RVing in the summer holiday's. HELP?

[Mik68]

I have a question mainly to do with the school summer holidays in June/July/August & where we will be in our travels at this time period. We are 2 family's from Australia planning the mother of a trip around your beautiful country towing FW's and have 2 possible starting points leaving close to the beginning of April 2014 & heading in an anti clockwise direction. We have 6 to 7 months to complete a full circle & end up where we started.
The 1st being from LA, so our travels in this summer holiday period we will be heading up the East coast from Florida all the way to top of Maine (June/July) & across the North to Vancouver (July/August). The 2nd starting point from Dallas, Texas at same time so would be travelling in the summer holidays from around Maine across the North to Vancouver (June/July) & down the West coast in the month of August to LA.
So with a lot of people filling up the camp grounds in this period is there one of my scenario's that sounds better than the other in terms of avoiding the chaos & full camp grounds or maybe weather could also play a part in our decision?
We welcome any other suggestions to this situation you can offer.
Cheers Mik

[Mik68]

Me Again wrote:


Speaking of Michigan. Be sure to go to the Ford museum! Chris

Noted thanks, my mate, the other family we are travelling with is a big ford fan. We are both car enthusiasts. I like most classic cars but I lean more towards dodge, plymouth, etc.

[Me_Again]

michigansandzilla wrote:
If you plan on staying in Michigan on the water, you will need reservations 6 months in advance for any summer weekend. Not just thigahe holidays. You can typically find a site at almost any state park that's not on the water provided it is not a holiday. But, it's Michigan and what's the fun in staying somewhere here in the summer that's not on the water!
The trip sounds amazing. Have a great time.

Speaking of Michigan. Be sure to go to the Ford museum! Chris

[Mik68]

Chock Full o' Nuts wrote:

Mik68 wrote:
Thanks for the ongoing suggestions & info. We have made our decision to land & start our trip in Texas.
Mik

Y'all should be fine as long as you recognize that distances are deceiving. Texas is a huge state and the rest of the western states are pretty big too. On a map, it can look fairly innocuous, but on the ground it can mean 100s of miles from one side of the state to the other. Just don't let your gas gauge dip below 1/4 tank--gas stations can be far apart out west.

Thanks For the heads up, Texas sounds a lot like Western Australia, in fact I was once told Texas is the sister state to W.A. Perth is the most isolated city in the world so any holiday in an RV is around 3 hours away. We are quite used to gas stations being far apart. We chose Texas because we can fly direct into Dallas & for the big open roads to get used to the truck towing a FW.

[Chock_Full_o__N]

Mik68 wrote:
Thanks for the ongoing suggestions & info. We have made our decision to land & start our trip in Texas. We need to keep to a certain pace in order to achieve our goals so should be able to work out roughly where we will be on those weekends. Of course everything is subject to change, due to health, weather, fun, location etc. That is probably a very realistic suggestion Tatest, keeping a distance from all the 'must see or be at places' , we can lie low in a not so crowded park for a popular weekend. We are not really ones for crowds anyway.
Mik

Y'all should be fine as long as you recognize that distances are deceiving. Texas is a huge state and the rest of the western states are pretty big too. On a map, it can look fairly innocuous, but on the ground it can mean 100s of miles from one side of the state to the other. Just don't let your gas gauge dip below 1/4 tank--gas stations can be far apart out west.

[Mik68]

Thanks for the ongoing suggestions & info. We have made our decision to land & start our trip in Texas. We need to keep to a certain pace in order to achieve our goals so should be able to work out roughly where we will be on those weekends. Of course everything is subject to change, due to health, weather, fun, location etc. That is probably a very realistic suggestion Tatest, keeping a distance from all the 'must see or be at places' , we can lie low in a not so crowded park for a popular weekend. We are not really ones for crowds anyway.
Mik

[tatest]

We have Summer Vacation (mid-May to beginning of September, considering all regional variations) during which families with school age children travel, and we have Holidays during which everyone tries to do their holiday activity. These are Memorial Day ( end of May), Fourth of July (what it says, stretching to nearest weekend) and Labor Day (first Monday in Septempber).

Those three holidays, everything fills up, almost everywhere. Three day weekends, a week eiter side.

During summer vacation, generally, families go off to the "must visit" places that show up in the "before you die" books that now dominate travel planning. Those places will be busy, reservations preferred, for all of the summer vacation peroid. But 95% of the places you might visit or camp will not be on these bucket lists, so you might expect to find someplace, somewhere, away from the prime attractons. Weekends busier than midweek, but not much so, any plsce more than 3-4 hours drive from a major metro area.

During the three holiday weekends, when almost eveyone is trying to be someplace other than home, a camping spot (or hotel room) can be challenging to find. Not as difficult maybe as the two big holidays in China (been there, done that) but getting pretty close, unless you happen to be in the great empty middle of our country, more than a half day's travel from either a metro area or a prime attraction. Half day is the key, about our threshhold travel time commitment for a holiday weekend.

[TnCamperMama]

IDK if your travels will take you through the beautiful state of TN, but you can make state park campground reservations up to a yr in advance online.
www.tn.gov click on the state park link.

Natchez Trace state park has an exit off I40 and easy to get to the cg off the interstate. There are 3 diff campgrounds in the park, so even w/o a res you should be able to find a site for your fw.

I'm jealous of your trip, 🙂 I hope y'all have a great time!!!

[Ray552]

I would start out from LA and get thru the southwest early in summer. Sounds like a great trip.

I think the suggestion to bring a laptop and get online while traveling every couple days /weeks is a good one to ask where are places near where you expect to be is a good one.

In a way I hate WalMarts and Meijer but they are great when traveling you can get oil, cloths and groceries all in one stop.

I would rather travel without a set agenda but have to have sites set up before hand to keep the wife happy. I have had an unexpected injury hold us up for a week on a long trip so I know we got to stay flexible. So far I have had no trouble cancelling when unexpected trouble comes up.

I took a long trip last year and had every reservation made ahead of time I planned to travel no more than two days straight then a stay of at least three days at a site. I had the info for the sites on the lap top and printed out on paper as well as a calendar planning book.

[Mik68]

michigansandzilla wrote:
If you plan on staying in Michigan on the water, you will need reservations 6 months in advance for any summer weekend. Not just the holidays. You can typically find a site at almost any state park that's not on the water provided it is not a holiday. But, it's Michigan and what's the fun in staying somewhere here in the summer that's not on the water!
The trip sounds amazing. Have a great time.

Now that's not gonna happen, booking 6 months in advance, we would of only just landed & got set up, there's no way were gonna know we're we'll be in 6 months. State parks it is when we hit Michigan & we'll have to make the most of coast lines when were on them & pools. :W

[michigansandzil]

If you plan on staying in Michigan on the water, you will need reservations 6 months in advance for any summer weekend. Not just the holidays. You can typically find a site at almost any state park that's not on the water provided it is not a holiday. But, it's Michigan and what's the fun in staying somewhere here in the summer that's not on the water!
The trip sounds amazing. Have a great time.

[wannavolunteerF]

Mik, if you want to see native animals consider state and national parks. In GA, SC, and FL, I have had racoons steal food off the table and try to break in my camp box, deer walk with 3-4 feet of me, armadillos walk under the chair I am sitting in, and other critters wander by. I tend to ignore the squirrels since they are such a nuisance at my house (they actually gnawed on the just painted eaves of my house). I have seen a few snakes, alligators and bears (but not quite so close). Be sure you research, so you know when you are most likely to see these animals. Also research the birds you will see, the US has a large variety of birds including some really impressive birds of prey and water birds.

[Mik68]

Sounds like fun, although I was hoping that we would encounter some native animals like Racoons, squirrels, the occasional bear, deer etc.
Australia is almost as big as US but alot of distance between towns and nothing inbetween. A bit lik travelling through Arizona or New Mexico I guess.

[Chock_Full_o__N]

Mik68 wrote:
Thanks for that Chock full o' nuts, I was hoping that we be the case, everyone has said to book on those holiday weekends you mentioned. We have done an itinerary & realised looking at that, that we need way more down time & less travel time so we are re-evaluating it. Handy hint about Walmart, cheers! We have 3 girls that will be 5, 8 & 10 so won't be taking risks. I have seen that there are other places like some state parks that you can boon dock at. We stayed in one in Washington state or Oregon back in '99 when we were cycle touring. Very excited, cannot wait!

Oh, wow, yeah with kids that young you're going to have to plan some downtime. If not, you'll have a mutiny in the backseat by the 3rd day. We covered 6000 miles in 60 days, but only because our teens were more tolerant of the long days of driving. The USA is a VERY big place.

Some of our best layovers were at small campgrounds. One had a litter of kittens that my daughter found--needless to say, she was fully entertained with that! Another place had a flock of turkeys that made the rounds every morning and every evening. Another had bunnies that came out at sunset and entertained everyone. We found a neat drive in movie in NM and giant ferns & trees in western Washington.

Most nights we stayed someplace that had a pool or lake or a playground. We stayed at several KOA campgrounds where they had pancake breakfasts on the weekends and one in Butte,Montana, that had the best fried chicken EVAH.

[Mik68]

Thanks for that Chock full o' nuts, I was hoping that we be the case, everyone has said to book on those holiday weekends you mentioned. We have done an itinerary & realised looking at that, that we need way more down time & less travel time so we are re-evaluating it. Handy hint about Walmart, cheers! We have 3 girls that will be 5, 8 & 10 so won't be taking risks. I have seen that there are other places like some state parks that you can boon dock at. We stayed in one in Washington state or Oregon back in '99 when we were cycle touring. Very excited, cannot wait!