Working while you travel question, curious minds want to know.

[scanzel]

I have noticed in the past posts of some busnuts that you say you are going to a job while traveling across the country. I was wondering what type of jobs you are doing as you travel in your bus ? 

[brando4905]

We are waste diversion specialists at outdoor events, mainly large music festivals. 

www.cleanvibes.com

[cody]

We're manure spreaders, we take the over abundance of BS from the northern areas and transfer it to the southern areas where it's deeply needed, and, cut a board from time to time.

[Ed Hackenbruch]

I am a heavy equipment operator. We come up from Az. to our old home area of Wa. to work for a few months in the summer then back to Az. for the winter. I consider myself semi-retired.....work 3-4 months, play the rest of the time. Probably 6-7 more years before i can fully retire.

[redbus]

We have worked in RV dealerships, campgrounds, warehouses for seasonal Christmas help and my wife as a registered nurse. We have done this for the past 13 years. You don't make a lot of money but it does keep some fuel in the tanks. We generally only work part time so we can explore whatever area we are in.

[rv_safetyman]

Steve, some folks can perform their job while on the road.  When my consulting was going better, I could do almost everything on the road (have a full office set-up in the bus).  Most of my work was expert witness related.  I did some traveling in the bus for things like depositions.  Unfortunately, much of that travel was done by plane .  At least one of the lawyers I worked for had software where we could jointly, in real time, work on my expert witness report via an internet connection - again from the road.

Some folks do "workamping" http://www.workamper.com/optinnew/index.cfm .  We have talked to a bunch of these folks and they all seem to enjoy the working conditions and the flexibility to explore a lot of areas.  As mentioned, you don't make much, but some of your living costs are covered and you get a bit of spending money.

We, of course, have an RV related business that takes us to RV rallies.  Good way to go broke quick .  I have spent a great deal of time talking to, and "analyzing" the vendors and their ability to "make money".  I would say that probably 70% or more are not making money from their business - especially in this terrible economy and the even worse condition of the RV market.  That number in recent years is probably very conservative.  We belong to an FMCA chapter called "Professional RV Vendors Chapter".  I has at least 50 active members and the general mood is really bad.  For many of the "losers", the tax write off on their personal income justifies the lifestyle.  The lifestyle, BTW, can be fun.  Setting up and tearing down the both is a pain, but meeting folks and seeing the country is lots of fun.  Besides that, vendors become "family" much the same way that bus folks do and both have some sanity issues .

Jim

[David Anderson]

I work with Volunteer Christian Builders www.vcbuilders.org We travel around where needed and construct buildings for churches that need help usually in two week commitments.  It has been great fun for me and my wife.  Most of the guys are in their 70's, some 80+ and it gives me great amazement to see the guys climbing trusses and firing those nail guns.  I wish I could get out to more jobs.   I think the group has done 40 jobs since October of 2009 with several more on the schedule in 2010.  We usually have 20~25 couples per crew.

David

[larryc]

The last few years that I was full timing, I worked for Southern Cross Corp out of Norcross, Ga.
It was a very interesting and exercising job and consisted of traveling to many different locations (North in the Summer and South in the Winter) and performing safety inspections on natural gas lines. It required walking six-seven miles a day and so I had to quit when I developed hip problems but I had a ball while being paid to travel. I won't tell all of what it entailed because things have probably changed since I last worked for them (about 12 years ago). I just did a Google search and see that they are still an active company. Probably not affected by the economy because of rigid requirements for periodic safety inspections.

[bobofthenorth]

We both do consulting from the comfort of our rolling office/home.  I have some agricultural and small business clients that I provide managment advice to.  I am rostered with a couple of outfits that occasionally provide longer term contracts in the areas of business strategy and succession and I just recently started a project that involves supervising the installation of technology for the livestock industry.  Marilyn writes technical training material.  In the past year she has written for two uranium miners and she is currently finishing up a project for funeral directors.  Typically she works for our provincial technical institute but she takes private contracts as well.

As Jim hinted, consulting is a feast or famine trade.  You have to be able to weather the droughts in order to survive.  We're only 3 years into this adventure so I guess its too soon to say whether or not we will be survivors but I guess another way of looking at that is that we have survived three years of this so far.  We have both very consciously looked for gigs where our mobility is an advantage.  I wouldn't say we have been completely successful in that effort but I did a project this summer that involved looking at farmland in all four corners of Saskatchewan and I think I got the work specifically because we are mobile.