need your opinions: rv or hotel?
We are retired, very young ages 58 & 64, two small dogs and getting ready to hit the road, but have not been able to decide on mode of travel. Additional facts: we want to take the dogs as much as pos...
Forum Discussion
We looked on and off for a few years before we saw a deal that told us it was time to buy. On our first trip, we pulled over for some coffee but decided to take a 15 minute nap first. Woke up 90 minutes later, grabbed the coffee, and drove on completely refreshed...and giddy with our new purchase.
You don't get that kind of flexibility in an SUV or on an airplane and using hotels. There's a schedule to keep, you can't stop until you get to a hotel...on one trip shortly before we bought the RV, we ended up driving an extra four hours because all the hotels for several rural exits were taken up by a large church convention at one, a regional baseball tournament at another, and a softball tournament at another. The staff at a few of the hotels said they didn't know of a vacancy for about 90 miles along the interstate, so we just got more coffee and kept driving.
There were Walmarts with big parking lots at all of those exits. I don't remember if they had RVs in them, but mine would have been there that night and I don't even like Walmart!
So I've done just enough cost analysis to confirm that we're roughly breaking even on the basic purchase and travel expenses...and all the extra stuff I'm doing to customize it is extra.
So I'm spending more on the RV, but I get to have MY stuff now when I travel. That's a huge advantage...sleep in my own bed, my wife sits on her own pot (which is pretty important to her), etc.
And when I'm ready to drive out in the morning, I just start driving. No prying the teenagers out of bed, no packing up and dragging stuff to the car, no searching around for hotels that accept pets, etc.
And we take our personal space with us when we visit friends and family.
We also take more trips now b/c it's convenient. We're already paying for it so we might as well use it...even just for short weekend trips.
So...you're probably gonna get the same answer from most folks here b/c it's an RV forum. Ask this on a hotel community forum and you'll get the other side. But for us, this was the right decision.
Hope this helps!
You don't get that kind of flexibility in an SUV or on an airplane and using hotels. There's a schedule to keep, you can't stop until you get to a hotel...on one trip shortly before we bought the RV, we ended up driving an extra four hours because all the hotels for several rural exits were taken up by a large church convention at one, a regional baseball tournament at another, and a softball tournament at another. The staff at a few of the hotels said they didn't know of a vacancy for about 90 miles along the interstate, so we just got more coffee and kept driving.
There were Walmarts with big parking lots at all of those exits. I don't remember if they had RVs in them, but mine would have been there that night and I don't even like Walmart!
So I've done just enough cost analysis to confirm that we're roughly breaking even on the basic purchase and travel expenses...and all the extra stuff I'm doing to customize it is extra.
So I'm spending more on the RV, but I get to have MY stuff now when I travel. That's a huge advantage...sleep in my own bed, my wife sits on her own pot (which is pretty important to her), etc.
And when I'm ready to drive out in the morning, I just start driving. No prying the teenagers out of bed, no packing up and dragging stuff to the car, no searching around for hotels that accept pets, etc.
And we take our personal space with us when we visit friends and family.
We also take more trips now b/c it's convenient. We're already paying for it so we might as well use it...even just for short weekend trips.
So...you're probably gonna get the same answer from most folks here b/c it's an RV forum. Ask this on a hotel community forum and you'll get the other side. But for us, this was the right decision.
Hope this helps!
