sure about heading there in winter, either, but we figured we could survive a temperature hovering somewhere around five degrees either side of zero. We didn’t actually count on minus 32, but hey, that’s where the thermometer ended up. The goal of the Canadian leg of the trip was backcountry hiking and mountain climbing. We had done a lot of this in New Zealand and Europe, but Canada looked like…

Fear is a primary emotion; it’s a survival tool that has kept our species alive. But fear is weird. It’s mean and irrational. It doesn’t care about your feelings or your plans. It will burn the whole house down if you let it. For me, fear sometimes gets a little out of hand. It plays with my mind, and it really gets a kick out of telling me NO. It even tries to convince me to turn back. And, living on the road, fear is something I often wrestle with. My husband, three kids and I (along with our overweight pug with anger issues) left our cozy suburban life for a year-long trip in our Airstream. We sold our quaint mid-century home in Southern California to head out into the…

Hoisting the crab cage onto the boat is much harder than Dave makes it look. I grip the yellow rope the way he showed me, and pull it out of the choppy water. My shoulders burn as the cage emerges, crawling with crabs. Andy, Sandy and I “ooh” and “ahh” as Dave sifts through the haul, tossing back the females and babies he measures with a small, L-shaped ruler. The process leaves us with three legal males. “Dinner,” he says with a satisfied smile. I steer the 17-foot boat back to the dock, and the sun streaks down from gaps in the clouds. I relish the feeling of the misty wind lapping at my face, pushing strands from my braid. We clean the crabs and meander back to Dave’s quaint…

My kids are on to me. They have figured out that the book or magazine that appears on their car seat before an adventure is not from “the Book Fairy”—I was discovered loading reading material into the car on a recent trip. I included a copy of ROVA that I’d bought for my wife, knowing that it would appeal to her and I’d get to read it after. The trip went well, and everyone enjoyed their reading material; when we got home, I finally got to crack ROVA open. So many articles appealed to me. You have done a great job of capturing a lifestyle and inspiring some of us who aren’t quite there yet to get with the program. Keep going.…

1. This kind of goes without saying, really, but pack warm bedding! I’m talking massive quilts or blankets, and minus 20-30 sleeping bags, because unless you are able to magic a hot shower out of nowhere, if you get cold at night you are never getting warm again! 2. This goes against every bit of advice you’ll ever hear for living in a van, but a small gas or propane heater will be your best friend if you don’t have a built-in heater. I know, I know: never run a gas heater in a small, closed-off area. I’m not saying sleep with it on—I’m actually saying never sleep with it on, EVER! But run it every now and then for a little while, especially when getting back to the van…

In the fall, Sedona hits you. It gets inside you as any good place can, and it stays there forever, whispering for you to return. Deserts can do that; they have a kind of magic that arrives on a soft breeze in the night, daring you to look up at the stars and dream. This is the home of the people who roamed the wild hills before Europeans even set foot here: the Anasazi, a name coined by the Navajos that means “the ancient ones.” High deserts are different than what you might imagine. The first time I came to Sedona, it was autumn. The palette of life’s color was on display: trees still mossy-green and covered in dew; turquoise rivers; velvety purple skies; and silver clouds, dark grey on…

My first year living and working full-time in New York City, I was filled with equal parts wonder and existential fatigue. I had landed from the southwest with romantic ideas about writing and art—idealizations that were gradually whittled down by the reality of commuting and a nine-to-five. I wanted to “figure out for myself the good life, by my own nature alone,” to crudely paraphrase Thoreau. But, rather than going inward and into the woods, I took the L train to midtown Manhattan for a copywriting job where I was “putting all the commas in the right place,” à la Holden Caulfield. One night, when my partner and I met up after work, he spoke about seeing these kaleidoscopic floaters behind his eyelids—something that, sans psychedelics, likely came from excessive…