It’s hard to believe our time in the south is almost over.

Our workamping gig at Hill Shade RV Park in Gonzales, Texas has come to an end. Yesterday we said goodbye to owners Michael and Christine Moers and their awesome family. If you’re ever between Houston and San Antonio, stop by and say hello. You’ll love their park.

We can’t thank the Moers enough for being so good to us. They are two of the most genuine, funny and down-to-earth people we know, and we hope to be back at their quiet little retreat again in spring.

Today we’re at lovely Landa RV Park in New Braunfels to hang out with NuRVers.  Oh how we missed the serenade of the train that runs through the back of the park. Despite how dissed it pretty hard in this blog post during our last visit, it’s not a bad place to be. Compared to some of the dumps we’ve been in, this one is first-class!

Tomorrow we’ll be boot scootin’ in Luckenbach for their annual Christmas Ball. Then Sunday, we’ll be blazing across I-10 out to the coast, for some sunshine, warm temperatures and family.

If you’re also traveling somewhere to see your families for the holidays, hoppy travels!  Where ya headed?

If you’re a fulltime RVer or just thinking about it, be sure to visit Work for RVers and Campers, one of the premiere websites for RVers to visit when looking for ideas about how to make a living on the road.

Work for RVers and Campers is for RVers who want to earn money to support a traveling lifestyle. You’ll find free paid employment and volunteer workamper positions along with work-at-home business tips for travelers. Coleen’s newsletter also has inspirational tips and workamping ideas.

We found this resource during our early days of researching the road tripping lifestyle and we continue to pop in whenever we’re looking for new ways to generate income. Now, we’re thrilled to be featured on the Worker’s Profiles page!

Coleen and Bob are a real source of inspiration to us and if you’re thinking about this lifestyle, their story will inspire you too. They’re one of the web’s most well-known experts on making a living from the road. After all, they know a lot; they’ve been fulltiming since 1992! Here’s a little bit about this inspirational couple:

Bob and I spent over a decade living in a recreational vehicle of some kind or another. They included several travel trailers, a pickup camper, a park model trailer, and a motorhome. Along the way, we worked and supported ourselves. We are proof that it is not only possible, but practical, to earn a living while full-time RVing.

Much of what I write is based on our experience. Some of it comes from corresponding with thousands of campers and RVers. I also share what I’ve gleaned from employers and managers who hire and work with work campers and other RV workers.

If you’re dreaming of the fulltime RVing lifestyle or actively looking for work, we can’t recommend Work for RVers and Campers’s Resources enough. Visit today!

Our wheels have been rolling much faster than we’re used to.

In less than two weeks we went through Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri and Arkansas and didn’t see much other than a few small farm towns and more conservative Christian billboards than people.

Our rig is now parked at Hill Shade RV Park in Gonzales, Texas where we’ll be here workamping until mid-December. More about that later . . . but now:

The Road to Amazon is Now Paved with Gold?

This time of year always brings me back to my not-so-glorious days of working as a seasonal workamper at Amazon.com’s Fernley, Nevada warehhouse.

In fact, I keep receiving automated calls from the mis-named “Integrity” Personnel staffing agency that finds Amazon’s temporary workers in Nevada. The messages hype the lucrative pay and rewards that never materialized when I was there.

Funny thing is . . . maybe they’re telling the truth this time!

New Times at Amazon

Recently I bumped into Amazon’s main workamper hiring representative, the “Camper Force Coordinator” who attends RV shows and gatherings like the Workamper Rendezvous, touting the benefits of working at Amazon and hiring people on the spot.

This man isn’t a stranger to working the lowest rungs on the ladder at Amazon. He’s a retired firefighter who toiled at Amazon’s Kansas location before being hired as a seasonal recruiter when Amazon started managing the workamping program directly instead of relying on staffing agencies to do so. This recruiter is so nice that I hesitated to tell him about my crappy Fernley experience.

However I didn’t need to be shy: he knew all about the lousy way that the Nevada staffing agency managed seasonal workers like me, and he’s been working with Amazon to make every location a better place for workampers.

So it wasn’t just me! I wasn’t crazy for thinking that the agency treated everyone like dog-doo. I LOVE being vindicated!

The Camper Force Recruiter told me “I want to make sure that seasonal campers have a good experience and want to come back and tell their friends about it.”

Now that Amazon oversees temporary workampers, the benefits are greater than ever. Everyone gets a completion bonus, all campground fees are covered (they weren’t in Nevada), the pay is higher and every worker gets a 10 percent discount on Amazon purchases!

Amazon is also better managing the amount of workers they hire so that the promised overtime that never materialized for me is now occurring for workers at each warehouse. We talked to one Amazon elf this week who is already getting overtime in Nevada.

The Camper Force Coordinator made being a minion sound so appealing, he almost swayed me into applying. If I didn’t have other business ventures happening right now, I might’ve done it.

But then again, who am I kidding?

All Aboard the S.S. Independence!

The most valuable aspect of working as a minion was reacquainting myself with punching a clock.

I had forgotten what it was like to be told how to do my work and even when I could have lunch. Call it a bad attitude or whatever, but that’s just not my style.

As bad as it was working at Amazon’s Fernley location in 2009, I wouldn’t trade that experience for anything.

Why? Because it reminded me that . . .

I’d rather be the captain of my own dingy than a junior officer on the Titanic!  (Dr. James Chan)

If you’re working at Amazon this season, what’s your experience like so far?

Colorado gave us a spectacular farewell on Monday while closed up the cabin to head south. A surprise snowstorm dumped several inches of white powder on us as we hitched up and pulled away.

Originally we were supposed to head to Eureka Springs, Arkansas, an artsy little town that I’ve always wanted to check out, but instead we drove a little further southeast to the Workamper Rendezvous in the Ozark town of Heber Springs, Arkansas. What a great decision that was!

Networking and Road Tripping with Like-Minded People

Workamper Rendezvous is a new, twice-yearly event put on by the good Workamper folks. This crash course is a 3-day seminar series geared toward anyone who wants to explore fulltiming and workamping arrangements that allow RVers to work a few hours in exchange for a free RV site and sometimes even pay.

The sessions were a little too beginner-level for us, so we didn’t attend the conference but instead went to network with others who work from the road.

Honestly I had forgotten about what fun this crowd can be. We were made to feel at home from the minute we showed up. From the nightly campfires to the folks I interviewed for an article I’m writing about workamping, everyone was so enthusiastic and welcoming!

If you’re unfamiliar with workamping and dreaming about ways you can live and work on the road, do yourself a favor and check out this seminar, held in April and October. The price is well worth it, and will pay for itself when you get that first workamping job.

We first started this blog as a marketing tool to sell our home based graphics business back in 2007, promoting it as the dream live/work opportunity.

After hitting the road, we started blogging about our adventures, reviewing campgrounds, and searching for the best biscuits and gravy.

For nearly three years, LiveWorkDream was our full-time RVing sabbatical blog as we searched for the perfect mountain property to call our summer home.

As seasonal snowbirds, the blog became a place to write about both our life in the mountains and the trials and tribulations of RVing.

After listening to Tim Ferriss, I realized he had coined the term I was looking for to label the new focus of our ramblings here at LiveWorkDream.com: Lifestyle Design.

After all, this is what we’ve been doing all along – creating our own reality, taking charge of our destiny, designing our own lifestyle.

In line with our new business venture, going forward we will share our lifestyle choices and the strategies we implement to stay on our path to total wellness and financial freedom. Please stick around and enjoy the ride.

This isn’t to say we won’t keep looking for tasty biscuits, or sharing any RV mishaps that we may encounter. But we’ll also review health and wellness products, and share our methods of making money on the road so others can do the same. What exactly would you like to hear about from us?