Finding Your Way

A few years ago, three Southern California college students who were unsure what to do with their lives after graduation acquired an old 31-foot motorhome for a trip across country. Their goal was to talk to people from all walks of life who were happy and successful and find out how they got there.

That trip has led to books, magazines, television documentaries and educational programs under the banner of Roadtrip Nation. Buddies Mike Marriner, Brian McAllister and Nathan Gebhard now run the enterprise from an old house in Laguna Beach.

How this all came about is recounted in a new book, Finding the Open Road, which describes the founding of Roadtrip Nation, offers advice to other planning self-discovery trips, and incorporates wisdom gleaned by Roadtrip Nation.

I talked to Marriner by phone while he was traveling by motorhome through Utah on a book promotion tour.

Marriner explained that RVs have been central to the Roadtrip Nation experience, not only providing a convenient way to travel, but also a great place to conduct interviews on the road.

First Trip
This all began in 2001 when Gebhard, Marriner and McAllister bought a 1985 Pace Arrow from McAllister’s parents, painted it bright green, acquired camera and audio equipment and began a three-month cross-country trip, interviewing people ranging from a Maine lobster fisherman to Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.

Whenever possible, Mar-riner said, they conducted their interviews inside the RV. People like O’Connor, Howard Schultz of Starbucks and Michael Dell of Dell Computers not only came aboard the RV, but also signed their names on its ceiling.

Marriner said interviewing corporate executives in the relaxed setting of a motorhome instead of their offices encouraged them to share their personal experiences. What Marriner and his friends wanted to know was how these people got started.

Marriner said it soon became apparent from interviews that even those who achieved great success were at sea in their 20s. Take the enormously rich and successful Michael Dell for example. “When he was 20 he was just as lost as everyone else,” said Marriner.

The theme that emerged from the interviews was that those who achieved their dreams found a passion and pursued it relentlessly. The key advice that emerged was “just follow what excites you.”

Changing Workplace
It also became apparent that the old pattern of getting a job and staying there long-term no longer applied. In Finding the Open Road, Dan Regis, a venture capitalist from Seattle, recalls: “In the sixties, Boeing gave me an offer as an engineering aide. I can remember to this day walking into the engineering room and there was a football field-long series of gunmetal gray desks and guys with pocket protectors and white shirts rolled up at the sleeves. You could see your life in twenty, twenty-five, thirty, forty, fifty years—then dead. That’s not the world we’re living in anymore.”

The premise of Roadtrip Nation is that many young people are governed by the expectations of parents and others as they go through school and into college. Some continue into careers without really considering all of life’s possibilities. Others finish college and wonder what to do next. The founders of Roadtrip Nation were in the latter category. One was a pre-med major; another was studying communications and the third was majoring in business administration. But as they write in Finding the Open Road, “We didn’t even have a clue as to what our life’s work could be. At twenty-three years old, we were already settling in, with no idea of what we were settling into.”

So in their senior year, they began planning a road trip to explore life’s possibilities. They set out in their RV from San Francisco through Chicago to New England, dipped through the South and west to Texas, then traveled north to Seattle and back along the coast to California. They covered 17,000 miles, filming interviews along the way with people such as the conductor of the Boston Philharmonic, a programmer at the Cartoon Network, the founder of Red Hook Ale, a snowboard designer, environmental activists, bookstore owners and others. In all, they amassed 82 interviews.

They returned home with lots of stories and massive credit-card debt. A magazine printed a small story about their adventure, and some doors started opening. They landed a book deal with a major publisher and obtained financing to edit their interviews into a documentary for public television.

Growing Business
Since then Roadtrip Nation has grown into a major enterprise. They have created an annual series on public television funded by State Farm, published books and a magazine, and established Roadtrip Nation chapters and educational programs on college campuses nationwide to send students on road trips.

Roadtrip Nation will be promoted in 3,100 Starbucks cafes this summer and will be featured on a J. Crew T-Shirt. The group has even acquired a fleet of RVs, adding a 1992 Safari, 1995 Monaco and 1995 Winnebago to the original Pace Arrow.

The founders of Roadtrip Nation have divided up the work. Marriner is in charge of publishing projects; McAllister oversees education programs, and Gebhard supervises television production.

They will be on the road in RVs this summer, accompanying three teams of students who have been chosen to be filmed for this year’s Roadtrip Nation project. The students will plan their own route and book their own interviews, traveling in the Roadtrip Nation motorhomes, while the organization’s founders oversee filming and other details.

Marriner said many more people would like to take road trips than Roadtrip Nation can possibly finance. “We can’t keep buying motorhomes,” he said.

So they have set up education programs to show students how to hit the road on their own. They also offer small grants to reimburse students for some expenses. Lots of road trip advice is available in Finding the Open Road, which is subtitled “a guide to self-construction rather than mass production.” The authors write about how to organize trips, obtain interviews on the road and reflect on the experience. You can also get information at their Web site: www.roadtripnation.com.

Marriner said even a short road trip can help expand one’s horizons if you take the right approach. It helps to get away from the everyday “noise” of life, and gain a new perspective. “Even a five-day road trip can change your life,” he said.

Certainly an RV road trip has drastically altered the lives of Marriner, McAllister and Gebhard. And if you read their books and watch their television documentaries, it is easy to see how Roadtrip Nation will probably alter the lives of many others as well.

Write to Mike Ward, editor at RV Life Magazine, 18717 76th Avenue West, Suite B, Lynnwood, WA 98037 or e-mail editor@rvlife.com. Find First Glance on-line at rvlife.com