Long Distance to Texas

[hhoenig]

We have always used our TM for week-ends and 10 day vacations. We are now considering a 3 week trip from New York to Dallas,starting last week June. Several questions come to mind: Is this trip too ambitious for a TM, what with setting up every night for 5 nights at a different campground, and the same on return trip? How about reservations at campgrounds?if they are even nescessarry. How do you know where you will be every 350-400 miles to call ahead. Seems like an awful lot of organization and planning. When it was just me and the van there was never a second thought, now with DW, DD(14) and DS(11), things have changed. Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you,
Henry

[BobRederick]

Last summer I traveled with a new Garmin 60CSx GPS with built in maps. I was able to find campgrounds, food, DQs, and fuel all the way on a 4200 mile trip using the GPS and cell phone. I called from the road to make reservations and assure the campground was open.

Another option is a campground book like Woodalls found at Camping World and other places. DW can look up a location 100 miles or so ahead and call for reservations.

Another nicety is that many now have wireless LAN and you can surf the web and read your emails from the CG or from a restaurant along the way. The cell phone and GPS will let you know which ones have it.

You should probably have reservations at hot spots if you are fussy ane want a special location. I took what I could get.

And with that ground crew, you should be able to set that TM up so quickly the neighbors will wonder what happened!

Good luck. I'll be out there with you this summer.

[wbmiller3]

We prefer not to set up 'n take down every day. Sometimes there's no choice, but we'd rather do the set up 'n take down thing for a few days to get to a destination area, then spend some time there.

My brother's family is on the move-every-night plan, so it works for some.

[Freedom]

We did a 9500 mile trip last fall and only had reservations at the final destination in Williamsburg, VA. The rest of the time we would just call ahead from the road. The biggest problem we had was traveling on the Labor Day weekend. One campground made room for us on the playground since we didn't want anything but electricity. Good luck and have a nice trip.

[edweidig]

You might consider PassportAmerica or Happy Campers and look in their books for the half price campgrounds. I have made my money back several times over with PA. You can get some ideas about where you might want to stop. Being retired military I also look for FamCamps along my route. I wouldn't worry too much about setup and takedown. It's not all that much trouble, and it looks like you have plenty of help to boot.

I took three long trips last year (solo), often setting up and taking down every day, a couple times staying in one spot for three or four days where there were interesting things to see and do. I'd say take the TM, enjoy your vacation, and if you can, keep a day or two open for serendipitious finds along the way.

[Bill]

Hi, Henry -

Last year, my wife and I took a four-week trip in the TM. The first week was set-up-and-take-down-every-night, as we made our way from Phoneix to Banff (Canadian Rockies) and then to Yellowstone. The second and third weeks were a permanent setup in Yellowstone. The fourth week was set-up-and-take-down-every-night again, as we went from Yellowstone to Maine. Everything worked out fine.

For Yellowstone, we made advance reservations, of course. But when we are travelling every day, we follow BobRederick's procedure. We carry the Good Sam Big Book of Campgrounds, and an hour or two before we want to stop, we look up a campground and call ahead to make sure we can get in when we arrive. This allows us to dawdle for a couple hours at places like The World's Largest Truck Stop (it's in Iowa), or drive til we drop to get some distance behind us. We're not tied down by pre-made reservations.

Your comfort zone may be different, of course, but this has worked well for us.

Bill

[Jubolo]

You might think about getting a Tom Tom 510.

They are about $499.00 at Best Buy or $370.00 on Ebay.

Will do all your navigation, just punch in destination and follow voice and visual instructions.

Warns you about 2 miles on turns and what lane to be in after the turn!!

Gives ETA, MPH , Mag direction, miles to turn, and on and on!!

Accurate to within 35 feet!!!!
Fred :)

[Freedom]

We use a $4.95 Wal-Mart Atlas - lists all the Wal-Marts and a Trailer Life directory of campgrounds (@ 15.00 on Ebay) and a free KOA directory. If all else fails we stay in a Wal-Mart parking lot for FREE. We always ask first at the customer service counter and give them a thank you card when we leave. Here's a couple of good sites to find campgrounds: http://www.rvparkreviews.com/ http://www.freecampgrounds.com/ and one for dumpsites: http://www.rvdumps.com/

[fishpondwest]

Just returned from a 7,000 mile 6 week trip from Northern California to the east Coast and back. Not so much as a flat tire. Worst thing that happened was a squirrel eating up some wiring in the Pilot which delayed our departer westbound from Fredericksburg, Tx. We were just a day ahead of the horrible storm that eventually closed I 10 between Fort Stockton, TX and San Antonio. If anyone interested I can provide some specifics and first hand account of the trip.

[hhoenig]

Dan , we would especially like to hear of your adventure. Thank you all for your suggestions and comments, they were very helpful and re-assuring. If things fall right, we will go for it. Happy and safe camping for 07.
Henry

[Bob&Karen]

We, like others here have stated, use a Trailer Life Directory, KOA directory, and a trusty Wal-Mart atlas. Someone mentioned GPS, and if you have a laptop then Garmin makes a small USB unit that plugs into the laptop for $130.00 - it can be very useful.

We haven't yet taken a big trip with the TM, but can tell you that the day-after-day set up and take down with a Fleetwood pop-up can be very tiring. I can't imagine the TM being as much work. We have gone on week-long excursions with the TM, with only one set-up/take-down each way and it wasn't difficult.

So, get on the road and GO! We're looking forward to a trip mid-May to Big Bend.

[Freedom]

Here's another campground locator I forgot to tell you about before: http://www.popupexplorer.com/

[Bill & Lisa]

Dan,
Last June we went from Virginia Beach to Colorado Springs for the Jubilee. We did it in 4 days out and 4 days on the way back. Wife spent a good bit of time planning the trip and getting reservations in advance. The others suggested methods will probably work with ONE EXCEPTION! IF you are going to be traveling on the 4th of JULY make a reservation in advance. Most parks fill up and many don't like to let you reserve for just one night (when they end up turning away folks looking for 3 or 4 nights!).

You will be tired of setting up, breaking down and driving. We were. We took some short cuts to make it easier like NOT putting our mattress toppers on every night but driving out with them wrapped in a tarp on the roof top carrier. They got wet anyway so on the way back we stowed them in the walk way like normal. Oh well.

Good luck and remember to have fun. Books on CD help ALOT and make the time go by much more quickly and without the normal level of Fatigue. We checked ours out from the local library but Cracker Barrel has rental books on cd that you can turn back it at any Cracker Barrel when you are done to get your "deposit" back (you actually pay what the cd would cost and when you turn it back in you get all but a small rental fee back.

Bill

[Harry Womack]

We traveled from Dallas to Wisconsin, International Falls MN, North Dakota, South Dakota, Colorado, and New Mexico. This was over 5000 miles and we stayed 1 night most places.

[Bob&Karen]

Yeah, what Leon said - we loved our pop-up (Fleetwood Sequoia) but it would take us around 15 minutes to set it up - lots of cranking, pulling, tugging, lifting the king-size bunk ends to put the supports in place, maneuvering the one-piece door into place, etc., etc. I was tired already after a day's driving, and really tired after setting it up. Then the take-down the next day would take another half an hour.

The TM is just so much easier. Even my wife, who is tiny, can lift that wardrobe full of clothes off the floor and slide it into place during set-up. The "hardest" thing I have to do is pull the living room slide. And, instead of 15 minutes of set-up, we're done in about 5. Next morning take-down, even screwing around with 3 dogs, only takes about 15 minutes.

Bob