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Noted American Author John Steinbeck (Grapes of Wrath, East of Eden, Of Mice and Men, and other classic novels) was also afflicted with self-described "lifelong wanderlust". So in 1960, at the age of 58, he set out on a road tour of America in a green GMC truck fitted with a custom camper-shell which he dubbed "Rocinante", named after Don Quixote's horse. Charley was his French poodle , and his sole companion on the journey. He chronicled his travels over the next year or so as he traveled from New York up through New England, across country to the west coast and then back via Texas and the midwest. The resulting book, "Travels with Charley " was published in 1962 and became a best seller. In ill health, it was to be one of his last works. Steinbeck received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1962, and died in New York City in 1968.
Steinbeck left a legacy of fellow Wanderlust sufferers who hit the road each year in search of adventure and new scenery. Steinbeck ponders in Part II of his novel:
"Could it be that Americans are a restless people, a mobile people, never satisfied with where they are as a matter of selection? The pioneers, the immigrants who peopled the continent, were the restless ones in Europe. The steady rooted ones stayed home and are still there. But every one of us, except those forced here as slaves, are descended from the restless ones, the wayward ones who were not content to stay at home. Wouldn't it be unusual if we had not inherited this tendency? And the fact is that we have."
I smile as I read "Travels with Charley" - the simplicity of life half a decade ago, and yet some of the parallels as Steinbeck chronicles his life on the road. Of interest to my readers may be some of the photos below of Steinbeck's humble mobile quarters as they compare to the 43 feet of rather extravagant accommodations the Windseeker offers. Steinbeck would likely be flabbergasted, ne even appalled I suppose... the excesses of modern culture. But hey, times change... I could not imagine traveling with my wife and dogs in Rocinante any more than Steinbeck could in the Windseeker.
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