Ready 4 full timing, but theft has me worried the most!

The reality is that there are a lot of RVers who like to keep cash on hand and scammers would like to find a way to take it from them. My first piece of advice is that you do not need to carry much cash.
I was in a campground in the Tampa, FL area when someone knocked on my door and lured me out with a great story. We wandered down a couple of coaches only to find that there were 3 guys there running a 3 card Monte scam (I was driving a Prevost). I laughed at them and told them they were crazy if they thought I was going to fall for their nonsense. I went back to the RV and tried to get in contact with campground security (Lazy Days) but was not successful. While trying other options I heard some screaming. Turns out they found a sucker farther down the road and when he won a couple of times he went back to his coach and came out with an envelope with $20,000 in cash. They just snatched it out of his hands and ran.
Victims are victims but sometimes having just a little bit of sense helps to keep you safe.
The "funny" part is when the police showed up and I told them what happened, they looked at my Prevost and said "You do know that you were the mark, don't you?" I had no cash on board but appearance is everything.

midnightsadie wrote:
buy a good security system from a watch dog company

Or, get a good watch dog for a security system!!! ;):D I don't think anyone wants to break into our motorhome with a big German Shepherd inside.

If a crook wants into an RV, be it Towable or Motorized, they are going to get in. But one cannot destroy their life worrying about it! When we leave, we lock the exterior bay doors (a key fob that locks them all with one click sure is nice), lock the entrance door, and go.

Agree with all. Being in the service industry for 35 years, that is 5-7 homes a day, 6 days week, 35 years, have met literally tens of thousands of people. And not on the street, but inside their personal homes seeing how they live, seeing how neat and clean or sloppy they are, blah blah blah. You don’t do that and not come to understand human nature, and be able to read people very well.

And I assume it’s the exactly same % in RV’s. Poor, rich, medium. You can never guess one’s personality or niceness or rudeness based upon money it’s just that simple. People are people and they are who they are regardless of their financial circumstances.

As such, you meet people who are poor and are very nice, and people who are rich and are Jerks. And vice versa. There’s no collation that I have ever found. You’re either nice or you are not and that has nothing to do with your financial status.

Update: other post sneaked in before me so was saying I agree with all, concerning your comments on homeless. Not necessary the rest about what I should bring or not :)

Don't leave stuff lying around. Keep the good stuff out of sight. Don't talk about it. Get to know your neighbors. Stop worrying or find another hobby.

Now on the other hand and in thinking about this more if you plan on traveling around with your $50k gold collection or a large amount of cash or a $50K painting you are crazy. I dont know your age but this whole conversation also makes me think of other stuff that I have gone through lately.

Recently when our in laws were talking about getting rid of stuff and giving stuff to the kids the words "death cleaning" came up. My wife later told me that that was sick. I said no not really, it's actually smart and seems like part of what everyone should do. I mean we are older people so we are closer to death. If I drop dead tomorrow what would my kids have to deal with? What would my wife have to deal with? If we both died what would our kids have to deal with, would they be rear end deep in "stuff" that they have to make decisions about during such an emotional time.

Ideally if we were gone they would get an envelope in the mail with all the details and will and accounts etc. Of course that's not practical but what is the in between ground? To me the in between ground is to reduce needless clutter and objects that I know I will never use again. I'm not going to kill and drag a deer out of the woods because it may kill me. I'm not camping on the ground and I'm not wrenching full time and moonlighting so why would I need so many tools? It wasn't long ago that I finally resigned myself to the fact that I'm not going to get a job and wrench again. I can do a lot of work at a slower pace but I cant wrench somewhere and crank out job after job 8 hr a day so thin out all the tools.

I understand what you mean about needing the stuff you have but some of that may change as you age and travel. Some people that full time keep a storage unit or have someone store stuff for them and make the process of getting rid of stuff a more gradual thing. It's all about money so some people have massive MH and tri axle double deck trailers with shops and cars and atv and aircraft with them. Overall though it just seems natural and good to down size ones possessions. I have been doing it and I'm now able to pretty much know where just about everything I own is. Stuff like cameras, guns, tools etc BUT I do still have a home base. My wife is the opposite and has tons of stuff that she wont even talk about getting rid of. that's ok but in the end it all ends up going to kids or garage sales or even an auction if both people die. Why deal with and stress over stuff that I dont need or use.

Going even a little farther on the topic I would say that there is a lot of stuff that I wasted money on. Look at how much stuff people end up with that ends up in a garage sale or in the trash. I often tell younger people to think about the trinkets and needs vs wants.

I do agree that having no plans is the way to go. That’s part of the freedom concept. I didn’t want to load myself up with must sees and must stops as would seem too routine and scheduled. I may very well change my mind after a couple of months of driving around in circles but for the most part I love the thought of being so free that I have nowhere to go and no timeframe to get there in

azrving wrote:
MH Motorhome
FW Fifth Wheel
TT Travel Trailer
TV Tow Vehicle
Television Television
:)

Who knows what the % of goofballs or weirdos is. Who cares. People are people, you sort them out as you go. No different then all the people we grew up with or worked with or whatever.

OMG!!!!!!!!! How did I not know FW was a fifth wheel ????!!! INSANE!!!! My bad I went brain-dead for a moment evidently...

MH Motorhome
FW Fifth Wheel
TT Travel Trailer
TV Tow Vehicle
Television Television
:)

Who knows what the % of goofballs or weirdos is. Who cares. People are people, you sort them out as you go. No different then all the people we grew up with or worked with or whatever. As we started traveling I noticed how many people seem to be homeless or living in rv parks. It doesn't make any of them bad people and to me it's a sign of the true economy and job market. It can get into politics and social issues but why go there. As inflation (printing and dilution of money) continues people choose to live in different ways.

There a lot of people living a mobile lifestyle that are considered the mobile homeless. If it wasn't for wheels they probably would be on the street. Again, it doesn't make them bad people and I have met and talked to a whole bunch of them. Some are near death of cancer, some are older and dont have the job skills to pay rent and all the associated costs so they choose a mobile life style. if a person might have limited resources yet plenty of money to buy a good rig and hit the road. Some will work or work camp to reduce costs.

Some of the nicest people I have met were some of the least well off and some of the snobbiest stuck up sob were very well off. I've also met poor dirtbags with a chip on their shoulder about anyone who has anything and have met people in $400K MH who were just as down to earth and friendly as could be.

You need to come out and do a tour of the slabs so you have a better perspective. ;)

I give up! What’s an FW? Based on my research the last few months I think it used to be that everybody who was out there in RVs were pretty cool people. In today’s world? I think about 30% of them are finicky weirdos! LOL

ok here we go, This will probably be like a book.

We have a FW. It's good that you have no plans, it gives you less stress as far as I'm concerned. Yes, we have basic plans but we seldom book a spot anywhere unless it's a place like Moab or something. We dont travel with anyone and keep watching in the mirrors to see that they are still with us. :) We have communicated with and met camping friends at places but we dont follow each other. We also dont have a huge number of friends, it's just a handful that we have met in different ways.

We know some of those people just from bumping into them and bsing with them and others from a motorcycle website and atvs. The first two guys I ever met were at Snowbird Mesa near Overton Nv while walking my dog. Both full time and one was from Idaho and the other Virginia. The Idaho guy was a little different and made some comment about trash that was dumped over the side of the mesa by my spot. I told him I'm the guy that was down there this morning cleaning it up so he shut up about that. We then talked about all 3 of our solar setups and he said his buddy from Virgina dont know squat about solar and his system was cast down by God. I knew then that Idaho was goofball and Virginia guy was normal.

They both also told me about all sorts of places to boondock and where to get free dumps and water and trash. Their next stop was in Vegas for a car show and then on to the AVI casino near Fort Mohave. There were no plans made and we said maybe we will will meet again. We made our next stop the AVI casino which is a hard packed illuminated parking lot. They also have a very nice campground. We were there a couple days and V guy pulled in so we would sit outside now and then and bs. We talked about solar again and compared performance. I was new to solar but noticed that for similar sized banks and him being mppt and me pwm I got better performance. I razzed him and told him it seems it should be the other way around.

He said back in Virginia he had a neighbor who was a Ford tech and anytime he V had a problem he'd open his hood in the driveway and Ford tech would be over and look at it and even wrench on it for him. He laughed and said he thinks I'm his solar Ford tech guy. We laughed and also told him we will look at his system and make him better at solar than the Idaho guy.

Fireworks are legal and the native Americans sell them so some of them enjoyed shooting them out over the parking lot so we moved on. We made no plans but he kept telling me about Socal and that it's where he spends a lot of his winter. Our next stop was along the north side of 62 west of Parker. When we pulled in V wasn't there but Mr I was. He was complaining about the dust and that someone was parked in "his" spot which was about 200 feet away. Both areas were exactly the same rocky desert but it was his spot so he moved over a couple days later.

He asked me if I ever went to the Bouse community center for the senior breakfast. I said I have never even heard of Bouse so he said to come down and check it out and told us where he would be parked. We went to Bouse a few days later and met but he was ready to pack up and move to the other side of the mountains nearer to the Q. We had no over the air television so we moved the next day. We were then camped in the BLM area on Plamosa road and I went with him to the solar store for another panel. His system was a little bigger than Mr V but a little smaller than mine so I think he needed one more panel so his system would be bigger. We are guys so I completely understand. :)

We woke up and he was gone but we stayed around to check out the Q area for a few weeks and then moved down to Socal. When we pulled in both of them were there. We did more bsing about solar systems and they told me were to get all the free stuff. Mr V showed me his poorly underwired system and told me about a couple other elec problems he had. We decided to rewire the whole thing and went Starlite solar in Yuma and he showed me around town. We worked on his rig for a few days and straightened it out then compared notes daily and he was able to start using more of his appliances without depleting his batteries too much.

I would ride my bicycle around and met another Canadian guy camped out in the far back area with his mini van, trailer and Honda atv. He told me about all the trails and fruitless prospecting that he did in the area. I climbed the small mountains out behind us and noticed him and others riding their atv far off in the distance and knew I needed to bring toys next time. I noticed Mr I during 2017/18 in socal but didnt connect because he's too crabby and lost touch with Mr V possibly because of medical issues. I did hang out and ride our atv's with Mr Canada who is a crazy but very good person. I would ride 5 miles down to his area and see his MH door wide open and grills, gas, propane, generator all laying around and him off on his atv somewhere. I left a piece of quartz on his door step and he came and found us the next day and said he knew it was me.

We were asked to camp with other dirt bike people so we went back to the Q and stayed there a couple weeks. While riding there we met several people and did a group ride and learned a lot about the area. While there I talked to others dirt riders on Rvillage but some had mechanical problems and couldn't make it to the rides.

So all of that gives you an idea of how it works for us. When you look at all the people who are out there doing this stuff most of it is stacked in your favor of having a very good chance of meeting good like minded people. Sure there are some out there that want your generator or mine but it's incredibly safe and trouble free. It doesn't mean that it's all lollipops and unicorns, there are people who want to sit there and not even wave to you. That's fine because we are all different and all doing different stuff.

If you like atv's or dirt bikes you will love the west. There are a wide variety of areas and some need street legal and some are atv permit. Some states recognize out of state orv permits and some dont. Az will sell you a plate so you can ride the highways or just orv.

I believe a lot of full time that no matter if in a car or van or rv people will go to the desert or south for the winter and head for higher elevation during the summer. We travel with the weather and prefer to run the furnace over running the AC. We are snowbirds so we dont have the experience that others can share with you about the summer temps and where they go. Our friend Mr V was going to Alaska for the summers. I'm in the south now so if I was fulltiming right now I would probably head towards Denver to have a spring visit with relatives then head over towards Taylor park, Grand Canyon of the Gunnison, Ouray, Silverton Colorado. I dont know the summer temps exactly but it's probably pretty mild compared to Moab or Flagstaff which is 7000 feet.

I hope all of this gives you some ideas and more of a feel of what to expect. You will be fine and find your way through it. The whole thing is very interesting. You can pull into a remote party store fuel stop in northern Minnesota and chit chat with someone who you find out lived 2 miles away from you. I drove over the muddy Mississippi several times and wondered where the heck it starts. I decided to find out and here it is.

Early bird view of the headwaters. A few hours later there were 25 people wading around.



Lets see if a few pics can help turn your unfounded worries into enthusiasm. :)

Part of Moab that people dont talk about. The La Sals south east of town in October.









Moab Fins and Things Trail



Hail storm on Hwy 313 on the way to Canyonlands



Canyonlands



Malaquite Padre Island



Indian Pass Rd near Picacho Peak Socal



Bull Sluice Chattooga River SC



Isaqueena Falls SC



Rocky Mt NP



Gemini Bridges Trail looking out to Moab



Cell phone pic on dirt bike headed back to camp on Plamosa Rd the Q