First time road trip

[Loveland Stacy]

Hello everyone. I am new to this forum, and new to Motorhomes, but have been camping my entire life. Everything from a mattress in the back of a pick up truck to tents, to pop up campers, 5th Wheelers, and pull behinds. We recently moved from Missouri to Colorado and are attempting to sale our travel trailer and lake lot since we can't get out to use them anymore. When we stopped going to the lake, my parents sold their lot and 5th Wheeler, so our family has been really "camper-less" for about 3 years.

Just last week my parents, my husband and I went in 50/50 on a motor home. My husband is a truck driver, so he will be doing 99.9% of the driving, and while we want to make the stops easy for him to get in and out of, we don't have a novice driving the vehicle (Class A motorhome and I believe it is 38 ft). We are attempting to plan our first road trip in it and are probably going to take it next year so we can take 2 weeks.

We have all agreed on Mount Rushmore, Badlands and Yellowstone. But does anyone have any suggestions of campgrounds, neat sites or any information that you think is useful for a trip like this? We will be doing a lot of shorter trips to really figure everything out (like sleeping arrangements) prior to this big trip.

Thanks!

[DonnaR57]

Welcome to RTA! You and I have a lot of things in common, from your camping and RV experience to having a truck driver for a husband. My husband just smiled as I read this and said yours should have no trouble with maneuvering the MH as long as he remembers it doesn't bend in the middle like the 5W, TT or his tractor-trailer rig! :-) BTW, mine's no longer driving commercial vehicles -- can't pass the health test any more. Like you, we've been RV-less for about 4 years.

If your idea of sharing a MH 50/50 was with anyone except family, I'd be wondering how it's going to work....so many "share" arrangements don't work out. Since it's family, however, hopefully that will be easier.

Shorter trips, as you probably know from previous RV experience, are essential to learning how the new-to-you rig goes. We always kept ours close to stores so that we could run in to collect forgotten items.

Too bad my hard drive crashed 10 months ago and I lost everything -- otherwise, I would have shared an RV-packing checklist with you, that I built over time. (It was also posted on another website, but then THAT website went down, and my only copy of the checklist is on a 3-1/2" floppy that I can't access any more...no drive!)

Campsites -- we started to research the price of RV parks and campsites and can't believe how the prices have gone up since we did the majority of our RV travels! Some are $30-45 now....OUCH! National forests, sans hookups, are still about the best bargains, as are national parks. State parks vary, as it depends on the state.


Donna

[Lifemagician]

... we started to research the price of RV parks and campsites and can't believe how the prices have gone up ...

Anytime you just want an overnight stop, as opposed to actually camping, truck stops / travel plazas are as good (and often better) as any other place.

Lifey

[Capn]

If you're heading up to the Dakotas, don't discount Theodore Roosevelt National Park in western North Dakota. It's an absolutely beautiful park, and the pitchfork fondue/musical in Medora is not to be missed!