Kodiak02
Apr 07, 2013Explorer
Travel with guns
When you are a full timer what issues are there with having a gun for protection? Restrictions when crossing state lines? Thank you.
CKNSLS wrote:Just Jeff wrote:
Glad to help!
You can also ask them if they have a responsibility to protect their families and when they say yes, just ask them what tools they plan to use if a bad guy has a weapon. Most folks who don't carry say they'll just call the cops and wait. So ask them to look up what the LEO response times are for the areas they're commonly in. In many urban areas, they'll have about 5-7 minutes of praying the bad guy has a conscience...and 45 minutes or more in rural areas. And then look up how long violent crimes usually take from start to finish. Aside from rape, most are over well before 5-7 minutes.
IMO, leaving my family's safety in the hands of a bad guy is shirking my responsibility to them. There's nothing evolved about that. Failing to plan is planning to fail, and in a game where the first failure could be your last chance, the stakes are too high for me to take that risk.
And being in the RV doesn't change that, so I look for ways to ensure I can legally protect my family when I travel. Usually that's as simple as...
- Knowing whether the states have reciprocity with my CCW permit, and any differences in laws
- Knowing whether the state has a Castle Doctrine, and if so, whether that extends to vehicles
-- Even when it doesn't extend to standard vehicles, sometimes it extends to RVs (and even tents). This is when some laws can get complicated...as in the firearm can't be in the cab, or loaded while the vehicle is in motion, etc. This usually only matters when there's no reciprocity...otherwise, I'm legal to carry anyway.
- Knowing whether the state is Duty-to-Retreat
I also carry the lockbox in case I want to have a beer. :) Don't need a gun on me with alcohol in my system!
The first few are pretty easy...it's the RV specific ones that are sometimes a little harder to find, and sometimes open to a little more interpretation.
As I said, if all goes well I'll never need to find out exactly how those laws apply! :)
You can spin it any way that suits you fancy. My bottom line is I have traveled thru over half of the USA in the past 6 1/2 months and have NEVER needed a firearm, or NEVER NEEDED to call the police. The way some RVers talk about carrying makes one think there is a bad guy in every RV campground, rest area, gas station or truckstop looking to rob you of your possessions or harm your wife.
And I haven't run in to one of them. TOTAL TRIP-16,000 miles thus far. Includes both towing and non-towing miles.