Need for Reservations

[Jerry Burks]

We are planning our first longer trip in September (31' Class A with small toad).
Route will be from Minneapolis down Mississippi River starting 9/14 continuing through Arkansas to Texas and back home to L.A. I believe the only super touristy destinations we will come across are in the Ozarks.

I was wondering about the need to make advanced reservation, given that this is already kind of off-season. Or should we just call ahead a few days before we get to an interesting place and take the risk?

I am asking because we have no recent camping experience and don't know how busy the typical RV campgrounds are at this time of the year. FWIW, we did already make reservations for the trip from L.A. out to Minneapolis, given that is August and Labor Day week.

[twogypsies]

I'd recommend just calling before a day or two of arrival. That makes the trip much more relaxing if you're not pressured to be at a place at a certain time.

I hope the flood mess will be o.k. by then. Some campgrounds might be closed because of damage.

Have a good trip!

[momdoc]

I would (and we usually do this) plan ahead a week or so.

[winniman]

There are two camps on this subject. The." fly by the seat of your pants" crowd, and the "wont leave home without the entire trip booked" crowd. I fall in the call when you know where you will be tomorrow crowd. In probably 40,000 miles of rving over 10 years, we have only had to stay at Walmart a few times. If you are heading into high demand areas at prime time, for sure make reservations. Otherwise, I recommend not making reservations. Mechanical problems, or other delays can put your schedule off. It happens when you rv sometimes.

[ivykrewe]

We call about an hour before we are ready to stop. Works 99.9 % of time for us.

[Jerry Burks]

Great, thanks! I guess I will just hold off with the reservations.

[Wayne M]

Jerry,
There are so many variables, season, school in or out, holidays, weekends (school in but weekend warriors because of school and work.)

We were fly-by-day until about a year ago. Ran into some problems finding places. Of course, we are seaonal. That is we get out of the Texas Gulf Coast during the summer and head to cooler places. Guess you could call us "Summerbirds," or "Traveling From Texas Texans."

We are getting a little later start than normal and want to go to Flagstaff, AZ and spend a month there. Made reservations as far as San Angelo, TX and then it stopped. No more places had a spot. Changed our plans and after many calls we are headed to Ohio.

My opinion, with the present upturn in RV'ing, is to plan your trip. How many miles you will drive in a day and make reservations within reason of those miles. Sure is a lot less frustrating than Fly-by-day. I can sit back now and drive to one place at a time and know I have a setup.

[twogypsies]

A lot has to due with how adamant you are about staying at a particular place or style of camping. If you need a certain kind of park such as one with full hookups or a pool vs. accepting water & electric only and using the dump station on the way out or dry camping in public parks then you might have problems. We love dry camping and public parks. Even the big national parks such as Yellowstone and Glacier have campgrounds that don't even accept reservations. If you stay nearby the previous night and pull into the campgrounds early morning your chances are good for getting a site. Flexibility is the key. You don't have to settle for WalMarts. You'll soon figure it out.

[Isaac-1]

I live in western Louisiana, and have spent something upwards of 50 (maybe 75) nights at public campgrounds and rv parks in Arkansas, Missouri, and Texas over the last 3 years since buying my current coach, and would only worry about reservations if you have specific must stay at locations that time of year. Otherwise if you feel like it make reservations a day to a few weeks out, depending on your comfort level. The vast majority of the time finding a place to stay will not be a problem even without reservations, baring some local event, festival, etc. going on. My general rule of thumb when traveling in the region is to make reservations 48 hours out for night 1, and a couple of weeks out for destinations where we will be spending multiple nights, and play it by ear for other in transit stops. The 48 hours out is only because some state parks, and other public campgrounds (COE, etc.) do not accent reservations in their online systems less than 48 hours in advance.


p.s. we arrived home from a 2 week trip to the Texas Hill Country on Memorial day, even with this trip we only made reservations about 2 weeks out, and had no real difficulty. 9 days were spent at our destination, which ended up being our second choice of RV parks in the area, the first choice one only had sites available for the last 8 of the 9 days (including Saturday night of Memorial day weekend). On the drive home Sunday / Monday of memorial day weekend we passed a number of roadside commercial rv parks, some nicer than others, and none appeared full, one fairly new, nice looking park with about 120 concrete sites, outdoor pool, etc. just outside College Station, Texas was probably at 20% capacity when we drove by on Memorial day, of course the lake front state park we stayed at the previous night was 100% full ( they had 4 (3 water and electric, 1 full hookup) out of 120+ sites available when we made reservations on May 10th, it had been 12 sites when I checked on May 7th).

[winniman]

As I stated in a previous post, you don't always know for sure where you will get to. Over 10 or more years, and half a dozen different rvs I have travelled in, things have happened. We blew a transmission in one. We have hit debris on the road, and blew a tire. We have had alternators go. We had a disconnect switch go, and we couldn't retract our slides. All these unknowns might cost you your deposit if you cant get there. If the entire trip is booked, you might have to skip part of the trip to get back on schedule, or pay for a bunch of camping you don't get to. To each their own. Holidays is supposed to be about relaxing, and freedom of travelling. What if you see something really interesting, and want to stay an extra day. I will take my chances on last minute bookings. Lots of places have last minute cancellations you can scoop. They are probably the ones who booked a month ahead, but cant get there. The parks must love that. They get paid twice for the same night.

[Wayne M]

We wanted to stay in Millersburg, OH for the month of July. When I called to make reservations all they had was one site for 11 days, then move to another site for the remainder. All of the sites were full except for the reservation we made We accepted the 11 day and move scenario.

Of course, DW's idea of roughing it is no Walmart nearby. We do not boondock. Never have and never will. I'll spend a night or two with just water and electric but then it's a full hook-up site somewhere - with reservations.


Yes, we used to do it the way others are describing it. Depends if you are going West, East, North or South as they are all different. Beginning in late March or April, points South become more available as all the Winter travelers are heading back to cooler country and getting out of the South heat. Heading North, everyone is going there to beat the South heat. Going West you run into the Oil Boom states where the oil workers have taken up permanent residence because it is so cheap to live in an RV. Going East, well who wants to go East, but just last year we had a difficult time finding spots on the East coast, but we did. Going North East or North West many of the RV Parks open in May and close in October. Being seasonal specific all the Mom's and Pop's want to show their children a good time camping and reserve weekends well in advance.


So Jerry, try it one way and if it doesn't work try it the other way. (Not a very good answer, eh?)