The thing about travel nursing is that it’s fluid. We knew that when we started making plans. We conducted extensive research, and Mark attended the Travcon conference in 2024. When he was there, he had the opportunity to speak with experienced travel nurses and various travel agents. I would highly recommend it to anyone considering this lifestyle. This was one of the reasons we chose to travel in a Class A RV. It would allow us to be self-contained, making it easier to move our household. The hospital in Hermiston decided that it needed a travel ER nurse with more pediatric experience, so they ended his contract early.
Our original intentions were for Mark to do travel jobs in the Northwest during the summers and to move to the Southwest for the winters. With his original Hermiston contract, he would have been finished in the middle of September. This would have allowed us to take a month off and then start looking at winter locations. We had both really enjoyed New Mexico when we visited it previously, and there were numerous places in Arizona we would like to see. We also had intended to use Texas as our residency state. Because Mark’s contract was canceled early, we were only halfway through the summer months. After looking at all of the available travel nursing jobs, nothing seemed to work.
So we started looking at places that were offering full-time positions. We were also looking for somewhere that would not have extreme winter or summer weather. The heat in Hermiston was not pleasant for any of us. After much research, we decided to look at hospitals and locations on the Oregon Pacific Coast. The weather is very mild there, with temperatures averaging most of the year in the mid-50s to mid-60s.
We pulled up all of the hospitals on the coast, went through them one at a time, and applied to positions in Bandon, Reedsport, and Florence. Mark interviewed with them, but ultimately, we decided to accept the job in Florence, so we will be here for at least 2 years and see how it goes.
Don’t worry, we are not giving up our intentions to travel extensively. We still intend to do that, but we will focus primarily on Washington, Oregon, and Northern California. These are all areas we were very interested in exploring, so we’re exploring them in different ways. 😁
So stay tuned for a deep dive into the Pacific Northwest, starting with Florence.
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