Help – new user needs advice

Is there a good place to check out when a person decides to start a blog, but has no idea where to start? We don’t want to start wrong, then later find out that we have to start over in order to set it up to do what we originally wanted to do. An example follows. Please note that all site names, etc. are fictional, and could have domains with those names. This is not the topic that we actually intend to use, but it does illustrate the structure that we would use.

If we wanted to start a blog on outdoor life, let’s say that we chose a domain:
ronsoutdoorlifeblog.com
Such a blog could have pages on equipment purchasing, campsites, tips for saving money, etc.

But, since that is such a general, all-encompassing topic, we would want to have additional, specific blogs in addition to this general one. Other, specific blogs, maybe with their own domain names – leaving the first domain as a catch-all for anything not specific to the new domains. The new domains might be:
ronsfishingblog.com
ronsrockclimbingblog.com
ronshuntingblog.com
ronskayakingblog.com
etc.

At $10 per domain, such an expense would be minimal, and it would seem to be more search engine friendly with a domain for each. Each blog could link between other domains at various points.

A couple of questions. Would this be the preferable way to setup at the start? All of the specific blogs would be setup over time. On our host, the directory tree would be something like this:
(hopefully the formatting will show the idea)

ronsoutdoorlifeblog.com:XXXX/public_html
index.html
<main ronsoutdoorlifeblog.com WordPress blog landing page here>
….WordPress files here(?)

ronsoutdoorlifeblog.com:XXXX/public_html/ ronsfishingblog.com
index.html
<ronsfishingblog.com fishing blog landing page here>

ronsoutdoorlifeblog.com:XXXX/public_html/ ronsrockclimbingblog.com
index.html
<ronsrockclimbingblog.com rock climbing blog landing page here>

ronsoutdoorlifeblog.com:XXXX/public_html/ ronshuntingblog.com
index.html
<ronshuntingblog.com hunting blog landing page here>

ronsoutdoorlifeblog.com:XXXX/public_html/ ronskayakingblog.com
index.html
<ronskayakingblog.com kayaking blog landing page here>

Besides the SEO considerations, it would also be more user friendly in that, somebody wanting to go to the fishing blog, would just type into the address bar:
ronsfishingblog.com
as opposed to:
ronsoutdoorlivingblog.com/ronsfishingblog

Am I over complicating this? With the quality, but inexpensive domains and hosting plans available, this would seem a preferable setup, but again, I am very new to all of this, and may be looking at it completely wrong. Also, if we did it this way, would the only WordPress installation be in the root directory i.e. ronsoutdoorlifeblog.com:XXXX/public_html/) or will there be a separate WordPress install in each subdirectory (domain)?

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Ron