The Thrifty Traveler: Keeping your relationship on track while traveling

The concern many people have when it comes to maintaining a relationship on the road relates to finding time to spend with their significant other while they are on the other side of the country or planet. Our situation is slightly different, as my husband and I are basically together seven days a week. While it’s pretty much been this way for some time now with both of us working from home, it’s definitely gone into high gear since we started traveling full time earlier this summer.

To be clear, we’ve traveled together long term before. Our six-month backpacking adventure taken after he retired from the military was definitely a strong assessment of how well we problem solve as a couple when out of our comfort zone. However, that trip was taken before we were juggling a dog, publishing curriculum, dealing with renters and researching book material from the road.

Pair all that with the fact we’ll soon be surpassing the length of that trip to set a new personal record for long-term travel, and I think it’s fair to say this yearlong adventure has taught us more than we ever thought we’d need to know about making a relationship work from the road.

Accommodations: While there are plenty of perks to camping, sleeping in comfort is by no means one of them. This can quickly result in a cumulative lack of rest that is bound to impact your day-to-day patience level. There are only so many times you can toss and turn on an inflatable bed, creating ripples with every move, before your spouse is tempted to skull smack you with a skillet.

Couple that with unpredictable temperature shifts, leaking tent seams and snack-stealing squirrels, and you can easily begin to see why you may want to schedule your outdoor adventure sessions with Mother Nature sporadically. Further, if you’ve never tried to get busy on a slightly deflated air mattress with an over-forty back and a rain-soaked Labrador looking on, I invite you to give the experience a complete and total pass. Splurging on a hotel room with a comfortable bed and dependable heat system is a much better bet for revving up the romance.

The sized-for-two love seats that seem to be gaining popularity in the hospitality industry are a perfect solution for an in-room television night when traveling with a pooch. If a microwave and fridge are part of your room’s amenity package, then microbrew and popcorn can be added to the mix. Throw in a $1 miniature scented jar candle from the nearest department store of opportunity, and you can pull off a no-frills, intimate evening no matter how crazy your travel day has been or how basic the hotel room you have available.

Dates: Since most canine day care centers close before dinner time, making the most of a day away from your furry child involves starting super early in the morning and maximizing every last minute. When we recently found ourselves with two additional hours to fill before pick up time, we opted to pull into the driveway of a Mexican restaurant we spotted from the road.

While we’d already grabbed lunch earlier, there was no way we were missing out on a single minute of pet parent solitude. Beer and vegetarian nachos became an immediate priority. Similarly, while a triple-shot soy latte in an atmospheric coffee shop might not be anyone else’s idea of morning romance, I assure you when you haven’t been able to experience this in months due to the permanent presence of a rambunctious pet, you will definitely appreciate the downtime. We use it to catch up on news items, chat about current events and plan our day of dog-free decadence. Typical activity choices include searching out a great lunch spot, catching a matinee in the nearest theater or doing something active such as rafting or checking out a national park trail that doesn’t happen to be pet friendly.

Consideration: Keeping your relationship in balance on the road involves at least as much planning as it does when you have a home base. It can be very easy to slip into lazy habits that leave your partner feeling underappreciated and emotionally neglected. While we’re as guilty of that as the next couple, we do have a few tricks up our sleeve to get back on track once we realize we’ve let things get out of balance.

Tag-teaming errands is one simple solution you can use to maximize the needs of both parties. For example, if one of you stays in the cottage with the dog to rest or work on a project, the other can take on things such as grocery shopping, restocking the wine supply or coordinating an oil change for the automobile. The person in the room gets some private time to unwind if they choose, while the other gets to squeeze in things such as shopping for replacement apparel without being rushed or hunting for a special surprise gift to take back to the spouse who’s been dog-sitting for the afternoon.

Errands can also be dealt within the hotel. For example, we recently arrived at a location in desperate need of laundry facilities, but each feeling too exhausted to accomplish much more than unloading the vehicle and feeding the pooch. After a minor bit of problem solving, one of us loaded the washing machine down the hall while the other fired up the computers for a quick email check.

While the person on laundry detail waited for the wash to finish, the other made a dash for the lounge to take advantage of the last few minutes of happy hour. Two discount beers placed in takeout cups and transported back to the room in a cardboard carrying tray ended a trying highway day on a positive note.

Maintaining a relationship in the road won’t always go smoothly, but it is possible to make things as balanced as possible with a few go-to solutions you can implement in nearly any location. Being observant of your partner’s moods and frustrations will help you know when it’s time to implement some immediate quality couple’s time.

(Myscha Theriault is a best-selling author and avid traveler. She is currently traveling through North America with her husband and Labrador retriever. Readers can follow their adventures on trekhound.com and on Twitter at @MyschaTheriault.)

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