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Adventure Expert Brian Brawdy Explores the Nation in Eco-Friendly RV

Originally Published in Trailer Life Magazine

The moment you meet Brian Brawdy, you get the itch to get out there and connect with nature. His passion is contagious. Brawdy is well into his widely popular 2008 Wonder Explore Believe Tour of 49 states with a goal to inspire and educate folks to take a proactive roll in their lives and in their planet. He presents a challenge of sorts to everyone across the nation to explore the outdoors, no matter how near or far – and his message is ringing loud and clear in the RV world.

If you’ve been following his tour at all, then you know exactly what we’re talking about. Leading by example, Brawdy tours the country in a very cool fully self-contained Lance camper that is outfitted with six solar panels and a wind turbine to generate and store electricity. He also captures rainwater from the roof and filters it for drinking, cooking and bathing. Leaving as little footprint on the environment as possible, Brawdy moves about the county in this eco-friendly RV while stopping along the way to explore and appreciate the outdoors by foot, kayak, bike or whatever he chooses.

Whatever your thing is – hiking, camping, climbing, etc. – be sure to park the RV from time to time and just get out there and do it. Here’s what Brian Brawdy has to say to all of us modern-day explorers:

The Modern-Day ExplorerBy Brian BrawdyWhat other title could there possibly be for you?Let’s kick it off with a definition…Explore: to familiarize oneself with the unfamiliar, to search out and investigate what you are unacquainted with. Pretty straight forward I think.Nothing about being the first, about representing the rest of humanity, about sticking your flagpole on some virgin piece of earth, about death-defying feats of heroism, superhuman strength or divine guidance from above. None of it.Where does the confusion come from? I blame Star Trek: “… to boldly go where no man has gone before,” blah, blah, blah.Now, that’s certainly not meant to take away from the Shackelton/Lewis and Clark types of our past. Pretty remarkable exploits punctuate human history. Still, what made them “explorers” was discovering new lands with their own eyes, through their own toil, blazing their own trails. The explorers of our past used bipedalism, snowshoes, dugout canoes or kayaks, horses, dogsleds, covered wagons, airplanes, helicopters, even lunar landers and rovers. Today, we use RVs.What? Modern-day explorers drive RVs? I’ll get back to this momentarily.Do you ever get tired of hearing that there is “nowhere left to explore” or that “humans have mapped every corner of the earth”?Oh well, I guess I should pack it in, someone else has “been there, done that.”Here is my point. If it’s new to you – if you’re witnessing a foreign and unfamiliar land firsthand and for the first time – doesn’t that make you an explorer? If it’s new terrain and you’re personally crossing that “little bit of foreign” as I call it, don’t you qualify for the title explorer?One more definition, if you don’t mind.Exotic: It comes from the Greek “exutikos” meaning foreign, outside the ordinary. It means unconventional or unusual. So once again, if it is new to you, it’s exotic. Yes? If it’s foreign to the convention of your status quo, if it’s outside the usual happenstance of your everyday, does that not fit the definition of exotic?OK. So now I am going to rewrite the definition of Explorer. An explorer is someone who finds the exotic where they find themselves.I guess if you are content plagiarizing the exploits of those who have gone before you, if you settle for looking at the pretty pictures of faraway places daydreaming about “someday,” if you are dissuaded by the simple thought that someone has trekked and treaded there before you, well I guess the explorer title isn’t for you. No worries. Not everyone sees the difference between topography and terrain.As an RVer, YOU, by your very actions, qualify as an explorer. Navigating new challenges, horizons and terrains, too busy to suffer the lament of the “been there, done that” crowd, you drive to bring the faraway to your own front door.

To learn more about Brian Brawdy and to check out when he’ll be in your neck of the woods, visit www.brianbrawdy.com.

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