pre-vacation hiccups

[0rion]

Hopefully these are just hiccups and not a sign of things to come. We leave Tuesday for 13 days of vacation. Get an email from the campground that the balance will be charged to our card on Tuesday. The problem was that card was cancelled by the bank because we had someone test it to try and rip us off and we're currently waiting for a new bank card to be issued. We have 2 different bank accounts....one that we use for online/phone purchases ect ect (the one cancelled) and another for everyday use. My wife called the campground to give them our other card number and finds out that the campground is doing some construction on part of the grounds and moved the monthly renters over to the site we had reserved. We're now in a site we really don't want but our 2nd campground choice is booked now and we don't want to risk trying a new place without checking it out first. In the end it's not life or death so we can live with it.

Tonight me and my son are driving through town in the truck and it's raining. There's a car getting ready to pull out of a parking lot so I move into the left lane to give them the right lane to turn onto. They weren't making a right....they were going straight across and pulled out in front of me. I was about 6" from t-boning them. I had my foot through the floor and the anti lock brakes were going crazy. Closest I've been to getting in a wreck in decades. I'm hoping this all isn't a sign of things to come.Maybe we're getting all the bad stuff out of the way before the trip. At least that's what I'm going with.

[0rion]

vacation went smooth....spot wasn't as bad as we thought although the kids didn't spend much time at the playground. They spent most of it asking to go to the pool haha. We would go to the beach and I would be changing into clothes and one of the kids would knock on the door and ask if I would take them to the pool haha.
We toured 5 other cg's while we were there and none of them were as good as the one we were in. Not nearly the shade or room. If anything it just showed us how much we like the current cg. They're doing a ton of renovations and changing a ton of things. We got to see the plans for the cg and what it'll look like when it's done. Hopefully they add spraying for skeeters to the list of things they'll do. It was impossible to sit out around the fire at night there. I've never seen skeeters as bad as they are there. I was using 40% deet and had 6 tiki torches going and we would still get bit to the point everyone wanted to go in.
Had the spare tire almost rip the bumper off. On the way home we stopped for lunch and during my walk around of the camper I noticed the spare tire looked odd. On closer inspection it had ripped the metal where the bumper attaches to the mounts. I pulled the spare tire and bracket off and made it the rest of the way with the spare riding in the camper. I'll have to look at that this week and weld it back up and reinforce it so that doesn't happen again. Very close and dangerous situation. Glad that bumper didn't come off and hurt someone.

[Mich_F]

It looks to me, after reading your original post, that you wouldn't have known your site was changed, until you got there, if your wife hadn't called the campground. Could be a help in getting a refund, if you want one.

[Toolguy5]

I have had 50/50 luck with refunds. I do believe in your situation though requested a specific site and was granted at time of reservation. But then lost in a few days before arrival the cg should give you a refund. It never hurts to ask.

[Crowe]

Check the cg's website or call to find out their cancellation policy. Most likely you are stuck, but as you stated you won't let the "where" take over "family time".

[0rion]

most of our camping isn't in cg's so we really don't know much about how policy is with most. We've already paid in full for our stay. Wasn't sure if they give refunds if we go and spend the 1st day touring other cg's and find one we like better. The wife and I sorta decided yesterday we wouldn't let a camping spot define our vacation. We're on vacation with our 3 kids and spending time together as a family.....how bad could it be right? This is probably the last year for us to go to this cg. There's been a few things that have made us say "hmmm" over the last 5 years of going to this one. New ownership took it over in April I guess which we weren't aware of. That could be a good or bad thing and the construction is a sign of them making improvements. I feel a little jipped though that we find out 2 days before we leave that we'll be staying in a spot we don't want. We like to stay line of sight to the playground so we can sit outside the camper and watch the kids play instead of packing everything over to the playground to watch. We won't let them go unattended. Like I say...this won't define our vacation but we'll be touring other cg's day 1 to either find one for next year or if we can get a refund we'll move to another cg day 2.

[jsmart]

Just pre-vacation jitters, all that stuff was going to happen anyway. You might see if the CG would consider a discount as they now have you in a spot that you didn't reserve. Anyway, enjoy your vacation and have a safe trip.

[Crowe]

Sounds like you've got a lot of "life" in life right now! I always try to take those as good signs-get all the bad karma done before you leave. You can always keep checking with the 2nd cg to see if an opening comes up and then move.

[jackquontee]

It's all uphill from here.

[Jim_Shoe]

One thing for sure. If you really did have the hiccups, the T-Bone incident would have scared them out of you. Glad everything came out all right. Hope you have a great vacation.