Get Lost in Fall Together

In 1942, with gas rationed and the country at war, people reportedly hoarded their fuel stamps all year for one reason and that reason was to go see the leaves change.

That’s how much people have always wanted fall.

The difference for RVers is that we don’t have to hoard anything. We have wheels, so we don’t wait for fall to come to us. We go find it.

I’ll be honest, fall isn’t my favorite season. (Rick’s either.) But after talking with him, I’ve got about nine new things on my list.



Fall is not a leaf. It’s a calendar.

Everyone does the leaf-peeping drive.

Rick does something different: he keeps what he calls his WOW calendar, for wacky, offbeat, and wonderful. It’s a running list of festivals from October through December, and these are the ones that made me stop and say “wait, what?”

• A coffin race in Manitou Springs, Colorado. Real coffins with real people inside, racing down the street. (Late October.)
• A medieval festival in Hollywood, Florida with jousting, pirates, and a living chess game. (Late November.)
• Merry Tuba Christmas in Los Angeles. Dozens of decorated tubas. That’s it. That’s the event. (December.)
• A sheep parade through Ketchum, Idaho. Yes, sheepdog trials too. Pack a snack.
• A duct tape festival in Ohio where every float has to be made of duct tape.

You can’t do them all, and that’s the point. Pick one and build a trip around it.

The ball of paint

Rick has been to the world’s biggest ball of paint in Alexandria, Indiana, twice. It started as a baseball, and for decades somebody added a coat of paint every day.

It now weighs thousands of pounds, and the whole world came to see it, including the morning shows. You can still add a coat yourself, but call ahead to book.

It’s a big ball of paint, and it’s one of the best stories he tells.

Scenery isn’t an experience. People are.

This is the part that stuck with me. The best moments from many of our travels aren’t the views. They are the people we meet.

Catch the FULL Episode on the Learn to RV YouTube channel or listen to Learn to RV the Podcast on your favorite channel today!

Rick’s rule: The whole point isn’t seeing the stuff. It’s having the stories.

Rick’s three marks of a trip of a lifetime

Next time you plan a trip, ask whether it can deliver one of these

1. An aha moment. You learn something that makes you want to know more, not just trivia.
2. A story. Something you’ll tell for years, preferably involving a minor RV scrape and a very determined photo of a giant whale.
3. An epiphany. The hardest one. Something wakes up in you that your everyday community never triggered.

Three quick fall rules

• Pull over at the ugly spot and buy the pie.
• Make one thing a tradition, then do it again next year. Ours is apple cider slushies with ice cream at Granddad’s Apples.
• Don’t quit when the leaves drop. Head south. Fall lasts a long time. It just moves.

Don't forget to Start your very own WOW list!

Rick’s whole calendar is free at RVGettingThere.com (it’s under Additional Things), or get there through RoadCruiser.life. Book early for the popular spots. Smoky Mountain leaf season fills up about six months out, at about double the price.

Which one are you putting on your list?

Join the Learn to RV Facebook Group today and SHARE your Favorite Fall place & Be sure to listen to the full episode for Rick’s story about scraping his fifth wheel just for a photo of a whale.