Traveling without a car

Hi,

I was in a class c for 5 years--never needed a toad.

I've traveled without a toad, and generally not found it to be a big drawback for me (emphasis on for me...different people have different needs and desires), though there are a few times it is a significant consideration for planning where to stay, where to go, and what to do. The longest trip by far was from Vermont up to and around Alaska and back.

I have put some miles on shoe leather over the course of several trips. I have occasionally used a bicycle, too, which can often be a nice compromise; a bike rack on the back of the motorhome is a lot less of an annoyance in maneuvering, etc. than a towed car.

I think generally if you're one who likes to move every few days or so then a towed car is much less of a help or necessity than if you like to spend a relatively long time at a given spot. It's a lot easier to stock up on groceries, say, if you can do it along the way to your next destination than if you have to unhook everything, drive the motorhome a couple miles to the local supermarket, and drive back and hook everything back up. It also depends somewhat on how much you do to set up and break down camp; simplify that and getting away for the day often becomes a little easier.

We did our first long trip (6 months, 6000 miles) without a toad. We didn't have a car you could tow 4 down anyway. We rented from Enterprise when we wanted a car. Getting parts for the RV got real expensive :)

We found that we were picking campgrounds based on the proximity to an Enterprise office. Not the best criteria. They say "we'll pick you up" but there's a limit as to how far they'll go to do that.

The next year I set up to tow a car. First thing I needed to do was find a good toad and buy a tow bar and brake. I lucked out on the tow bar, an older gent was selling his Blue Ox and RVi brake 2 for $900. A few hundred more to wire the Eqiunox and we were off.

We found that we see a lot more stuff with a toad. We did our second long trip out towards Glacier and we would have been hard pressed finding a rental in N. Dakota.

I just had some inspiration! We could plan our trip to go by a nearby RV repair place, pay someone $20 or so to help us hook up our toad, then be on our merry way. At our destination we can disconnect ourselves. When it's time to go, we can probably find someone (park employee or friendly camper) to help us connect again, give them a little spending money or some beer and then off we go! Wash and repeat! Do you think this will work?

We traded our 5'vr and bought a small Class C(24 ft.) which can go about anywhere. But, if we don't want to leave our site and need or want to explore, travel, sight see, etc.-we use Uber, Enterprise, shuttles, etc. Works for us and a lot cheaper than owning a vehicle in Calif.

Just got home last night from a 7000 mi 6 week trip from Ohio to northern CA and the Pacific NW. We did not take a car with us (30' class c). the only time we wished we had a car was driving through the redwoods in CA. There were several roads that we couldn't take the MH on. Also a couple times we stayed at a cg for a couple days. But the plusses outweighed the minuses. If I missed a turn(we stayed on the 2 lane roads), it was a very easy turnaround. Better mpg. We just planned our stops(overnight). We toured through the day on the way to the CG,and did any shopping before we stopped for the night. Would have rented a car in Glacier NP, but the road in the park was not completely open until a few days after we were there. If we had been destination camping we would have towed a car, but for on the move nearly every day we found it wasn't necessary. Gary

If the campground is near a popular tourist area often there will be shuttle service to visit nearby sights. Or car rental companies like Enterprise will bring a vehicle to the campground for you to rent.

Same if the campground is near or in a major city. We have on occasion used rental cars or public transportation to get around to see the sights.

It partly depends on what sights you are wanting to see. In some places, there are CG's right in town so you can use public transit to get around.

If you stay in some of the National Parks, they have free shuttle systems that get you around even easier than if you had your own vehicle. Zion, Bryce, Glacier, and the Grand Canyon come to mind. I'm sure others will chime in. The downside is that NPS campsites with FHU are either few in number or non-exitant in most parks. Although at Bryce and Zion, the free shuttle system also services nearby areas with private CG's w/FHU.

We ditched our toad and got a small motorhome that we use as a toad. We recently completed a 7,900 mile road trip across the US and Canada and had no problems. We even used the moho for sightseeing in Old Quebec City with its narrow roads.

If driving your moho as toad isn't your thing, you can always rent a car, use Lyft or Uber, or public transportation.