Katerina Augsdörfer

After really warm and comfortable night we packed our stuff, cleaned the camper and drove back to Vegas to return our RV.

Our flight back home goes via Denver where we have 4 hours layover. Crazy fact is that we have already 9 hours time difference 😆 I guess we gonna have some crazy jet lag 😅🥲.

To sum up our travel here so key facts or things which surprised us/ were unexpected:

- We drove 1600 miles / 2575 km with our RV but as this distance was spreaded in 13 days it didn’t seem that long.
- we visited three states ~ Nevada, Utah & Arizona
- road in US are really nice even the least important streets were in great conditions
- we experienced all the seasons from sunbathing by pool in Vegas till snowstorm in Grand Canyon
- 3 days in Vegas were really memorable and fun but Vegas is very pricey compared to other places we visited, e.g. beer for 13$ or cocktails for 35$ no thanks
- prices in supermarkets are almost the same some things are cheaper in Europe some here in US
- Americans love huge packages 😂 so you can either buy orange juice in 0,2l bottle or 4l bottle 🙈😂
- Americas love barbecue / fireplaces, every campsite have a private firespot, even in middle of the snowstorm in Grand Canyon they still make fire 😅
- water in the restaurant is for free and sometimes for the drinks you pay just once and the rest is free refill you just never know what comes on your bill 😂
- all prices in supermarkets, restaurants ect are without taxes and additional fees so you can expect always much higher price then you thought
- tipping culture is a different level here, people live here from tips and they expect them all the time usually tips are between 18-25% 🥲
- out of 12 nights in RV we paid only 6 nights with prices varying from 14-20$, to find free or affordable campsites is quite difficult and require research because most of the campsites were turned to luxury RV resorts with pool and other facilities costing around 100$ per night.
- entrances to national park are quite high and it’s worth to purchase the national park pass for 80$ which gives you free access to all national parks for 1 year
- apart from national parks there are also state parks which you need to pay extra 😆
- in America live many different tribes, the only tribe owning a land is a Navajo Nation. The entrance fees to Navajo tourists sites were the most expensive of the whole trip and we were not sure if we would do it again.
- internet connection was extremely poor and made us realize how good is it in Europe. In most of the cafes and restaurants they do not offer WiFi and even with local SIM card we had often difficulties to connect to internet which was in general fine but not so funny if you need to find next camping place or reserve some tour
- all the national parks and camping places we visited has a really good infrastructure, nice visitor center, clean toilets everywhere, picnic spots, water refill stations and maps for all the points of interest
- hikes are well marked with profile, distance, time required ect. Also the hiking paths are in best conditions and are much easier then hikes in Europe
- American are very friendly and communicative people and it was fun talking to them as Flo said many times: “I don’t know how they can all be so overexcited” 🤣 well we got very excited about your country and will for sure come back for more adventures ❤️🇺🇸

Until next time!Read more