Should I make reservations or wing it?
This might be the most general of general questions but since I'm a relative newbie - at least in terms of owning a motorhome - I really want the opinions of more experienced RVers. I'm planning a 3...
Forum Discussion
It's kind of ironic that you posted this topic at this point in time. I've just about finished planning a 6-week trip that we'll be taking this spring. At the beginning of my planning I was telling Mrs. S that I didn't want to be tied down to reserved sites. I wanted the freedom to be able to move around as we liked, in response to the weather and whether or not we liked where we were.
Our destination is Florida.
The first thing I realized is that if we wanted to camp in the Keys (we did), then I either had to be prepared to pay top dollar at a resort or get lucky to pick up someone else's cancelled reservation at a state park. Well, we got lucky and landed reservations for 6 nights at Bahia Honda. This pinned us down to a six-day stay near the end of our six-week trip. The very next day we found ourselves with the opportunity to take a cancellation at Topsail Hill Preserve, in the panhandle, for six nights near the beginning of our trip. Both of these parks are so highly prized and so hard to get into that we went ahead and made the reservations. So now we were pinned down at the beginning and ending of our trip
Then, as time went on, we found a number of highly-desirable and inexpensive campgrounds in various areas throughout the state. Some were state parks, some were Corps of Engineers campgrounds, and some were Forest Service campgrounds. Each of them had plenty of sites available during the times when we'd be traveling. But, day by day I saw the number of available, reservable sites disappearing. Each time it got down to two or three sites left, I pulled the trigger and grabbed a reservation.
So now, I have reservations for about 22 of the 42 nights we'll be traveling. Each time, just before I made the reservation, I went through this argument with myself: freedom or peace of mind? Each time it came down to the fact that we really liked the specific place we wanted to stay, and we realized that if we didn't reserve it we weren't going to be able to stay there.
So - the lesson I think I've learned? If you have done the research to find highly desirable places to camp, and you really want to be able to stay in them - you probably need reservations.
Having said that, the 3-to-5 day drive down to FL and the 3-to-5 day drive back are totally non-reserved. We will be winging it all the way, both ways.
-Speak
Our destination is Florida.
The first thing I realized is that if we wanted to camp in the Keys (we did), then I either had to be prepared to pay top dollar at a resort or get lucky to pick up someone else's cancelled reservation at a state park. Well, we got lucky and landed reservations for 6 nights at Bahia Honda. This pinned us down to a six-day stay near the end of our six-week trip. The very next day we found ourselves with the opportunity to take a cancellation at Topsail Hill Preserve, in the panhandle, for six nights near the beginning of our trip. Both of these parks are so highly prized and so hard to get into that we went ahead and made the reservations. So now we were pinned down at the beginning and ending of our trip
Then, as time went on, we found a number of highly-desirable and inexpensive campgrounds in various areas throughout the state. Some were state parks, some were Corps of Engineers campgrounds, and some were Forest Service campgrounds. Each of them had plenty of sites available during the times when we'd be traveling. But, day by day I saw the number of available, reservable sites disappearing. Each time it got down to two or three sites left, I pulled the trigger and grabbed a reservation.
So now, I have reservations for about 22 of the 42 nights we'll be traveling. Each time, just before I made the reservation, I went through this argument with myself: freedom or peace of mind? Each time it came down to the fact that we really liked the specific place we wanted to stay, and we realized that if we didn't reserve it we weren't going to be able to stay there.
So - the lesson I think I've learned? If you have done the research to find highly desirable places to camp, and you really want to be able to stay in them - you probably need reservations.
Having said that, the 3-to-5 day drive down to FL and the 3-to-5 day drive back are totally non-reserved. We will be winging it all the way, both ways.
-Speak
