To Plan or not to Plan

We've RVed and camped since the '60s and never make reservations. Reservation for us means traveling on a schedule of being some where at a certain time. We prefer a more laid back approach when we go on trips with the camper or without.

My work like revolved around being on a schedule such as a completion date or delivering my loads on a certain date at a specific location. That put lots of stress on me so I promised myself no more driving to meet a schedule...... if possible.

Were like a butterfly. Wife and I planned a trip to Yosemite and come back through NV southern CO/UT and northern NM to our home in OK.
We made it to Yosemite but instead went up through NV/UT on to Thermopolis WY and back down through central CO. Very long relaxing trip. I didn't have to be limited by time or a schedule.

holstein13 wrote:
That is the dilemma. In the past, I worked full time and could only travel on weekends, vacations or holidays -- the most crowded times of the year with the least time to waste. I planned the major details like where we are going and where we are staying. Sometimes, I planned 9 months in advance just to get into a popular campground. But the downside to planning was A) the work involved and B) the commitment to the plan.

Now we are fulltiming and I find that long term planning is becoming a hinderance. Things come up that don't fit into the plan such as maintenance, chance meetings, discovering new things, etc.

So, what can I do? I still need to have some idea where I'll be so that I can receive my mail and schedule appointments, but when is enough, enough?

back in the pre-MH days when we were doing the motel thing on trips I would plan out the entire day. where we were having lunch, getting gas, stopping for the night. the whole shebang. Inside I was miserable and was likely making the wife miserable. it was all about the journey and not in a good way.

I made a radical change. instead of a detailed plan we basically selected a direction and headed that way. no plan other than a vague destination which frequently changed. I recall one year, still pre-MH, where we sat in the driveway still unsure if we were heading south or west. we picked west and wandered and meandered our way out there and back for a full month.

as we've gotten older we've found that a mix of the two methods is best for us. we tend to go to the southwest for 3-months in the spring along the same route and stopping at the same places along the way but making time to see and go places that we've not seen before. in the fall we're more spontaneous and likely to blow with the wind for 3-months...more of 'I wonder what's around that curve' and less structure.

another change we made was how many hours a day we drive between here and there. the norm in the car was 12-hrs. we were both working and, like you, there was not a lot of time to waste. after we retired that habit carried over to the MH trips. then one day as we were returning from a spring trip to Arizona we were EB on I-40 near Tucumcari, NM, fighting the wind all the way. we hadn't been on the road for more than 2-hrs when I decided to pull off the hwy at a Flying J truck stop to rest. as we were getting ready to head back out I saw an RV park just down the road from the truck stop. we decided to call it a day right then and there...at noon! that was a turning point. now we usually limit our driving day to 5-hours. 2-hrs in the morning, a 1-hr lunch stop followed by 2-additional hours of driving. we're usually setup in the campground or RV park by 3pm. we are now truly enjoying the journey.

as for mail...virtually all of the mail we must have...bills mostly...have been switched to e-mail and the associated payments are direct-debited from the bank account. we've been doing that for the past 15+ years with no hitches whatsoever. the rest, magazines and junk, can wait till we return home. my bro-in-law lives in our home while we're gone and if the odd piece of mail comes in that we need to see he opens it, scans it and e-mails the PDF to us.

good luck and safe travels to you.

Some things we find advance planning are required, some not so much. A summer trip out west with an Alaskan cruise in the middle of it required some planning. We didn't want to get held up on the road and miss the cruise plus we had to have a place to store our fiver for 8 days/nights.

Our winter spot in SW Florida we reserve months ahead of time also.

Other than that we may decide on a Monday to hook up and take a 2 week trip with very little advance planning.

Prior to us going full time I recall reading posts by experienced full timers. They said at first you would be in sort of a "vacation" mode but would eventually slow down and settle in. I think that is very true.

holstein13 wrote:

Old-Biscuit wrote:
If the CG didn't accept visitor mail we would find local PO that accepted 'General Delivery' and have it sent there.

What the what? There are Campgrounds that don't accept visitor mail? I hope there aren't very many of them. I do most of my non perishable shopping on Amazon and have been sending my packages ahead to the campgrounds as I knew where I'd be.

If there are campgrounds that don't accept mail, I'll be in real trouble because I don't even bother to check if they do or not. I just send my mail and packages there and assume they will accept it.

I'm thinking this will have to change...

Unless you enjoy being a mega-planner. ;)

What is long term planning?
We plan on crossing the Canadian Border around the middle of May to head to Alaska for the summer. We have no reservations, just a plan.
We are in DC right now but plan to leave around December 28. Don't know where we are leaving to, but we should figure it out.
We plan on heading west from DC, west enough that we wind up in Tucson by March 8 for the Escapees Escapade. We do have reservations for that.
We also have a week's worth of reservations in Yosemite because I lucked out and managed to snag a site when the reservations opened.

The thing about a plan is you are the one making it. You can also change it. I'm not sure how it could be a hindrance if it is something you control.

I am not full-timing yet so this is just my thoughts about the mail issue.. do you really need all those coupons forwarded to you? Every bill I owe (currently)is sent to my bank E-Billing address on the web and I pay them from online banking. Any forms from any company that I need in hard copy (insurance papers, bank statements, etc..)can be printed off from my computer/printer, I can't think of any hard copy mail that I would need to sent to me while on the road. JMHO.

If you are not worried about mail then "Plan A" is not to plan and to go with the follow, relax and stop rushing like you are in vacation mode.

In 16 years of full-timing we rarely made definite plans except if we were to meet up with someone at a particular time or wanted to go to a particular function. We had a general idea for 3-4 months out and headed that direction but no reservations. For instance, in summer we'd normally cover 3-4 states.

90% of our stays are at public parks and even with our 40' motorhome we rarely make reservations. We've been to all the major ones in the west. We get there early in the week and early in the day, many times spending the previous night outside the park but nearby so we can grab a site as folks are leaving in the morning.

For mail, we use Escapees RV Club mail forwarding service. We email or call them and our mail has always been received in 2-3 days as a small-town post office - general delivery - even in Alaska. We've never found a post office that wouldn't accept it. The key is to pick a small town. If we're heading toward a particular area that's the post office we'll pick. We've never made advance preparations with a post office.

For appointments, such as doctors, we make them when we'll be in an area a longer period of time. Winter months have worked the best for us as we usually stayed in the same winter area year after year so that's where we established doctors. Knowing that's where we'd be, we'd call for appts. approximately 3 months prior.

Everything is doable for full-timers with minimal planning.

for definite destinations, dates, in a desirable location during an event or season, make reservations.
Its regrettable to us all to see the uninformed/ miseducated at a destination having to settle for, if it can be found, lesser quality accommodation at inflated price.
Do yourself a favor.

holstein13 wrote:

Old-Biscuit wrote:
If the CG didn't accept visitor mail we would find local PO that accepted 'General Delivery' and have it sent there.

What the what? There are Campgrounds that don't accept visitor mail? I hope there aren't very many of them. I do most of my non perishable shopping on Amazon and have been sending my packages ahead to the campgrounds as I knew where I'd be.

If there are campgrounds that don't accept mail, I'll be in real trouble because I don't even bother to check if they do or not. I just send my mail and packages there and assume they will accept it.

7 yrs. of FTng.
YES there are CGs that don't accept visitor mail.
We came across quite a few in our travels.
Same with Post Offices.....not all accept 'General Delivery'

Best to ALWAYS check/verify FIRST

We plan the route and stops but not in stone or dates. We stop Sun-Thurs nights and stay put over the weekend. In popular areas we make reservations. We also make reservations for weekends. This loose planning keeps us flexible.
Our daughter sends our mail about once a month. We look ahead decide where we want to spend a week, make reservations for the week and provide our daughter with the address and tell her when to mail them. We usually get our mail in 5-7 days. Sometimes we have to stay a couple extra days if it falls on a weekend to get the mail. We schedule our appointments when we're at home base every 6 months.