Before we started our YouTube channel and RVing, we were huge fans of many other RV YouTubers. Many of the channels we watched back then are still going strong and we still love to watch. We are also fans of many newer channels too.
However, you may or may not be aware that there really isn't a lot of money to be made from YouTube and due to this, a lot of channels get burnt out and find that the amount of time, money and effort is no longer fun. Here is a list of RV YouTubers who vanished from YouTube. Many also quit RVing completely.
10 - The Gray Adventures
Nick, Rachel, Lana, Mariah + Bella started full time RV life in February of 2017. They hit the road in their renovated 30ft travel trailer exploring the US - National Parks, museums and so much more. They road schooled their kids and worked fulltime jobs in addition to running their YouTube channel, Social Media sites and their website.
In 2020, they decided to quit RV life and bought a home in Cleveland. They originally planned to keep the RV and become part timers, however, shortly after they sold their Travel Trailer.
They continued to upload videos occasionally and still traveled, but mainly used hotels and some Tent camping.
Despite having nearly 20,000 subscribers, in 2021, they slowed down uploading YouTube videos and eventually only uploading 1 video in 2022, which would be their last.
9 - Fate Unbound
David and Roe Hiser rose to RV Tuber fame amassing an impressive 131,000 subscribers over 6 years of full time Rving. For most of that time they would upload videos every week with very few breaks.
In 2017, they both quit their day jobs, sold all of their belongings and moved into a tiny 24ft Travel Trailer. Over the years, they covered everything around RVing from product reviews to Travel day Drama. David even created an excellent 'silent' video about solo winter truck camping.
Sometime around 2021/2022, Roe began fulltime remote working. They also had some truck issues. In addition to their 131k subscribers and a healthy Patreon following, it seems that RV life and YouTubing took its toll and they abruptly stopped making videos. After taking down their website and many months of not posting videos or having any contact with their subscribers, they eventually posted an update on their facebook page: "Hey everyone! We're sorry we completely fell off the face of YouTube and social media. We decided to stop making videos and to stop traveling and we took the time to not only decompress from it all but to make sure it was the right decision before making a final announcement. We settled down in the beautiful Pacific Northwest where we have friends and family. While we do miss our lives on the road, we're excited for what the next chapter of our lives holds. Thank you everyone for all the support over the years - it truly means the world to us! Safe and happy travels to all you lovely people - David and Roe"
8 - Getaway Couple
Rae and Jason Miller were actually one of the first RV YouTubers who we started watching back in the early days of their channel. They started their travels in 2017 when they sold up everything to live in their Grand Design Solitude. They quickly became a popular RV YouTube channel racking up over 70,000 subscribers over the years.
With Raes excellent photography, editing and storytelling skills and Jasons technical and DIY skills, they managed to secure many strong relationships in the RV world, including becoming one of the first Grand Design and Battleborn Batteries Ambassadors among other p[opular RVing products and services. Jason even started a Smart RV Facebook group for fellow nerdy RVers to share ideas on Smart RV solutions.
In 2019, Natalie and I even had the chance to meetup with Rae and Jason in New Orleans for Mardi Gras where they showed us around the city and introduced us to Oysters, Hurricanes and Hand Grenades. Despite the hangover the next day, we had a fantastic time.
Despite their amazing success, and unbeknownst to their loyal subscribers, things started to fall apart for Rae and Jason behind the scenes and they vanished from YouTube and all social media. They did however continue to post content to their very success blog on their website, however, none of these posts were related to them personally and were more focused around the RV industry.
Late in 2022, they posted a very honest video titled "Where is Getaway Couple?", where they explain all the reasons why they dropped off the face of the planet. Unfortunately, they had a string of bad luck from everything from Health issues to serious rig issues with their Grand Design. They eventually sold their Solitude 5th wheel and settled down in a house near Orlando, Florida. Luckily for us and them, they worked through their problems and announced towards the end of 2022 that they had bought an older, used Truck Camper that they are planning to refurbish. Although they are not religiously uploading videos every week, they do occasionally post updates on the progress of their Truck Camper refurb that we are enjoying and can't wait to see where it will take them.
Kyle & Olivia started their YouTube channel in 2015 when they decided to explore the USA full time in their vintage camper. They officially hit the road in September of 2015, with the goal to live a minimal lifestyle and connect with the world around them.
Their plan was to share their experiences and inspire others to pursue a life of passion and adventure. They had various different RV setups over the years and shared all the pros and cons of each of them through their travel videos.
Kyle and Olivia also have a very successful Blog sharing information on many different RV topics from RV news to travel information.
In 2021, they announced that they were quitting fulltime RV life. They still continued to make YouTube videos, but these became far and few between.
Apart from a small unedited video of a live concert, their last video was uploaded at least a year from the time of publishing this article. Although we don't really know what they are up to right now, we do know that they are still publishing regular blog posts about the RV and travel industry on their website.
6 - Creativity RV
Robin Barrett rode a corporate job roller-coaster for years, doing what she thought she had to do for security and happiness until she realized that old paradigm wasn’t working. She hit the road in 2016 in a class B after self admitting that "I wasn’t a camper, I wasn’t an adventurer and wasn’t travelling with a partner; what I was, however, was miserable."
She soon realized that stepping out of her comfort zone and full-time RV living was "the best decision I’ve ever made".
Robin not only started making YouTube videos, racking up an impressive 287,000 subscribers that focus on everything from being a solo Female traveler to tips and tricks in RVing. She also has multiple books available on amazon, a vast website with multiple blog posts and she even did her own TedX Talk.
Robin has changed RV setups many times over the years from larger 5th wheels, to a tiny Bambi Airstream, trying to find the right balance between comfort and ease of travel.
Things didn't seem to go to plan with Robin during the covid lockdown and she slowed down releasing YouTube videos. She was radio silent for quite a few months, eventually uploading a video explaining some of the reasons why. Much of the reason was due to personal health problems and relationship issues.
Robin is still active on social media via her website and YouTube, however video released are sporadic with occasional large gaps in between video uploads.
As Robin said from the start, she began the Nomadic life to create real freedom for herself and that's exactly what she is doing. We enjoy her videos and consider ourself lucky that she still uploads when she can.
In Sept 2015, Tom and Cait Morton gave up the stationary life for one where they are constantly on the move, and they have been living the RV Life as digital nomads ever since.
Toms engineering background has been very obvious all the way through their YouTube journey, from building a Lithium battery pack from a scraped Tesla car, to building a fully capable off-road truck camper.
They have actually featured two truck campers in their videos, the first was a sponsored build, which they used to travel to remote places in Alaska. They did a fantastic series on this adventure called 'Go North'. The second truck camper build was on their own dime and again, using Toms extensive engineering knowledge, built and upgraded a real off-grid, off-roading truck camper.
They also own and (we believe) still live in their original 5th wheel with multiple upgrades. Around 2021, they bought a plot of land in a Northern state and call this their homebase, giving them a good place for them to work on their projects.
After buying the land and preparing for their first Truck Camper build, their YouTube videos started to slow down until their Go North series. But again, after that series, video releases started to slow down again. They are now co-hosts of 'The RVers' TV show on Discovery Channel, PBS, FunRoads TV, and online streaming platforms.
They are still occasionally uploading videos, but we sense that YouTube is more of a hobby and not their primary focus. Either way, we still look forward to and enjoy watching whatever content they want to share with us.
In 2018 Michael and Tiffany Dunagan made the choice to sell their house that they had lived in for over 20 years. At the time, they were recently empty nesters and wanted to travel.
A few years before this decision, Michael suffered a major stroke mainly due to stress from his corporate sales career. As part of his recovery, he decided to retire to reduce the stress in his life and realized that life is too short to keep waiting for adventure. Although Tiffany still had a full time job that she 100% loves, they were able to make her position a remote position, with occasional travel. They were successfully able to plan their RV travel around Tiffanys work schedule and saw much of the USA.
The covid lockdown was tough for Michael and Tiffany, but they were able to find a long-term place to live in their rig near Washington DC, not far from where their son lives. After the covid lockdown was lifted, they realized they needed some kind of homebase and ended up buying a permanent RV pad in a fancy resort near Orlando in Florida.
Over the past few years, Michael and Tiffany built up an impressive 16,000 subscribers and loyal Fanbase. However, not long after buying the new RV site, their YouTube videos became much more sporadic, eventually dying out for many months.
After a lot of silence, they eventually uploaded a video explaining their absence and their plan going forward. Shockingly, they announced that they were selling the RV pad and the RV and would be buying a home in Central Florida. They are both big Disney fans and love to explore Disney world with their Annual passes.
Soon after the announcement, they removed many of their RV travel and product videos and rebranded as 'Do More Happy' with their mission statement changing to "Life is short. Do More of what makes you Happy!", which has always been their plan. They have always been clear that they are on YouTube for fun and to document their adventures and did not want it to become another stressful Job.
Michael is now back to uploading videos focused around their new lives and even uploaded a series of videos of them traveling Route 66 in their new Tesla Model 3.
Natalie and I have crossed paths with Michael and Tiffany many times over the past few years and although we will miss their RV videos, we look forward to following their videos on the next chapter of their non-RV adventures.
3 - RV East Coast
When Eli and Fawn first bought their first RV in 2018, they quickly discovered that there really was a need for honest, quality reviews of campgrounds in our area. "You find no shortage of great reviews on the West Coast but here, on the East Coast, it was scarce".
They also realized that most of the campgrounds in the East Coast have outdated and poorly designed websites that do the campground no justice. With their filmmaking and marketing background they have created a platform that portraits the campground as inviting vacation destinations.
They made it their goal to create the most complete gallery/database of family campgrounds around the East Coast of the United States. By doing this, they built their YouTube channel up to 24,000 subscribers and continue to share reviews of campgrounds that they have visited, along with stories about their trips, gear reviews, recipes and content about RV life.
Both Eli and Fawn both work full time and their schedules have never really allowed them to upload regular videos, however, at the time of writing this, they have not uploaded a new video for nearly a year. The last update on their Facebook page was on New Years Eve in 2022, which included a picture of them and their kids looking great.
"Happy New Year to all our RV and family travel enthusiasts! We hope that the coming year brings you many exciting adventures on the road and that you get to create new memories with your loved ones. As we leave behind the challenges of the past year, let's embrace the new opportunities that the future holds and the memories that can be made. Here's to a year filled with health, happiness, and of course, plenty of RV travels. We are still quite busy with work but we will do our best to put together some travel plan ideas for the new year. We miss you !!!"
2 - Adventurous Way
We have a lot in common with Matt and Diana. Mainly that they were not born and bred in the USA, worked stressful 9-5 tech jobs, don't have children and love to travel. They also started their YourTube channel only a year before we did (2018).
They quit their high-stress tech jobs in the San Francisco bay area, bought a tiny 21ft offroad travel trailer and set off on a mission to visit all 419 of Americas National Park Units.
They have built up an impressive 24,000 subscribers on their channel which covered everything from travel day shenanigans to some cool Smart-RV installations, including an impressive solar and inverter setup and multiple upgrades to the RV.
Although they didn't specifically vanish from the Social Media world, for a period in 2021, their videos were very sporadic and we feared that they were slipping away from the YouTube world. During this time, they were still providing regular updates through their website newsletter.
However, this was because they had other plans for the channel and their lives. Although they still have (and live) fulltime in the same 24ft Travel Trailer, they bought 40+ acres of land in Vermont where they are currently working on building a new home. The series is very impressive and follows their journey from buying the land, getting permits for the house build and services and of course a LOT of manual labor to clear the area.
Between 2014 and 2020, Natalie and I owned and ran a small 7+ Acre homestead in Northern Virginia and although we miss some aspects of that life, we don't miss the huge undertaking of managing and maintaining the land. Matt and Dianas latest videos remind us of the challenges of this. Not only that, but they also have all the challenges of planning and preparing for their build. We love following the progress and challenges they have during this series and hope they will soon have time to do some more traveling once the build is done.
1 - RV Geeks
Peter Knize & John Sullivan have been full-time RVers since 2003 and have built an impressive 192,000 subscribers from their excellent and informative maintenance, repairs and upgrade videos.
They have built up their channel over 11 years and documented much of their travels and RV repair/upgrades in simple to understand 'how-to' formats.
In 2018, their channel started to slow down and videos were uploaded more sporadically and eventually thinned out a lot.
However, in 2019 it became obvious why.... Peter & John made the big leap to broadcast television as they co-host the new TV series The RVers on The Discovery Channel, PBS, iTunes, Amazon, Fun Roads TV, and Google Play.
At the time of writing this, Peter and John have not uploaded a video for nearly a year. We hope to see them on Broadcast television somewhere soon.
Embracing Detours is another channel whose content creators stopped producing on YouTube about two years back.
Great list! I watched "The RVers" series. Very well done. That k's for this! Btw, I don't know who came up with your "Oysters, Hurricanes and Hand Grenades" phrase, but it sounds like the beginnings of a great song! 🤣Cheers! 🇨🇦
Gary Brownrigg
Great list! A few more I would add are RVLove (Bought small home in Colorado and do random infrequent trips and videos), RV Odd Couple (bought a campground... still do videos, but they have totally changed focus/topics), Story Chasing (new channel name Amber Baldwin, renting an apartment), Three Little Trees (cute family that bought LJMJ Airstream, no videos for a while), A Streaming Life (homesteading now, new channel name A Dreaming Life, infrequent uploads), The Freedom Theory, I'm Not Lost I'm RVing (started a solar business and then after lots of quiet, Tom made video saying the couple was now divorced, all past videos were deleted and channel name changed to Baseweight, but almost no videos.).