Benefits of Advanced Travel Planning
01-17-2018
Author: in Glamping: Teresa and Ed
Many long time RVers often tell us about the “good old days”, when they used to be able to travel the country in their RV from park to park, day-to-day or week-to-week. They could arrive unannounced and plan to stay for one night. If they liked the park, they would go in the next morning and extend their stay for days, a week or longer. They could travel the country with a flexible travel plan, changing it up at a moment’s notice when desired.
Not any more.
With 250,000 Baby Boomers turning 65 years of age every month for the next nine years, the RV industry has been witnessing a great renaissance for the last few years. ALl of us have read how this period is one of the greatest industry boom in decades. Add to that, the surge of Millennials jumping into RVs at a much younger age than previous generations, and it is understandable why this industry has experienced this exponential growth.
Today, it is difficult to get into a popular, high rated RV park or resort without a reservation. Many resorts have gone to requiring a reservation of a month or longer in their respective peak season(s). Many more RV properties cannot take an overnight reservation but if they do, the RVer cannot extend their stay due to the pressure of RVers coming to the Park. So what is an RVer to do today?
Make a Plan A. Then a Plan B. Maybe even a Plan C.
For an example, take our current 2018 travel plans:
We started the year at the Hilton Head Island Motorcoach Resort on that Paradise Island in South Carolina during the first two weeks of January. Well, that is not factual as we actual ended 2017 with a Polar Bear Plunge in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina on December 31, 2017. This year, it WAS cold air temps and cold water temps!
Getting back on our 2018 trip plans, then, we are in Hilton Head until January 16. This time of year on the Island is quieter than the peak season of April-November but we enjoy it. Traffic is much less during this visit so we enjoy this time each year. We are to be in Fort Myers, FL from January 17-31. We have to travel from Hilton Head to Fort Myers and those overnight stays can be tricky when you desire a paved site for your beloved RV. Using MobileRVing.com to plan our trip to Fort Myers, we found many RV properties to review. Cross checking those with RV rating sites, we were able to find an overnight stay at the Starke/Gainesville NE KOA ON January 16, 2018. Nice, paved, pull through site for a great price halfway on our route.
Once in Fort Myers, FL we stay on a super site in Cypress Trails RV Resort through January 31, 2018. Weather temperatures will start out cool but are forecast to be awesome during most of our stay. We have friends and family we will see so this is an exciting part of our winter route. Cypress Trails RV Resort is top rated and offers wonderful amenities we will enjoy during our stay.
From there, we have reservations in Lady Lake, FL for the first two weeks of February 2018 at the Grand Oaks RV Resort on a paved site near the clubhouse. This resort is on a Carriage training farm, with horses and carriages all over the place. When we started staying at this Resort, it was known more for their horses and carriages. It was relatively unknown in the RV world a couple of years ago. We would pay $40 a night for a Florida resort in the Winter. We mentioned it in a couple blogs and now the place is packed with RVs and the daily rate is now $65. We will be working with two other resorts in the area, Recreation Plantation and Lake Griffin State Park. The first of these would normally be our Plan A, but as they are packed for the season and could not manage our reservation this year, Grand Oaks became our Plan B. Amazing thing is that Recreation Plantation just added 250 new sites to their Resort but those are essentially reserved for the season. That area is where The Villages have grown like the Borg on Star Trek, taking over tens of thousands of acres in the region. Amazing growth.
From there, we move just up the road to the Ocala North RV Resort in Reddick, FL for two weeks. Good friends of ours manage the park and we enjoy helping them produce their marketing materials during our stay during the last two weeks of February. This park used to be easy to get into but since last year, it has been packed with snowbirds traveling south or people who need a place to stay for the winter.
We finish this Winter route moving up to Cedar Key, FL from Feb. 28-March 10. A quiet, resort community, the Cedar Key RV Resort has become a favorite of snowbirds over the past couple of years. We were able to secure the last paved site for that time period at the Resort. Two years ago, we could have pulled into the Resort without an appointment. Thanks to the boom in RVing and the investments our friends have made in the Ocala North RV Park, it is a busy place.
We have to be in New Orleans, LA from March 12-16, 2018 for an annual conference. So when we leave Cedar Key on March 10, 2018, we have to find that elusive overnight stay. Back to MobileRVing.com and a few calls later, we have an overnight at Bella Terra of Gulf Shores Motorcoach Resort. A top rated, motorcoach resort, this allows us an easy day of travel to Foley, AL and then on Sunday to New Orleans, LA. When we arrive on Sunday, we will have the opportunity to be well rested when our meetings begin on Monday.
All of this doesn't sound very hard to do but the reality is most of these plans were done six months or more in advance. If we had waited longer, we could not have had RV resorts with paved sites for our RV, something my wife desires for our 2015 motorhome.
We have an even more extensive travel plan from mid-July until the end of October. Those sites were reserved before we left the RV resorts in 2017. We found if we didn't, we would not have places to stay. And many of these places are not top of mind destinations. Sure, there is the Pigeon Forge/Smoky Mountain region but we are there during the lull after kids go back to school. Other areas? Crossville, TN in July. Cape May, NJ in September after season. Back to South Carolina for a new market we are developing.
Today, each of those areas are now busy not only in peak seasons but in their shoulder and off season periods as well. Some have extended their seasons with Halloween events, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year event or popular Winter Festivals.
We also have maintenance program we follow by getting our motorhome into two separate vendors. One is for our chassis with Freightliner in either Gaffney, SC or the Premier Truck Group (a Freightliner store) in Knoxville, TN. This covers the oil changes, the engine maintenance, the generator and such. This year, Plan A was to get our motorhome to Gaffney for its annual maintenance. Somehow, the schedules got mixed up and suddenly we could not have Freightliner in Gaffney work on our RV. Plan B was Premier Truck Group, which was able to get our RV into their schedule a week later for its annual maintenance.
The other service appointment is for the motorcoach side of the RV. We do that work with a local RV repair specialist, Ricky's RV, in Sevierville, TN. This covers our motorcoach side with all of the elements like the heat pumps, the AquaHot system, filters and more. The point here is we need to schedule those appointments nearly a year in advance. Just a few years ago, Freightliner was offering a 15% discount for RVers bringing their motorhomes for service in November. Today, they are very busy all year around. Great news for business but something that necessitates better planning but RVers as we travel.
The RV industry, from the manufacturing, to the RV dealerships, to the RV properties and after market vendors - all are experiencing tremendous growth again! But that means, as an RVer, we must be better prepared to plan our travel. Plan our maintenance schedules. Good news is there are resources to help us.
The search engine MobileRVing.com is one site that is great for planning your trip. We also like it because we can search the RV resorts, their guest guides, and businesses that they recommend (Preferred Businesses) which is helpful if we need RV service, maybe a vet appointment for our dog(s) or another type of vendor. There are other sites that also offering information on RV resorts from amenities and ratings. The point is, we must all plan better to insure we have what we need as we travel, for our enjoyment and our safety. When we do that, we can all travel better, travel safer and enjoy our RVs across the miles in the coming year.
Safe travels.
Not any more.
With 250,000 Baby Boomers turning 65 years of age every month for the next nine years, the RV industry has been witnessing a great renaissance for the last few years. ALl of us have read how this period is one of the greatest industry boom in decades. Add to that, the surge of Millennials jumping into RVs at a much younger age than previous generations, and it is understandable why this industry has experienced this exponential growth.
Today, it is difficult to get into a popular, high rated RV park or resort without a reservation. Many resorts have gone to requiring a reservation of a month or longer in their respective peak season(s). Many more RV properties cannot take an overnight reservation but if they do, the RVer cannot extend their stay due to the pressure of RVers coming to the Park. So what is an RVer to do today?
Make a Plan A. Then a Plan B. Maybe even a Plan C.
For an example, take our current 2018 travel plans:
We started the year at the Hilton Head Island Motorcoach Resort on that Paradise Island in South Carolina during the first two weeks of January. Well, that is not factual as we actual ended 2017 with a Polar Bear Plunge in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina on December 31, 2017. This year, it WAS cold air temps and cold water temps!
Getting back on our 2018 trip plans, then, we are in Hilton Head until January 16. This time of year on the Island is quieter than the peak season of April-November but we enjoy it. Traffic is much less during this visit so we enjoy this time each year. We are to be in Fort Myers, FL from January 17-31. We have to travel from Hilton Head to Fort Myers and those overnight stays can be tricky when you desire a paved site for your beloved RV. Using MobileRVing.com to plan our trip to Fort Myers, we found many RV properties to review. Cross checking those with RV rating sites, we were able to find an overnight stay at the Starke/Gainesville NE KOA ON January 16, 2018. Nice, paved, pull through site for a great price halfway on our route.
Once in Fort Myers, FL we stay on a super site in Cypress Trails RV Resort through January 31, 2018. Weather temperatures will start out cool but are forecast to be awesome during most of our stay. We have friends and family we will see so this is an exciting part of our winter route. Cypress Trails RV Resort is top rated and offers wonderful amenities we will enjoy during our stay.
From there, we have reservations in Lady Lake, FL for the first two weeks of February 2018 at the Grand Oaks RV Resort on a paved site near the clubhouse. This resort is on a Carriage training farm, with horses and carriages all over the place. When we started staying at this Resort, it was known more for their horses and carriages. It was relatively unknown in the RV world a couple of years ago. We would pay $40 a night for a Florida resort in the Winter. We mentioned it in a couple blogs and now the place is packed with RVs and the daily rate is now $65. We will be working with two other resorts in the area, Recreation Plantation and Lake Griffin State Park. The first of these would normally be our Plan A, but as they are packed for the season and could not manage our reservation this year, Grand Oaks became our Plan B. Amazing thing is that Recreation Plantation just added 250 new sites to their Resort but those are essentially reserved for the season. That area is where The Villages have grown like the Borg on Star Trek, taking over tens of thousands of acres in the region. Amazing growth.
From there, we move just up the road to the Ocala North RV Resort in Reddick, FL for two weeks. Good friends of ours manage the park and we enjoy helping them produce their marketing materials during our stay during the last two weeks of February. This park used to be easy to get into but since last year, it has been packed with snowbirds traveling south or people who need a place to stay for the winter.
We finish this Winter route moving up to Cedar Key, FL from Feb. 28-March 10. A quiet, resort community, the Cedar Key RV Resort has become a favorite of snowbirds over the past couple of years. We were able to secure the last paved site for that time period at the Resort. Two years ago, we could have pulled into the Resort without an appointment. Thanks to the boom in RVing and the investments our friends have made in the Ocala North RV Park, it is a busy place.
We have to be in New Orleans, LA from March 12-16, 2018 for an annual conference. So when we leave Cedar Key on March 10, 2018, we have to find that elusive overnight stay. Back to MobileRVing.com and a few calls later, we have an overnight at Bella Terra of Gulf Shores Motorcoach Resort. A top rated, motorcoach resort, this allows us an easy day of travel to Foley, AL and then on Sunday to New Orleans, LA. When we arrive on Sunday, we will have the opportunity to be well rested when our meetings begin on Monday.
All of this doesn't sound very hard to do but the reality is most of these plans were done six months or more in advance. If we had waited longer, we could not have had RV resorts with paved sites for our RV, something my wife desires for our 2015 motorhome.
We have an even more extensive travel plan from mid-July until the end of October. Those sites were reserved before we left the RV resorts in 2017. We found if we didn't, we would not have places to stay. And many of these places are not top of mind destinations. Sure, there is the Pigeon Forge/Smoky Mountain region but we are there during the lull after kids go back to school. Other areas? Crossville, TN in July. Cape May, NJ in September after season. Back to South Carolina for a new market we are developing.
Today, each of those areas are now busy not only in peak seasons but in their shoulder and off season periods as well. Some have extended their seasons with Halloween events, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year event or popular Winter Festivals.
We also have maintenance program we follow by getting our motorhome into two separate vendors. One is for our chassis with Freightliner in either Gaffney, SC or the Premier Truck Group (a Freightliner store) in Knoxville, TN. This covers the oil changes, the engine maintenance, the generator and such. This year, Plan A was to get our motorhome to Gaffney for its annual maintenance. Somehow, the schedules got mixed up and suddenly we could not have Freightliner in Gaffney work on our RV. Plan B was Premier Truck Group, which was able to get our RV into their schedule a week later for its annual maintenance.
The other service appointment is for the motorcoach side of the RV. We do that work with a local RV repair specialist, Ricky's RV, in Sevierville, TN. This covers our motorcoach side with all of the elements like the heat pumps, the AquaHot system, filters and more. The point here is we need to schedule those appointments nearly a year in advance. Just a few years ago, Freightliner was offering a 15% discount for RVers bringing their motorhomes for service in November. Today, they are very busy all year around. Great news for business but something that necessitates better planning but RVers as we travel.
The RV industry, from the manufacturing, to the RV dealerships, to the RV properties and after market vendors - all are experiencing tremendous growth again! But that means, as an RVer, we must be better prepared to plan our travel. Plan our maintenance schedules. Good news is there are resources to help us.
The search engine MobileRVing.com is one site that is great for planning your trip. We also like it because we can search the RV resorts, their guest guides, and businesses that they recommend (Preferred Businesses) which is helpful if we need RV service, maybe a vet appointment for our dog(s) or another type of vendor. There are other sites that also offering information on RV resorts from amenities and ratings. The point is, we must all plan better to insure we have what we need as we travel, for our enjoyment and our safety. When we do that, we can all travel better, travel safer and enjoy our RVs across the miles in the coming year.
Safe travels.
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Author: Ed & Teresa Herbert
