This is without a doubt the most self indulgent thing that we have bought since we got the camper and that’s saying a lot. If you haven’t read it yet, go check out this article - Ready, Set, Go! - to see what we travel with. It’s not a short list but as I say in that piece, we are really glampers more than we are campers and I’m not going to feel guilty about traveling with deck chairs, a french press and a metric ton of bed linen. It makes me happy, which by default makes my husband Mike happy. You know the saying - happy wife, happy life.

So why a drone?

Because… I don’t know. I’m not sure I have a good answer for this question. I suppose the easiest and tbh the most honest answer is that I think they are cool. I think being able to capture video from the sky, to learn how to navigate this little aircraft - it’s just a cool thing to be able to do. Does the fact that we’ve been trapped in our house for a year due to Covid play into this? Maybe. We are a little bored. Is it a mid-life crisis? I don’t think so… I will be 55 this year (please let that be mid-life) but I don’t really identify with age per se…. I think it is going to be fun so I’m going for it but there is one small problem.

I know nothing about drones

And when I say nothing, I mean the light leaving from the planetary system where I know something about drones is never going to reach the earth. So I did some research because I like to increase the likelihood that I will invest the right amount of money to get the right outcome. Below I’ve summarized some of the important things to consider when buying a drone and what it means from a cost perspective.

Having figured out the fundamentals the question is - what’s the right combination of these functions for us to have the best outcome? We are obviously novices, so nothing too difficult to fly is important plus we really want to get what’s called an RTF - ready to fly model. There are other types of drones - BNF (bind and fly), PNP (plug and play) and ARF (almost ready to fly) - and these all have a level of complexity that I think is better suited to someone with experience. These models don’t come with either a transmitter or a receiver (or both) or they are best for racing. Which leads us to…

We are getting this drone

With a goal of being able to take cool aerial video around our neighborhood and while on camping trips, this is what we decided to buy - the DJI Mavic Air 2 Fly Combo. Here is why:

• Battery lasts 34 minutes and it comes with them included

• It’s got really good picture and video quality - one reviewer said that the best way to describe it as a seriously good camera that flies

• It has responsive tracking to help us get better videos

• It got an average of 4 1/2 stars on Amazon reviews

• It has automatic obstacle avoidance which sounds really important since we don’t know what we are doing

There are cheaper drones that I looked at - less time in the air, not quite as good specs on the camera, made from plastic - which could be perfectly good options. There were much more expensive models which are for racing which, while cool, really exceed our needs. And while this model/package is not cheap (coming it at about $950), I do think it’s going to give us the best results. And Amazon has a great returns policy so if it isn’t right, we can start over again.

How about you? Do you have a drone? What model did you get? What features mattered most to you? And what were your biggest learnings as a novice - we could really use the advice!