Reserve America is just about the only was to grab a site these days sort of walking up praying for an available site.I have herd from more than one person that the trick is to be on te site at EXACTLY 8:00AM & be redy to search & select your site. I hae herd from others that it's midnight!Whats the real deal on reserving a site on Reserve America?

It's not so much a trick as a problem with the system.If you try for a specific site or time frame, if ANY ONE of those days is taken or overlaps, you can't make the reservation.Assume you want two weeks in Yellowstone, and you pick a site and dates. IF someone has a weekend, or even ONE day in your date choice, it rejects it. The only trick I can see is to look at the sites, find sites that are open first -- say you can get seven days on one site, five on another and two on another. Then you make three reservations -- and decide if moving, and paying three RA fees is worth it. When we reserve here in Florida state parks, we look at the sites open for the day we want to start, then look at how many days each of those sites is open longest days in a row, then reserve that site for those days ... then find another site that is open on the day after the first reservation, and see which one has the longest time frame open and reserve that one. We usually only have to move once in two weeks (and we are easy to move - a Truck Camper) The other way to do it is "show up" take one or two days open at a time - usually, unless it's peak season, at least a few sites are open between reservations, but no one asks which ones online (can't ask, actually) So, it depends on how much time and effort (and reserve fees) you want to spend getting camping days in a specific area.We've been camping all over the USA for a lot of years, and I can remember only a few times we had no luck with at least one or two nights in any CG. And, then we spend a day or so occasionally in overflow until something opens.Is it a hassle - NOPE -- we make the effort because we don't want to get stuck with a reservation we can't get to, or when we decide we want to spend more days where we are before leaving ... Families have different issues, but the same sequence of searching will often get you the days you want, even if it means a move or two - and an extra fee) And, we all are 'fairly mobile' -- that's what RV is all about.

It is in the morning, not midnight.The trick is to see what is available, look at the pictures and description and decide if it is for you. Have alternatives as well.Once you put in a site to the reservation spot, that site is assigned to you, giving you time to arrange payment. I think that you have 10, 15, or 20 minutes. Often, spots get assigned, but then the reservation does not actually get paid for, so they become available after that 10,15, or 20 minutes expires. It's worth trying again if you don't get it right.

mchero wrote:Reserve America is just about the only was to grab a site these days sort of walking up praying for an available site.I have herd from more than one person that the trick is to be on te site at EXACTLY 8:00AM & be redy to search & select your site. I hae herd from others that it's midnight!Whats the real deal on reserving a site on Reserve America?It really depends on what state or states you are making reservations for. As a for instance, CT, allows you to book no more than 11 months in advance but NYS allows you to book 9 months in advance. I generally book around 2 in the morning on the day the window opens and have no problems since I already did my research and know what my favorite sites are. reserveamerica also helps the date challenged amongst us by allowing you to put in an earlier than the window date reservation and then telling you it's not opened yet for reservations and what the actual date IS for making one;). Now the Fed system for booking @ Fire Island's National Seashore is not a part of reserveamerica so I go to that site separately and book at the stroke of midnight. And cross my toes and fingers since the system is slower and not as intuitive as RA's. HTH!

monkey44 wrote:It's not so much a trick as a problem with the system.If you try for a specific site or time frame, if ANY ONE of those days is taken or overlaps, you can't make the reservation.Assume you want two weeks in Yellowstone, and you pick a site and dates. IF someone has a weekend, or even ONE day in your date choice, it rejects it. The only trick I can see is to look at the sites, find sites that are open first -- say you can get seven days on one site, five on another and two on another. Then you make three reservations -- and decide if moving, and paying three RA fees is worth it. When we reserve here in Florida state parks, we look at the sites open for the day we want to start, then look at how many days each of those sites is open longest days in a row, then reserve that site for those days ... then find another site that is open on the day after the first reservation, and see which one has the longest time frame open and reserve that one. We usually only have to move once in two weeks (and we are easy to move - a Truck Camper) The other way to do it is "show up" take one or two days open at a time - usually, unless it's peak season, at least a few sites are open between reservations, but no one asks which ones online (can't ask, actually) So, it depends on how much time and effort (and reserve fees) you want to spend getting camping days in a specific area.We've been camping all over the USA for a lot of years, and I can remember only a few times we had no luck with at least one or two nights in any CG. And, then we spend a day or so occasionally in overflow until something opens.Is it a hassle - NOPE -- we make the effort because we don't want to get stuck with a reservation we can't get to, or when we decide we want to spend more days where we are before leaving ... Families have different issues, but the same sequence of searching will often get you the days you want, even if it means a move or two - and an extra fee) And, we all are 'fairly mobile' -- that's what RV is all about.RA added a "Not Flexible", "Flexible for 2 weeks", and "Flexible for 4 weeks" drop down to their opening page for making reservations a year or so back. Makes life a little easier although I wish they would add an ending date box for reservations instead of simply how many nights you want to stay.

mchero wrote:Reserve America is just about the only was to grab a site these days sort of walking up praying for an available site.I have herd from more than one person that the trick is to be on te site at EXACTLY 8:00AM & be redy to search & select your site. I hae herd from others that it's midnight!Whats the real deal on reserving a site on Reserve America?It's more like be on the RA site BEFORE 8:00:00am, have your campsite scoped out and be ready to hit "book now" right at the stroke of 8:00:00 a.m. And then be ready to see "Inventory Not Available" at 08:00:01 as I always do when trying to get that ever-elusive waterfront site at Bahia Honda. Ahhh.....someday ;)

OK, What's the trick to reserving on Reserve America?

NYCgrrl
Explorer
Jul 19, 2015
Big Katuna wrote:
snip
tcas01 wrote:
It sure would be nice if they would reserve some sites as "weekly only," maybe combine that with first come, first serve.

One of my pet peeves as well.

We owned a beachfront motel for ten years. We quickly learned that we could always fill the weekends up at the last minute so we would turn away weekend bookings that called months in advance and wait for the weeklies.

RA (who I detest) gets paid half the first night booking so negative incentive to book less stays.

They make more money booking four weekends than they would one site for two two week reservations.

Kind of irks me as a taxpayer that many parks are half empty during the week.

RA's payment structure is also based on the individual state's contract; there is no nationwide fee structure for them.

I can book a weekend and or/ weekdays with perfect ease as long as I follow the state's guidelines. It's been my experience that RA follows the individual state's requirements to the letter.Just back from a 21 day stay at a prime site located at a campground near several metropolitan areas. Made my reservation back in Aug or Sept 2014 when the window opened. And yes forethought is needed.

Sure there are empty spots from Monday to Wednesday but that's the norm in all segments of the lodging industry. The managers set an average price that allows them to meet their annual projected income accordingly which means your tax money is actually working well in this instance.
Knowing that, last Friday, I booked my annual Perseid viewing trip from August 10th-14th because it falls during the week; no way could I get a weekend since it was booked months ago. Since the best viewing time ends on the 14th no reason for me to want the weekend either. I'll buck the crowd and be back home while everyone else is heading out.
GMandJM
Explorer
Jul 19, 2015
Big Katuna wrote:
...RA (who I detest) gets paid half the first night booking so negative incentive to book less stays.

They make more money booking four weekends than they would one site for two two week reservations.

Kind of irks me as a taxpayer that many parks are half empty during the week.

Ya know, I always wondered if they had something like that built into their booking algorithm. Detecting which prospective customer wanted a site for 1 day vs. 14 so that they could get additional booking fees.

Like, if two people are trying to book at the exact same time, the one wanting fewer days would get preference, hence more first night booking fees for RA.

I'm probably giving RA too much credit for being an evil genius (instead of just evil) ;)
marcsbigfoot20b
Explorer
Jul 19, 2015
It seems to be even worse this year I'm guessing due to low gas prices now more people can afford to drive to the campgrounds.

I noticed every single weekend is booked now in many campgrounds (fri-sat nights) for months to come.
I'm sure there are cancellations but you would have to surf RA every day.
2gypsies1
Explorer III
Jul 19, 2015
Perhaps everyone could complain to the park they're trying to reserve. They're the ones who contract to Reserve America.

Ourselves? We go to non-reservable campgrounds. Even in some national parks there are campgrounds that don't even accept reservations such as in Yellowstone, Grand Tetons.
Big_Katuna
Explorer II
Jul 19, 2015
2gypsies wrote:
Perhaps everyone could complain to the park they're trying to reserve. They're the ones who contract to Reserve America.

Ourselves? We go to non-reservable campgrounds. Even in some national parks there are campgrounds that don't even accept reservations such as in Yellowstone, Grand Tetons.

I have written and called. Deaf ears. Thing is, occupancy went up when they signed on with RA as before, each park handled their own phones. The parks had one or two phones manned 8-5 and you could never get through. No cancellation rules so people would book more than they needed then cancel or just not show up.

And the slow parks didn't get much exposure. My complaints are $7 to book, $17 to change or cancel and you cant get a weekly site because the working folks grab all the weeknds.

In Florida, all the state parks use RA and we don't have many COE or Fed parks. A few county parks.
noplace2
Explorer
Jul 19, 2015
There are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of sites available on ANY date and whatever climate is your pleasure. Take your blinders off, stop bothering with that RA nonsense, and LOOK!

Hint: it ain't here.
TXiceman
Explorer II
Jul 20, 2015
Texas went to RA for the reservation system for a few years and due to the complaints dumped them for am in-house system. Works much better. I try to avoid RA as much as possible.

Ken
bikendan
Explorer
Jul 20, 2015
We generally avoid the RA nonsense, by avoiding camping in the summer, weekends and holidays.
Which leaves us at least 2/3 of the year to camp.
RGar974417
Explorer
Jul 20, 2015
Here's a trick: don't try to book weekends.We typically go in on a Sunday and leave on a Wednesday or Thursday.I just reserved the site we wanted in a popular state park for the middle of August less than a month away by doing this. Even the most popular sites will have vacant spaces as long as you don't go on a weekend.
noplace2
Explorer
Jul 20, 2015
RGar974417 wrote:
Here's a trick: don't try to book weekends.We typically go in on a Sunday and leave on a Wednesday or Thursday.I just reserved the site we wanted in a popular state park for the middle of August less than a month away by doing this. Even the most popular sites will have vacant spaces as long as you don't go on a weekend.

Please stop spreading this nonsense! It's liable to catch on!

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