camp ground guides

I've never used Woodalls, do you get the 10% discount with them like you do with the Good Sams?

I use two very helpful guides--Anderson"s camping & RV park travel directory and Woodall's.
Another source is the State welcome center----Great FREE directories!!

I have been very impressed with "The Unofficial Guide to the Best RV and Tent Campgrounds in the USA, 1st Edition" ,published by Frommer's Guide Series. in 2002. For a large number of campgrounds, they have had inspection teams on site, and discuss where the best places to camp are in the campground, how friendly the owners are, what locations to avoid, and so forth. They give good maps, and rate many campgrounds from a large variety of viewpoints, including scenary, beauty, privacy, cleanliness, and many more categories. It is the most detailed description of the basic "intrinsic character" of each campground that I have seen anywhere. If a campground is just a parking lot, it says so, without pulling punches. If there is a better campground nearby, it says that you are better off going another 15 miles to the alternative campground. Incidently, it doesn't take advertising, so it is not beholden to anybody and can be very candid.

Best Wishes
WyomingRockHound

Do they rate government (city, state, and fed) owned campgrounds? If so where do I find one?

Hi WyomingRockHound,

does the guide also let you know if dogs are allowed?

thanks,
Teresa

We used Trailer Life's Directory for 2 years until we stayed at a Kennesaw, Georgia RV park that was highly rated by Trailer Life's staff. We had reserved a space for a week's stay there based on their high ratings. It turned out to be the worst RV park we've ever stayed in! One of the more vocal RVers even wrote a sarcastic criticism of the RV park on a bathroom mirror with a felt pen. It was obvious that Trailer Life's staff did not make an on-site evaluation of this place for their directory.

Now we're using Woodalls directory to see if their ratings are more accurate. I don't intend to be misled again by Trailer Life.

Hello Teresa, John, and Karen

Yes, it lists regulations on pets. Most say "pets on leash, cleaned up after". I saw one that said "pets on leashes, 6 ft. or less".

Mostly, it lists commercial campgrounds. State Parks and Forest service campgrounds appear largely absent. I checked for Kurt Gowdy State Park, between Laramie and Cheyenne, and couldn't find it.

I am looking at the book now.1174 pages, 8.5 by 11 inches. I opened it at random, and ended up in the write-up for Waterfront Park, Seward, Alaska. It has a 3-star rating for RV sites, and a 4-star rating for tent sites. It lists 8 more ratings for the campground

Beauty 5-star
Spaciousness 2-star
Security 2-star
Insect control 3-star
Site privacy 1-star
Quiet 2-star
Cleanliness 2-star
Facilities 3-star

Then it has paragraphs on (1) General description, (2) Basics, (3) Facilities, (4) Restrictions (pets - on 6-ft. leash, fires - in pits only, ages - no alcoholic beverages allowed, maximum length - no restrictions, back-in sites only, Other - Quiet hours 11pm-7am.), and (5) How to get there

I get the impression that it is very specific and candid, letting the chips fall where they may. Readers can leaf around and try to located a campground with high ratings in whatever aspect of camping they desire.

The drawback to the book is that it doesn't list all existing campgrounds. But it seems to list most areas that I frequent. It tries to mitigate this fault by giving a supplementary list of additional campgrounds without the full treatment of the main listings. I guess that they will add more main listings in future editions. The book that I have was published in 2002.

Hope this helps you evaluate whether you want to go to the trouble of acquiring this guide. I just checked Amazon.com and they list the new price at $21.99 but are selling new copies for $15.39 and have some used copies starting at $13.99. Happy camping!

Best Wishes,
WyomingRockHound

WyomingRockHound, Thanks for the info. We may try this one. Almost all of the good (I know the TX guys say there are not any good ones in OK) campgrounds in OK are US or State owned and never rated even though listed. Hmmmmm . . . . wonder if there is a 1st Amendment issue there somewhere. Probably not. Just the IRS lurking.

[Northwoods]

Found out today (3/15/04) that a brand-new edition of the Frommer's Guide is to be released in late April. We'll wait to get that edition on your recommendation. Missouri has excellent info on State Parks on the State Park Website, but then we love this state. Olga (Northwoods)

[Sinclue]

CC

I second the endorsement of the California Camping book (Foghorn Press) by Tom Stienstra. It is very useful and right on target. But it is generally oriented towards tenting so most commercial RV parks (ie places with lots of hookups, etc) are not included. If thats the way you want to go then one of the big books (Woodalls, GoodSam, CampingWorld) is what you should look into. You can see them all and compare them at a Camping World store. We also use the AAA info. They have both a booklet and two very useful camping maps (Southern & Central Ca. and Northern Ca).

If you travel with dogs as we do then I'd add The California Dog Lover's Companion by Maria Goodavage and DogFriendly.com's California & Nevada Dog Travel Guide. They also have Dog travel guides for other parts of the US. They are especially useful to us because they have a list of local vets and emergency vets. One of our dogs has seizures (idiopathic epilepsy) and although we are able to deal with them effectively it is good to know that we could locate a "local" vet quickly if needed.

jp