Dirty Little Secrets from the RV Dump Station – RV Dumping Tips + Composting Toilets

When Trailer Life Magazine asked me to write a 2,000 word feature article on RV dump station procedures, including step-by-step RV dumping tips, overall RV dump station etiquette and ideas for how best to empty and manage an RV’s holding tanks, all I could think of were two words:

Don’t Spill !!

Once Mark and I put our heads together, though, we realized it was a perfect opportunity to share the many dirty little secrets from the RV dump station that we’ve learned over the years! Our article quickly filled up with tips, procedures, hints, photos and ideas, and grew to cover seven pages of the May 2014 issue of Trailer Life!!

Holy cow!! I had no idea we’d learned so much about this topic and that we had so many ideas to share with the RVing community. Motorhome Magazine liked the article so much they ran it in their July, 2014 issue!

RV dump station procedures tips and tricks

Dumping the holding tanks is easy. A few short steps and you’re done!

Dumping is a subject that is near and dear to every RVer’s heart (smile). So here is a synopsis of what we think are the most important things to do when visiting an the RV dump station or when you have sewer hookups at an RV park.

Over the years, we’ve received lots of queries about our thoughts on composting toilets and whether we use one or would recommend installing one if you are going to do a lot of boondocking. So there’s a section on that too.

For easy navigation within this post, use the links below:

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A FEW LITTLE TIPS FOR DUMPING THE TANKS

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Keep it Clean - Trailer Life Magazine

Feature article: “Keep it Clean”
Trailer Life Magazine – May 2014

(1) The most important thing at the RV dump station is to protect yourself from any pathogens that may be lurking, and to leave the place clean for the next guy.

Before starting, put on some rubber gloves. We use disposable nitrile gloves.

As you do your work at the dump station, be aware of what you touch, because even though you are wearing rubber gloves, your gloves will still spread bacteria from one item to another.

At the end, when you take the first glove off, peel it back from the wrist to your fingertips so it turns inside out. Then peel the second glove off the same way while holding the fingertips so the second one rolls inside out into the first one in one unit. This keeps your hands from touching the exterior of the gloves. Then dispose of them properly.

(2) We connect a clear plastic elbow to our sewer hose so we can see what is coming out of the tanks. It’s not the prettiest picture, but this way we know the status as we go through the dump process.

(3) Before connecting our fresh water hose to the potable water spigot, we spray the nozzle of the water spigot with Clorox bleach spray.

(4) At the RV park, keep the black and grey tank valves closed. This keeps the liquids in the black tank and prevents the solids from drying out and getting stuck to the bottom and sides of the tank. It also prevents odors from the sewer to creep up into the rig via the sink.

Pouring water down RV toilet

Pour a bucket of water down the toilet
to remove the solids.

(5) When flushing the black tank (about every 4-6 days or so at the RV park, or when at the RV dump), flush it first and flush the grey tank afterwards to clear the sewer pipes and hose of any black tank solids.

(6) At the RV dump, after the black tank is completely empty, we use a five gallon bucket to pour a pail of water directly down the toilet into the holding tank below. This removes any solids that are stuck to the bottom of the tank under the toilet. Usually two buckets is all that’s necessary for the water to run clear, although occasionally we need to dump in a third bucket. If you have a window in your toilet room, you can run a hose through the window rather than lugging buckets of water around.

(7) Once you are finished, hose down the whole area so the dump station is clean for the next RVer that comes along.

(8) In general, be courteous to your RVing friends at the RV dump. We find that popular dump stations often have a line of RVs waiting, especially at the end of a weekend. Try not to dawdle. We’ve heard of people taking showers while at the dump station because there is unlimited water and sewer capacity, but lordy, I would not be happy if I rolled up to a dump station and had to wait around for someone ahead of me to finish their shower!!


And where can you find an RV dump station? They are far more common than you might expect: national, state and municipal/regional parks, interstate rest areas, truck stops and RV parks all have them! The best resources for locating an RV dump station are:

Many RV parks and campgrounds allow RVers to dump their tanks in a site for free, usually about 25% to 50% of the cost of staying for a full night. Many of these places are listed in the above links. Of course, most folks figure that if you’re going to pay $10 to dump the tanks, why not spend $30 and spend the night at the RV park or campground as well!

 

TIPS FOR REMOVING DISPOSABLE RUBBER GLOVES

Thin rubber gloves fit fairly tightly on your hands and they can’t easily be pulled off by the fingers the way ordinary gardening or cold weather gloves can. Also, to be totally sanitary about things, it is best not to touch the outside of the gloves with bare hands after the dirty deed at the dump station is done.

Here’s an easy way to pull the gloves off by peeling one glove most of the way off one hand and then peeling the other off and over the first glove, leaving you with a neat little bundle where all the yucky stuff is on the inside:

Removing disposable rubber gloves 1

Grab one glove by the edge of the cuff and peel it off your hand over your fingers stopping just before the glove is completely removed.

Removing disposable rubber gloves 5

Then peel the other glove off over the first.
Now the first glove is sealed inside the second glove which has been turned inside out.

WHERE TO DISPOSE OF DISPOSABLE RUBBER GLOVES

When we first started RVing, we saw tons of folks at RV dump stations using their bare hands. Fortunately, this article and others have encouraged people to protect themselves against lurking pathogens by using disposable rubber gloves.

However, we’ve begun to notice used disposable gloves lying around dump stations on the ground, in the grate and in the nearby bushes because folks just drop them after taking them off instead of throwing them in an appropriate trash container.

I’m not kidding!

After removing the gloves, please dispose of them properly. There may be a trash can at the RV dump station. If there isn’t, please put them in your own trash rather than throwing them on the ground or in the grate of the dump station!!

Discarded disposable gloves at RV dump station-min

How inconsiderate and unnecessary! This was in an otherwise cute town in Montana!

HOLDING TANK TREATMENT PRODUCTS

There are a ton of RV and boat holding tank treatment products on the market, and some of them are extremely damaging to the environment. Many are made with various forms of formaldehyde and other toxic chemicals.

If you remember high school biology class and those gruesome dissections of fetal pigs, dogfish and other critters, you might remember that formaldehyde was the putrid smelling chemical that was used to preserve the carcasses. Formaldehyde isn’t the only toxic chemical used in RV holding tank treatment products. Some products are made with different types of embalming fluids.

RV dump station preparation

Getting ready to do the dirty deed.

The idea behind using preservative and embalming chemicals on dead organic matter is to remove the stinky odor.

But do you really want the contents of your holding tank to be preserved?

It might be okay to preserve that stuff a long long time if it didn’t go anywhere, but what about the sewer system or septic tank that the holding tank’s contents are being transferred into when you dump them?

We have come across RV dump stations that were closed due to poisoning of the septic field and damage to the ground water supply caused by toxic RV holding tank chemicals.

The states of California and Arizona as well as the EPA have issued warnings about the use of those chemicals in RV holding tanks. California has considered banning their use all together.

For reference, here are a few links with more info about the environmental impact of toxic RV and boat holding tank chemicals:

RV Digest-ItAs responsible RVers, I think it is in all of our best interests if we use chemicals that won’t pollute our ground water supply.

We have used a product called RV Digest-It by Unique Natural Products ever since we first saw it at the Quartzsite RV Show in 2007 in our first year of RVing full-time.

The demo was pretty convincing. Two identical glass jars were filled with dog food, balled up toilet paper and water. One was beautifully preserved by a formaldehyde-based holding tank treatment product. The other was reduced to mush by RV Digest-It.

How did that happen?

RV Digest-It is an enzyme and bacteria based solution. The enzymes break down the solids in the tank, and the bacteria eat them up. What’s very cool is that, over time, the bacteria colonize in the holding tanks, and they continue working away, munching on the goodies in the tank and digesting them. They climb the walls and nibble on what’s there, keeping the walls of the tank clean and helping the tank level monitoring system perform better.

Another excellent environmentally friendly product that we use is Happy Campers Toilet Treatment. This is a powder product rather than a liquid. We have had equal success with both products.

The difference between these two products are the following:

RV Digest-It Holding Tank Treatment

RV Digest-It

    RV Digest-It

  • Liquid
  • Nothing on label about danger if ingested
  • Does not work well in very hot or very cold temps

 

Happy Campers Holding Tank Treatment

Happy Campers

 

RV Digest-It and Happy Campers are not the only enzyme-bacteria based holding tank product on the market. They’re just the ones we’ve used in both our trailer and our boat.

Click here for a list of other enzyme-bacteria based holding tank treatment products.

These may be just as good, we just don’t have personal experience with them.
Unfortunately, RV Digest-It and Happy Campers are not carried at many RV or boating supply stores, or Camping World, West Marine or Walmart. When we find one or the other, we stock up. Fortunately, they are available at Amazon.


HOLDING TANK CLOGS

Almost all black tank clogs are due to wadded up toilet paper. Most enzyme-bacteria based holding tank products claim to be able to break down even the thickest toilet papers. If you aren’t sure whether you can trust that claim, one way to avoid toilet paper clogs is to buy special RV (or marine) toilet paper.

We like the plush stuff, and we don’t want to test whether the bacteria like to dine on Quilted Northern, so we have opted, in our little household of two people, not to put our toilet paper down the toilet and into the holding tank. It sounds disgusting, I know. But it would be a lot more disgusting to have to fix a clogged black tank!

In our trailer, we find we have an overabundance of plastic supermarket shopping bags. Rather than toss them out, we put our soiled TP in a bag, sometimes doubled up, and dispose of the bags daily. Every shopping bag gets used, and there is nothing smelly about it.

Obviously, this is a very personal decision, and not one that’s worth debating if you don’t like the idea. However, I put it out there as something to consider. For us, having lived with holding tanks and funky RV and marine toilets for 7 years, it has worked just fine.

When it comes to freeing an RV holding tank clog, many people swear by Happy Campers Extreme Cleaner. We haven’t used it because we haven’t had a clog that bad, but if your tank is clogged up, give it a try!

LEAKY VALVES

Valterra RV holding tank valveValterra T-58 Twist on gate valve for RV sewer systems

Over time, the grey and black tank gate valves may begin to leak a little bit from debris getting caught and preventing the valves from closing completely. When this happens, you get a nasty little surprise at the RV dump when you first take the cap off the sewer line — a small bit black or grey water dribbles out. Having a bucket ready to catch that stuff is helpful, but it’s still messy.

One easy way to deal with this is to install an inexpensive Valterra T-58 twist-on gate valve. This screws onto the sewer opening the same way the sewer hose does and provides a final opening and closing valve to catch the dribble.

Screw on the twist-on valve and keep the valve closed until you are ready to dump the tanks. At the RV dump, start by removing the cap off the twist-on gate valve to attach the sewer hose, then open the gate valve to let the dribble out, and then open the grey or black tank valve to begin the dumping process.

For more RV dump station and holding tank tips, check out these articles:

FRESH WATER and WASTE WATER HOLDING TANK MANAGEMENT

WHAT’S A GIRL TO DO at the RV DUMP STATION? – RV Dump Station Tips for Women

For more RV tips, the following index pages give links to our extensive library of articles:

RV TECH TIPS – RV Upgrades – RV Maintenance Tips + Buying an RV

RV LIFESTYLE TIPS – Costs & Finances, Boondocking, Jobs & Work, RV Repairs, etc.

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IS A COMPOSTING TOILET A GOOD IDEA IN AN RV?

Updated September 30, 2021

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There is a growing interest in using composting toilets in RVs and boats instead of conventionally plumbed flushable RV toilets and marine heads, and we have received lots of inquiries from people who want to live an off-the-grid boondocking lifestyle, like we did, asking us if they should install a compost toilet in their RV.

We lived primarily OFF THE GRID in our RV and sailboat for thirteen years

During those years we spent 4,308 night either boondocking or at anchor in our sailboat.

We were very happy using CONVENTIONALLY PLUMBED RV toilets and periodically visiting RV DUMP STATIONS

In our minds, the expense and hassle of replacing a conventional RV toilet with a composting toilet is NOT REQUIRED AT ALL if you wish to live in an RV off grid. So, if you’re on the fence about whether to jump into this project, save your money and avoid the complications of installation until you have lived off the grid in your RV for a while. At that point you will probably have met several fellow RVers who showed you how theirs worked and you will be able to make an informed hands-on decision rather than relying on internet research.

I used to have a long rant here about the questionable practice of dumping the waste from composting toilets into the trash or out in America’s beautiful public lands. The composting toilets I was familiar with at the time did not compost the feces completely by the time the toilet needed to be emptied. It was gloppy and smelly. Also, the frequent dumping of large quantities of urine on public land seemed like a poor way to treat a National Treasure. Running into public bathrooms every few days to dump containers of pee also seemed like an awkward hassle.

Composting toilets have come a long way since then, and a seasoned RVing friend who has lived off the grid for decades recently showed me how her newly installed composting toilet works. I was astonished to see that the feces were fully composted into soil when it was time to empty the toilet. The urine dumping is still an issue, but if you are kind to the land and don’t repeatedly pour it all in one place, future users of your campsite will appreciate it. I’m still not sure about carrying a bucket of pee into a public bathroom stall on a regular basis…

I took step-by-step photos of my friend showing me how she and her hubby care for their composting toilet, and I noted which products they use for effective composting as well as for the avoidance of bug infestations. I will share those photos and their excellent tips and tricks in this space soon.

For us, we still find that dumping our holding tanks at an RV dump station is effortless and painless, and these days we have a conventional RV toilet in our seasonal-use truck camper.

For more information about living in an RV off the grid, see these links:

RV Boondocking – How To Live Off The Grid in an RV
Finding Boondocking Campsites
RV Solar Power Made Simple

If you’re a gal and your significant other does the dirty deed at the RV dump station, here are a few ideas for how you can help out.

If you ever experience a failure with your conventional RV toilet, here’s what’s involved in replacing it (an hour’s job).

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RVing Full-time: Living in an RV, Working on the Road & More

RVing full-time is becoming really popular these days, and you may be curious about what goes into living in an RV full-time. Who lives this way? And what’s it like working on the road? We absolutely loved our 13 years of full-timing and have a few tips to pass on.

This 3-part series covers all the basics about RVing full-time, from who’s out here doing it to what to consider when buying a rig for full-timing and how to insure your new rolling home. The other articles in this series are: Full-time RV Tips – Mail, Domicile, Insurance, Saving $$ and Going Full-time: How to Transition and Which RV is the Best Rolling Home?

For easy navigation, and to read a little now and come back for more later, use these links:

Links to the entire series and its various chapters are here: Full-time RV Lifestyle Tips

RVing full-time and working on the road

Just another day at the office…what a place to live and work for a season!

OUR FIRST GLIMPSE OF FULL-TIME RVING

“The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page.” — St. Augustine, 354-430 A.D.

The first time we learned about the full-time RV lifestyle was in 2006 at Lake Cahuilla Campground outside of Indio / Palm Springs California. We were staying there for a week one February in our popup tent trailer to participate in the Palm Springs Century bicycle ride.  We noticed that every afternoon there was a large gathering of people outside one or another of the RVs parked at the campground.  These folks were all grey haired and whooping it up.  Suddenly we saw an old-timer walking through the campground yelling, “Okay everyone: Time to get up from your naps.  It’s happy hour!”  It was a party on wheels!

We started talking to our neighbors at the campground about how they were living.  Everyone was having a ball and seemed so free.  We heard one woman talking to her adult child on the pay phone, saying “I’ll call in a few weeks to let you know where we are.”  That sounded good to me — I had to be back at work on Monday!  We talked to another woman who was getting a tan in southern California while her friends back in Idaho were shoveling snow.  We heard a few folks making music around a campfire at night.  From what we could see, they lived simply, they had fun with each other, and they seemed happier than anyone we knew at home.

We left California with a new idea taking shape in our minds.

Our popup tent trailer had become a key to new adventures and a new lifestyle!  We researched what we could online and quizzed the campground hosts wherever we took the popup.  Over time we learned that many people work as they travel, often as “work campers” at various tourist sites.  Suddenly the idea of taking off on a long term travel adventure — with the backup option of getting part-time jobs if we ran out of money — seemed feasible.

We set off on our full-timing adventure within the year!

 

WHO LIVES THE FULL-TIME RV LIFESTYLE?

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Full-time RVers are a rare breed that set out in their RVs for a life of travel.  Many sell their homes, and most have gone through the life-affirming self-discovery process of downsizing all the way to an RV.  They share a curiosity about what lies beyond the horizon, and they are willing to accept a few bumps in the road to find out. The full-timers we have met on the road include the following:

Retirees

The vast majority of full-time RVers we have met, perhaps as many as 98%, are retired couples.  The average age is mid- to late-sixties, with a lot in their seventies, a few in their eighties and a few in their fifties. Of course, this is the age group that has the money, the time and the lack of day-to-day responsibilities that easily allow for this kind of free-spirited lifestyle. We have read about full-time RVers at both ends of the age spectrum. Many younger full-timers keep fabulous blogs, and some of the oldest old-timers have been written about in the magazines, including a woman who started in 1966 and was still out there in 2008 at age 90, and another fellow who started in 2007 at the young age of 104. We interviewed and wrote a magazine article about a terrific full-timing couple who began in their late 30’s and are still at it in their sixties.

Singles

There are quite a few singles on the road. We have run into the Wandering Individuals Network or WINS groups quite a few times over the years. They are a very active group of singles that has a great time together. Another group is Loners on Wheels. If you are a member of Escapees RV Club, you can join their SOLOS BOF (Birds of a Feather) Group.” We have camped near them quite a few times in Quartzsite, Arizona.

Surprisingly, we have met lots of women traveling alone.  These gals are strong! A popular group for women RVers is Sisters on the Fly, which is open to any woman with an RV who wants to spend time with other women with similar interests, whether they are single or married, full-timing or not. 

Sisters on the Fly RV club for women

The “Sisters on the Fly” have a ball on gals-only RV adventures.
Many of them have wonderfully decorated vintage trailers!

We have also met two men who had full-timed with their wives until their wives died unexpectedly.  Deeply saddened and lonely, both men opted to downsize from a fifth wheel to a truck camper and continue traveling.  We also met a solo woman who had lost her husband and decided to keep going, big RV, towable boat and all!

Families and The Under 50 Crowd

There is a growing interest in full-time RVing among younger folks, and there are many great blogs by younger RVers who are working on the road. Technology is making it possible for people to have a professional career without having to show up at an office every day.

We have read and heard about these fortunate people, but have met fewer than five on the road since we started RVing full-time in 2007. The youngest full-timers we have met personally was a couple in their early thirties. We’ve also met a handful of couples in their forties. We’ve met one family on the road, a French couple in their late forties with a 3 year old son. They were in the second year of a seven year RV trip around the world! Friends of ours from before our RVing days set off in a 24′ travel trailer with their three kids in 2016 and they have a YouTube channel filled with fun videos of their travels.

The Xscapers branch of Join Escapees RV Club is dedicated to this growing group of younger RVers. Two websites dedicated to families living on the road are: Fulltiming Families and Families on the Road.

The online world of exciting blogs and social media groups related to full-time RVing for the younger set can make it look like there are tons of families and young couples out adventuring in their RVs full-time. This is a wonderful and lovely thought. However, in our personal experience on the road, we have met only an extremely very rare few.

 

RV Hacks Book

WHAT’S THE BEST WAY TO LEARN ABOUT RVing FULL-TIME ?

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Campground hosts enjoy sharing insights into their RV lifestyle

An offer of free beer is hard to turn down!

You will learn the most about full-time RVing by
talking to full-timers IN PERSON.

Where can you find them? At RV parks and campgrounds!

Most hosts are either full-timers or part-timers, and they are a wealth of information about every aspect of RVing, from rigs to travel to jobs to living small.

They may also know of other campers staying in the RV park or campground that are full-timers that you can talk to.

There is nothing like the back-and-forth of a real conversation to get all your questions answered quickly and to explore other subjects that suddenly spring to mind.

Before we started, we learned a lot this way. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to Bernie and Phyllis, hosts at Bonito Campground in Flagstaff, Arizona, who talked to us endlessly about trucks and fifth wheel trailers and solar power.

If you feel funny about taking up their time, ask the hosts if you could bring over some drinks and snacks at happy hour and chat with them about the lifestyle for a while. Few people will turn down a free drink and a chance to talk about a lifestyle they love!

You can do this kind of in-person research with experienced RVers whether you are staying in a hotel near an RV park, staying in a tent at a campground or staying in an RV.

Where can you find a high density of RV parks and full-timers? In the southern states in winter! Take a roadtrip to Quartzsite, Arizona, during the Quartzsite RV Show in January, and drive around on all the roads within a 15 mile radius of town. Pitch a tent and go make some friends. Or visit Yuma or Mesa, Arizona, or southern Texas or anywhere in Florida!

Buy A Cheap RV and Go Play!

Another great way to learn about full-timing is to get a smaller, cheaper RV and go try it out. As mentioned above, we started with a popup tent trailer. By the time we hit the road full-time, we were very seasoned RVers and had dry camped in campgrounds over 150 nights. This made it very easy for us to begin boondocking as newbie full-timers and know what to look for in a trailer.

Rental RV - learning how to RV full-time

Renting an RV for a week’s vacation in southern Utah is a great way to sample the lifestyle.

A small used trailer or used Class C or van would work just as well.

This experience will teach you a million things about RVing and about yourself: the kinds of places you like to stay, the kinds of people you’re likely to meet in your travels and how the systems on an RV work, whether you are plugged into hookups or are dry camping somewhere.

You will also learn what you want and don’t want in your full-time rolling home!

Rent an RV and Try It Out!

If you don’t live in an area that lends itself to easy weekend RV travel, then flying to a gorgeous place and renting an RV is a fabulous way to go.

Renting an RV for a week may look really expensive on paper, but the memories will last a lifetime and the lessons you will learn will be priceless.

There are lots of RV rental companies all over North America. Most companies rent Class C motorhomes, and we’ve seen them everywhere in our travels. A few companies to look into that have their own fleets of rental RVs are:

America:

Canada:

There are also companies that offer rental RVs that are owned by private individuals or are part of smaller RV dealership rental fleets. These companies provide a “peer-to-peer” rental experience and function much like AirBnB and VRBO in the vacation rental property industry.

This kind of RV rental company acts as the middle man between the owner, who is renting out their own RV or one in their fleet, and the renter. The company’s website serves as an “aggregating” searching tool to put these two groups of people together.

This concept is potentially a great boon to both RV owners and to people who want to try out a particular style of RV before committing to buying one. For RV owners, there is a potential to make a few dollars on an RV that is otherwise sitting unused in their driveway. For prospective RV buyers, it is a neat way to try a tear drop trailer or fifth wheel trailer for a weekend and get more of a feel for it than just by looking at it on a dealership lot.

One of the first companies in this industry is RVshare.com.

Of course, both lessors and lessees need to enter into these contracts with eyes wide open, as there is the potential for things to go awry. An unscrupulous owner might be trying to make a few bucks from a junker that has been rusting in the back yard for a few years, or an unscrupulous renter might throw a wild party in someone’s meticulously maintained RV.

Rental RV in the Canadian Rockies

Take a vacation to a beautiful place in a rental RV!

The key to enjoying a happy RV rental, whether from a single source rental company that has its own fleet of RVs or through a website like RVShare.com that brokers deals between individual RV owners and renters, is to make sure you have covered all the bases before signing on the dotted line.

A few things to consider:

  • Have you tabulated all the hidden fees beforehand and do you have them in writing?
  • Do you have a written contract detailing how and when your security deposit will be refunded to you?
  • Do you understand exactly how the unit is insured (many private RV insurance contracts do now cover RVs that are leased out)?
  • Do you have all the codes and phone numbers necessary for obtaining roadside assistance if it is offered?
  • Have you done your due diligence searching for complaints against the company and pondering any negative reviews?
  • Have you contacted previous renters to find out if they were happy with their RV renting experience?
  • Do you have the phone numbers and names of the key people at the rental company so you know who is responsible and who to call in the event of breakdown or a financial concern?

Research the RV Lifestyle Online

In between your weekend and vacation RV adventure travels, there are lots of resources that will help you with your planning.

One caveat about any online discussion group or website where the writers are fairly anonymous is that they may or may not be experts about the topic. Take everything with a big grain of salt and trust your own instincts. I was amazed to find out that a very outspoken member of a popular cruising forum hadn’t sailed in 30 years and lived hundreds of miles from the ocean. Yet he expressed his opinion on every cruising topic. It was his way of feeling connected to a world and activity he loved and dreamed of doing.

Learn RVing with a Popup tent trailer RV

An inexpensive popup tent trailer can give you some incredible RVing adventures

 

WHAT DOES FULL-TIME RVING COST AND HOW DO YOU MAKE MONEY ON THE ROAD?

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The full-time RV lifestyle can be very inexpensive or very costly, depending on how you choose to live. We are budget travelers and have posted a detailed explanation of our costs and budget over seven years of full-time travel here:

Full-time RVing Costs and Budget

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There are a myriad of options for making money on the road. The range of things available depends largely on how much money you need to make.

We started full-timing before retirement age, however we do not work. We live very simply and we were lucky enough to have a small nest egg before we began our adventures. We set up our investments before we left home.

Consulting Work or Part-Time Work In Your Profession

One approach to working on the road is to take part-time jobs in locations where you want to live for a while. Some professions lend themselves to that. Nurses can get three- to six-month contracts that pay a full professional wage. A couple we know of in the oil and gas industry takes contract work within their profession. We met a young couple that was waiting table at swank restaurants near their favorite national parks each summer and making enough money to float their RV lifestyle all winter. We met a woman who was a contract waitress for a catering firm in Las Vegas and she was doing very well too, bopping in and out of Vegas whenever funds ran short.

We have also met construction workers and electricians who work on jobs for short periods and then move on. If your profession doesn’t lend itself to part-time contracts, you might have skills or a hobby that lends itself to part-time jobs.

Early on, we met a young pair of musicians living in a popup tent trailer for the summer and playing gigs across the country. They booked themselves about 3 to 6 weeks out at various bars and other venues and were having a blast. We heard of a pair of sailors that did the same thing across the South Pacific ocean!!

One strategy is to work a “real” job for a period of time and then travel until the money runs out, and then repeat the cycle. School teachers can travel in the summertime. A ski instructor or sailing instructor can travel in the off season.

RV Log Book Journal

Ordinary Part-Time Jobs In Seasonal Tourist Destinations

There are also “help wanted” postings for part-time work in many towns that have a seasonal tourist industry. What fun to work in a boutique shop for a while! Many employers have trouble finding seasonal part-time workers among the local population, and they are happy to hire RVers who want to stay in town for a season.

In Jackson, Wyoming, where the billionaires have pushed out the millionaires, we spotted a help wanted sign in tne window of a fabulous bakery and coffee shop. I asked it they would hire RV travelers for two to three month stints. Absolutely! They loved the idea of mature workers who would be prompt and reliable. In the summer of 2014 they were paying $10 an hour.

Working on cruise ships and luxury charter yachts are another option. Just store the RV for the months you are at sea.

Self-Employment

Some RVers come up with a product to sell at the many RV rallies held around the country. Others write books about RVing or their travels or take on some freelance writing. An engineering friend of ours absolutely loves to grill meat, and he was hanging out on his favorite website about barbecuing and grilling one day when he noticed they wanted someone to do scientific testing on grill thermometers. He made $8k last year testing thermometers for them. Who woulda thunk??!!

Transcription work can pay really well. Full-timer Wendy Estelle explains the details on her blog, Gypsy Gibberish, HERE.

Another popular occupation for RVers is to work for the company that provides the free RV campground maps that you get when you check into a park, AGS Guest Guides. These maps/guides are paid for by the advertisers whose ads appear on them, and AGS Guest Guides hires reps to go out into the community to solicit ads. From what I understand, reps can stay in the RV park for free for as much as two weeks while they meet with the advertisers and get to know the area. More info here: AGS Guest Guides.

Many people dream of making money on the internet from a blog, or some sort of web service, or from online product sales. This is highly competitive, however, as everyone in the world wants to stay at home and make money on the internet, whether or not their home is an RV.

RV travel blog writing

Is an RV blog a good way to earn a living in the road?

So, can an RV blog support your travels? Our blog has given us priceless experiences and opened some wonderful doors and given us some great opportunities that wouldn’t have been possible otherwise. For cold, hard cash, however, a “real job” (flipping burgers) would pay far more per hour for the first few thousand hours. I explain a bit about how all this works in this post: In the Spirit of Giving.

I’m hardly an expert on travel and RV blogs, however, and my experience is limited. A far more experienced blogging couple, both of whom work on activities related to their blog all day every day — and theirs is one of the top travel blogs in the entire world — has this to say on the subject of making money from a travel blog: I Want To Know Your Secret

In a nutshell: if you need to earn cash on the road to make your dream of a full-time RV lifestyle come true, the bottom line is to get creative. What do you love to do? How would you like to spend your days?

 

Work Camping – What Is It and How Do You Find Out About Job Openings?

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Work camping is part-time work that is geared specifically towards RVers, often including an RV site on the jobsite or nearby as part of the compensation or at a reduced rate. Work camping is super popular with full-timers, and many choose their destinations based on work camping opportunities. Most of them seem to love their work.  If you don’t need a full-time job to cover your expenses but do want a little supplemental income or want to work in exchange for a “free” RV site, this is a great way to go. 

RV Work camping can be lots of fun

A very happy work camper on the job

The best workcamping options, according to the workcampers we have met on the road, are often found either in private deals or at small out-of-the-way places.  One workcamper who has been at it for over 15 years told me that his favorite places were small historic sites. 

Another workcamper we met on the Oregon coast was assigned the task of distributing literature to beach-goers about a rare plover that nested in the dunes.  He loved birds, and these plovers were interesting little creatures.  What a fun way to keep the public informed about an unusual bird and get an RV site with full hookups in exchange.

A good arrangement I heard about was a very wealthy absentee estate owner who needed someone to mow the lawn once a week.  The estate owner had installed RV hookups and the work camper lived on very plush grounds for a few months in exchange for mowing the lawn and “being a presence” on the property. 

Some private RV parks pay a good wage for workers that can maintain the grounds, check people in and out, etc. We’ve heard of pay rates as high as $20,000 for a couple, each working 25 hours a week, for six months. One of our readers told me about a fabulous job she has manning the guard shack at an oil field. The work is easy and the pay is terrific.

Work campers at the Escapees CARE Assisted Living facility in Livingston, Texas, receive meals as well as an RV site, and they get a discount on future stays in other Escapees RV parks to boot.

In Mesa, Arizona, where thousands of snowbird RVers flock each winter, we met two couples work camping at a cute little bakery called RaVeS Cafe. It has an RVing theme and is adorably decorated with RVs and RVers in mind.

At stunning Bryce Canyon National Park, in Utah, the privately owned hotel, gift shop and restaurant complex that is located just outside the park, Rubys Inn, has an RV work camping program that we’ve heard great things about as well: Rubys Inn Employment.

RV cafe RaVeS for RVers and RVing

Work campers at RaVeS Cafe in Mesa Arizona

And, of course, some people work camp not because they need the cash but because they want to give back to society. There are loads of opportunities through the National Park Service, US Forest Service, BLM and Army Corps of Engineers.

One really fascinating workamping volunteer position we discovered was cataloging ancient Indian pottery for the National Park Service. This job was described to us by our vivacious tour guide on a ranger-led tour we took of the ancient Indian ruins at Tonto National Monument in Arizona: Workamping with the Ancients at Tonto National Monument

Another very popular program designed specifically for RVers is Amazon Camperforce where you can join dozens of other RVers at the big Amazon warehouses during the holiday season, packing boxes and shipping products, and make some really good money while you’re at it.

Websites that list work camping positions include the following:

National Geographic National Parks Book

Things to Ponder About Work Camping

We have not work camped yet, but we have met a lot of people who have. Listening to their stories prompts these thoughts:

— Choosing a work camping position is a hunt both for property and for a job. Not only do you need to make sure you want to do the work that’s required, but it needs to be in a place where you want to be, both on the map and within the grounds of the location.

— Sometimes work campers are given a yucky site next to the dumpster out back. Sometimes they are required to work 35 hours a week instead of the advertised 20 hours a week they saw when they took the job. The National Parks subcontractor Xanterra has been notorious for offering poor work and sub-optimal RV sites for minimal pay.

On the other hand, we’ve met RVers work camping at state park campgrounds on the waterfront in San Diego that keep going back and back and back again because they love it so much.

Mark plays air guitar with his rake

Raking is fun but taking a break to play air guitar is even more fun!

— Whatever kind of part-time work you take, whether in your professional field or work camping at a National Park, it is important to evaluate both the work required and the wage being paid to make sure you feel the exchange is fair. If you are trading labor for a site, make sure the site and the hours of labor you are paying for it match up with other RV park sites in the area — or that you are happy with the trade.

— For many retirees, there is nothing more fulfilling than helping out at a national or state park, and the positions can be in the gift shop, at the front gate, on the grounds or in the bathrooms. We met an 81 year old whose RV site at a national forest campground without hookups would have cost him just $3 a day if he didn’t workcamp there. However, he was more than happy to put in 8 hours of work a day picking up trash for four full months. He made a massive contribution to the area, and was sorely missed when his workcamping stint was over. He sure wasn’t being paid fairly, but he was one happy camper!

— For younger folks that need a living wage, the step down from a professional white collar position to cleaning the bathrooms at a private RV park can be a big jolt. Sometimes the bosses don’t remember you had a fancy career and they treat you like grunt labor. It’s important to think all this through before ditching a good paying conventional job and a big house mortgage to live in an RV and bounce from RV park to RV park doing menial work.

Fortunately, there are many kinds of work camping opportunities, and judging by the number of very happy work campers we have met, it is definitely a viable option to flush out the travel kitty and reduce camping costs.

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This was the first part in our 3-part series on full-time RVing. You can read the full series or skip to its various chapters via these links:

Part 1 – Living and Working in an RV:

Part 2 – Going Full-time: Transitioning to Full-time RVing & Which RV to Buy

Part 3 – Selecting a Domicile, Mail Forwarding, Insurance & Money Saving Tips

Further Reading:

  • Live Work Dream – Lots of tips and ideas for working on the road written by full-timers who have done just that for a many years

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RV Boondocking – Tips for Living Off the Grid in an RV

Camping out in nature on beautiful public lands and living off the grid in our RV are the very foundation of our lives today. Other than the weeks we spent transitioning on and off of our sailboat during the years we sailed Mexico’s west coast, we have lived exclusively on solar power and self-contained plumbing in our trailers and sailboat since we started this crazy full-time traveling lifestyle in 2007.

Free camping in an RV in Utah

Enjoying nature out in the boondocks

Since we started in 2007, as of June 2020, we have spent over 4,300 nights living off the grid in our RV and sailboat. We’ve lived within the electrical constraints of a house battery bank and dealt with funky RV and marine toilets that flush into holding tanks.

In the process, we have learned a lot about “dry camping” (or “boondocking” or “wild camping” or “free camping” or “dispersed camping”) as well as “anchoring out.”  And we’ve figured out how to do it comfortably.

Is it fun to live this way, even though there are limits on electricity and water consumption? OMG – yes! We have no plans to return to a life on the grid anytime soon.

Is it hard or primitive? Not at all. We don’t feel we have to compromise any aspect of our lives to live this way.

This page explains how we have lived this very independent and free spirited lifestyle.

For tips on how to find free camping spots, see our page: Boondocking – How to find Free RV Campsites. And if your love of adventure is enticing you further into the outback, you’ll find great tips for overlanding at: Overland Site.

This is a long post and you can use the following links to skip further down the page:

1. Electricity Basics
2. How to Conserve Electricity
3. Water Capacity and How to Conserve Water
4. Waste Water Tanks, Propane and Communications
5. Safety

ELECTRICITY BASICS

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Solar Power – The Foundation of RV Boondocking

In order to boondock efficiently, you need to equip your rig to supply its own electrical power for extended periods. A generator is okay if your stay is going to be just a few days or even a week or two once in a while. However, generators require fuel, and it won’t take long to run up a big fuel bill. They are also noisy, they require maintenance, and they insist that you stay home when you operate them. We carry a Yamaha 2400i portable gas generator, but we use it only 5-10 times a year, if that.

00 601 Motorhome with four solar panels on the roog

Solar power makes it easy to life off the grid in comfort.

A solar power system is silent, doesn’t need expensive or messy fuel to run, doesn’t need any kind of maintenance, and works all day long, whether you are out sightseeing or shopping or hiking or at home taking a nap. Solar power is also very affordable, and for the same approximate cost as a similarly sized generator, you can put solar power on your rig.

 

We have lots of pages on this site that explain the components and parts that make up a solar power system. We show you how to design a system to suit your needs, and offer pointers on installation. These pages are all accessible at this link:

Solar Power Articles for RVs and Boats.

For an easy-to-read overview of how to install solar power on an RV, visit this link:

RV Solar Power Made Simple!

Understanding Electricity – Counting Amps

Before we get into the details of how to conserve electricity, it helps to understand just a little about terms like “amps” and “bulk charge state.” This section and the next cover that. You don’t have to know anything about electricity or weird terms like these to conserve and live off the grid. However, I reference them a few times in this post, and I don’t want to lose you, so here are some quickie notes.

  • An “amp” is a measure of electrical current flow
  • An “amp-hour” is one amp of current flowing for one hour
MacBook Pro at the RV window

Picture in a picture on the laptop!

As a reference, here are the approximate amps required to run some common appliances.  For more specific numbers, check your owner’s manual spec sheet for the number of watts an appliance uses and divide by 10 to get the approximate number of amps the batteries will have to deliver to run the appliance.

Some of these appliances fluctuate or turn on and off as they operate, so these numbers are very rough.  Multiply the amps by how many hours you use each item to find out how many amp-hours the batteries will have to provide for them each day:

  • Laptop running => 3 to 6 amps
  • 36″ LED TV => 5 to 7
  • RV furnace blower => 10
  • Coffee maker => 10
  • Microwave (small) => 10

But who wants to do all that math? Here are two more little facts:

  • Most full-time RV off-the-grid households use 80-200 amp-hours per day
  • It is possible to live on much less (we lived on 30 amp-hours per day for a year)

Understanding Batteries – Battery Charging Stages

When living off the grid, it helps to know a little about the stages the batteries go through as they get charged.

Starting with tired, worn out, “discharged” batteries, a solar charge controller (or a generator or a converter or an inverter/charger or an alternator) gets things rolling by putting the batteries into a Bulk charging state. In the Bulk state, the charge controller allows a maximum amount of current to flow into the batteries (from whatever source — from the solar panels, from shore power, from the motorhome engine).

This slowly raises the battery voltage up to 14.4 – 14.8 volts (the amount depends on the type of battery; more sophisticated charge controllers let you program the value, otherwise a default of 14.4 is typical).

Once the batteries reach that voltage, they enter the Absorption charging state, and the charge controller changes its charging strategy. Rather than allowing a maximum amount of current to flow into the batteries, it allows just enough current to flow to keep the batteries at the Absorption voltage for a specified amount of time (usually 3 hours by factory default — again, sometimes programmable).

During this Absorption period, as the voltage is held constant, less and less current needs to flow into the batteries to keep them there while they slowly get charged.

At the end of the specified Absorption time, the charge controller enters the Float charging state. Now it holds the batteries at a lower voltage (13.3 – 13.8 volts, depending on battery type), gradually reducing the amount of current flowing from the panels into the batteries even further. When the batteries are in the “Float” stage, they are considered to have become fully charged.

For more details on battery charging, click here:

RV and MARINE BATTERY CHARGING BASICS

Free camping in Utah

Enjoying the views in Utah

 

HOW TO CONSERVE ELECTRICITY

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If your battery bank and solar power array are big enough, you don’t have to scale back at all in your use of electricity. However, there may be times when you need to conserve a little if you don’t have a generator for backup, or if you don’t want to drag it out and set it up. When a big storm rolls in and darkens the skies for a few days, or in January when the days are short and the sun is low in the sky, you may decide to conserve a bit for a day or two.

Monitor Your Batteries

There are many ways to stay on top of how your batteries are doing, and there are all kinds of price tags for getting this info. At the cheap end, for a few dollars, you can get a simple car battery volt meter that plugs into a cigarette lighter in the coach. We have one of these and it’s a good quick-and-dirty way to see what’s going on. Ours reads a consistent 0.1 volts low, compared to a better quality meter, so we just keep that in mind when we use it.

Outback FlexMax FM60 MPPT Charge Controller Display

Outback FlexMax FM60 MPPT charge controller on our RV
Batteries at 14.5 volts with 28.7 amps going to them.

Another method is to look at the battery voltage being reported on your solar charge controller, if the display shows it.

Our Outback FlexMax FM60 MPPT charge controller in our trailer has a four line LCD display that shows the battery voltage and current going to the batteries from the panels.

Our Xantrex XW-MPPT60-150 charge controller in our boat has a one line display you can scroll through.

The Morningstar TriStar TS-60 solar charge controller doesn’t have an LCD display on it. However, you can purchase an additional display module for it which has 2 lines of text.

Xantrex XW MPPT 60-150 Solar Charge Controller in a sailboat

Our Xantrex XW MPPT60-150 charge controller on our sailboat

Another method is to get a clamp-on current meter. We use ours from Sperry Instruments all the time.

The most elaborate method is to install a dedicated battery monitor in the coach somewhere so you can see what’s going on without making too much effort.

[As a side note, although some folks consider a battery monitor mandatory equipment for boondocking or anchoring out without shore power, we have never installed a battery monitor in any of our rolling or floating homes.]

All of these are valid methods that get you an approximation of what’s going on with your batteries. But none are scientifically “perfect,” because the “real” state of charge of the batteries is not indicated by its current voltage.

Sperry Clamp-on current meter

Checking the DC current flow on our new LED light bulbs.

For instance, when the panels are charging the batteries, they are held at an artificially high voltage of 14.4 to 14.8 volts during the Absorption stage. Even after the sun goes down, if there’s nothing using electricity in the motorhome or trailer, they have a “surface charge” that keeps them at an elevated voltage. Likewise, at night, when the TV is blaring, the computers are going and a bunch of lights are on, the voltage will be drawn down artificially low because of the temporary load from all these appliances.

If you really care about the exact status of the batteries, and you have wet cell batteries, monitor them with a battery hydrometer.

But scientific precision doesn’t really matter. You just need to know if you’re okay or not.

We simply check the batteries in the morning before the solar panels start raising the voltage. If they are on the low side (12.2 – 12.3 volts or less), then we check again in the afternoon to see if they are in the Float stage.

If they are really low in the morning and clouds are predicted, or if they don’t reach the Float stage for a few days in a row, then we think about using the generator to get them fully charged up again.

Can a Generator Work with Solar?

Utah camping in an RV

A summer storm rolls in

We have used solar power in conjunction with both our generator and our boat’s engine 100 amp alternator, and in both cases, the two charging systems worked fine together and shared the load.

On our boat, we used our clamp-on current meter to measure the current going from both the solar charge controller to the batteries and from the alternator to the batteries. As soon as we turned on the engine, the current from the solar charge controller dropped from 20 amps to 6, while the current from the alternator jumped from 0 amps to 14. So a total of 20 amps was still going to the batteries, but the solar system backed off and let the alternator do the lion’s share of the work.

Similarly, on our trailer we have seen the generator and solar panels trade off the load as heavy clouds came and went..

Bottom line: They work it out between themselves.

For a detailed explanation of how a solar charge controller works in conjunction with shore power, see this link:

Solar Power and Shore Power Combined – What Happens?

Pick the Best Time to give the Solar Panels a Generator Boost

When the solar panels aren’t quite keeping up with their task of charging the batteries, you’ll have to use a generator to get the batteries back into a fully charged state (or go to an RV park or campground to plug in). You can run the generator at any time, but if you are looking to run it as little as possible, running it in the morning is best.

Why? Because first thing in the morning the sun is very low in the sky, greatly limiting the panels’ ability to produce power. So, even though the charge controller puts the batteries in a Bulk charge state at dawn, the panels just can’t deliver.

A generator, however, can. It will produce maximum current flow to the batteries as soon as it is plugged in. In our case, we’ll see 20 amps going from the generator to the batteries at sunrise. After a little while, sun will be higher in the sky and the solar panels can take over and bring the batteries all the way through the Absorption stage to the Float stage by afternoon.

If you wait to use the generator until the end of the day, however, the batteries will already be fairly well charged from the panels working all day. When you turn on the generator, it will quickly switch from the Bulk stage to the Absorption stage and begin reducing the amount of current it puts into the batteries.

In our case, it will drop from 20 amps to 10 or less in about 5 minutes, and it will then slowly drop (and “trickle charge”) for hours as it wraps up the Absorption stage and goes into Float.

RV camping in Utah

Beautiful afternoon light

To make this clearer, say the ticket to getting the batteries fully charged on a given day is about 20 amp-hours.

If you run the genny at dawn, they’ll get that in an hour. If you run it in the evening, it may take two or three hours. That’s wasted fuel — not a huge amount, but it’s still wasted.

How do you know you need another 20 amp-hours to get to full charge? It doesn’t take long to get a feel for what your daily consumption is. On the days the batteries reach full charge, you’ll see how much the solar panels delivered for the day. Then you’ll be able to compare one day to the next as you use your favorite appliances more or less.

We have an entire series of articles that covers every aspect of BATTERIES and BATTERY CHARGING:

Replace incandescent and halogen bulbs with LED bulbs or fluorescent lights

New rigs are being built with LED lighting, however in older rigs, it is helpful to swap out the most frequently used bulbs for modern, efficient ones. Both fluorescent and LED lights are energy efficient. Fluorescent lights are cheap. LED bulbs can run from $6 to $18 apiece, so pick and choose which ones to replace.

Fluorescent overhead light in a fifth wheel RV

We use our fluorescent lights overhead lights the most.

Our 2007 Hitchhiker fifth wheel came with three very large fluorescent lights in our kitchen and living area, so we did not replace any incandescent bulbs with LED bulbs for the first six years we owned it. We boondocked all that time with no problem.

We did replace a few 120 volt AC sconce bulbs with LED bulbs early on, but the light was so dim and cold that we ended up never using those lights!

The technology has come a very long way since then, however, and we recently swapped out those old LED sconce bulbs for new ones that cast a wonderful warm light. Now we use those sconce lights a lot for soft evening lighting!

So, think about which lights you want to use and where it makes sense to spend money on LED bulbs. There’s no no need to drain your bank account replacing every bulb in your RV with LEDs!
.

Choosing the Right LED Bulb

There are a gazillion LED lightbulbs on the market, and it is dizzying to figure out what to buy. In the end, there are just 3 things to consider:

LED lights

Different types of 12v LED bulbs

1. The style and base of the bulb
2. The brightness
3. The color (warmth or coolness)

A great resource for buying LED lights is superbrightleds.com, but you may be happiest buying from a place where you can take your old bulbs in for comparison and keep trying different bulbs until you get the exact kind of lighting in your RV that you want.

Bulb Base Type and Shape

120 volt AC bulbs have either a standard screw on base or a narrow one like you find in chandelier and sconce bulbs.

12 volt DC bulbs come in more shapes and sizes. There may be two long prongs, or a bayonet mount with two nubs sticking out of a cylindrical base, or there may be a “wedge” base.  Most incandescent DC bulbs have a number on them, and you look for an equivalent replacement LED bulb that references that number.

Besides the base, the other consideration is the overall shape of the bulb. If the light fixture casts light 360 degrees around it, then a cylindrical shape is good. If it is an overhead light that only casts light downwards, then a flat panel with LED pads only on one side makes more sense.

Brightness

Historically, light bulbs have been rated in terms of watts, and we all have a “feel” for what kind of light a 25 watt, 40 watt or 60 watt bulb produces. LED bulbs are rated in terms of lumens, which is a measure of brightness. Where it gets confusing is that both incadescent bulbs and LED bulbs require a certain amount of watts (power) to run. The difference is that incandescent bulbs require many more watts than LED bulbs for the same degree of brightness.

So, for a given amount of brightness (lumens) how many watts does an LED bulb require versus an incandescent bulb? We haven’t found a strict mathematical relationship given anywhere.

Ceiling Fan LED Lightbulbs

We put LED bulbs in our AC (120v) ceiling fan.

The Department of Energy has a Lumens and Lighting Fact Sheet that shows:

Incandescent -> LED
60 watts -> 800 lumens
40 watts -> 450 lumens

Manufacturers put widely varying claims on their packaging about incandescent bulb watts and their own LED bulb equivalent. But all that really matters in an RV is how much light you get per amp of drain on the batteries.

In terms of brightness, we have found:

  • A single 300-350 lumen bulb is “mood lighting” or “accent lighting”
  • A pair of 300-350 lumens bulbs generates enough to “see well”
  • A total of 800 lumens or more is what we want for bright overhead lighting.
Double 12 volt light fixture

For overhead lighting, two 400+ lumen LED bulbs (or one 800 lumen bulb) works well
in this fixture.

We measured the amps used by both the DC and AC LED bulbs we have installed in our trailer. The very rough relationship we found between lumens and amps turned out to be:

It takes ~1 amp DC to get ~1000 lumens of light

So, a 300 lumen bulb will use roughly 0.3 amps DC, and a pair of bulbs totaling 700 lumens will use approximately 0.7 amps DC.

Color (Warmth)

Perhaps the most important factor with LED bulbs is the color, or warmth, of the light they produce. There is nothing worse than that harsh blue-white light so many LED bulbs generate.

The warmth is is given in degrees Kelvin. Higher numbers are cooler. We’ve found the following:

  • 2700-3200K is a good number for a bulb that will match the warmth, or yellowness, of an incandescent bulb
  • 4,000 is just a little too white for our personal taste (although we have a few)
  • >4,500 starts getting into the glaring blue-white range

Use LED Rope Lights

Another fun lighting idea is to use LED rope lights. A bright white variety can be strung across the ceiling for overhead lighting. A warm white variety can be strung behind the crown molding on the slide-outs to create indirect mood lighting (great for watching TV).

More Mood Lighting Ideas that don’t use the House Batteries

There are several ways to get wonderfully romantic mood lighting at night. During our first year of minimal solar power in our travel trailer, we relied on hurricane oil lamps at night. We hung them from the slide-out trim molding using long decorative s-hooks. I loved those!

A sailing friend of ours introduced us to an even better idea using LED Pillar Candles that are flame free. These are made of wax and they flicker, so they look and feel like a real candle.  She places them in teak drink holders that gave her boat’s cabin a fantastically nautical flare.  I’ve used mine every night in our boat and trailer for five years! The batteries in them last about two years.

I place them on the tops of our window valences and carry them around. If one of us goes to bed before the other, we leave this flameless LED candle flickering in the bedroom to make it easier for the other person to find their way into bed without tripping in the dark! They also work really nicely as background lighting when we’re watching TV/videos or are on our computers at night.

Use lights only where you need them

The more lights you have running, the more juice you’re using. The pesky ones are the ones in places you can’t see. Make sure you turn off the lights in the basement areas and closets. We’ve accidentally left lights on overnight. It’s not a big deal, but it is wasted electricity!

Operate laptops on their own battery power. Charge them when not in use.

We each have a 13″ Macbook Pro laptop that uses about 1.6 amps when turned off and charging. However, these laptops use anywhere from 3 to 8 amps apiece when they are turned on and running, depending on what applications we are using and whether we are accessing large, powered external hard drives.

Laptop

Run laptops on their own batteries.

They average about 5 amps or so when in use, and they can run for 3-5 hours on battery power before they need to be charged up again.

It takes the same length of time to charge up the laptops whether they are closed and turned off or turned on and actively in use. So, it is more energy efficient to charge them when they are turned off and to run them on their own batteries.

For instance: if one laptop runs on battery power for 3 hours and is charged later, it uses a total of 4.8 amp-hours for that 3 hours of use (3 hours x 1.6 amps).

However, if it is plugged in for 3 hours as we use it, it gobbles up around 15 amp-hours (3 hours x 5 amps)!

Multiply that computer activity by two people using their laptops for 3 hours, and the consumption can be as low as 10 amp-hours if we’re conservative, or 30 amp-hours if we’re not. That’s a huge difference!

Make coffee manually

Making coffee by hand with a Melitta coffee filter

Great coffee without a coffee maker.
(Mug: “Home is where the Heart is!”)

Rather than using an electric coffee maker, which can draw 10 amps or more, we use a plastic Melitta coffee filter with cone filter inserts to brew coffee. Coffee aficionados actually consider this method to be the best way to make coffee!

The overall process is similar to a coffee maker, but you manually pour near-boiling water over the grounds to make drip coffee rather than relying on a machine to do the work for you. There is no mess, and it is very easy and quick.

If you are patient, the best method is to moisten the grounds with the hot water first, and let them soak up the water for a minute. Then pour the rest of the water over the grounds slowly. A lot of times, though, I’m not that patient, and I just pour and go!

Mark doesn’t drink coffee, so I use a single-cup Melitta coffee filter (and paper cone insert) to pour my own drip coffee, one fresh cup at a time.

A bigger version of this filter (and cone inserts) is perfect for brewing two cups of coffee at once.

Another non-electric alternative is a French Press. This method has the advantage of preserving the bean oils in the coffee. The only difficulty in the RV lifestyle is that you have to dispose of the grounds before washing the French press so they don’t go down the drain. It can be a challenge to get all those tiny grounds out with limited water. I used a French press when I lived on a boat at a dock in New England years ago, and it was easy to rinse out the grounds over the side of the boat in the ocean (brrrrr in January!). But that’s not possible in an RV. I find it’s much easier to lift out the paper cone filter and toss it.

Keep the volume down on the TV/DVD and stereo

We don’t watch much TV, but we’ve found that the volume makes a huge difference in the amount of current it draws. We measured a difference of 1.5-2.0 amps on a 19″ LCD TV if we turned the volume way up. A TV attached to a large sub-woofer and a four speaker surround-sound system is going to have an even bigger difference at high versus low volume.

Free camping on the beach in Floria

Life’s a Beach in Florida

Of course, you’ve gotta be happy too, and watching an action flick at low volume just doesn’t cut it. That’s where more batteries and more solar power makes life better.

 

Use small inverters, and charge more than one item when you turn an inverter on

150 watt inverter

150 watt portable inverter

Inverters convert 12 volt DC power (battery power) to 120 volt AC power (like the power in a house). They come in all sizes. Most RV boondockers have one big inverter that supplies power to all the AC outlets in the rig. We also have a few small portable inverters.

All inverters use battery power just to run. This is noted as the “no load draw” on the specs. A few examples of small portable inverters we’ve measured:

Our Exeltech XP 1100 watt pure sine wave inverter that powers all our AC outlets in our RV uses 2 amps to run!

Some of the larger pure sine wave inverters, like the Exeltech XP 2000 and Xantrex ProWatt 2000 have a “no load” draw of less than an amp. This must be due to an increased efficiency in the design of the larger size inverters. Check your specs!

As long as any inverter is on, you might as well make the most of it and charge everything up at once, from toothbrushes to power tools to cameras and phones, so you don’t have to keep it turned on for as long.

For an amusing tale of inverter use gone awry, check out our post, How Much Inverter Is Enough?

Charge laptops and other devices in the car or truck when you do errands

If you really want to conserve, another option is to plug a cheap, small inverter into the cigarette lighter of your car or truck and to charge everything up as you drive around town doing errands or going on sightseeing excursions.

We don’t do this any more, because we don’t have to be that frugal with our electricity, but during our first year in our travel trailer we had a small solar power system — 130 watts of solar power and 220 amp-hours of battery capacity — and we frequently chauffeured our electronic devices around town as we did errands so they could get charged up! (See our page RV Solar Power Made Simple to learn more about the solar power installations we have done on our RVs).

 

WATER CAPACITY and HOW TO CONSERVE WATER

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Holding Tank Capacities

Larger rigs can carry bigger holding tanks, making boondocking easier. Our fifth wheel trailer’s tank capacities are the following:

Holding tanks in a 5th wheel RV frame

Holding tanks in a 5th wheel frame at the factory.

Fresh Water: 70 gallons of water, including the 10 gallon hot water heater
Gray Water: 78 gallons
Black Water: 50 gallons

Plus:

4 6-gallon jugs of fresh water in the bed of the truck.
10 1-gallon bottles of filtered drinking water under the kitchen sink.

This gives us a total of 106 gallons of fresh water capacity.

How Much Do You Have To Conserve Your Water?

The thing to keep in mind with water conservation is that you can be as conservative or wasteful as you want, depending entirely on when you next plan to dump/refill. The day before a dump/refill run is a great time to take a long shower. If we arrive somewhere and stay for two days days and then decide to leave (and dump/refill) in two more days, we no longer need to conserve. Bring on the long showers and truck washing project! We typically dump/refill about once every 7-10 days, but we’ve been known to do it after just 2 or 3 days too.

Driving – Tanks Full or Empty?

Camping in an RV in Utah

We love camping in the red rocks.

We like to arrive at a new location with everything ready to go so we can enjoy our stay and not have to look for water right away.

When we leave a place, we dump the waste water tanks and fill the fresh water tanks. We do all our towing to new locations with full fresh water tanks and empty waste tanks.

At 8.3 lbs per gallon, that is about 900 lbs of water — quite a drag on our gas mileage! But that is one of the trade-offs we are happy to make, as it means we can always begin enjoying our new location without worrying about the status of the tanks.

Topping off the Water Tanks

If we stay in one spot for a while, we top off the fresh water tanks using the 6-gallon jerry jugs. We keep a drinking water hose in the back seat of the pickup so we can refill our water jugs any time we find a spigot, if we need to. We refill our fresh water tanks whenever we go to an RV dump station, which is usually once every 3 days to 3 weeks (we don’t drink the water from our fresh water holding tanks).

Pouring water into the RV

Adding water to the trailer is a good upper body workout!

We used the Reliance water bottles for years. Other water jerry jugs are made by Igloo and Scepter.

We replaced these bottles every other year because they deteriorated from the sun’s UV rays as they sat in the bed of the truck. The plastic seams would split.

In February, 2016, we switched to Reliance Rhino 5.5 gallon Bottles. The spout is the same, but the plastic on the body is thicker, so they are much more rugged and should last longer. They have a better air hole for breathing as they pour, and they lock together when standing side by side.

Some people get a huge 55-gallon water tank (or even larger) that they keep in the bed of the pickup. They use a12 volt water pump to pump the water from the tank to the fresh water intake on the trailer.

The positioning of the fresh water intake on your rig may make it impossible to pour jugs of water into the tanks, so the water pump system may be the best option in that case. For us, so far we don’t mind getting a bit of an upper body workout using our individual water jugs and manual pouring system!

Drinking Water

We fill our 1-gallon drinking water bottles at reverse-osmosis water kiosks or water stores. These are usually found outside supermarkets, and the cost is typically 15 to 40 cents a gallon. When we are in areas that don’t have these filtered water stations, we use an inline water filter to filter the water at a regular water spigot.

Deset camping in an RV

Reverse osmosis water has been stripped of the trace minerals that drinking water usually contains. We often add trace minerals to our 1 gallon water jugs of drinking water to put those minerals back into the water to be healthy.

Some people drink the water from their fresh water holding tanks. They may install a water filtration system on the kitchen faucet, and/or use either an inline filter or larger water filter (with cartridges) to filter all the water they put into the trailer’s holding tanks from wherever they get their water (RV dump station, RV park, or city park water spigot).

For a few years we carried two 7-gallon plastic water jugs to carry filtered drinking water in the bed of the truck. Eventually we stopped using that method, as it was easier just to load up the individual gallon jugs we keep under the kitchen sink.

Water Usage – Conserving Water

We use a total of about 9-11 gallons of water a day. The rough breakdown is:

  • Drinking water: 1-2 gallons (I cook with it too)
  • Showers: 4-5 gallons
  • Washing dishes: 2-3 gallons
  • Bathroom vanity: 1 gallon
  • Toilet: 1 gallon
Rinsing dishes with low water flow while dry camping

Wash dishes in a thin stream of water!

Some folks are concerned that flushing the toilet wastes a lot of water, and some even install a composting toilet to save water. We find that our toilet uses too small a percentage of our fresh water capacity (~10%) to warrant such a big expense and installation project. Here are a few more things to consider when installing a composting toilet in an RV.

Our biggest trick to conserving water is not to run the faucets at full blast and not to leave them running unless we are actively using the water.

Washing Dishes

Rather than filling the whole sink with water, fill a bowl or small washtub with water. Make sure the dish detergent is well mixed with the water so no soapy residue is left on the dishes that requires a lot of water to rinse off. Use just a fine trickle of water to rinse.

We often leave a little sudsy water in the sink so we can wash our hands easily later in the day without turning on the faucet, except to rinse.

13-03-27

If you think showering in an RV is tough, try Showering on a Boat…

Showering

This may sound silly, but if you’re wondering how to live for years on 2 gallon showers, here’s what we do:

Since the water comes out cold at first, start by washing your feet and lower legs which can handle the cold. If you and your spouse can shower back to back, the second person gets warm water right away. Then go from the top down, shampooing first. Use the button on the shower wand to turn off the water when you lather up.

Again, like the other faucets. we keep the water pressure low in the shower. We can hear the surges of the water pump as it cycles on and off, and that gives us a sense of how much water we’re using. If the water pump starts going non-stop, then we know we’re using water up too quickly.

There are special shower wands that claim to use less water because they infuse the water with air. We tried one and found that it didn’t work well at the low water pressures we use, so it actually forced us to use more water for showering than we usually do.

Friends of ours who use hookups all the time love that shower wand, so we gave it to them. We use the simple shower wand that came with the rig because it has a nice flow that works well at low pressure.

If you need a laugh, check out our post on what it’s like to shower on a sailboat at sea!!

Washing the Rig

Just like learning to shower in 2 gallons of water, we’ve learned to wash the truck and trailer in about 10 gallons each. We go into a little detail about that in this post: How to wash your RV in the boondocks.

For a giggle, check out this post: What To Do in the Rain While Boondocking? Wash the Rig!

Washing your RV while boondocking

Chores in the boonies! See our posts: How to Wash your RV in the Boondocks and Wash with Rain Water!

 

WASTE WATER TANK MANAGEMENT

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If you are dry camping continuously, without going to an RV park in between that has sewer hookups, then you’ll need to empty the holding tanks at an RV dump station. There are RV dump stations in many different kinds of places: state and regional parks, rest areas, truck stops, gas stations and RV parks. Some are free, some cost anywhere from $5 to $10. We find RV dump stations using sanidumps.com and rvdumps.com.

To learn our secrets for easy and painless RV dumping, click on this link RV Dump Station Procedures and Waste Tank Tips. For hints on what the Wifey can do while the Hubby is fighting with the sewer hose, see our post: What’s A Girl To Do at the RV Dump Stataion?

Many people ask us about composting toilets. Here are our thoughts about whether you should install a composting toilet in your RV.

 

PROPANE

Many things in an RV run on propane, although it varies a lot from rig to rig. The more you boondock, the more you will appreciate the appliances that run on propane, because if those appliances ran on electricity, you would burn through your battery capacity far faster than you could replenish it with solar power.

Electric refrigerators are the most challenging culprits, because they have to run 24/7. We had an electric fridge on our boat, and at just 3.75 cubic feet, it consumed as much as half of our solar charging capacity each day.

Propane appliances in a 5th wheel trailer RV

Propane appliances: fridge, stove/oven & vent-free heater.
RV furnace and hot water heater not shown!

The propane appliances in our rig are:

  • Refrigerator
  • Hot water heater
  • Stove/oven
  • RV furnace
  • Vent-free propane heater

Our fifth wheel has two 7 gallon (30 lb.) propane tanks that are connected to each other with a valve that automatically switches from one tank to the other when one tank is empty. This way the fridge doesn’t quit working whenever a propane tank is empty. We monitor the tanks each day, so we see when one tank is empty and needs to be filled.

We generally find that in the summertime we have to refill one of the propane tanks every three weeks. In the coldest part of winter, we have to refill a tank once every 7-10 days.

Install a Vent-Free Propane Heater

Long-term boondockers usually install some kind of vent-free propane heater because they use propane so much more efficiently than a conventional RV furnace. For more information, visit the page: Vent-Free Propane Heater Installation.

Insulate the Hot Water Heater

Cover the hot water heater with insulation and wrap all the hot water pipes with pipe foam (wherever you can reach). This helps keep the water in the hot water tank warmer for longer.

Turn on the hot water heater only once a day

Heat up the water in the hot water tank right before you shower. Depending on how hot you like your water, you can turn the hot water heater off before it turns off on its own. We shower in the afternoon which gives us hot water for washing the dinner dishes. When the overnight lows stay above about 40 degrees, we still have warm water in the morning for breakfast dishes.

Heat Water on the Stove

If you need to heat water just to wash dishes, rather than heating the whole hot water tank, put a quart or half gallon of water on the stove and heat it for a minute until it’s the right temperature for you. If you use the hot water faucet to fill the pot and there is still warm water in the hot water tank, doing this will skim off the cold water that was in the RVs pipes. You’ll then have warm water from the tank to rinse the dishes without having to let it run first.

When cooking, put a lid on the pot. Things cook faster when covered. Of course if the recipe says to simmer uncovered, it’s more important to put food on the table that’s cooked right than to mess it up just to save some propane!

 

COMMUNICATIONS – INTERNET and PHONE ACCESS

There are many techniques for maintaining contact via internet and phone when you are out in the boonies. For more info, visit our page: RV Communications – internet and phone access on the road.

 

SAFETY

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Camping on your own without the company of other RVers or a camp host may seem like it might be fraught with danger. From theft to bears, questions about the safety of boondocking are among the most frequent queries we receive.

5th wheel RV camping in Arizona

I dunno, does this look safe to you?

Crime

People in this world are nicer than they get credit for, and we have not had any bad encounters.

That being said, we weren’t born yesterday, and we are cautious. For starters, we travel to places that are not crime-ridden, and we seek out places to stay overnight that feel safe. We follow our hunches, and if a place doesn’t have a good vibe, we don’t stay.

Once we set up camp, we pay attention to our surroundings. Mark, in particular, is very attuned to the goings-on around us, and he is quick to notice a car that has driven by twice or to recognize a person that he saw in the area three days ago.

Theft

Everything in the bed of our truck is locked to the truck with a cable lock. The bikes are covered and locked to the bike rack on our trailer. The bike rack itself is locked to the trailer as well. (Learn more about our bike rack here).

King pin hitch lock

A king pin lock prevents the trailer from being stolen.

We also use a king pin lock so no one can tow the trailer away while we’re gone.

When we leave our campsite, if we have the barbecue out, we lock it to a fifth wheel leg with a cable lock. The bikes are covered and locked to the bike rack. If we need to use the generator in an area where there are other people around, we lock it to a fifth wheel landing leg with a cable lock.

However, if we are out on our own with no one around, which is usually the case, we are much more relaxed about these things.

 

Guns

For the first ten years of our travels we never carried a gun. Mark used to love target shooting as a boy and often commented that he wished he had something with him for target practice as a pastime. In our eleventh year of travel he picked up a .22 rifle and now gets a lot of pleasure out of plinking.

We’ve never felt remotely threatened by anything. Most people we meet are very friendly and wild animals don’t approach our trailer.

RV Camping in Arizona

Bears

We have camped in bear country quite a bit, but we have never seen or heard a bear while boondocking. In general, if you keep your campsite clean (no tempting food scraps lying around), bears will leave you alone.

The Good Stuff

We find that living off the grid — boondocking and free camping in our RV — is the most fulfilling, beautiful and satisfying lifestyle we have ever tried.

Rather than being frightened in our rig, we have been enchanted.

We have been woken up in the middle of the night by the sounds of elks bugling as they ran past, by coyotes howling, owls hooting, wild horses whinnying, cattle mooing, and on our boat, by whales singing.

To us, that is the beauty of living out in nature, and that is why we choose to live this way.

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More tips for boondocking:

Our most recent posts:

Boondocking (“free camping”) – How to find free RV campsites

There is nothing like the feeling of freedom of setting up camp in an ideal, secluded, picturesque RV campsite out in the hinterlands somewhere, and that’s why many RVers love to go boondocking and why we’ve done it almost every night for over ten years.

Rather than camping in a campground or an RV park, finding an RV campsite somewhere on the gorgeous public lands that have been set aside by the government for recreational purposes can make for a thrilling and fulfilling getaway.

Boondocking in an RV in Utah-min

Boondocking in Utah

Boondocking” refers to this kind of camping which is also more officially known as “dispersed camping” or “primitive camping.” Many RVers also call it “free camping” or even “wild camping” because it usually doesn’t cost anything and many sites are far out in nature somewhere.

Whatever name you give it, it falls under the category of “dry camping” because you are living in your RV without hooking it up to city water, sewer or electricity.

RV boondocking camping in a trailer in Idaho

Boondocking in Idaho

This post describes the different kinds of boondocking spots that are available and how to locate them.

If you are interested in tips for how to live off the grid in an RV (i.e., tips for how to save electricity, how to conserve water & propane, how to boondock safely, etc.), see this page: RV Boondocking – Tips for Living Off the Grid in an RV

WHAT IS RV BOONDOCKING ALL ABOUT?

Generally, boondocking is a very different way of traveling than staying in RV parks and campgrounds, because it is very free spirited and spontaneous. Nothing can be reserved in advance, and often you have no idea what kind of site you might find.

Boondocking in an RV in Montana-min

Boondocking in Montana

Many days we have no idea where we will be staying until late in the afternoon. Learning to be this flexible takes time, especially after years spent in structured, workaday routines, and not everyone ends up liking it.

We find the freedom from rules and restrictions and the beauty of the public lands is intoxicating, and we wouldn’t travel in our RV any other way.

We have been camping this way every night since we started full-timing in 2007, and as of June 2019, we have boondocked in our RV for a total of nearly 3,200 nights.

Boondocking in an RV-min

Boondocking in Wyoming.

PUBLIC LAND

The US Forest Service (USFS) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and other government agencies (Army Corps of Engineers among others) all manage vast tracts of public land.

The USFS (National Forests) is part of the Department of Agriculture, while the BLM (Bureau of Land Management) is part of the Department of the Interior (as is the National Park Service).

Both the USFS and BLM have a mission “to sustain the health, diversity, and productivity of America’s public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations.”

As a result, both of these entities manage two kinds of activities on their land: recreational use (camping, hunting, fishing, hiking, biking) and productive use (cattle grazing, mining, logging, etc.).

For this reason, the USFS and BLM generally allow “dispersed camping” on their land. That is, you can camp wherever you find a spot that seems suitable and is accessible.

In stark contrast to the USFS and BLM, the mission of the National Park Service, which manages both America’s National Parks and National Monuments, is to preserve America’s natural and historical treasures. For this reason, the whole notion of dispersed camping runs contrary to their charter, which is preservation (i.e., “don’t touch”). Therefore:

America’s National Parks do not allow dispersed camping in an RV (boondocking)

Some ranger districts and specific locations within the USFS and BLM lands do not allow dispersed camping either. If overnight camping is not allowed, a “No Overnight Camping” sign will be posted at the site or in an otherwise obvious place.

The idea behind dispersed camping is to allow people to enjoy the beauty of nature without the ordinary restrictions of a campground. However, campers have a responsibility not to harm the site and to leave it in good condition for the next person.

That is why there are rules for boondocking about packing trash out, burying human waste deeply, and not making new campfire rings.

In general, the rules for boondocking are very simple:

  • Stay in a site that already has a campfire ring or other evidence of being a campsite, and don’t build a new one
  • Observe fire restrictions (sometimes fires are not allowed due to the ease of starting a wildfire)
  • Pack out the trash you create (and don’t leave it in the fire ring)
  • Bury any human waste under at least 6″ of dirt
  • Enjoy a stay of 14 days or less (sometimes 16 days) and then move on
Fifth wheel trailer camping in Oregon

Sunset in Oregon

The reason behind the 14 day stay limit for dispersed camping is that the government agencies don’t want people moving onto public land and making it their home. The idea is: get in, enjoy the place, and get out. The idea is not to turn public land into little RV homesteads.

In some places the rangers will monitor the campers on their land and will ensure campers leave when their 14 days are up. Even when no one is monitoring how long campers stay, it is important to respect the rules and leave when you’ve reached the time limit.

There is a ranger’s office for each district within each of these agencies, and a stop at the ranger’s office is often worthwhile to pick up maps and to ask about dispersed camping opportunities, local rules and regulations.

Camping in a fifth wheel RV in utah

Lakeside in Utah

Note added May, 2017: A reader recently emailed me to express her distress that when I discussed “our” public land, I referred to it as “their” land, meaning land “belonging to” the federal agencies that manage it (USFS, BLM, etc.). For anyone that is puzzled or put off by this reference, please read my post Copper Mining, Not Camping, In Tonto National Forest which explains in detail one way (of many) that land management agencies control public land.

It takes just a few hours for any land management agency to erect a permanent “Road Closed” sign on any tract of public land to keep the public out — indefinitely — until the road grows over with weeds and fades into oblivion. We’ve seen it happen many times. Public land is “our” land in many ways, but our access to it and the things we can do on it are tightly controlled (and have been tightly controlled for as much as a century in some places).

RV boondocking dispersed camping in Arizona

Arizona

As noted above, the USFS and BLM generally allow boondocking while the National Park Service (NPS) does not.

This means that famous places like Grand Canyon, Yosemite, Yellowstone, etc., are off limits to boondocking.

The one exception for boondocking in the National Park system is at Big Bend National Park in Texas where a very controlled kind of boondocking is possible, as explained here: Boondocking at Big Bend National Park – Tips & Tricks.

Many National Parks are located near National Forests. If you don’t mind a 10 mile or more drive to get to the National Park you are visiting, you can boondock in the National Forest and drive in.

If you are interested in boondocking, or simply camping in National Forest and BLM campgrounds, you’ll soon become aware of the complexities and political issues surrounding the management of America’s public land.

In every western state public land campgrounds and dispersed camping areas are closing at an alarming rate.

Some shocking public land changes we have seen in our years of RVing full-time are described in these two blog posts:

  • Copper Mining (NOT CAMPING!) at Tonto National Forest
    – The 2015 Defense Bill under Obama gave away the world’s largest copper vein (in Arizona) to British/Australian mining interests. Surprisingly, after 50 years of national debate about this land (including a decree by President Eisenhower that it never be mined), it was given away to foreigners rather than sold to an American corporation at a massive profit — with huge royalties on extraction — as it could have been.
  • What is Happening to our Public Land? – Changes at the Grand Canyon
    – Private Italian owned commercial developments have taken place in the National Forest just outside Grand Canyon National Park. Is that an appropriate use of National Forest “public” land?

While there has been a huge outcry recently about reducing the size of several National Monuments, in our experience, RV boondocking is generally not allowed on National Monument property. Also, the creation of a National Monument brings a deluge of tourists and requires building visitors centers, roads, parking lots and other tourist oriented features.

Much of the land in those National Monuments was already managed by federal land agencies prior to becoming a National Monument, and it is slated to return to BLM and USFS control now. The National Monument designation not only restricted how the public could enjoy the land (like boondocking) but dramatically increased the tourist traffic as well.

During a very long conversation with a ranger at Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument, we learned that he and another ranger had spent an arduous 14 hour day the previous day cleaning up human poop and toilet paper from a popular spot on the National Monument that is too remote for toilet facilities. In the past, that place was not known to the public and saw very little visitation, but because it is now in all the tourist literature for the National Monument, lots of folks go there.

Sign in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument-min

Increased tourism with “National Monument” designation has its downside.
We saw this sign in Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.

We were also very surprised on a long back road trip to find that much of Grand Staircase Escalante was, in our opinion, very nondescript and featureless land — nothing like the truly stunning and dramatic canyon that was bisected by busy US-89 highway north of Kanab decades ago!

Perhaps the most disturbing development is the deliberate blocking of public land by wealthy people with a political agenda. In the past, ranchers generally allowed the public to have easement access to inaccessible public land next door to their property. Now, as old ranch land is sold, folks are buying it to block access to neighboring public land.

We met a fellow who told us with glee about his recent land acquisition. “When I close the gate to my property I block public access to 88,000 acres of public land!” he said with sheer delight. Another way of looking at it is that he has taken 137 square miles of public land away from the public and made it his own.

In several cases, private landowners who continued to allow public access across their property were murdered by their neighbors who wanted to shut down access to the public land all together: Class War in the American West.

We are not hunters or fishermen, but hunters and anglers are much better organized around the public land debate than RVers are, and they have gathered resources to ensure they retain access to hunting and fishing grounds: SportsmensAccess.org.

The bottom line is that the public land debate has been ongoing for over a century and it is complex. It’s worth noting that beloved photographer Ansel Adams vehemently opposed the National Park Service nearly a century ago. He discussed his opinions and actions at length in his terrific autobiography here.

BOONDOCKING ETIQUETTE

Respect The Neighbors – Give Them Space!

Boondocking campsites vary a lot in size. Some are large enough for several big rigs and some can fit only a single van or truck camper.

If you arrive at a campsite and find someone is already set up there, move on to another site unless you can set up your rig in such a way that you won’t be intruding on their space.

Even though rigs can easily park in very close proximity in RV parks, people who are boondocking on their own generally don’t want to have neighbors move in close by.

There’s no hard and fast rule on “how close is too close,” but for us, if we can’t give the campers a few rig lengths of privacy, we leave them in peace and continue our search for a different site.

Respect The Neighbors – Keep The Noise Down!

Most people boondock to get away from it all, and if you do end up within sight of neighbors, respecting their quest for peace and quiet is simply common courtesy.

Whether it’s loud music or a loud generator, nature is not nearly as tranquil when a neighbor is making a lot of noise.

Respect The Neighbors – Don’t Search For Campsites After Dark!

It is very difficult to find your way around in the boonies on small dirt roads in the pitch dark, but there are folks out there who do their campsite scouting after sunset.

This is most common with people in small driveable RVs without a car who spent the day sightseeing and are now looking for a place to crash.

Just because you have GPS coordinates or directions to a campsite in hand doesn’t mean it will be vacant and available for you when you arrive. There may be sleeping people in RVs there, and they may be surrounded by large obstacles like bushes, rocks, trees and fire pits.

It is quite a jolt to be woken up at midnight by someone driving over small bushes and boulders with their headlights flashing in all directions as they circle around your bedroom trying to find a place to camp for the night!

If you have a small RV without a car, try to finish your sightseeing before sunset so you can find a campsite and set up camp in the boonies without waking up the neighbors. Or, if you want to be out at night, stay in a campground in a well marked site that you can find easily when you return in the dark.

View from RV window in Utah

View from our window in Utah

Leave Your Campsite Cleaner Than You Found It!

In the olden days of 50 years ago, this motto — “Leave your campsite cleaner than you found it” — was drilled into camping kids by their parents. Lots of older campers today remember hearing that refrain from stern parents when they were young. Even if it is not commonly heard any more, it is still great advice that is well worth following.

– Pick Up Other People’s Trash

The land management agencies ask that campers “pack it in and pack it out.” This means: don’t leave the place a mess. Generally an RV won’t leave a footprint behind, but sometimes we arrive at a site and end up filling several grocery bags with trash.

I’d rather pack out someone else’s trash than leave that legacy for our grandchildren to find when they go camping with their RVs decades from now. Sadly, there is LOTS of trash on our public land, and we pack out bags of other people’s trash all the time.

Our feeling is that if we can stay for free for two weeks on a gorgeous piece of property, surrounded by hundreds of acres of natural beauty, with a multi-million dollar view out our windows, the least we can do is to pick up a little trash.

This makes the campsite nice for the next visitor!

We also want to keep the USFS, BLM and other land management agencies happy with RVers so they continue to allow boondocking on their land.

So the first thing we do when we set up camp anywhere (both on public land AND in commercial parking lots) is to grab a grocery bag and fill it with whatever trash is strewn around our rig. There is ALWAYS some! I usually throw on a pair of rubber gloves.

In Arizona, many Tonto National Forest boondocking areas have been closed because it was too expensive for the USFS to clean up after winter RVers and others who trashed the places. What a shame that those thoughtless people ruined it for everyone else.

– Clean Out the Campfire Ring

Many campers like to leave some of their trash in the campfire ring, thinking that the next camper will burn it for them. They seem not to realize that the next camper may not want to sit down in front of their wonderful campfire on their first night out only to spend an hour burning someone else’s trash!

Also, lots of folks don’t do campfires. Who wants to see a pile of trash in the front yard while they’re camping?

Here’s a photo of the things I pulled out of a campfire ring in gorgeous Sedona Arizona one time:

campfire ring contents-min

We arrived to find all this piled up in the campfire ring.
Who wants to start their camping getaway by burning the junk left by the previous camper?

– More about Poop on our Public Land

Many conservation oriented people who plan to do a lot of boondocking ask us if they should get a composting toilet for their RV. Keeping campsite cleanliness etiquette in mind, and remembering the public land managers’ important and common sense rule about burying human waste under at least 6″ of dirt, we’ve summarized our thoughts at this link: Is a composting toilet a good idea in an RV?

HOW TO LOCATE BOONDOCKING SITES

The Delorme State Atlas Books and the Benchmark Atlas Books show where the public lands are in each state, and we have one for every state we travel in (and for a few states we have two, one from each publisher!).

These atlases also have a section in the front that describes the various outings, scenic drives, historic spots and unusual natural landmarks that can be found within the state. With those attractions in mind, we have an idea of where we want to go and which secondary roads will get us there.

boondocking with a fifth wheel trailer in Idaho

Camping under a big open sky in Idaho

Each state also produces a free paper road map, and visitors centers usually stock them for all the states in the region, so it’s easy to get your hands on a road map when you arrive (and sometimes even before you arrive) in a new state. Note that the big state visitors centers are generally located on the interstates, so if you are crossing into a new state and want a map, arriving via an interstate highway is a good idea.

RV camping in the Oregon woods

Tucked into the woods in Oregon

We like these paper road maps because they give an overview of the layout of the state and they usually show where the scenic drives are too. You see, where there are scenic roads, there are beautiful things to see, and sometimes there are nice places to boondock too!

That’s why, between the atlas map books and the road maps, we are always on the lookout for scenic areas.

Another super resource is the wonderfully detailed National Geographic maps of America’s public lands. These take the atlas books one step further, giving finer detail (but covering less area). We turn to these when we want to zero in on a particular national forest or BLM area. These maps are especially useful for:

The National Geographic maps are also excellent for these states:

Arizona, California, Colorado, Oregon, Montana, Nevada, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, Wyoming

We usually aim for a particular area, and once we arrive, we find a place to park the rig temporarily so we can get our bearings and do some scouting in person. Then we unhitch our truck or unload the bikes, and we go scouting to see if there are any good campsites.

Usually, the first night or two we are in a temporary spot that is okay but is not somewhere we’d want to spend a long time. If we like the area and want to stay longer, we then do an all out search to find a better place. Sometimes we get lucky and find a great campsite. Sometimes it’s impossible and we just move on.

Camping under a rainbow in Wyoming

A rainbow crosses the sky in Wyoming

We incorporate our search for boondocking spots into our overall travels and sightseeing in each area we visit. Because of this, unlike most RV campers, for us searching for boondocking locations is an integral part of our lives and is the very fabric of our RV lifestyle.

Our biggest concern in scouting out a boondocking campsite is whether or not our rig will fit, both on the road getting there, and also once we are in the campsite. Overhanging branches and insufficient room to turn around can make a great spot impossible for us to use.

Secondary concerns are the potential that the place will get really muddy if it rains or really dusty if it gets windy. We also debate how long a drive it is from the campsite to wherever we want to visit. Sometimes it’s not worth staying if we’re going to be driving excessively to see whatever we came to see. However, in popular places we do frequently boondock in places that are as much as 20 to 50 miles from wherever we plan to be sightseeing.

It may sound funny, but we frequently don’t unhitch our trailer when we stay somewhere, especially if we know we won’t be staying more than a few days. If the area is bike friendly, and we’re caught up on our chores (laundry and grocery shopping), we won’t be using the truck anyways. So, we save ourselves a few minutes while setting up and breaking down camp by keeping the truck and trailer attached.

Camping in an RV in Arizona

Full moon at dusk in Arizona

There are listings of boondocking sites on various websites and some folks sell books with boondocking locations in them.

However, in all our years of living off the grid and boondocking, we have found that going scouting in person is by far the best way to find places to stay.

Ultimately, RV boondocking is all about adventure, and for us, the true joy of boondocking is exploring the wonderful public lands in America and discovering special campsites that are relatively unknown.

Overnight at a scenic lookou at Washington Pass in the North Cascades

One of our earliest boondocking experiences in Washington

Besides the thrill of discovery, another reason we like to find our campsites on our own rather than relying on lists of boondocking locations given by other people is that, in general, the quality of the reports in those lists is unreliable.

If the person reporting the site is traveling in a van, or in a car with a tent, or small RV, and has never driven a big RV, their “fabulous” campsite that is “good for any size RV” may be totally inappropriate for a truly big rig.

In addition, not only is one person’s definition of a “good dirt road” different than another’s, the site may have become unusable since the report was made.

RV camping in the boondocks in Oregon

Exotic skies in Oregon

Boondocking locations are being closed all the time.

Unfortunately, the places that allow RVers to boondock are shrinking in number all the time.

As communities grow in areas next to tracts of public land, residents don’t want to look out the windows of their new home to see RVs camping, and they get the public land management agencies to close the sites. Nearby RV parks and other fee based campgrounds also don’t like the competition from free campsites nearby, so they campaign to close dispersed camping sites to encourage RVers to stay in their campgrounds instead.

Also, the public land management agencies close roads to former boondocking sites every day for various reasons, frequently converting them to “Day Use Only.” All it takes to eliminate a stunning dispersed camping location is a “Road Closed” or “No Camping” sign on the road leading to it. These are becoming more and more common on America’s public lands.

Many places we stayed early in our travels are now off limits, and RVers who started out 10 or 20 years before us have told us of favorite campsites they lost before we even knew what boondocking was.

Day Use Only - No camping - sign for RV campers in the National Forest-min

There are over a dozen fantastic former boondocking campsites behind this sign in Colorado.

PARKING OVERNIGHT at COMMERCIAL PARKING LOTS, TRUCK STOPS and CASINOS

Walmart is famous for being very RV-friendly, and they sell a Rand McNally Atlas that lists all the addresses of every Walmart in the US as well as its interstate exit number, if it is near one. However Walmart is not always in control of their land, so staying overnight in their lot is not always legal.

Although most Walmarts would allow RV overnight parking if they could, when the building is on leased land with a landlord that forbids it, or when it is located within city limits that have an ordinance against overnight parking, then you can’t stay there.

Usually there are signs in the parking lot if overnight parking is not allowed. It is advisable to check with the store’s security department to find out whether or not they allow overnight parking, and if they do, where they want you to park.

Here is a list of No Overnight Parking Walmarts. Of course, sometimes rules are flagrantly ignored, and we have arrived at Walmarts where RVs and semi-tractor trailers were lined up between the signs prohibiting overnight parking!

Even more-so than on public land, the boondocking etiquette at a commercial parking lot like Walmart is really important.

We try to keep a low profile, usually remaining hitched to the truck and often not even putting the slides out. Obviously, camp chairs, patio mats, grills and other outdoor paraphernalia is strictly forbidden.

5th wheel trailer Boondocking in Colorado

Surrounded by gold in Colorado

We have seen people treat a Walmart parking lot like a campground, grilling steaks, enjoying cocktails in their camp chairs, and playing ball with their kids in the parking lot (and hitting car windshields with the ball!). No wonder city ordinances against overnight parking in commercial lots are on the rise!

How serious is this business of polite overnight parking etiquette?

Years ago, when we first started full-timing, we stayed at a casino that was very popular among snowbird RVers migrating down I-15 to Arizona for the winter.

While walking around the parking lot at sunset, we saw lots of of RVers setting up a big circle of camping chairs right in the parking lot. These more experienced RVers told us “it was fine” to have cocktail hour in the parking lot and that they did it whenever they came through on their north-south migration in spring and fall.

Free camping with a fifth wheel trailer in Wyoming

Camping on a lake in Wyoming

“The casino management doesn’t care if we do this…” these RVers told us. So we accepted their invitation to join them. It looked like fun! Well, apparently management did care, because now overnight parking is prohibited, not only in that particular casino parking lot but at most of the others in town too.

Along with this casino, we have seen quite a few other commercial parking lots that were once popular overnight spots close their lots to RVers. So again, be respectful of the special places that still allow it so others can enjoy it in the future!

Fifth wheel trailer RV boondocking in Arizona

Camping amid the cactus in Arizona

Cracker Barrel allows overnight parking at many locations, and they have a map that lists the addresses of their stores. However, we have yet to see a Cracker Barrel with a parking space big enough for our rig!

Camping World allows overnight parking in some of their lots. They list their store locations online and you can give them a call to find out which ones allow it.

Casino Camper gives descriptions of casinos that offer overnight RV parking, either in RV parks for a fee, or in a back lot for free.

Truck stops are another option in a pinch, although that rarely makes for a good night’s sleep.

Small businesses will sometimes allow an RV to stay in a back lot if you patronize them and ask permission. Some visitors centers allow it too, but generally only the ones in less busy areas.

GETTING A GOOD NIGHT’S SLEEP in a COMMERCIAL LOT

Most commercial lots are very well lit, so it’s almost impossible to find a spot in the parking lot where the street lights won’t be shining in the windows or down the bedroom hatch.

Using a vent hatch insulator in the bedroom roof hatch and putting Reflectix in the windows will block the light and make it easier to sleep. Choosing a spot that is far away from any trucks is important too, as they tend to come and go all night long. Refrigerated trucks run loud generators to keep their contents cold. Parking next to one overnight is no fun at all!

Camping by a brook in Idaho

Our own private Idaho

REST AREAS and PULL-OUTS

Some Interstate rest areas allow overnighting and some don’t. Generally, if it is not allowed, then there are signs that say so. Like truck stops, finding a spot away from the trucks is vital.

Vermont doesn’t allow sleeping in their rest areas between 7 pm and 7 am (apparently “resting” at a rest stop is a very short duration activity in Vermont), while at one time Texas offered free wifi at all of theirs! One rest area in Mississippi is set up like a campground with individual campsites and a water spigot at each site!

Many secondary roads have large pull-outs where you can be far off the highway and get a good night’s sleep.

ASK AROUND

The best boondocking resources are often fellow RVers and other people we meet in our travels. However, as with the online and printed reports of campsites, it helps to verify that the person has actually been there and done it.

Many forest rangers will say there is dispersed camping in their district, yet despite being “legal,” it is totally impractical. Find out if the ranger you are talking to is an RVer with a rig your size.

RV boondocking in Arizona

Beach camping in Arizona

Also, whoever you talk to, find out what kind of rig they actually took to the campsite they are describing and when they last went. They may own a big rig now, but if they took a Jeep and a tent to this site twenty years ago, it doesn’t count.

Lastly, size up the person and their thirst for adventure as compared to your own. We have several RVing friends who happily take their big motorhomes to places we’d hesitate to go.

Most of all — have fun with it. For us, half of the excitement of boondocking is in the searching. We always have an eye out for prospective camping sites as we drive around, and when we find a really good one it’s a total thrill.

RV camping and boondocking in Arizona

Red rock camping in Utah

WHY DON’T WE SHARE OUR BOONDOCKING LOCATIONS?

Many people ask us why we don’t give GPS coordinates or directions to the boondocking locations we find. Very simply, boondocking is all about adventure — not knowing what might lie around the corner or where you might sleep tonight. We don’t want to spoil that adventure for you!

More importantly, the essence of boondocking is being able to experience true independence, freedom and self-reliance, things that are rare in today’s world.

One of the greatest thrills of boondocking is suddenly coming across a campsite that is ideal for you, somewhere you would just LOVE to stay for a few days. If you simply drive to the GPS coordinates somebody else has given you, you are missing out on the most exciting aspects of boondocking: exploration and discovery.

Our boondocking locations work well for us, but they might not work for you. Our trailer sports a lot of pin stripes along its sides from scraping against tree branches when we’ve squeezed down a narrow road, and our truck already has a dent in the side from a tree branch falling on it when we shoe-horned ourselves into a tight spot.

We are willing to commute as much as 50 miles between our campsite and the areas where we sightsee. So, many of the stunning photos of our rig on this blog are not anywhere near the areas we were visiting at the time.

We also spend many hours each week searching for good campsites by driving our truck or riding our bikes down tiny dirt roads to see what’s there. This is an integral part of our daily lives and is not only a fundamental part of our travels but is something we really enjoy doing.

For those that are willing to make this kind of effort, all of the beautiful places you see in this blog are waiting for you to find. Relish the search — we do!

When we cruised in our sailboat, a popular cruising guide had just been published. It gave the GPS coordinates where the authors had anchored in every anchorage. Everywhere we went, boats were crammed around those coordinates. Even if the anchorage was a mile wide, 20 boats would be on top of each other where the authors of the book had dropped their anchor.

That kind of “paint-by-numbers” cruising (or boondocking) is easy, but I think all those sailors were missing out on something priceless: exploring and finding a little corner of their own that was away from it all and that was “theirs” for a few nights.

RV boondocking in a 5th wheel trailer

A classic sunset

Also, like everything on the Internet, this blog is read worldwide. I have seen our RV articles and our blog links being discussed on RVing forums from France to The Netherlands to Romania and have received emails from South American and Australian readers as well!

I love corresponding with American service people who are stationed overseas in the war-torn parts of the world, especially when they tell me that this blog is a source of inspiration for them as they begin to plan for a different life after their service is over.

However, there is little reason for people on the other side of the planet to get detailed directions to or GPS coordinates for priceless camping spots on America’s public land.

If boondocking and anchoring out all these years have taught us anything, it is that these places are precious. Anchorages are disappearing as they are turned into mooring fields and then get built up into marinas. Public land boondocking locations are also disappearing at an alarming rate, often because it’s much cheaper for the land management agencies to prohibit dispersed camping all together than to pay to pick up the trash that careless campers and partiers have left behind.

We love our life in an RV off the grid, and we hope others with a similar passion for the natural world will approach it with the same kind of adventurous spirit as we do, and will find it as thrilling and fulfilling as we have.

However, going out and having a thrilling adventure of your own is an exercise we leave up to the reader!!

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  • US Forest Service – The USFS manages America’s many National Forests under the Department of Agriculture
  • Bureau of Land Management – The BLM manages vast tracts of land in the west under the Department of the Interior
  • US Army Corps of Engineers – Among many other things, manages America’s watershed areas, largely in the east
  • National Park Service – Oversees and protects America’s natural and historic treasures, under the Department of the Interior

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Full-time RV Tips: Mail, Domicile, Insurance & Saving Money!

We loved our 13 years of total freedom and nomadic living on the road, and we have some great full-time RV tips for you. Have you wondered how full-time RVers get their mail? Or what the heck they use as a home address (known in legalese as a “Domicile”) and where they register to vote? What kind of insurance do they buy? Is an RV Warranty a good idea? And what kinds of tricks are there for saving money on RV park and campground costs?

This page, the third part in our series on full-time RVing, reveals all that we have learned about these topics in our many years on the road. The previous two articles are: Working and Living in an RV and Which RV is the Best Rolling Home?

For easy navigation on this page, and to read a little now and come back for more later, click on these links:

Links to the entire series and its various chapters are here: Full-time RV Lifestyle Tips

Full-time RVing Domicile Mail Forwarding Taxes RV Insurance

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SELECTING A DOMICILE: TAXES, MAIL FORWARDING & VEHICLE REGISTRATION

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Once you run away in an RV, you lose all the familiar pillars that supported your life before: mail no longer arrives daily at your doorstep, the washer and dryer are no longer just steps from the kitchen, the bank is no longer on a familiar corner. With a little flexibility all these things are easy to handle in a traveling lifestyle.

Selecting A Home State – Taxes and Vehicle Registration Rates

When you trade your home address to live on the road in an RV, you need to decide how to receive mail and what to call “home” on your tax returns. Some of the full-time RVers we meet retained the state of residence where they were living before they hit the road. Most of them still own property in that state, and they often have a relative or friend who forwards their mail.

However, most full-time RVers change their state of residence, or domicile, and there are valid reasons for doing so, including tax, insurance and vehicle registration rates.

States Without A State Income Tax

Not every state has a state income tax. South Dakota, Florida and Texas are among the states that have no state income tax, and they are the most popular states for full-time travelers. They are also fairly lenient for establishing residency, and they have many companies that offer mail forwarding and vehicle registration services.

Choosing a Domicile address and residency

When you no longer have a permanent physical home address, your legal address or “domicile” can be
in any state. Some states are better than others for this purpose.

State Sales Tax Rates

The sales tax rates also vary from state to state. The sales tax in one particular state may not seem important for someone who is going to be traveling all over the country, but the sales tax in your home state can actually be very important. If you buy a new vehicle — car, truck, trailer or motorhome — during your travels, you will register it in your home state and pay that state’s sales tax in the process. Many full-time RVers upgrade either their RV, tow vehicle or “toad” at some point. We have purchased tw trucks and two trailers during our years on the road. The sales tax rates in the most popular states for full-time travelers are:

South Dakota 4%
Florida 6%
Texas 6.25%

Other Considerations – Additional Taxes and Insurance

Vehicle registration fees and vehicle insurance rates, as well as cell phone taxes and health insurance rates also vary between those states. Health insurance varies dramatically from state to state and health insurance needs and qualifying criteria also vary from person to person.

For those concerned about dental and medical care on the road, another option is to zip across America’s southern border to get good dental/medical care in Mexico. We have gotten a lot of excellent dental care in Mexico, both in our lives as RVers and our lives as boaters living in Mexico. We have detailed information about dental care in Mexico at this link:

Mexican Dentists – Finding Affordable Dental Care in Mexico

South Dakota is popular among full-time travelers because it boasts no inheritance tax, no property tax and no vehicle inspections. We chose South Dakota as our domicile right before we hit the road as newbie full-time RVers in 2007.

There are other states that have either no income tax and/or no sales tax besides these three most popular ones (SD, TX and FL). However, those states make it a little more difficult to establish residency, leaving full-time travelers in a bind, and they have fewer companies offering mail forwarding and vehicle registration services.

 

The Impact of Non-Residents on these Popular States

The advantage to these states and communities of having lots of non-resident residents is that they receive many thousands of dollars of sales taxes, insurance premiums and registration fees that wouldn’t otherwise come their way. The presence of mail forwarding companies also creates jobs in these states that wouldn’t otherwise exist.

At the same time, this non-resident residency impacts the local politics of the cities and towns where the biggest mail forwarding companies do business because of the huge number of absentee voters. These voters may vote like each other — full-time RVers have a lot in common with each other — but they don’t necessarily vote like the other residents of their adopted hometowns.

The Right to Vote

Many Americans assume that they have a constitutional right to vote. Surprisingly, that is not the case. States control who can vote and who can’t, from local elections on up to presidential elections. For more info on this, visit FairVote.org.

Uncle Sam Right to Vote for nomadic RVers

In early February, 2016, a bill was introduced in South Dakota that would effectively deny anyone using a South Dakota mail forwarding service as their legal domicile the right to vote. The history behind this bill was that in Pennington Country a vehicle tax increase of $60 came up for a vote, and prior to voting day, certain politicians assumed that the nomadic RVers with legal domiciles in that county would unanimously vote against it.

Interestingly, in the end only 11% of the RVers from Americas Mailbox in that county actually cast a vote. Of course, 98% of them did vote against the tax, which continued to raise an alarm for the politicians.

As a result, Senate Bill 164 was proposed by Republican Senator Craig Tieszen to deny voting rights to residents who did not maintain a home in the state. The bill was tabled in committee, due in large part to the very vocal response from the RVing community, but the issue still rankles certain politicians in South Dakota, so it would not be surprising if it surfaced again in the future.

We have posted a detailed article explaining the issue as well as a detailed analysis of the committee hearing written by the Escapees Advocacy Director in an email to Escapees members. The comments made by Senator Tieszen at the hearing make it clear he is going to continue to work towards eliminating the voting eligibility of people who are not physical residents of the state.

The “Right To Vote” is a Privilege Some Full-Time RVers Might Lose

Selecting A Mail Forwarding Company — Your Home Address

In addition to finding a state that makes financial sense for your lifestyle needs, finding the right mail forwarding company is very important. This company will give you your actual legal mailing address for everything you do, from banking to borrowing to filing income taxes to voting.

South Dakota, Texas and Florida are all home to major mail forwarding services that will help you become a legal resident, help you register and insure your vehicles and help you become a registered voter. Your postal mail will be sent to your address at the mail forwarding service. They will then sent it to you, wherever you are. You will have to show up in person in your new home state to get your driver’s license. The terms for renewing a driver’s license vary from state to state.

If the company goes out of business (and we’ve heard of that happening), not only might you lose some mail, but you are left without a legal address. Of course, it is easy enough to “move” when you live on the road, so you won’t be homeless for long. But you will have to make a lot of phone calls and online address changes wherever your mailing address is recorded.

Your Name
General Delivery
City, State Zip

“Virtual Mail” Service

Most of the bigger mail forwarding services now offer some kind of “virtual” service where you can see a scanned image of each envelope as soon as it arrives and then request to have the envelope opened and the documents inside scanned as well, with further options to do something special if the document needs to reach you physically right away or to shred it.

We have been enjoying the virtual mail service that comes with the Platinum plan at America’s Mailbox, and we have found it is really handy to know what is waiting for us in the mail before we have it shipped to us.

Mail Forwarding Service Providers

In South Dakota, one of the largest mail forwarding services is America’s Mailbox just outside of Rapid City in Box Elder near the Black Hills in the western part of the state. We have the Platinum plan with them and have been absolutely delighted with their service. We call them once a month and tell them where to send the mail. Mail forwarding providers in South Dakota include:

The locations can be seen on this interactive Map of South Dakota

In Texas, Escapees has the largest mail forwarding service in the country. They receive a semi tractor-trailer load of mail everyday. We saw this truck come in everyday while visiting the main Escapees Headquarters campus in Livingston, Texas, and we toured their mail sorting facility. We were absolutely floored by the operation (our blog post about it is here: Rainbow’s End – Escapees RV Club Headquarters in Livingston Texas. Another Texas mail forwarding service is Texas Home Base.

In Florida, cruising sailors have relied on St. Brendan’s Isle mail forwarding for ages. To my knowledge, they were the first (by at least 5 years) to provide a virtual mail service where you could see a scanned image of your mail in an email message. This kind of service is now provided by America’s Mailbox and Escapees and others as well. Other mail forwarding services in Florida are Nato Mail, Escapees, Good Sam Club and My RV Mail.

US Mail truck at Escapees RV Club mail sorting facility Livingston Texas

A US Mail semi tractor-trailer arrives at the Escapees mail sorting facility in Texas with one day’s mail.

How Do You Get Your Mail Forwarded To You?

Usually we have the mail sent to a post office, addressed to us via “General Delivery.” We get the zip code for the post office online from www.usps.com. If we are in transit, we try to guess what town we might be traveling through in a few days. The post office holds all General Delivery mail for 30 days, so there is plenty of time to locate the post office and retrieve our box.

The format for a General Delivery address is:

When selecting a post office, be sure they offer General Delivery services (you can find out at the www.usps.com link). Virtually all full service post offices do, but some of the “Approved postal providers” that they list don’t. When you go to get your box o’ mail, they will ask for your ID before handing it to you.

You can also have your mail sent to an RV park where you are staying or to a friend’s house. If mail is going to a friend, address it:

Your Name
c/o Your Friend’s Name
Street
City, State Zip

We find it is far preferable, in all mail and shipping matters, to select a smaller, quieter rural post office instead of a big chaotic urban one.

US Post Office Mail General Delivery

We find the smaller post offices are easier and more fun to work with, like this little log cabin
post office in the historic village of Washington outside Maysville, Kentucky

How Do You Have Packages Shipped To You?

Because we don’t like to plan more than a day in advance, we have small items sent to our South Dakota mailing address. Sure, we pay double shipping sometimes (first to get it to SD and then to get it to us, wherever we are), but that’s a small price to pay to be on the road full-time, happy, free and independent.

We have larger packages shipped directly to us, wherever we are. This takes some planning and strategizing, as explained below.

Can FedEx and UPS Packages Be Shipped to General Delivery Post Office Addresses?

UPS and FedEx packages are most easily shipped to real street addresses (RV Parks or friends) or to post office box holders at a post office or to a shipping store like FedEx/Kinko’s or a UPS store or Mailboxes Etc. If you are staying somewhere for the season, you can get a PO box at a mailing services store.

If you don’t have a real street address at the moment (i.e., you are boondocking), the easiest way to go is to have packages shipped by the US Postal Service to General Delivery at a post office. Doing it this way, the package stays within the US postal system the entire time from shipping to delivery.

We have at least two dozen shipping addresses listed in our Amazon account. LOL!! Reading through those addresses is like reading a brief history of our RV travels, as the addresses date back to our first year on the road!!

If the shipper can’t or won’t use the Postal Service, then they can ship via a dedicated shipping company like UPS or FedEx to a post office General Delivery address. However, this is more complicated because the package is handled by both the Postal Service and the shipping company.

The Postal Service coordinates shipping and deliveries with UPS and FedEx, but they are also direct competitors with them, so things can get muddy and there are no strict rules and regulations that we know of.

We’ve had the Postmasters at several different Post Offices give us totally conflicting information. We pressed two different Postmasters to call their district supervisors to get the details clarified, and even then we got conflicting information. So it seems the Postal Service is is still working out its relationships with UPS and FedEx as far as General Deliveries go.

Postal Service Fees For Packages Shipped By UPS and FedEx

Sometimes packages shipped by UPS or FedEx to a General Delivery address at a post office are handed to the recipient free of charge. However, sometimes the Postal Service charges the recipient a fee at the pickup counter before handing over the package. I know this seems odd, because FedEx or UPS carried the package all the way across the country while the Postal Service is merely carrying it from the mail room to the front counter. But it happens.

We have received many Post Office General Delivery packages shipped by both UPS and FedEx without being charged a penny by the Postal Service. However, we have received just as many packages where we were charged a fee of as much as $12, depending on the size of the package, when we went to the post office window to pick it up. There is no way of knowing what the fee will be ahead of time, as it is out of the hands of the company that shipped the package and is entirely up to the local Post Office that delivers it to you via General Delivery.

Shipping to a Warehouse Distribution Center

To get around this, you can look up the nearest warehouse distribution center for either FedEx or UPS and have the package shipped to that distribution center with “Hold for Pickup” written on it. You will not be charged a fee at pickup. However, you will need to track the package and you will have 5 days to pick up the package before it is returned to the sender.

Delivery to a Shipping/Mail Services Store

If the distribution center is too hard to get to, you can opt to have the package shipped to a UPS Store or FedEx/Kinko’s store or other shipping store like MailBoxes Etc. The store will likely charge you a fee, even if it is a UPS store and you are shipping via UPS or is a FedEx/Kinko’s and you are shipping via FedEx. We’ve seen the fee range from a flat fee of $3 whenever you pick it up to $7 per day, however these stores are more likely to hold the package longer than 5 days. So, check with the store before having something shipped to them to get the details and verify how they want the package to be addressed.

New: Shipping to a Store Near You

There is a new development at both UPS and FedEx to ship packages to drug stores, supermarkets and mom-and-pop stores on Main Street. While we staying in Buffalo, Wyoming, in the summer of 2017, a small clothing store on the main drag both shipped and received UPS packages for us.

The FedEx program is called FedEx OnSite and it networks with Kroger Stores, Albertsons and Walgreens. The UPS program is called US Access Point and networks with 4,000 locations in mom-and-pop grocery stores, dry cleaners and other merchants.

Case History – UPS Goes Above And Beyond!

This all may sound complicated, but sometimes it’s as smooth as silk.

One time we had a package shipped via UPS to a post office General Delivery address in a small town. We tracked the package, and noticed its status was “On the truck and out for delivery.” This seemed to imply that the package was on its way to the post office, so we called the UPS distribution center to find out at what time of day the truck might get to the post office so we could drive in to get it.

The UPS distribution center was small, and they said only the driver would know the exact time. To our utter astonishment, they gave us the UPS driver’s cell phone number. So we called him!! He was very friendly and said he could drive over to where our RV was parked and hand deliver the package in about 10 minutes. We were both totally shocked when he pulled alongside our rig and handed our package to Mark — at no charge. Now how’s that for service?!

UPS Package Delivery to an RV

A UPS driver hand delivers a package to Mark at our fifth wheel!

Vehicle Registration

We have registered four vehicles through our mail forwarding service provider: two trucks and two trailers. Each time they have emailed us a few forms and worked with us on the phone to fill them out properly. They have then submitted the forms to the registry of motor vehicles and we have received our license plates in the mail a few weeks later.

Each year we get new tags for our plates. We handle this via the phone or online with a credit card or check, and the tags come within a week or so. Easy!

Banking

Online banking has made full-time travel much easier than it was years ago. Almost everything can be done with plastic in person and then by paying the credit card bill online. Income taxes are easy to file online these days, and you can get your tax refund for state or federal income taxes very easily.

For cash needs, you can get “cash over” on a debit card at the supermarket without any fees rather than worrying about finding a branch of your bank in some obscure town or paying extra to get money from an ATM machine. Buy a pack of gum for a buck and get $100 over. If you need to deposit a check, get the mailing address of your bank branch and mail them a short explanatory note, a deposit slip and the check, endorsed “For deposit only.”

If you will be RVing in Canada or Mexico a lot, get checking and credit card accounts from Capital One to avoid international currency exchange fees (Capital One doesn’t charge anything whereas most US banks charge a 3% fee on every transaction made outside the US).

We have other notes for RVers headed into Canada here: Tips for RV Travelers Going to Nova Scotia

 

FULL-TIME RV INSURANCE

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These are notes from my own recent calls to 7 different insurance agents representing a variety of providers. I got multiple quotes from National General (Good Sam Club), Nationwide (Allied), National Interstate and Progressive .

Some agents represented the same companies as each other, but getting an apples-to-apples comparison between agents and providers proved extremely difficult and required repeated phone calls and lots of persistence. The differences are all in the fine print, which no one likes to read.

How Much Is That RV Worth?

New RV insurance policies\ for late model RVs can cover the RV for its Replacement Value. That is, within the first 2 to 5 or so model years, depending on the insurer, if the RV is destroyed, you can shop for a new one of similar type and features. In the next model year after the insurer’s time limit for Replacement Value coverage has ended, your coverage will change to Actual Cash Value which is the current market value of the year, make and model of RV.

If your RV is covered for Actual Cash Value, at the time of a claim, the insurance adjuster will determine what that current value of it is using the NADA guide or similar pricing tool.

Tow truck towing a motorhome do they have insurance

Bummer.

Liability Coverage

When you give up your home owner’s policy, you give up a lot of nice blanket coverages that come with it, like liability coverage and the loss of personal belongings. Quite a few companies offer “Full-time RV insurance” that includes liability coverage similar to what would typically come with a home insurance policy. Coverage for personal belongings is a whole different story, however. See below.

Personal Effects

The biggest problem for full-timers is covering their personal belongings. Anything that was not originally sold with the RV and is not attached (imagine turning the RV upside down to find out what’s “not attached”), is considered “Personal Effects,” and most RV policies include some kind of coverage for Personal Effects. However, from my research, this coverage is woefully inadequate if you have anything beyond basic camping gear in your rig.

The following is a summary of how the various quotes I received were explained to me. I list the specifics here not so much to suggest one company’s product over another but so you can see just how much you need to press for the exact details if you really want to understand the insurance you are buying. Obviously, the companies mentioned may change their policies, and it’s possible I misunderstood something.

The value of Personal Effects coverage available generally ranges from $2,000 (National Interstate) to $20,000 (National General), and the full amount is reimbursed in the event of the RV’s total loss. In the event of theft, there has to be proof of forcible entry and a police report must be filed (the time limits for filing the report vary). In case you disagree with the value the adjuster assigns to an item at the time of a claim, it helps to have dated photos of each item and receipts.

In the event that there is a partial loss, like theft of just a few items, there are caps on what is covered. With National General, if the theft occurs inside your RV, then the cap is 25% of the total value of all the Personal Effects coverage that you carry. For example, if you have a $20,000 Personal Effects policy, then this means there is a cap of $5,000 per claim. If the theft occurs outside the RV but on your campsite, then the coverage is 10% of the total value of all the Personal Effects coverage that you carry. Again, for $20,000 total coverage, this means a cap of $2,000 per claim. There is no coverage if the theft occurs away from the RV (i.e, your bike is stolen from the bike rack at the coffee shop in town).

Bicycle insurance and camera insurance is separate from RV insurance

Bikes and cameras are covered (more or less) on your campsite but not away from the RV.

In the case of Nationwide (Allied), there is a four page description of how personal effects are covered and the capping methodology used, including more than a page of listed exclusions. Some highlights: There’s a cap of $500 per individual item. Groups of similar types of items are capped differently, for instance items grouped as “camera equipment” or “fishing gear” or “musical instruments” are capped at $1,000 per group while items grouped as “computer equipment,” “tools” and “silverware” are capped at $3,000 per group.

On the other hand, the “outside the RV” coverage with Nationwide is more generous than National General at 25% of the total Personal Effects coverage rather than 10%.

All of these reimbursements may be subject to your overall policy deductible or may have a specially applied Personal Effects deductible (for Nationwide it is $250).

Getting Personal Effects coverage above and beyond the $20,000 limit generally requires scheduling each item and giving it a value. Progressive requires each item to be appraised ahead of time and submitted as part of the application process for securing an insurance policy. Nationwide doesn’t require appraisals but asks for receipts showing prices paid and date of purchase so they can determine the depreciated value. I’m not sure how either handles the “outside the RV” scenario if the base coverage is higher than $20,000.

So, as you can see, you won’t get much for your stuff unless the whole RV and everything in it goes up in smoke, even if your policy says that $20,000 of personal belongings is covered.

We had National Interstate at first and were very happy with their speedy payment in covering a very large claim. However, their Personal Effects coverage just isn’t adequate, so we have National General at the moment and are still shopping.

How About Renter’s Insurance?

Renter’s Insurance provides tenants with a policy that is much like a homeowner’s policy, covering all the items in the home whether the loss occurrs in the home or somewhere else. These can be set up with small deductibles (like $50) that make sense for a $2,000 loss. However, you must be renting a stationary home and you must provide the address of the place you are renting. Unfortunately, your mail forwarding address or a relative’s address don’t count, and using an address where you are not living constitutes insurance fraud.

Awww… We Don’t Have Nuthin’ — We’re Livin’ Cheap!

You may look around at your stuff and say, “Bah… I don’t have anything of real value here.” But imagine trying to replace all your clothes (winter and summer), shoes (running, walking, hiking, dress shoes, slippers, sandals, boots), jackets, sweaters, blankets, pillows, sheets, towels, everything in the bathroom vanity, food in the fridge as well as pantry, dishes, pots and pans, kitchen appliances, CDs, DVDs, BBQ, portable generator, tools in the basement, spare parts, musical instruments, laptops, printers, cameras, smartphones, bicycles, kayaks, books, etc.

It adds up quick! It is worth it to take five minutes with a calculator and get a figure, just so you know.

With any luck, as the full-time RV lifestyle grows in popularity, insurance companies will come up wtih a way for full-time RVers to insure all their worldly belongings beyond just their vehicles and to provide useful replacement coverage for it.

How To Insure Specialty Items Like Camera Gear and Bikes

If you have expensive camera gear or very high end bicycles, it is possible to insure them with specialty insurance. Cameras can be covered through a photography membership in NANPA. Bikes can be covered through Big Ring Insurance.

Upgrades to the RV

If you install solar power, a big battery bank, or upgrade your converter or inverter or have any kind of add-on that is pernamently attached to the rig, and you have an older rig that you are insuring for Actual Cash Value, that upgrade will be part of the Actual Cash Value figure that the insurance adjuster will be calculating at the time of a claim. If you are insuring for Replacement Value, check with your agent how best to cover major upgrades.

Photograph the equipment you have upgraded, locate the receipts, and ask your agent if they want those things at the time you apply for insurance or if they should be supplied at the time of a claim. They all vary!

RV upgrade solar panels on roof

Mark installs flexible solar panels on the roof of a friend’s motorhome.

RV Extended Warranties

We carry a trailer warranty policy through Wholesale Warranties now that the original manufacturer’s warranty is no longer in effect.

Here's a summary of what our four year RV warranty through Wholesale Warranties cost, what our repairs WOULD HAVE cost, and what our warranty reimbursements have been to date:

Cost of Warranty $1,904
Total Cost of Repairs we've had done $7,834
Total Out of Pocket Costs for those repairs $1,145
Repair Reimbursements:
Trailer Axle Replacement $1,036
RV Refrigerator Replacement $1,647
Plumbing Issues & Window Leak $1,142
Suspension Replacement $2,550
RV Toilet Replacement $314
Total Repair Reimbursements $6,689

Our trailer warranty has paid for itself 3.5 times over!
Confused about the nitty gritty fine print buried in RV Extended Warranties? Here's an excellent detailed explanation!!

We were so exhausted by these repairs (they hit us all at once in a three month period), that I haven’t yet written a blog post about the last one. It just isn’t fun writing that stuff!! However, hopefully you can see the incredible value of getting a motorhome warranty or trailer warranty, especially if your rig is a few years old (ours is a 2007 Hitchhiker fifth wheel trailer).

The beauty of an RV Extended Warranty is that it picks up where a regular insurance policy leaves off. Our entire trailer is covered for all failures other than regular wear and tear. This includes having the frame crack or slides fail to come in and out or the suspension give up the ghost (it did) or having the air conditioner or refrigerator die (which it did too).

These could be very expensive repairs, and it is worth the peace of mind to carry an RV Extended Warranty policy rather than risk a large, unexpected repair expense. We use Wholesale Warranties, and you can get a quote for a policy from them here.

To learn more about RV Warranties and what to look for when you buy one, see:

What Is An RV Warranty and Do You Need One?

 

Internet and Phone – Staying Connected On The Road

We do not have a cell phone, but getting internet on the road is pretty easy. We have written an article on how we get get internet access and live without a phone here: RV Mobile Internet Access – A Minimalist Approach

Laundry

Many RV parks have laundry facilities on-site, and some full-timers purchase RVs equipped with a washer and dryer. We like to use the local laundromat in town. We can do four, five or six loads of laundry in two hours flat. We use the biggest front loading washers in the laundromat we can find because they are usually the best ones both for washing and for spinning dry. Laundromats can be a great place to meet people and learn about an area. In Flagstaff, Arizona, if you want to meet Navajo Indians, go to the local laundromat, preferably on a Saturday when it’s busy!

However, if you want the place to yourself, go to the laundromat midweek around noon, well after the daily morning rush and before the after work crowd arrives.

Laundry facilities in RV parks can be very crowded and usually have just a few smaller top loading machines. Most parks have only a few machines and when a park is full they can get very busy and it can be hard to get a machine.

Washers and dryers installed in RVs are really small, and it is common to do a load a day to keep up. However, you can do it “in the background” while doing other things around the rig, the way you used to in your old conventional life back home!

Hair

Along with all the other changes when you start a life in an RV on the road, you’ll find yourself adjusting to having a new hair stylist — and sometimes a new hair style — every time you get your hair cut. There are Great Clips and Super Cuts everywhere, and Walmart has their in-store salons.

One of the best ways we’ve found to get to know a small town is to get a haircut from the local barber. We have many special memories from haircuts in towns from Kansas to Utah to North Carolina to Mexico’s Pacific Coast.

But perhaps our best hair cutting story is in this blog post:

It’s Not About The Hair!!

 

SAVING MONEY ON RV OVERNIGHT COSTS

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There are three basic options for where to park the rig and spend the night:

  • Private RV parks
  • Public campgrounds and RV parks
  • Boondocking

Private RV Parks

There are private RV parks everywhere. They are extremely easy to find online, in commercial guide books and by asking at visitors centers. The AllStays App is a very popular resource. Private RV parks range from about $30/night to $60/night or more, tending to even higher prices in popular destinations at peak season in choice sites that offer more amenities (like a view). The parking is generally laid out in rows, and the sites can range from drycamping sites (no hookups) to electric and/or water only to electric/water/sewer with cable TV, telephone and free WiFi. Usually the site includes a picnic table, and sometimes the park has a pool, showers, shuffleboard or horseshoes, sometimes bike and canoe rentals, a small store, or other goodies.

Staying for one night is most expensive. Commiting to a week or a month or a season will get you a much lower nightly rate.

Public Campgrounds and RV Parks

Public campgrounds run the gamut from rustic campgrounds on-site at the national parks to state park campgrounds to national forest service and BLM campgrounds to Corps of Engineers campgrounds to regional park campgrounds and fairgrounds. Somewhere along the line there is a crossover to municipal and city RV parks. These campgrounds and RV parks often offer fewer amenities than private RV parks: there may (or may not) be water spigots or vault toilets (non-flushing), or there may be electric and water hookups and hot showers. Usually there are no sewer hookups but there is often an RV dump station in the campground.

RV camping at public state park campground_

Many state park campgrounds are in beautiful locations like
Lost Dutchman State Park in Arizona.

Usually there are picnic tables and campfire rings at each site. Often the sites at national park, national forest and Corps of Engineers campgrounds are too small for a larger RV. However, some state park campgrounds have absolutely gorgeous big sites that are in a natural setting with a jaw dropping view. Generally these campgrounds cost anywhere from $8/night to $35/night, depending on the amenities offered, the beauty and popularity of the surrounding area and the the season you are visiting.

Many of these public campgrounds (except the state parks) honor the National Senior Access Pass (for citizens aged 62 and over) and Federal Land Inter-Agency Pass (the annual “National Parks Pass” that is available to everyone) offering a 50% discount to carriers of one of these passes.

Don Wright has written two books that list inexpensive public campgrounds:

Generally there is a stay limit at these kinds of campgrounds, typically 2 weeks, and generally there are no discounts given for longer stays.

Boondocking

Many National Forests and most lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) allow RVs to camp outside the confines of their campgrounds. Also, it is generally legal to park in public parking areas and rest areas that are not posted with signs prohibiting overnight parking. And you can always camp out in a friend’s driveway! The price for these kinds of overnight stays is $0. However, you need to equip your rig to run without hookups to take advantage of these places for an extended period of time.

For more info about boondocking, check out our pages on:

Campground Memberships

There are a lot of campground membership programs that offer discounted nightly rates at private RV parks. Each program is different, however they fall into two general categories: inexpensive memberships that offer modest discounts on nightly rates and “investment” memberships that cost a lot up front but offer big discounts on nightly rates.

The inexpensive memberships generally unite thousands of independent RV parks under a single umbrella. The “investment” memberships tend to include fewer RV parks in their networks and insure a higher standard and better consistency in RV park quality.

Inexpensive Campground Memberships

The most popular inexpensive campground membership is offered by Passport America. They charge an annual fee of $44 ($79 for 2 years, $299 for lifetime) and offer a 50% savings off the nightly rate at any of the 1,200 member RV parks. .

There is little risk in joining this programs, as it is cheap to join and you do not have to renew if you don’t like the program. However, because the member parks are independently run, RV parks join and abandon the programs as suits their individual business needs. When you make your reservation, double check that the park is still a member of the program.

“Investment” Campground Memberships

“Investment” style campground programs cost a lot up front but offer very inexpensive overnight stays.

The Thousand Trails network offers 30 free overnight stays in a 12 month period for $545 at campgrounds that are within one of five zones across the country. After you’ve used up the 30 free nights, the rest of your overnights for that year are just $3 a night. Each zone has between 13 and 23 RV parks in it. You can stay at any RV park in your zone for up to 14 days and then you must stay somewhere outside of the network for 7 nights before coming back. You can repeat this cycle indefinitely. Right now they are offering a special of two zones for the price of one. An added perk is that you get a 20% discount on overnight stays at the affiliate Encore network of RV parks too.

Other “investment” campground programs are structured like a timeshare. You buy into a “home park,” pay an annual fee, and can then stay at member parks for $10 to $15 a night. You learn about these membership programs just like a timeshare — by taking a tour.

We have taken two such tours, and they were a lot of fun. In each case we were given two free nights at the RV park, and at some point during our stay we took a 2-3 hour tour. The sales technique is the “hot seat” method, but it is easy enough to smile and say “no” politely if you aren’t interested. One of our tours was at the Havasu Springs Resort.

One of the biggest programs is offered by Good Sam Club’s Coast Resorts which has 400 member parks. You can sign up for their free two night stay and tour package here.

RV Resort Membership Programs - Thousand Trails

“Investment” campground memberships aim to offer higher quality RV parks at a discount

These kinds of campground membership programs are a complicated, and the companies change the rules as their profitability and growth plan requires. It is best to book your stays 90 days or more in advance and there may also be a complex set of rules to follow regarding staying within the network and outside of it. Sometimes an alternative campground network is offered so you have somewhere similar to stay when it is time for you to stay outside your home network. Two we’ve heard of are Resorts of Distinction and Adventure Outdoor Resorts given as the alternative networks.

Moose and Elks Clubs

We have met several full-timers who are members of the Moose Club and Elks Club and use their RV facilities on a regular basis. This seems like a terrific option, although we have not joined either organization yet. Membership requires a sponsor, but each time we’ve stopped in and inquired, people have offered to be sponsors right at the bar! The membership fee is on the order of $100 or so a year and overnights in the RV parks are $10 to $20 or so. Some lodges without formal RV park sites may allow members to dry camp in the parking lot if there’s room.

Military RV Parks

For those people that are retired from the military, there is a fantastic network of RV parks located on many bases throughout the US. If you enjoy dry camping, you may be able to cut the cost even more by parking on the grass (we have!).

Final Thoughts

I hope these notes have given you an idea of what becoming a full-time RVer entails when you are ready to turn your fun RV vacations into a lifestyle. Despite all the words I’ve written here and in the other two posts in this series on full-time RVing, going full-time isn’t all that complicated.

Do your research, get out and talk to as many full-time RVers in person as you can find, practice a little by renting or buying a small rig, and then take the leap and go have an awesome RVing adventure!!

Renting an RV

Have fun with your research and planning!

Further Reading:

This was the third part in our 3-part series on full-time RVing. You can read the other parts in this series or skip to its various chapters via these links:

Part 1 – Living and Working in an RV:

Part 2 – Going Full-time: Transitioning to Full-time RVing & Which RV to Buy

Part 3 – Selecting a Domicile, Mail Forwarding, Insurance & Money Saving Tips

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Mobile Internet & Phone Communications for RV Living – A Minimalist Solution!

How do you stay in touch when living on the road full-time in an RV? What kind of internet access is best? Which phone plans make the most sense for a full-time RVer? These are some of the questions that RVers face, and there is a huge array of possible solutions available for every need and lifestyle.

Note: This post was updated in February 2018 to report our experiences with the WeBoost Drive 4G-X RV cellular signal booster. Click HERE to skip to that section.

Mobile internet and phone communications for full-time RV living

Mobile communications techniques differ a fair bit among RVers. We have a simple method with one device.


The gurus on topic of mobile internet access are unquestionably Chris Dunphy and Cherie Ve Ard of Technomadia. They have written a fantastic book about the internet for RVers and also created an online community dedicated to mobile internet issues (more about those excellent resources here).

Because we have taken an unconventional route with our own communications solution (as we have done with everything in our traveling lifestyle since we started 10 years ago), I thought a few notes here about what we do might be useful.

For starters, we don’t have a phone.

What, No Phone?! How Can You DO THAT?!

After several decades of being “on call” in our professions, bound to our customers by electronic leashes, we ditched our cell phones when we started traveling full-time in 2007. At first, this was a money-savings tactic, but since then it is in many ways a small act of defiance against a world that is increasingly held in electronic bondage.

We have managed just fine without a phone all these years.  We’ve been able to meet up with friends at appointed hours, find our way to remote and stunning locations without a GPS-enabled electronic map. We’ve even bought and sold large assets like our sailboat and truck, all without a phone. Lower on this page there are lots of details explaining how we make and receive phone calls.

If you are looking to shave a few dollars off your full-time RVing budget, or if you are just curious how this is possible, here’s what we do.

Internet Access – Verizon MiFi Jetpack

Verizon MiFi Jetpack 6620L

Verizon MiFi Jetpack 6620L

We have a Verizon MiFi 6620L Jetpack hotspot that is the basis of all our communications. It operates on the Verizon cell phone towers, has a cell phone number itself, provides password protected WiFi inside and near the rig, and can theoretically support 15 devices connected to the internet.

A little back-story on — For three years we had a Verizon MiFi 4620 jetpack, but in October, 2014, its tiny charging receptacle broke and it could no longer get charged. Mark tried to nurse it back to life by soldering its lifeless receptacle to the charger permanently, but the problem was internal and it was dead.

MiFi Jetpack Charger solder repair

We tried soldering wires from the MiFi to its charger, but it still wouldn’t charge.

The old 4620 Jetpack always had problems charging and holding a charge. The MiFi 6620L Jetpack can theoretically run on battery power for 20 hours and support up to 15 simultaneous connections. It can definitely run longer than the old one, but 20 hours is an overstatement. 6 to 7 hours with two users is more like it in our household.

There is a new 7730L Jetpack from Novatel that has a theoretical battery life of 24 hours. The WiFi signal strength it broadcasts is stronger, so you can connect to it from further away. However, the signal strength coming from the cell tower is the same in both units. We haven’t upgraded yet.

Our old 6620L Jetpack has the annoying habit of falling asleep when nothing is happening between us and the internet. For us to resume using the internet after a period of doing nothing, we have to wake it up manually by tapping on its power button. Then the computer has to reconnect to the Jetpack as well.

The New Verizon Plan

As of July, 2017, our MiFi Jetpack is the single device on a 30 GB talk/text/data “New Verizon Plan.”

A few months prior to this switch, Verizon began offering its “New Verizon Plan” and pushing an “Unlimited” plan for data. The “Unlimited” plan sounded great, but it has limitations.

After many hours on the phone with Verizon, I learned that if you have a Smartphone or Tablet, the new Unlimited plan runs at 4G speeds for the first 22GB each month when you use the internet based apps on the phone or tablet. After that, there will be a 1-2 second delay when you first connect to the nearest cell tower, but once connected, the speed will still be a nifty 4G.

HOWEVER — and this was critical for us — if you are using your Smartphone or Tablet as a mobile hotspot, or if you are using a Jetpack, the Unlimited plan will run at 4G speeds for only the first 10 GB of each month. After that it will drop to 3G speeds.

This was not properly explained to me when I talked to Verizon reps the first few times, so we tried the Unlimited plan for a month. For us, it was unusable after it dropped to 3G. With today’s bandwidth intensive websites, 3G is painfully slow. At times during the one month we had the Unlimited plan, we had to walk away and do something else as we waited for something basic like the Google search page to come up.

Yesterday, after a few more hours on the phone with several Verizon reps, we learned that there are high GB plans available that remain at 4G speeds all month long. The question for us was: which one? Not all of these “New Verizon Plans” are advertised on the website in obvious places, and not all the salespeople know the various options either.

We use anywhere from 20 to 30 GB of data a month these day, so we wanted a 30GB plan. The first plan that was offered to me was a 30GB data-only plan for $185 per month.

The New Verizon Plan Data Only Plans

Verizon’s first offer for a 30 GB plan that would run at 4G all month long was the “New Verizon Plan” that is Data Only and is intended for Jetpacks and phones/tablets operated as Mobile Hotspots

This was crazy expensive and I complained loudly.

Eventually, I was transferred to a rep who offered me a 30 GB talk/text/data plan for $135 per month. That was more like it! I highly recommend being extremely persistent and asking to speak to supervisors when you get on the phone with Verizon!

The New Verizon Plan 30GB talk-text-data plan

Our “New Verizon Plan” for our Jetpack is a talk/text/data plan with 30GB of data for $135/month

This 30 GB talk/text/data plan has these features:

  • Carryover of unused data from this month to next month (if not used, it doesn’t carry over beyond that)
  • The fee for the Jetpack connection itself is $10/month
  • There is no surcharge for using the Jetpack in Canada or Mexico (see below)
  • Unlimited talk/text (but our Jetpack can’t do that so we don’t use that feature)

Changing Plans? Cut to the Chase & Call Verizon!

I always dread calling Verizon (I had terrible experiences with them with a fleet of corproate phones in the mid-1990’s), but in recent years, I’ve found that talking to their sales people has always helped us find a better deal than if I just poked around on their website.

Also, I’ve found that the reps are very reasonable when it comes to crediting erroneous charges. We were shocked when we were charged $80 for switching from our old 24GB talk/text/data plan to the New Unlimited plan, because no one had told us this would happen. Verizon later refunded the charge.

Verizon Jetpack Admin and Messages page

Text messages from Verizon come into the Messages page on the Jetpack, including the code necessary for verifying your account online.

In my experience, Verizon is becoming harder and harder to reach by phone because they require using a handset to send magic codes and text messages before connecting you to a rep.

As noted above, any text message they send can be found on the Admin/Messages page of the JetPack. Also, some portions of the Verizon website require you to authenticate your account. To do this, Verizon sends a code via text message to the Jetpack that you then enter into the website.

One neat trick I found is that if you initiate an online chat with a Chat Rep on the Verizon website, you can give the rep your phone number and ask them to have a Phone Rep call you.

For me, this proved to be a lot easier than trying to get through on the phone by calling the customer service number and punching numbers and talking to the Verizon phone menu system computer.

Studying the Verizon web page today, I noticed that talk/text/data plans are not offered for Jetpacks and mobile hotspots, so we may have been given that plan instead of the Data Only plan because I made such a fuss on the phone (very politely, of course).

Saving Data by Using Free WiFi Signals

When we want to save data on our plan, we put off our big download operations, like operating systems upgrades that download as much as 1.5 GB of data at once. We do those things when we have access to a free WiFi signal at a library or coffee shop or elsewhere.

We also use Clipgrab on free WiFi signals to download videos so we can watch them from our laptop hard drives later.

Verizon MiFi Jetpack – International Use

The new Verizon talk/text/data plans now allow you to use the MiFi Jetpack in both Canada and Mexico — if you get a big (or unlimited) data plan — without paying a surcharge. Using our MiFi Jetpack came in very handy during our travels to the Canadian Rockies in the summer of 2016.

HOWEVER — and this is important — when you are in Mexico and Canada your data will operate at 4G speeds for only the first 512MB of use each day. At midnight each night the speed will revert to 4G, but as soon as you hit 512MB in the next 24 hours your speed will drop to 2G. That’s 2G, not 3G! So think through your access needs each day!

ALSO — and this is very important too — if, during a 60 day period, you have used your device more than 50% of the time in Mexico or Canada, you will get a text message (or email or phone call) warning you that you are going to be put on a pay-as-you-go plan until you return to the US. Text messages arrive on the Admin/Messages page of your Jetpack.

Despite 30 minutes of conversation with the Verizon rep, I never got to the very bottom of this issue (we aren’t planning to go to Canada or Mexico in the immediate future, so I didn’t press the issue!!), but I want you to know that the fee she mentioned for this “pay as you go” feature was $2.05 per MB.

That doesn’t seem possible because it would be over $1,000 for 500MB!!

The reason for this draconian fee structure is that Verizon doesn’t want to provide US-based services and charges to ex-pats who are living in Canada and Mexico.

I highly recommend if you plan to travel to Canada or Mexico for more than two weeks that you call Verizon and discuss your plans. After an initial round of questions, ask for a supervisor if necessary, of course.

Internet access in the Gulf of Tehuantepec Mexico

Internet access on a boat at sea in a foreign country is a trip!
Here I hold up my laptop to get a much needed internet weather report while crossing Mexico’s notorious Gulf of Tehuantepec.
It took 21 minutes to download a 604 KB file!!

Putting a Verizon Data Plan on Hold

One handy aspect of Verizon’s plans is that you can put them on hold. We used this feature a lot when we spent months at a time sailing in Mexico because Verizon didn’t offer Mexico access for Jetpacks back in those days.

Seasonal RV travelers may find this comes in handy, as they may not want to use the MiFi Jetpack when they are at home and not out traveling in their RV.

You can put the plan on hold for up to 90 days, at no charge. If you call in again before 90 days is up, you can put it on hold for another 90 days, and so on, indefinitely.

All the days that you put the plan on hold get tacked onto the end of your contract. So, for us, our two year contract during our Mexico travels took nearly three years to fulfill. When you decide to resume the contract, a simple phone call is all it takes and you are back online immediately. There is a nominal charge for re-instating the contract.

Phone Access – Skype

We use a Skype account for all of our phone needs. Skype is best known for making it possible to make free video calls between people who have Skype accounts. Similar to Apple’s FaceTime, this is a fun way to communicate. It also requires a pretty strong internet signal. If the call begins to falter due to a sketchy internet connection, turning off the video will often perk it back up again.

Skype Image

That’s not generally how we use Skype, however. Instead, we use it to call people on their cell phones and land lines. For $2.99 a month we have an annual subscription service with Skype to call any cell phone or landline in the US or Canada for unlimited minutes. These are outbound phone calls only.

To receive incoming calls requires another step: For $2.50 a month, Skype assigned a phone number to our account that accepts voicemail and appears on our friends’ phones when we call them. Skype sends us an email when a new voicemail comes in. If we are on our computer and it is connected to the internet, we receive incoming phone calls just like a regular phone (the computer’s speaker rings, and you click a button to pick up the call). Skype has an app for mobile devices too, so you can do all this with a tablet, iPad or iPod too.

If you don’t sign up for that service, Skype calls will come into your friends’ phones with a mystifying number that is unrecognizable. We did this for four years, and it was okay. It was a little awkward not having a call-back number when calling a business, but we let them know that we checked our email frequently, and most companies were happy to get back to us via email instead of a phone call. Our friends eventually knew that if a weird number came in on their phone, it was probably us calling!

Tricks for Making Skype Calls

Skype is pretty good for phone calls, but the connection is not always perfect. We’ve gotten used to tipping our MacBook Pro laptops so the microphone is a little closer to our mouths than when it’s down in our lap. The person on the other end is on speaker phone, which can be nice for calling family and friends, if they don’t mind. However, when making an important call to a company, using earbuds makes it easier to hear the other person and takes them off speaker phone if you are in a somewhat public place.

In general, our internet download speed is faster and better than our upload speed, and this affects Skype. Oftentimes, we can hear the person on the other end of the phone much better than they can hear us. One way to improve things is to make sure only one device is on the internet via the MiFi jetpack.  So, if Mark wants to make a call, I have to do something local on my laptop and stop using the internet, and vice versa.

It’s also important that no other internet applications are running on the computer that is making the call. That means turning off the email application, shutting down all browsers and quitting out of anything else that might unexpectedly access the internet and disrupt the phone call.

WeBoost Drive 4G-X RV – Getting More from our Internet Signal? Or Not!

In January 2018 we were given a WeBoost Drive 4G-X RV cellular signal booster to test. We were excited because we had not had good luck with our Wilson Booster several years prior (our experiences are described in the ARCHIVE section below).

We explained to the good people at Wilson Electronics that the older product had not worked for us, but that we would be overjoyed to let our readers know if the new product were better.

The WeBoost Drive 4G-X RV booster can be powered by either 12v DC or 120v AC and it consists of three major components that get wired together:

  • An External Antenna that goes on the ladder of the RV
  • A Booster that is installed inside the RV
  • An Internal Antenna that communicates with the Verizon MiFi Jetpack

The external antenna must be installed as high as possible on the RV. While driving it must be lower than highway requirements for vehicles (generally 13′ 6″). While parked it could be raised higher. It must also be installed as far from the Booster as possible (a 20′ cable is supplied).

The Internal Antenna must be installed inside the RV as close to the Verizon MiFi Jetpack as possible.

A full installation consists of mounting each item in a permanent location, running a cable from inside the RV to outside (likely near the ladder so the external antenna can be mounted to the top of the ladder) and dressing the wires between all three components. We decided that prior to doing a full installation and mounting the components and dressing the wires, we would do a test installation to see how the booster improved our internet signal.

We test the booster by positioning the External Antenna in two locations. The first position was above the crown molding of a slide-out inside the trailer (not a good spot at all, but adequate for a dry run). The second position was outside, where the External Antenna is supposed to be. Mark stood on the roof of the trailer and held the External Antenna above his head. This positioned it more than 7′ above the RV roof, higher than we would be able to position it with a permanent installation.

The Booster rested on the dining table.

The Internal Antenna sat next to the Verizon MiFi Jetpack which was positioned in a window.

We had a 3G signal that was a steady 4 bars. We had been working with this internet connection for a few days, surfing the web, sending and receiving email, listening to internet radio, downloading YouTube videos, making Skype calls (without video) and updating this blog.

The signal was adequate, but a faster speed would have been awesome.

Using a very pedestrian and low tech method of testing the booster, we ran several speed tests using the website speedtest.net. We tested these situations:

  • Test 1: Booster off
  • Test 2: External Antenna positioned on top of a slide-out INSIDE the RV (not the recommended placement)
  • Test 3: External Antenna held overhead while standing on the roof of the RV (higher than it would be if we installed it permanently)

The results can be seen in the following three screenshots.

The speed did not change significantly and, in our opinion, the changes were probably within the margin of error.

Speedtest 4 No Weboost-min

Booster turned off.

Speedtest 2 WeBoost Antenna top of Slide inside-min

External antenna positioned in a high place inside the RV.

Speedtest 3 Weboost Mark on Roof-min

External antenna positioned 7′ above the roof of the RV

For the non-tech folks out there who don’t have a feeling for “how fast” a particular Mbps upload or download speed is, the following image shows the numbers for a “blindingly fast” signal we got on our Verizon MiFi Jetpack in a completely different location without a booster.

In numbers the difference is 16+ versus 1+ Mbps for download speeds and 17+ versus 0.3 Mbps for upload speeds. That is pretty dramatic!

So, this is the “feeling” difference between “Wow, this is FAST” and “Hmmmm…I can do what I’ve gotta do if I drink a cuppa joe while I wait, but I sure wish there were a way to make it faster.”

Speedtest Very Fast Signal

A “blindingly Fast” signal while we were camped in a completely different state.
This is for comparison to give you a feel for the numbers just in case Mbps aren’t your thing.

As a final test, while Mark patiently stood on the roof holding the external antenna overhead, I tested using the internet for basic surfing, email, modifying our website and video downloading, the things we typically do on the internet. The difference in speed was not noticeable.

This is not scientific testing and we did not measure decibels or anything fancy. However, the bottom line for us when we use the internet is how fast it FEELS as we do whatever we are doing, not how fast some numbers tell us it is. What this showed us is that even a 100% improvement of Really Lousy may turn out to be just A Little Less Lousy. What you really need is a rock solid 1,000% improvement or more.

In the end, we decided that rather than do a permanent installation we would simply return the unit. So, as of the conclusion of this booster test, we still access the internet using our MiFi Jetpack without using any kind of booster.

ARCHIVE – Wilson Booster – Getting More from our Internet Signal – Kinda

Wilson Antenna on fifth wheel slideout

The higher the antenna, the better.

For about a year (in 2014) we used a Wilson Sleek 4G Cell Phone Booster which we have permanently mounted in a cabinet alongside a cigarette lighter outlet. We haven’t used it at all for the past few years and we haven’t missed it. However to keep this page complete, our experiences with it are described below.

The Wilson Booster connects to a Wilson 800/1900 Magnet Mount Antenna. This combo works okay, however, these signal boosters do much more for 4G signals than they do for 3G signals, and we have 3G signals quite a bit of the time.  One note: according to Wilson, the number of bars on the MiFi unit doesn’t necessarily increase even though the signal is improved by the booster. A fun way to see how fast your internet signal is and to keep track of the speeds in different places is to use SpeedTest.Net.

Wilson Antenna on a frying pan

It’s “grounded” as per Wilson’s recommendation, but the signal isn’t as good this low down.

The folks at Wilson told us it was very important to have the antenna sitting on a piece of metal for grounding purposes, so we bought their suction cup mounted Accessory Kit for Grounding. Unfortunately, we haven’t found a good place to mount the antenna with this suction cup plate because the wires are so short. Someday Mark might replace our outside (and rarely used) radio antenna with the Wilson antenna, but we haven’t done that yet.

Wilson also told us that simply placing the antenna on a 5″ x 5″ sheet of ferrous metal would do the trick, and we searched around for something and discovered our cast iron skillet fit the bill.

We did tests with the antenna to see how much having a grounding plate seemed to matter. We placed the antenna near the ceiling above our slide-out without a metallic plate under it, then set it on our big frying pan on our kitchen counter, and lastly set it on the roof of our truck.

We found having the antenna higher in the air near the ceiling above our slide-out was much more important than placing it on metal.

Internet Portability – Driving Tactics and Electronic Maps

Siri — ahhhh. Although we don’t have an iAnything, I am in love with the little Apple genie, Siri, who lives inside iPhones and iPads. However, after lots of soul searching about whether Siri’s companionship would make me happier in our travels, so far I’ve decided that it wouldn’t.

Instead, I get to be Mark’s Siri as he drives, and that’s not a bad gig. He does all the driving in our family (I did almost all the helmsman duty on our boat, so it’s pretty fair). To help out with the RV navigation, I bring the MiFi jetpack and laptop with me into the truck’s passenger’s seat, and I use Google Maps to figure out where we’re going. I don’t get the nifty icon that shows me where we are, so sometimes I have some frantic moments trying to deduce our exact location, but once I’ve got it, I call out the instructions for how to get from here to there.

Our 2016 Ram 3500 truck has a factory installed dash-mounted GPS, but its user friendliness pales by comparison. Occasionally when I’m confused/lost, I use it to get the GPS coordinates for where we are and then plug those into Google Maps.

So, the overall functionality of a smartphone or tablet is there for us on the road, it’s just a whole lot more clunky.

Using a SmartPhone or Tablet as a Hotspot and More

When our Mifi Jetpack died, I thought the only solution was to get another one. Not so. I have since learned that we could have taken the SIM card out of our old jetpack and put it into a glistening new iPad. We wouldn’t have had to sign up for another 2 years with Verizon when we replaced our dead MiFi jetpack either (which we did when we upgraded to the new MiFi jetpack), since our contract was tied to the SIM card. We could have simply continued on our old plan until it ran out four months later and then reassessed our situation.

Internet Access Resources for RVers

Mobile Internet Handbook for RVers

The Internet Bible for RVers

For us — for now — we’ll keep doing what we’ve been doing since it works just fine. In all likelihood, however, our simplistic and minimalistic methods are not getting you fired up with excitement.

As I mentioned above, the Mobile Internet Handbook (available on Kindle and in Paperback) by Chris Dunphy and Cherie Ve Ard is the most thorough resource available and is an absolute necessity for anyone that wants to get technical on the road. Prior to starting their full-time RV adventures, Chris was a mobile technology expert, working as Director of Competitive Analysis for Palm and PalmSource (the companies behind the Palm Pilot and Treo). He studied every aspect of mobile phone and tablet technologies and is using that expertise to help RVers today.

The detail this book goes to is staggering. From explaining nationwide versus regional cellular data carriers to getting into the nitty gritty of what “roaming” is all about, and what hotspots and routers really are, to discussing cellular frequency bands and the all important topic of security, this book covers it all.

What’s better, Chris and Cherie continue the discussion and keep it current at their RV Mobile Internet Resource Center, with an accompanying public Facebook discussion group. They are also keeping a list of RV internet strategy blog posts that describe various real-life technology setups that RVers are using. They even offer personal advising sessions where you can find out what the best solution is for your unique situation.

Of course, all of this technology is changing daily. When we started RVing full-time in 2007, we got by with pay phone cards and free WiFi at coffee shops. We were unaware in those days (although we had our suspicions) that cell phones weren’t nearly as smart as their progeny would soon be, and we had no idea just how far the industry would come.

In just a few scant years everything has changed, and who knows where the future will take us!

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RV Solar Power Made Simple

Thanks to solar power, we have lived completely off the grid in two trailers and a sailboat full-time since May 2007. Without doubt, our solar power installations have given us more independence and freedom as full-time RVers and sailors than anything else in these lifestyles. It has allowed us to go anywhere at anytime, and has revolutionized our lives.

On this page I describe the two systems we have had on our trailers. These were installed in 2007 and 2008 respectively. Prices for solar power equipment have dropped every year since then, however the prices listed throughout this page are from August 2014:

  • A Small (minimal) RV Solar installation for ~$700 that we used full-time for a year of boondocking in 2007
  • A Full-timer (all you need) RV Solar installation for ~$2,500 that we have used for full-time boondocking since 2008

I also offer a little theory and reveal some of the discoveries we have made along the way. For more info, please see our Solar Power Tutorial pages and our Sailboat Solar Power Installation page.

Links to all of our articles about solar power can be found on our Solar Power For RVs and Boats page.

You can navigate to different parts of this article by using these links:

WHY BOTHER WITH A SOLAR POWER INSTALLATION ON AN RV?

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The biggest advantage of a solar power system in an RV is that the system works from dawn to dusk, silently, odor free and without requiring any fuel or maintenance, no matter where you are or what you are doing. Towing, parked at the grocery store, or camped, the batteries are being charged. They start getting charged before you finish breakfast, keep charging while you hike or go sightseeing, and continue all day, rain or shine. They don’t quit charging until nightfall. You never have to think about the batteries getting charged. It just happens. In our current rig, I feel like we have electrical hookups all the time — and we never get hookups any more!

Traveling full-time since 2007, we have connected to electrical hookups for a total of about 25 days, and that was during our first 18 months on the road. The last time we got electrical hookups was in October, 2008. Since we began our full-time travels in 2007, as of June 2019, we have boondocked in our RV nearly 3,200 nights. We also lived on solar power on our sailboat for over 900 nights during our sailing cruise of Mexico.

We do carry a Yamaha 2400i generator, but use it only a few days each year, either after a long period of winter storms to give the batteries a boost, or on hot summer days to run our 15,000 BTU air conditioner. We have used it a total of about 20 times since we purchased it in December 2007. We run it every six months or so to flush the gas through the lines. Little as we have used it, we have found the Yamaha to be a fabulous generator. It has always started on the first pull, even after it sat in storage for 20 months when we first moved onto our sailboat!

Our first solar power installation that we used for a year in 2007 was a “small” system that allowed us to use almost every appliance we owned, that is, laptop, TV, hair dryer, vacuum, two-way radio charger, power drill, etc. However, we had to be very conservative with our electrical use during the winter months. A similar “small” RV solar power kit can be found here.

Our second “full-timer” solar power system that we have been using since 2008 is like having full electrical hookups wherever we go. Very little conservation is necessary! On our biggest electrical use day to date, we watched our 26″ LCD TV with its huge surround-sound system and sub-woofer for 15 hours (it was the Olympics!) and ran two 13″ laptops for 7 hours, made popcorn in the microwave and ran several lights for 4 hours in the evening. It was July, and the next day was very sunny and the batteries were fully charged by mid-afternoon. A similar “full-time” RV solar power kit can be found here.

Here are some sample kits, smaller and bigger in size, and their prices. The only trouble with buying a component kit is that if one component fails the whole kit has to be returned. The third item, however, is a portable suitcase kit that does make a lot of sense for someone who doesn’t want to hassle with the installation just yet (you can always sell the portable kit later).

BASIC ELEMENTS OF A SOLAR POWER INSTALLATION

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BATTERY CHARGING and AC POWER
The basic components of all solar power installations is the same, and is comprised of two major subsystems: BATTERY CHARGING to get the batteries charged up and AC (120v) POWER for appliances that can’t be run on DC (12v) power (i.e., TV, computer, vacuum, hair dryer, etc.).

The BATTERY CHARGING subsystem includes these components:

  • Batteries
  • Solar panel(s)
  • Charge controller to protect the batteries from getting overcharged

The AC POWER subsystem includes this component:

  • Inverter(s) to convert the batteries’ 12 volt DC power to 120v AC power

GET YOUR HANDS DIRTY!

300 watt inverter for an RV solar panel installation

A 350 watt portable inverter
Plug it into a cigarette lighter

It is hard to “play with” the battery charging subsystem of a solar power installation to get a feel for how it works until you actually take the leap and buy a solar panel, charge controller and cables and hook it all up to the batteries. One great option if you don’t want to do any wiring but want some hands on experience is to get a portable solar panel kit. You can sell it later if you want to upgrade to a rooftop system.

You can get the hang of how the AC power subsystem works very easily. Simply run down to Walmart or any auto parts store and pick up a $15-$20 inverter that plugs into a cigarette lighter DC outlet. Plug it into the lighter in your car, turn it on, and then plug your laptop into it or your electric razor or any other small appliance. Now your 12 volt car battery is operating your 120 volt appliance.

Big inverters that can run the microwave, toaster, blender and vacuum cleaner work on exactly the same principal, the difference is just the amount of power the inverter can produce. Big inverters are also wired directly to the batteries rather than plugging into a cigarette lighter.

IS SOLAR POWER EXPENSIVE? SMALL SYSTEMS VERSUS BIG SYSTEMS

The difference between the “small” system we used for one year on our little Lynx travel trailer and our “full-timer” system we have now on our big Hitchhiker fifth wheel is simply the overall capacity of each of the components. That is, the capacity of the battery charging system (solar panels, batteries and charge controller) and of the AC power system (the inverter).

In functional terms this means that the difference between the “small” and “full-timer” systems is threefold:

1) the ability to run more appliances at once (i.e., have two laptops running while the TV and blender are going)
2) the ability to run larger appliances (i.e., using a VitaMix versus a small blender)
3) the ability to run more appliances for a longer time at night without discharging the batteries too much.

So, in a nutshell, the two subsystems — battery charging (batteries + panels + charge controller) and AC power (inverter(s)) — combine to do the same job as plugging a generator into the shore power connector on the side of the rig. The panels and charge controller charge the batteries. The inverter makes it possible to use AC appliances.

The cost of the parts for these installations is:

Small: $700 – Comparable to having a Yamaha 1000i generator
Full-timer: $2,500 – Comparable to having a built-in Cummins Onan 2.5KW generator

With solar power there is no noise, no fuel cost, no maintenance and no smell, unlike a generator. However, it is not possible to run the air conditioning in the summertime on solar power, unless you have a massive system with several hundred pounds of batteries and a roof absolutely loaded with panels. As mentioned before, we use our Yamaha 2400i generator to run our 15,000 BTU air conditioner.

 

OUR “SMALL” RV SOLAR POWER SYSTEM (~$700 in parts)

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This setup is a fully functional, inexpensive solar power installation, and is what we used for a 350 nights in our first year in our Lynx travel trailer. It could power a 19″ LCD TV and DVD player, radio, laptop and vacuum as well as charge camera batteries, razor, toothbrush, cordless drill, cell phone, etc.

  • Two 6-volt batteries (wired in series) giving 220 amp-hours of capacity $250

    Ours were Energizers from Sam’s Club

  • 140 watts of solar power $175

    Ours was a Kyocera 130 watt DC panel. Today Kyocera sells the 140 watt panel instead.

  • A charge controller that can support at least 10 amps $90

    Ours was a Morningstar Sunsaver 10 amp charge controller (consider a Sunsaver 20)

  • A portable inverter that can supply 1000 watts of AC power $80

    Ours was a Pro One 800 watt inverter

  • Cables, connectors and mounting brackets $100

Here are the parts for the system (except for batteries and cables) — solar panel, solar charge controller and inverter:

This system is the smallest size system I would consider for an RV if you want to drycamp or boondock for more than a night or two and be comfortable. This setup worked great in the spring, summer and fall when the sun was high in the sky and the days were long. We never thought too much about our power use until the wintertime when the days got short and the nights got long and cold. Then we began to wish for a bigger system.

RV solar panel installation - wiring the panel's junction box

Mark installs our first solar panel on the roof.
He chose a nice spot by the ocean to do it!

On those long cold winter nights we had to conserve our use of lights and the TV to make sure our furnace (which used a lot of battery power) could still run. We used oil lamps a lot in the evenings. If we had stayed in that trailer longer, we would have installed a vent-free propane heater that did not use any battery power (we eventually did that in our bigger trailer the following winter: see our Vent-Free Propane Heater Installation page).

I think every RV should have this kind of a charging system installed as standard equipment, as it is useful even for the most short-term camping, like weekends and week-long vacations during the summer months.

When we installed this “small” system in our little Lynx trailer in June 2007, we were quoted $135-$350 for installation. Mark is very handy (although he is not a Master Electrician), and he found the installation was not difficult at all and completed it in one day.

SOME THEORY – SIZING THE SYSTEM

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CHARGING & CONSUMPTION

Here is some theory to explain why the above system is “sufficient” but is not great for “full-time” use. When it comes to a solar battery charging system, the concept of power charging and consumption is very simple. The amount of power you can use, or take out of the batteries, is essentially only as much as the amount you can put into the batteries. If you use (or take out) more power than you replace (or charge them with), sooner or later your batteries will be discharged and dead. The batteries are just a temporary storage place for electricity. They act as a flow-through area for the power you are going to use.

The most important part of any solar setup is the amount of charging going on (i.e., the total size, or capacity, of the solar panels), and you want that to be greater than the amount of electricity you use. More must go into the batteries than comes out. You can have an infinite number of batteries and eventually discharge them all completely if you repeatedly use more electricity than your solar panels put in.

We often find people want to add batteries to address their power shortages when what they really need to do is add more solar panels. As a rule of thumb, don’t use more than 1/3 to 1/2 of the total capacity of the batteries in one night. More important, though, is that the bigger the solar power panel array, the better. And lastly, Keep the size and age of all the batteries in the system fairly similar so the strong ones don’t waste their energy helping the weak ones keep up.

AMPS and AMP-HOURS

Appliances use amps to run. Another unit, the amp-hour (abbreviated as “Ah“), refers to the number of amps an appliance uses when it is run for an hour. For instance, an appliance that uses three amps to run will use up three amp-hours when it runs for an hour. These amp-hours will be drawn from the batteries, and the batteries, in turn, will look to the solar panels to recharge the amp-hours they have forked over to the appliance. It is for this reason that you need to know how many amp-hours you will use in a typical day. Ultimately those amp-hours must be replaced by the solar panels, so the size and number of panels you purchase will be determined by how many amp-hours you use in a day.

To estimate how many amp-hours you might use in a day, estimate how many hours each appliance will run and multiply that by the number of amps the appliance uses. We have measured some of the appliances in our trailer, and this is how many amps they use:

Single bulb DC light — 1.5 amps
Dual bulb DC light — 3.0 amps
Dual bulb fluorescent light — 1.5 amps
19″ LCD TV — 5.5 amps
DVD / CD Player — 0.5 amps
13″ MacBook laptop, on & running — 6-8 amps
13″ MacBook, off and charging — 1.6 amps
Sonicare toothbrush charging — 0.1 amps
FM Radio w/ surround-sound — 3.0 amps
12′ string of rope lights — 3.3 amps

We find that we typically use anywhere from 50 to 150 amp-hours per day, most commonly in the 70-90 range.

HOW MANY AMP-HOURS DOES MY FAVORITE GIZMO USE?

Since RV solar power systems are DC battery based, it is helpful to know how many amps (in DC) various appliances use. Multiplying that value by the number of hours the appliance is used each day then reveals how many amp-hours the appliance will require from the battery in the course of a day.

Most DC appliances list their amp usage in the user manual or spec sheet. In contrast, most AC appliances list their wattage in the user manual instead of amperage. So, for AC appliances that are run on an inverter you have to do some math to get their equivalent DC amperage rating.

You can get a rough estimate of the number of amps that an AC device will use on an inverter simply by dividing the wattage by 10.

Why is that?

Here’s one way to look at it: Technically, Watts = Volts x Amps. AC circuits run at ~120 volts. DC circuits run at 12 volts. An AC appliance will use the same number of watts whether running on a DC or AC. On a DC circuit (using an inverter so it can run), that AC appliance will use 10 times as many amps as it will on an AC circuit (that is, 120/12 = 10).

Here’s another way to look at it: Watts / Volts = Amps. So, to determine most precisely how many DC amps an AC appliance will use when running on an inverter, start by dividing the number of watts it uses by 12 volts to get its Amps DC. HOWEVER, keep in mind that inverters are not 100% efficient. Typically they are only about 85% efficient. That is, an inverter loses a bunch of watts to heat as it runs — about 15% of the watts it needs to run get dissipated into heat. So, it takes more watts to get the required amps out of the inverter, the exact figure being 1 / 85%. This means that after you divide the appliance’s Watts by its Volts (Watts / 12, as I mentioned above), then you have to divide that result by 0.85. This is messy.

Rather than dividing watts first by 12 and then again by 0.85, you can simply divide the watts by 10 and get a pretty close estimate. (That is, (1/12)/0.85 = 0.1)

Our AC 19″ LCD TV is rated at 65 watts. How many amps is that DC? 65/10 = 6.5 amps DC. We measured the TV at the volume we like to hear it and it was using 5.5 amps. If we cranked up the volume, the meter went up to 6.5 amps.

Likewise, our old white MacBook Pro laptop was rated for 65 watts. As we opened and closed files and started and stopped various programs, the meter zoomed all over the place between 3 amps and 8 amps. When we ran Adobe Lightroom, which is very disk and memory intensive, the readings hovered in the 7-8 amp range. So on average you could say it uses about 6.5 amps DC.

When we shut down the laptop and left it plugged in and charging, the meter dropped to 1.6 amps. This is important if you are trying to conserve electricity! Run your laptop on its own battery until the battery is depleted. Then turn it off and let it charge from the inverter while you do something else!

HOW DO YOU MEASURE THE POWER USAGE OF A DEVICE?

If you have nothing running in the rig (no computers running, no TV, no vacuum or toaster, etc.), you can measure the current a device is drawing from the batteries using a clamp-on meter around one of the battery cables. To measure the AC current of a small device, you can use a Kill-a-Watt meter. Simply plug it into an AC outlet and plug your device into it.

WHERE DO THE BATTERIES FIT IN?

Battery storage capacity is measured in amp-hours (Ah), and more is better. As a starting point, most new RVs come equipped with one 12-volt Group 24 battery which will give you about 70-85 Ah of capacity. Assuming the sun has charged the batteries completely by nightfall, and sticking to the rule of using only 1/3 of your total battery capacity each night, you will have only 25 Ah available each evening. That isn’t very much!

What is the best upgrade strategy?

Upgrading to two 12-volt Group 24 batteries (wired in parallel) will give you 140-170 Ah of capacity.

However, a 6-volt golf cart style battery has the same footprint as a Group 24 12-volt battery (although it is about 3″ taller), and a pair of them wired in series will give you about 210-240 Ah of capacity.

So, rather than buying a second 12-volt Group 24 batteries and getting just 140-170 Ah of capacity out of the pair, why not sell the 12 volt battery and buy to two 6-volt golf cart style batteries for 210-240 Ah of capacity? That’s what we did on our first trailer. Just make sure that you have enough height in the battery compartment for the taller golf cart batteries.

WHAT ABOUT BATTERY MAINTENANCE?

So far I’ve been talking about wet cell batteries, and these kinds of batteries need to be maintained. Wet cell batteries are made with thick metal plates and liquid between them. Over time the liquid evaporates and needs to be replaced with distilled water. Also, over time, sulphite builds up on the plates and needs to be removed by “equalizing” the batteries.

Hydrometer Reading on Battery

Use a hydrometer to check each battery cell.

Before we upgraded to AGM batteries, Once a month Mark would check the liquid levels in each cell of each battery and pours in a little distilled water wherever needed. He also checked the condition of each battery cell using a hydrometer. This little device indicates whether a cell is functioning at full capacity. Then he equalizes the batteries by programming our charge controller to raise the voltage on them to one volt higher than their normal charging voltage for five hours. Last of all, he re-checks the liquid level in each battery cell and adds distilled water as needed and re-checks each cell with the hydrometer. Usually any cells that had a poor reading before equalizing now give a good reading.

This maintenance stuff can be avoided by buying AGM batteries which are maintenance free. However, AGM batteries are really expensive. One big advantage of AGM batteries for sailors and for people with tight battery compartments is that they operate fine in any position, that is, they can be installed on their sides and will operate when a sailboat is heeling. We had them on our sailboat.

On our trailers, we initially opted for wet cell batteries. We had Trojan 105 wet cell batteries for the first five years on our fifth wheel. Then we replaced them with cheaper Costco batteries from Interstate (Johnson Controls).

The Trojans worked very well, but replacing them with cheapo batteries was a mistake. The cheap batteries failed completely within 14 months.

We now have four Trojan T-105 Reliant AGM batteries which are truly awesome. They are a little more money than the T-105 wet cell batteries, but they are superior and, in our minds, worth the extra little bit of cash.

For price comparisons: Trojan Reliant AGM (single), VMaxTanks AGM (set of 4 & free shipping), Trojan T105 Wet Cell (single):

To learn more about our new batteries, why we chose them, and how we upgraded the power plant on our trailer in April 2015, visit:

Wet Cell vs. AGM Batteries – Why We Upgraded to AGM Batteries PLUS Wiring Tips!
RV Electrical System Overhaul

To learn more about batteries and what “single-stage” and “multi-stage” battery charging is all about, visit:

RV and Marine Battery Charging Basics

AND HOW ABOUT THE SOLAR PANELS?

Battery capacity is only part of the story. The ultimate limiting factor is how many amp-hours the solar panels can put into the batteries during the day. If the solar panels are sized too small to charge the batteries sufficiently each day, you will eventually discharge the batteries over a series of days and they will be dead.

Solar panels are rated in terms of Watts. The relationship between the amp-hours that the panel can store in a battery and the panel’s watts rating is not straight forward. Suffice it to say that a 130 Watt panel produces 7.5 amps in maximum sunlight when the panel is exactly perpendicular to the sun, and both of those numbers are available in the specs for the panel. What isn’t stated, however, is how many amp-hours a panel will produce in a given day. That is because it varies by what latitude you are at, what angle the sun is to the panel (which changes all day long), how brightly the sun shines, how many clouds go by, etc.

We have found that each of our 120 watt and 130 watt panels typically produces between about 8 Ah and 40 Ah per day depending on the season, weather, latitude, battery demands, etc. Most commonly, they produce around 25-30 Ah per day each.

If you have the time and inclination (who’s got that stuff?), you can figure out how many amp-hours you use each night. Make sure that that number is less than 1/3 of your total battery capacity AND make sure your panels can provide that many amp-hours of charging each day.

But all that sounds very difficult.

Solar panels also come in a variety of flavors, including rigid or flexible and monocrystalline or polycrystalline as seen below:

To learn more about SOLAR PANELS, see our detailed review of the pros and cons of the different types of panels available today:

Solar Panel Selection – Flexible or Rigid? 12 volt or 24 volt? Monocrystalline or Polycrystalline?

NEVERMIND THE THEORY – JUST TELL ME WHAT SIZE STUFF I NEED!

As I have mentioned before, we changed how we lived when we had a small solar power installation and again when we got a big one. You can opt to live with very little electricity or not.

We met a couple living on their 27′ sailboat on its trailer in the desert in Quartzsite, Arizona (they were on their way to launch it in the Sea of Cortez). They were using just 6 amp-hours per day because they had a tiny solar panel. Lord knows, I never saw their lights on at night!

In our little Lynx travel trailer we used about 25-35 amp-hours per day. We relied on kerosene lamps for much of our lighting at night in the winter.

In our Hitchhiker fifth wheel we use an average of 60-120 amp-hours per day and we do not conserve electricity.

So as a rule of thumb, here is the number of amp-hours you might consume per day:

• 6 Ah = living ultra-conservatively
• 35 Ah = living very modestly
• 120 Ah = living much the way you do in your house

The amp-hour capacity of your battery bank should be three (to four) times your typical daily amp-hour usage.

A popular rule of thumb is to match (roughly) the amp-hour capacity of the batteries to the watts capacity of the solar panels. So, 140 Ah of battery capacity “goes with” 140 watts of solar power. 440 Ah of batteries “goes with” 440 watts of solar power.

However, having more solar capacity than that is not a problem, as it gives you much more flexibility in case you have cloudy days, the panels aren’t oriented well towards the sun, or you have periodic shading during the day from buildings or trees.

Side note: The average American house uses about 30 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity per day (see here), whereas we use anywhere from 0.6 to 1.2 kWh per day in our RV. This is because houses are much bigger and more complex and have much larger appliances and systems that run on electricity (refrigerator(s), stove/oven, hot water heater, heat and air conditioning, etc.).

It is also interesting to note that the ~1 kWh of power that our fifth wheel requires to recharge its batteries every day is approximately the same amount of energy that is required to recharge the batteries of a Tesla Model S after it is driven three miles (see here). Charging a frequently driven Tesla’s batteries exclusively with solar power would require an immense solar panel array.

 

OUR “FULL-TIMER” RV SOLAR POWER SYSTEM (~$2,500 in parts)

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Fifth wheel trailer solar power 681

In a nutshell, in order to run your RV with the same level of comfort as a house, using all of your appliances whenever you feel like it without thinking about conserving at all, you will need at least the following:

  • Four or more 6-volt batteries giving you at least 440 amp-hours of capacity

    We have four 6-volt batteries (2 pairs of batteries in series to make two 12-volt equivalent batteries, and then those 2 twelve volt equivalent batteries placed in parallel with each other). We had Trojan 105’s for the first five years, and after that we’ve had batteries from Costco, ~$480, which we soon replaced with Trojan T-105 AGM Reliant batteries, $1,200 (see note below).

  • 500 or more watts of solar power (preferably 600-800 watts)

    We have three 120-watt Mitsubishi panels and one 130-watt Kyocera panel, for a total of 490 watts of solar power, `$1,140

  • A charge controller that can support 40 amps or more (preferably 60 or 80 amps)

    We have an Outback FlexMax 60 60 amp charge controller (consider the FlexMax 80) $565
    For more info see our page: Solar Charge Controllers – Optimizing RV Battery Charging

  • A true sine wave inverter that can supply at least 1000 watts of AC power (preferably 2000 or 3000 watts)

    For 7 years we had an Exceltech XP 1100 watt true sine wave inverter $600.

PLEASE NOTE: In April, 2015, we upgraded to Trojan 105 Reliant AGM batteries ($1,200) and an Exeltech XP 2000 watt true sine wave inverter ($1,700). See our post RV Electrical Power System Overhaul to learn more.

This system will power everything except the air conditioner, regardless of weather or season. My notes indicating “preferably” larger sizes for everything reflects the fact that our installation is now quite old and component parts costs are half what they were when we were buying. More is definitely better.

I’ve never heard anyone say they wished they had less solar power!

Mark did the installation of this solar power system on our Hitchhiker fifth wheel. My rough guess is that the installation might have cost $700-$1,500 if done by an experienced installer. It took him three partial days, largely because we were boondocked in the woods about 15 miles from Home Depot, and I had to keep running back and forth to get little things for him!

NOTES and LESSONS LEARNED

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More and more solar power equipment manufacturers are selling complete kits for RVs, boats and cabins. Here is an example full-timer kit from Go Power, and a slightly smaller full-timer system from Renogy. Here is a small solar power kit from Go Power for “weekender/vacation” use and another small solar kit using Renogy panels.

Also, if you don’t want the hassle of doing an installation, here’s a nifty portable solar panel kit that folds into an easy-to-carry suitcase!!

 

INVERTER and CONVERTER CONFUSION

If you are like me, the terms “inverter” and “converter” are confusing. They sound so similar it seems they must be one and the same thing. They are actually two very different components with very different missions in an RV.

CONVERTERS

A converter takes the AC power coming in from the shore power cord (via electrical hookups or a generator) and gives power to all the DC appliances in the rig so the batteries can take a break. It essentially does what the batteries do, but does it only when there is shore power.

The DC converter in an RV also charges the batteries while connected to shore power. Some converters have sophisticated multi-stage charging mechanisms, and others simply provide a trickle charge.

For more about single-stage versus multi-stage charging, click here.

The DC converter is not involved in the solar power system. In our “full-time” solar setup, the DC converter is actually unplugged because our inverter powers all the AC outlets in the rig. Because of our converter’s design, when it is plugged in it senses when there is AC power available and automatically turns on. This would impose a huge demand on our batteries whenever we turned on the inverter.

Once in a while, when the skies have been overcast or stormy for a few days, we fire up our trusty Yamaha 2400i generator to bring the batteries up to full charge. We plug our shore power cord into the generator, unplug the inverter and plug in the converter. Now the converter is charging the batteries.

The converter that came with our rig was a single-stage trickle charge Atwood 55 amp converter. This was very inefficient for use with the generator because it charges at such a slow rate that we had to run the generator for hours and hours to get the batteries charged up.

In April, 2015, we replaced that converter with a slick new Iota DLS-90 / IQ4 converter. This converter can put as much as 90 amps into the batteries and has a true multi-stage charging algorithm. To see our introductory post about our big electrical system upgrade, see this post: RV Electrical Power System Overhaul

For more about converters, visit: RV Converters, Inverter/Chargers & Engine Alternator Battery Charging Systems

Almost all trailers and many smaller motorhomes have a converter installed at the factory.

INVERTERS

An inverter takes the DC power from the batteries and converts it to AC power so you can run things like TVs, computers, vacuum cleaners, hair dryers, toasters, etc., and also charge things like your phone and camera batteries. Turn on the inverter, plug an AC appliance like an electric razor or TV into it, and poof, the razor or TV works.

Inverters come in two flavors:

True Sine Wave (or Pure Sine Wave) which means the AC power signal coming out of the inverter is identical to the power signal of a wall outlet in a house (a smooth sine wave).

Modified Sine Wave which means the waveform is clipped at the top and bottom and is stair-stepped in between rather than being a smooth sine wave.

It is easier to convert DC power to a square-type wave than a smooth sine wave, so modified sine wave inverters are much cheaper. However, some sensitive AC appliances don’t work with a modified sine wave inverter.

We purchased a high-end true sine wave inverter for our “full-time” solar setup, because it matched the quality of the system and our particular unit was noted for its ruggedness (we run it 15 hours a day, sometimes 24). Our Exeltech true sine-wave inverter is designed to operate medical equipment, so it provides exceptionally clean and stable AC power.

See our story “How Much Inverter Is Enough?” to learn about what happened to us when we accidentally “blew up” our fancy Exeltech true sine wave inverter and had to live on a tiny cheapo 350 watt modified sine wave inverter while waiting for the parts to fix it!

Ironically, some RV parks have unstable AC power that can damage AC appliances in an RV. Our inverter power from our Exeltech is cleaner and more reliable (Exeltech inverters are designed to power sensitive medical equipment)! Desktop computers, laser printers, TV and stereo equipment and Sonicare toothbrushes are the most likely appliances to have trouble with modified sine wave inverters. However, when we used modified sine wave inverters exclusively with our small solar power setup on our Lynx travel trailer, we never had a problem with any of our appliances. Modified sine wave inverters often have loud fans, and Mark did have to put some WD40 on our Radio Shack inverter twice when the fan quit working unexpectedly.

INVERTER/CHARGERS

To add to the confusion about inverters and converters, some inverters combine a little of the functionality of both an inverter and a converter. These are called inverter/chargers and have two independent functions: (1) convert the batteries’ DC power to AC (inverter), and (2) use the AC power from the shore power cord (connected to electrical hookups or generator) and charge the batteries.

These are pricey pieces of equipment and many higher end motorhomes come with them. Our sailboat came with both a 600 watt pure sine wave inverter (which we used for everything on the boat except the microwave) and a 2500 watt modified sine wave inverter/charger (which powered the microwave and charged the batteries when we plugged into shore power).

NOW THAT IT’S ALL CLEAR, THE MANUFACTURERS MESS US UP!

The distinction between inverters and converters is pretty easy, isn’t it? However, recently when I was in an auto parts store I noticed a box labeled “POWER CONVERTER” and the picture and description were very clearly that of an INVERTER! So, maybe the distinction is going to get all muddied up after all.

For more about inverter/chargers, visit: RV Converters, Inverter/Chargers & Engine Alternator Battery Charging Systems

AN IMPORTANT NOTE ON RV REFRIGERATORS

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Because conventional propane RV refrigerators are inefficient and are (shockingly) expected to fail within ten years of service (see our blog post about that here), the current trend in full-time RVs is to manufacture them with residential AC refrigerators. These RVs are built with an inverter large enough to power the refrigerator while the RV is in transit. This is great for folks that are going to plug into electrical hookups 100% of the time. However, the electricity required to run a refrigerator, whether AC or DC, and no matter how Energy Star Efficient it is rated to be, is astronomical.

A typical 10 to 12 cubic foot Energy Star refrigerator will use over 300 kilowatts per year, or 822 watts per day. There is some energy lost when running on an inverter, so this will be roughly 822 Watts / 10 Volts = 82 amp-hours per day. To keep this fridge operating during the short days of winter when the sun is low in the sky, you will need 400+ watts of solar panels and 200+ amp-hours of battery capacity in addition to whatever you will need to run the rest of the household.

If you plan to boondock a lot, and you don’t want to run your generator 24/7, be prepared to outfit your rig with over 1,000 watts of solar panels and close to 1,000 amp-hours of battery capacity to power a residential refrigerator.

Non-Energy Star compliant DC electric refrigerators are even worse. Our sailboat had a 3.5 cubic foot DC refrigerator (“counter height” or “dorm size”) that was built for RV use. It did not have a freezer compartment. We had 710 amp-hours of AGM batteries and 555 watts of solar power. Granted, we were living in the tropics and the ambient cabin temperature was generally 85 degrees. The refrigerator compressor ran about 50% of the time and our solar power system was pushed to the max to keep the batteries topped off every day.

We had a separate standalone 2.5 cubic foot DC freezer on our sailboat. If we turned the freezer on, the solar panels could not keep the batteries charged without supplemental charging from the engine alternator every third or fourth day.

Residential refrigerators have vastly improved in recent years, running on a mere 25% of the electricity they used to use in 1986, and they are only getting better. For more information about refrigerator energy use and energy saving tips, see this resource: How Much Electricity Does My Refrigerator Use?

I have corresponded at length with a reader who has been boondocking 95% of the time for 6 months in a 40′ Tiffin Phaeton motorhome. He has a Whirlpool 22 cubic foot residential refrigerator, 1,140 watts of solar panels on his roof and 940 amp-hours of battery capacity in his basement. His fridge is powered with a dedicated Xantrex pure sine wave 2,000 watt inverter that is wired through a transfer switch to both his shorepower line and his generator, just in case the inverter fails (he had a 1,500 watt modified sine wave inverter that literally burnt up and started smoking).

So it can be done, but it will be easier in a motorhome that has a big payload capacity than in a fifth wheel or travel trailer that has a smaller payload capacity due to the weight of the batteries required. Even though we had to replace our RV refrigerator in its 8th year of service, we do not want double our battery bank and solar panel array just to power a residential fridge. I would rather put that extra 275 lbs into other things we need in our mobile lifestyle.

PHEW! THAT WAS A LOT OF INFO. WHAT NOW?

Still confused about the components and operation of an RV solar power system? See our four part RV SOLAR POWER TUTORIAL series where these concepts are re-introduced and discussed in greater detail:

Learn more about the different kinds of solar panels on the market:

Solar Panel Selection – Flexible vs. Rigid, 12 volt vs. 24 volt, Monocrystalline vs. Polycrystalline – PLUS Wiring Tips!!

Get the quick-and-dirty shopping list of things to buy for your solar power installation:

Three RV Solar Power Solutions: Small, Portable, and Big!

Want to learn more about BATTERIES and understand how battery charging works at a deeper level? Our Intro to Battery Types and our four-part tutorial series covers all the details involved in charging RV and marine batteries and takes a close look at a variety of specific charging systems, from converters to inverter/chargers to engine alternators to solar charge controllers. It also reveals how these systems work together:

Curious about the solar power installation we did on our sailboat? See our page: SAILBOAT SOLAR POWER INSTALLATION.

In April, 2015, we overhauled our electrical power plant on our trailer. See the introductory post about this upgrade here:
RV ELECTRIC POWER SYSTEM OVERHAUL

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Where do you buy solar panels, charge controllers, inverters and such? Surprisingly, Amazon offers solar power kits and more. Click the following links for a wider selection of:

If you click through to Amazon from anywhere on this website, anything you put in your shopping cart or wish list immediately after that results in a small commission to us at no cost to you, no matter what you search for and no matter when you finalize the purchase. This is a wonderful way that you can "help us help you" with detailed and carefully researched articles. Thank you!

 

We offer all the information on our website free of charge in hopes of helping help our fellow RVers and cruisers. We have been alarmed and saddened to find portions of the copyrighted material on this page plagiarized in ebooks that are sold for profit, but so it goes. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Good luck with your solar power installation — we hope our articles on this website are useful to you!

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Photography – Cameras, Gear, Tips and Resources

Since we began our full-time RV travels in 2007, photography has become a huge part of our lives. Photography is an ideal hobby for travelers, and it isn’t hard to learn. Our learning curve has played out on the pages of this website, and it is satisfying to see our improvement over the years. When we first started traveling, we each shot about 6,000 photos per year. Now we each shoot over 35,000 photos per year (a little under 100 per day per person!).

Camera on a tripod - photography

Photography is a lot of fun, and it’s not hard to learn.

People have asked us what cameras and equipment we use, and how we improved our skills. This page presents all of our gear choices over the years, from our camera bodies to our favorite lenses to our filters and tripods to the goodies we use to take our cameras out for a hike to the software we rely on for post-processing.

It also explains how we organize all our photos and lists all the books, eBooks and online tutorials we have studied to learn to take better photos. We are entirely self-taught, and the inspiring resources we reference here lay it all out in plain language.

We’ve invested in our camera equipment because photography is our passion and we do it all day long. What you’ll see here is our progression through good solid “value” gear, from the “entry level” gear we started with to the more professional quality gear we use today.

For easy navigation, use these links:

The best time to buy camera gear is during the lead up to Christmas or when a manufacturer discontinues a camera model. An inexpensive but good quality DSLR is the Nikon D3400 camera which is available in kits with one or two lenses, camera bags, filters, etc., here

CAMERAS and LENSES

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Our Current Cameras and Lenses

As of 2018, we both shoot with Nikon D810 cameras. This is a professional level, truly awesome, full-frame 36 megapixel camera. We use these primarily for landscape shots.

We also both have Nikon D500 cameras which are crop-sensor 20 megapixel cameras that can shoot 10 frames per second, ideal for fast moving objects like wildlife and our adorable puppy.

Prior to these cameras, we both used Nikon D610 cameras. This is a full-frame, 24 megapixel camera. It is considered a “pro-sumer” camera, not quite professional quality but at the high end of the hobbyist ranks.

Although we have a big collection of lenses, we typically take no more than two apiece with us when we are out and about on foot. It’s just too much stuff to lug around!

I have a Nikon 28-300 mm lens on my camera which I use almost exclusively, simply because I love the flexibility of having both wide angle and zoom options with the twist of my wrist without having to change lenses.

Photographer with camera tripod in the water

When we got into photography, we jumped in with both feet.

Mark likes to pick a lens for the day and work within its limits. His favorites are prime (non-zooming) lenses, and he uses the Nikon 50 mm and Nikon 85mm lenses a lot. These are a lot less expensive than zoom lenses, and they are much faster lenses too (meaning they can be used in lower light). However, they do not have vibration resistance (also known as “image stabilization”), a technology that reduces the inherent wiggle caused by hand-holding a lens.

He also uses the Nikon 24-120 and the Sigma 24-105. These are very similar lenses, and we would have just one of them, but I used to use the Nikon 24-120 all the time before I got the Nikon 28-300, so he got the Sigma 24-105 to have one with a similar range. They’re both terrific lenses, so we can’t decide which one to keep and which one to sell!

We have a Nikon 70-200, which is a truly beautiful lens. For a long time neither of us used it much, but after I commented to that effect when I first published this post, Mark put it into his regular arsenal and uses it frequently now. It is a fabulous lens with excellent color rendition. Another advantage is that the zoom feature doesn’t lengthen or shorten the lens — it is always one length and all the zooming is physically done inside the lens. This means that dust doesn’t sneak into the lens when it is zoomed in and out the way it does with other lenses (like the 28-300, 24-120 and 24-105 mentioned above).

For wide angles, we have a Nikon 16-35 and a Nikon Nikon 18-35 so we can each shoot very wide angles simultaneously. Mark LOVES wide angle photography, and he uses these all the time. The 16-35 is more expensive, and was purchased as an upgrade from the 18-35, but he can’t seem to part with the 18-35 now, so I inherited it.

For super wide angles like at Horseshoe Bend in Arizona or for shooting stars at night (like the final image in this post or the first image in this post), we turn to the Rokinon 14 mm lens (with the Nikon focusing chip) or our very cool fisheye lens, the Rokinon 12 mm lens.

A few years back we bought a Tamron 150-600 mm G1 lens for shooting birds (like wild peach faced lovebirds here) and for wildlife — or even for stationary cacti at a faraway distance as in this image here. We loved this lens so much we bought the upgraded Tamron 150-600 mm G2 lens. While we got lucky with the first one and it worked great right off the bat, we had to send back our first copy of the G2 and get a replacement because it didn’t focus well. Now both lenses are awesome. Frankly, if you are picky about testing the lens to make sure you have a good copy, we find we are getting just as good pics from the older G1 lens as from the newer G2, so you might save a few bucks and get the G1. We used both lenses as well as the Nikon D500 and the Nikon D810 to capture the eagle and moon images in this post: Magical Moments in the RV Life.

An alternative to this lens that is priced similarly is the Sigma 150-600 contemporary series lens. Another awesome option that has become available since our purchase is the Nikon 200-500 mm lens.

What about those third party lenses?? Some are better than others, although Sigma’s Art Series lenses are really great these days (and expensive). When I was casting about for a “do it all” lens, we initially bought a Tamron 28-300 mm lens. It had terrible color rendition and didn’t focus for beans, so we returned it to buy the Nikon 28-300, which I totally love.

Our Past Cameras and Lenses

Do you need all this crazy stuff when you first get started? No!

When we began traveling, we purchased two Nikon D40 cameras, which were 6 megapixel crop-sensor cameras. Each came with a Nikon 18-55 mm lens, and we got a Nikon 55-200 mm lens for distance. This was a great camera model to learn on, and we published five magazine cover photos taken with it.

Coast to Coast Cover Spring 2012

Do you need to spend a bundle on a camera? No!
I took this photo with a Nikon D40 that you can buy today (used) for $100.

The Nikon D40 (and its modern day equivalent Nikon D3400) are “crop sensor” cameras (or “DX” in Nikon lingo). This means the sensor is smaller than on a “full frame” camera (like our current Nikon D810 cameras which are “FX” in Nikon lingo). This, in turn, means the image quality is slightly lower and if you blow up the image to poster size it won’t look quite as good up close.

The D40 was discontinued long ago, but can be found on Craigslist and eBay for $100 with two lenses. One that has been lightly used will work just as well now as it did years back.

How do you tell how “used” a used camera is??

If you have a Mac, an easy way to find out how many shutter clicks a camera has is to take a photo, download it to your computer, export it or locate it in the Finder, and open it in Preview by double clicking on it. Then click on Tools > Show Inspector, click the “i” button and then the “Exif” button. The Image Number is the number of shutter clicks the camera has on it. This works only for cameras that have a mechanical shutter, not for pocket cameras with an electronic shutter.

My only frustration with the Nikon D40 was that there was no built-in cleaning system for the camera sensor, so every time we changed lenses the sensor was vulnerable to picking up dust — and it did! We used the Nikon D40 cameras fro 2007 until 2011.

Today’s “equivalent” entry level DSLR is the Nikon D3400. It is a 24 megapixel camera that is far more sophisticated than the D40 and not “equivalent” in any way except the price point. If you want to get it in a kit with multiple lenses, filters, camera bag, tripod, etc., there are lots of kits here.

The Tamron 150-600 lens can be hand held

The Nikon D610 and Tamron 150-600 mm lens.
I’m in camo to keep from scaring the birds away.
Think it will work when I point this huge scary lens at them? Not!!

In 2011, we upgraded to the Nikon D5100, a 16 megapixel crop-sensor camera. Like the Nikon D40, this camera was also a “crop sensor” or “DX” camera. It came with a Nikon 18-55 mm lens. We got a Nikon 55-300 lens, and I ran all over Mexico with both of those lenses, switching back and forth all day long.

In hindsight, I should have gotten the Nikon 18-300 lens and spared myself the hassle of carrying a second lens and switching lenses all the time (I missed so many great shots because I was fumbling with the camera!). But I had read some iffy reviews of the first edition of that lens and decided against it (the current model is its 3rd generation and I’ve met people who LOVE this lens. Oh well!).

The best thing about that camera was the built-in sensor cleaner. Living in the salty and dusty environment of coastal Mexico, this was huge. The other fun thing about that camera was the flip-out display on the back. You could put the camera in Live View, then set it on the ground or hold it overhead and still see your composition on the back of the camera.

We used the Nikon D5100 cameras from 2011 to 2013. The Nikon D5100 has been discontinued. Today’s “equivalent” level DSLR is the Nikon D5300. It is a 24 megapixel camera that, again, is far more sophisticated than the predecessor that we had. This is an outstanding “intermediate” camera and can be purchased in a Nikon D5300 camera and lens bundle.

If you have a few more dollars to spend, the Nikon D7200 is even better. It is still a crop sensor camera, but it is very sophisticated. Like the others, if you are starting out, getting a Nikon D7200 Camera and Lens Kit is very cost effective.

Pocket Cameras

Sometimes carrying a big DSLR camera is inconvenient. We both like having a pocket camera for times when a DSLR is too big.

I use an Olympus Tough TG-4 camera when I ride my mountain bike. I used its predecessor when I snorkeled in Mexico too.

This camera is very rugged. The bruises it has given me on my backside are proof that it holds up a lot better than I do when I fall off my bike and land on it. I like it because the lens doesn’t move in and out when it zooms, and you can drop it and not worry about breaking it. Here are a bunch of photos it took: Bell Rock Pathway in Sedona Arizona.

Mark has a Nikon Coolpix A that he is nuts about because it is just like a mini DSLR. He doesn’t do crazy things like take photos while riding his bike one handed the way I do (and he’s less prone to falling off), so he doesn’t mind having a more delicate camera in his pocket. It is a 16 megapixel camera that has most of the features of a the Nikon D610, except it is a crop-sensor camera that has a fixed 28 mm lens that can’t be changed. It has been discontinued.

Prior to that, he had a Nikon Coolpix P330 (also discontinued). It could shoot in raw format, which was the reason he chose it, but it didn’t produce nearly the quality images of the Coolpix A.

Lots of folks use a smartphone for all their photo ops or as an alternative to their DSLR. We don’t have a smartphone, but we have used a lot of them at scenic overlooks when groups of people pass their cameras around to get pics of themselves. One thing we’ve noticed is that there is a big difference in dynamic range (the rendering of bright spots and shadows) between Androids and iPhones, with iPhones being much better. This is probably common knowledge and not news to you at all, and it may be partly due to which generation of smartphone a person hands us to get their portrait taken.

 

ADDITIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY EQUIPMENT and ACCESSORIES

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Batteries – We have two batteries for each of our cameras, so we each always have a fully charged battery on hand besides the one in the camera. We’ve found the Watson batteries are a good alternative to the more expensive Nikon batteries. My Watson battery died shortly after the manufacturer’s warranty expired, and I was impressed that they honored it anyway and replaced it for me. However, note that the Nikon D500 camera can’t use third party batteries, so you have to spend the bigger bucks on a Nikon brand EL-15 battery for that camera.

Memory Cards – We also have two memory cards in each camera (the Nikon D610, D810 and D500 all have two card slots in them). We use Sandisk brand for all our memory cards. We like the SanDisk “Extreme Pro” 95 MB/second SD cards. We like these fast SD cards because when we start shooting in a burst (holding the shutter down and letting the camera take pics as fast as it can — for instance, when a bison jumps over a fence in front of us), the faster the card can be written to, the faster the camera’s internal memory buffer will empty, and the longer the camera can keep shooting at top speed. Faster SD cards are also faster when downloading photos to a computer. Our Nikon D500s use Sandisk XQD cards and our Nikon D810s use Sandisk CF cards.

Every evening we download all our photos onto our laptops and reformat the memory cards in the camera. We’ve heard that this reduces the chance of the card failing and losing all our photos (which happened to me once long ago with a Kingston card – ugh!).

The Hoodman Loupe – A Game Changer! The Hoodman Loupe revolutionized our photography because we were suddenly able to see our photos clearly on the back of our cameras and then retake the photo if necessary. The loupe fits over the LCD screen, blocking the glare and magnifying the image. The lens is adjustable, so no matter how good or bad your eyes are, you can adjust it until you can see the image perfectly clearly. We have the original hard sided loupe. A new model collapses down so it can be stored more compactly. In a lot of the photos of me on this website, you can see my Hoodman loupe hanging around my neck!

Hoodman Loupe on a Nikon D610 Camera

The Hoodman Loupe lets you see the image on the back of the camera clearly, adjusted for your eyes, and without glare.

Battery Grip – Mark occasionally uses a Vello Battery Grip on his camera. This grip can hold extra batteries and also makes it possible to take portrait oriented shots (vertical images) while holding the camera as if it were upright rather than twisting your right arm over your head. Mark absolutely loves his. I use mine only occasionally because I can’t use it with my tripod L-bracket (see below).

Camera Straps – We replaced the standard Nikon camera straps with the Optech Pro Strap. This strap is thick and cushy and is slightly curved to fit the curve of your shoulder. It also has quick release clasps so you can easily unclip it from the camera when you’re using a tripod.

 

LENS FILTERS

For a long time we preferred the B+W brand for all our filters, although we’ve used a lot of Hoya filters over the years too. We’ve also tried Tiffen filters, but find they are hit-and-miss. Often, if a “lens deal” includes a filter with the lens, it’s not a great one. Most recently, we have begun buying Nikon filters which seem to be the best quality all around. Just be sure you get the right size for your lens (52 mm or 77 mm, etc.).

Camera UV Filter, Polarizing Filter and Neutral Density Filter

UV filter (top), Polarizing filter (left) & neutral density filter (right)

UV Filters – We have UV filters for all our lenses to provide protection for them.

Polarizing Filters – We also have polarizing filters for all our lenses. A polarizer makes it possible to enhance the colors or reduce the glare in certain lighting situations. It is best around midday and has less effect at dawn and dusk. It is wonderful around bodies of water and for removing the dashboard glare on the windshield when taking photos from inside a car. A polarizer adds a lot of contrast to an image, however, so while it can enhance a landscape beautifully, I’ve found it makes street photography of people too contrasty.

Graduated Neutral Density Filters – We occasionally use a graduated neutral density filter when the sky is very pale and the scene we are shooting is dark. This kind of filter is half colored and half clear. By twisting it so the colored part lines up with the sky and the clear part lines up with the darker landscape, the sky and landscape come out more evenly exposed. They are also very helpful for sunrises and sunsets.

Neutral Density Filters – When shooting moving water, a neutral density filter darkens what the camera sees enough so the shutter speed can be increased to show silky movement in the water without it being blown out and all white. These filters are also helpful if you want to use a very big aperture (small “F number”) to blur out a background and the camera’s top shutter speed isn’t fast enough to get proper exposure. These filters come in different degrees of darkness. A 10-stop filter is good for shooting a waterfall in broad daylight while a 4-stop filter is good for the same scene at dawn or dusk. We had fun with moving water photography at Watkins Glen in Upstate New York, the Blue Ridge Parkway in N. Carolina, and Great Smoky Mountains National Park in N. Carolina.

Lee Filter System – Mark also uses a Lee Filter System and loves it. This is a multi-part system of square filters that can be placed on any camera lens. You need the Lee Foundation Kit, an adapter ring sized to your lens and some filters. The advantage of this system is that for graduated neutral density filters you can position the transition point between light and dark. So, if you are shooting a sunset and have very little land and lots of sky, you can darken the sky and lighten the land even if the horizon is just above the bottom of your photo. Likewise if you have a bright sky and a dark hillside – you can rotate the filter so the transition is on an angle and not a horizontal line right through the middle of the photo.

 

TRIPODS

It is really hard to invest in a tripod after blowing the bank account on a nice camera, a few lenses, spare batteries, memory cards and filters. And you can have loads of fun with photography without getting a tripod. But if you want to play with shooting (and showing) motion (i.e., a car going by with a blurred background, clouds streaking across the sky or silky water flowing) or you want to have perfect exposure in very low light (like a sunset) without a flash, or you want to do some timelapse videos (very cool at sunrise in a big canyon) then a tripod is a must.

Sunwayfoto XB-52DL Ballhead with T2C40C Tripod and DDC-60LR Quick Release Clamp

Sunwayfoto XB52-DL Ballhead with T2C40C Tripod and
Sunwayfoto DDC-60LR Quick Release Clamp

Most people end up upgrading their tripod several times because they just can’t believe, at first, that they have to spend good hard earned money on a tripod, and they go through a bunch of cheap ones before they bite the bullet and get a decent one! We did that, and lots of our friends did too.

The biggest difference between tripods is how much weight they can hold solidly, how easy they are to set up and adjust, and whether things drift or droop a little after you tighten the buttons. I have a Benro carbon fiber tripod that I absolutely love for hiking. The legs slide in and out really smoothly, and the adjustments are easy. I also have a set of super long Really Right Stuff tripod legs and a Wimberly gimbal which is awesome for letting me swing the Tamrom 150-600 lens around smoothly while shooting birds.

Mark has Sunwayfoto tripod legs and smaller ballhead for hiking and bigger ballhead that he loves and he uses a Sunwayfoto GH-01 gimbal head as well. We reviewed them in depth at this link:

Choosing a Tripod – Sunwayfoto Tripod and Ballhead Review

Sunwayfoto GH-01 Ballhead Review – Great Support for a Long Lens

We both have the SunWay Foto L-Bracket that attaches to the camera body and lets us set the camera in the tripod in either Landscape or Portrait orientation very easily. I keep my L-bracket on the camera all the time for simplicity in case I want to grab my tripod quickly, but it means I can’t use my Vello Battery Grip. Mark loves his battery grip, so he has to switch back and forth between the regular tripod bracket that fits on the camera along with the battery grip and the L-bracket that doesn’t.

 

FLASHLIGHT

We love doing night photography, photographing the milky way and the stars, and doing light painting on old buildings for ghostly effects. At Waterton Lakes National Park we did a timelapse video of the Milky Way.

When we are hiking on a remote trail in the middle of the night, or light painting a building to make it appear visible in a nighttime photo, we find that a good flashlight is essential.

We use the fabulous, super high powered LED flashlight from Lumintop, the Lumintop SD75 4000 lumen flashlight. It is like having a car’s headlight in your hand!

Lumintop SD75 4000 lumen tactical flashlight

Lumintop SD75 4000 lumen tactical flashlight next to a pocket Mag Light

Built with heavy duty aerospace aluminum, it has a military grade hard-anodized aluminum finish and is water resistant to 2 meters. Offering 3 power levels plus a strobe, there’s also an LED tail light that can be used as a night light when we’re setting up our camera gear in the dark. It also has threads on the bottom for mounting on a tripod.

The flashlight batteries are rechargeable and there is a battery level indicator. The flashlight ships with a wall charger and 12 volt car charging cords, and it comes in a suitcase! The batteries are so strong, it can be used to recharge other smaller devices like cell phones via 2 USB ports.

This is not a pocket flashlight, but it has slots in the end for a strap that makes it very easy to carry.

We love this flashlight and just wish we had had it when we cruised Mexico on our sailboat, as it is far more powerful than the emergency floodlight we had for rescuing a man overboard!

 

HAULING, STORING & MAINTAINING OUR CAMERA GEAR

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With all this camera stuff, it can be a challenge to figure out how to carry it to scenic spots and where to store it in the RV and truck when we’re not using it. Also, our camera gear takes a lot of abuse from dusty air out west, salty air on the coast, and sunscreen from our faces and hands. So it needs to be cleaned periodically. Here’s where we’re at with all this right now:

Hiking With Camera Equipment

When we go on a hike of a few miles, it is likely to take us four hours or more because we stop to take so many photos. So, we want to have water, snacks, our camera gear, tripods, and possibly a jacket with us. There are a lot of camera-specific backpacks and sling style camera bags on the market, but none we’ve seen is really designed for hiking.

After a lot of searching, we finally decided to use big Camelback hydration packs instead of bona-fide camera bags when we hike with all our photography stuff, and we’ve been really happy with this choice.

I have a Camelback H.A.W.G. and Mark has a Camelback Fourteener. Both can carry 100 ounces of water, and each has enough capacity for the Tamron 150-600 lens along with everything else if need be. (We never take more than two lenses with us — one on the camera and one in the pack).

Camelback H.A.W.G. camera bag

The Camelback H.A.W.G. can hold a big camera.

We generally hike with our cameras slung around our necks so we can take photos with them as we walk. I put the Camelback on first and then put the camera on afterwards so the camera straps aren’t trapped under the shoulder straps of the Camelback. There’s nothing like getting caught in the Tourist Tangle!

My main criteria for choosing a Camelback was that I wanted to be able to put my camera (with the 28-300 mm lens attached) inside the Camelback and then close that compartment so I could scramble over something gnarly that required two hands and not worry about the camera slipping out of the pack. And it had to do that with 100 ounces of water in the hydration pack.

My other criteria was that I wanted to be able to hang my tripod on one of the Camelback straps and hike without carrying it in my hand.

The straps on the sides of the H.A.W.G. aren’t designed to carry a tripod, and they may fatigue over time, but I’ve been really happy with how this Camelback has held up on the many hikes I’ve taken with it so far in two years of owning it.

The straps on the sides of the Fourteener are designed to hold ice picks and things like that, so they are probably a little more rugged. If I had known about the Fourteener before I bought my H.A.W.G., I probably would have bought that model instead. Mark has had it almost as long as I’ve had my H.A.W.G., and he is very happy with it as well.

Camelback H.A.W.G. with camera tripod

The tripod fits neatly on the side of the H.A.W.G., and the camera straps aren’t trapped under the Camelback straps.

One really nice feature of both of these Camelback models is that they have a waterproof rain sack that can be pulled out of a hidden pocket and slipped over the whole Camelback, keeping the contents dry if you’re caught in a downpour. This came in super handy at the Duggers Creek Falls on the Blue Ridge Parkway!

One of the tricks with backpacks in general is that, if they have a waist belt, you can loosen the belt a little, slip your arms out of the arm straps and then swing the pack around so it is in front of you. This way you can get something out of it without taking it off and putting it on the ground. This is fantastic when you want to swap filters, grab a snack, or change batteries without taking the whole darn thing off.

Once we get to an area where we’re going to take a lot of photos, we take the tripods off the Camelbacks and we carry them around in our hands until we’re ready to hike out again.

We carry a plastic bag (a shopping bag is fine) in our packs in case it sprinkles and we want to cover our cameras for a short time. We also carry rain ponchos so we can cover ourselves and our Camelbacks in the event of unexpected rain.

Short Walks With Photography Gear

If we are going to spend the day roaming around but not hiking, or if we’re taking photos a short distance from the truck, we don’t take the big Camelbacks. I use a small fanny pack to carry a spare battery and possibly a second lens. Mark likes to wear a photographer’s vest that has lots of pockets for all his goodies. He likes the one he has, but has his eye on the Phototools Photovest 14!

Storing All This Stuff

In the trailer we have Ruggard camera cases and Ruggard backpacks to hold the cameras and lenses. We also have camera cases in the truck. We’ve found good homes for the tripods in the truck too, and they generally stay there so they are with us if we arrive somewhere and suddenly wish we had them with us.

Cleaning

A great way to get the dust off the camera and lenses is to blow it off with the Giotto Rocket Blaster (the largest size is best). The Nikon LensPen Lens Cleaner is good for brushing dust off too. For smudges and smears, we use the Eclipse Camera Cleaning Kit which comes with a cleanser and pads.

Giotto Rocket Blaster & Camera Cleaning Kit

Giotto Rocket Blaster & Camera Cleaning Kit

Sometimes the camera’s built-in sensor cleaning system doesn’t quite do the trick, and getting debris off the camera sensor can be really intimidating. Rather than paying for an expensive cleaning at a camera shop, we’ve discovered that the Sensor Gel Stick sold by Photography Life does a phenomenal job (don’t get the cheap Chinese imitation ones). Check out the video under the product description here to see how to do it. It’s easy and we have done it many times.

 

PHOTO ORGANIZATION and POST-PROCESSING TOOLS

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We each have a plain MacBook Pro (no retina display) with 16 GB RAM and a 1 TB internal drive and slots for CD, SD card, Thunderbolt, etc. (2012-style case). We also each have a 4 TB external hard drive with a Thunderbolt dock that allows multiple drives to be daisy-chained.

We use Adobe Lightroom for most of our post-processing. The easiest way to learn Lightroom is the Julianne Kost Lightroom Videos. Julianne is Adobe’s “Lightroom Evangelist” (what a great title and job!) and her presentations are clear and concise.

Organizing photos is never easy, and everyone has a different method. Lightroom lets only one person work on a catalog at a time, so we each have separate Lightroom catalogs. We make use of the Smart Previews in Lightroom to get access to each other’s photos without transferring all the original photo files between our laptops. All we have to transfer is the catalog, previews and smart previews. It’s clunky — I know they could do better — but it works.

We also have a separate Lightroom catalogs for each year. The older catalogs are stored on external hard drives and the current year catalogs are on our laptops. We try to make sure all our photos are in two places (laptop and external drive or on two external drives). Some of our older photos are in Apple’s Aperture and our oldest are in Apple’s iPhoto, the two post-processing programs we used prior to Lightroom.

I don’t want to have to plug in an external drive every time I go into Lightroom, which is why we keep our current year’s photos and catalogs local to our laptops. We have our previous year’s catalogs and smart previews on our laptops so we can see and work with our older photos. If we need the full image of an older photo, we plug in the appropriate external hard drive, and the catalog on the laptop reconnects with the original images.

We don’t store anything in the cloud.

We organize our photos by location but like to have an overall sense of the chronological order in which we visited places, since that is the way we remember our travels. So, we label our folders with 2 digits followed by the state to bring up the states in the order in which we visited them.

Inside of each state folder, we name every download with a 4-digit date (month/day) followed by the specific location. For photos that aren’t location specific (like photos of our trailer disc brake conversion or fifth wheel suspension failure, we move them after downloading to a MISC folder and name a subfolder within it more appropriately or add them to an existing folder.

Lightroom Folder Organization

2 digits to order the states chronologically, then 4-digit dates on subfolders with the specific location.

Photomatix Pro is an excellent program for creating HDR (high dynamic range) effects from several identical photos taken at different exposures, and Topaz Adjust and Topaz Detail in the Topaz Suite of software are great for getting a little wild with crazy effects at the click of a button.

For panoramas, we use Panorama Maker to stitch together a series of photos.

We use the X-Rite Color Checker Passport to create custom color profiles calibrated to specific camera and lens combinations. It also comes with a gray card that we sometimes use to set a custom white balance for particular light conditions.

 

RESOURCES FOR LEARNING PHOTOGRAPHY

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Photography is something you can spend the rest of your life learning. We’ve been reading and studying photography books and blogs for a few years now, and we have found the following printed books and ebooks and online resources to be really helpful in conquering both the technical aspects of understanding what all those buttons on our cameras do and the artistic aspects of how to capture the essence of what we’re seeing.

Photography Books

Some of our Favorite Photography Books

BOOKS ON PHOTOGRAPHY

 

eBOOKS ON PHOTOGRAPHY

 

ONLINE TUTORIALS

The website that has taught us the most is Photography Life written by Nasim Mansurov and his very talented team. He has super detailed gear reviews and his site is read by many of the top professionals in the photography world. His tutorials are excellent, and he has two pages with links to them all:

We were very fortunate to meet Nasim at his 2012 fall foliage photography workshop in Ridgway Colorado. Those extraordinary three days were a real turning point for our photography.

 

BLOGS, TIPS and GEAR REVIEWS

The photography blogs we read regularly are these:

  • Nikon Rumors – The latest info about everything related to Nikon cameras: future products, recalls, Nikon deals and specials
  • Photography Life – The most comprehensive camera/lens reviews anywhere and a top team of writers producing tutorials
  • Ken Rockwell – The first online photography resources we found. We’ve been following ever since
  • Ming Thein – Excellent and detailed camera reviews and truly inspiring photographs
  • DigitalRev TV – Hilarious (and very informative) videos on all kinds of photography topics.
  • Thom Hogan – Interesting photography-related essays as well as gear reviews
  • Dreamscapes – Phenomenal, jaw-dropping photography that makes us want to keep learning, plus tutorials & eBooks
  • DxO Mark – A laboratory that uses industrial testing equipment to do comparative camera, sensor and lens ratings

 

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RV Tips and Tricks – Make RVing EASY and FUN!

There are a million RV tips and tricks to make the RV life easier, and this page offers some little jewels we’ve discovered since we started RVing full-time in our fifth wheel trailer in 2007. We’ve broken them down into:

RV Tips and Tricks for making RVing and the RV Life easy

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OUTDOOR RV TIPS and TRICKS

High Powered “Search” Flashlight

We often camp in areas that are quite remote, and getting to and from and around the rig at night is much easier with a very high powered flashlight!

Lumintop SD75 LED flashlight

Lumintop SD75 Flashlight compared to a pocket Maglite

We have a Lumintop SD75 Flashlight which is downright phenomenal. We have hiked Bryce Canyon and the Grand Canyon at night to photograph the stars and the Milky Way, and this flashlight is literally like holding a car headlight in your hand.

Here is more info about this flashlight:

Lumintop SD75 Flashlight Review

Getting Parked Without Damaging Anything

The most basic element in RVing is learning to hitch up and unhitch, whether you are driving a car pulling a popup, a diesel truck towing a fifth wheel or a Class A motorhome towing a car. Of course, lots of people have loads of fun in their motorhomes without towing a car behind, but getting hitched up and unhitched is part and parcel of the RV lifestyle for an awful lot of us.

The most important thing for the driver and the person standing outside of the rig is to stay in eye contact with each other. This is entirely up to the person running around outside. If you can see the driver’s face in the rear view mirrors, you are golden. If you can’t, then any kind of gesture you make, including jumping up and down and waving your arms because the driver is about to drive the rig right off a cliff, will never be seen.

We use two-way radios to give us a way to talk to each other and to lessen the impact if I inadvertently end up in a position where Mark can’t see me in the rearview mirror. We use the longest distance radios we can get, to make sure the signal is decent. Right now we have 36 mile GMRS radios, which are realistically good to about 3-5 miles. We used these on our boat (a godsend when anchoring) and we’ve used them ever since we started RVing. We’ve gone through three sets so far, because the salt air ate up two pairs during our cruising years.

Two-way radios for backing up an RV

We use our two-way radios all the time…

Besides the radios, it’s really helpful to have good hand signals. I indicate the distance until disaster by spreading my arms wide and then bringing my hands closer and closer together until I give a “halt” sign (palms forward). Shaking my head and waving my hands and giving a few slices to the neck can help too if it starts to look really bad.

Midland 36 mile GMRS radios

36 mile GMRS radios

It is royally embarrassing to make all these gestures when you’ve got an audience of people watching, but I’ve learned that there’s no ego in getting the rig parked well. Every RVer who has been around a while has made a huge blunder of some kind while parking, and they’ve all lived through it. So a few members of your giggling audience will probably be very sympathetic to whatever mistakes you have up your sleeve.

My worst gaffe was in front of two very special friends we hadn’t seen since we’d moved into our fifth wheel a year earlier. They had come out to camp with us, and we were all excited. I had just finished telling them (with great pride) that we didn’t need their help parking because we parked our rig all the time, we had a system, and we had gotten pretty darn good at it.

Mark began to back up as our friends watched, and I began to warn him that he needed to go more towards the driver’s side to avoid a tree. He adjusted, but again, I told him, he needed to go more towards the driver’s side! I kept repeating my instructions louder and louder as our good friends watched in bewilderment. When Mark was just about to cream the tree, we all started shouting STOP!!! Mark got out of the truck, calmly assessed the situation, and then said to me: “Ahem…. which side does the driver sit on?”

Our friends smiled weakly and I looked for the nearest rock to crawl under…

So, don’t be embarrassed and don’t be shy. Make your gestures big and strong, and remember which side of the rig the driver sits on!

Hitching and Unhitching a Fifth Wheel Trailer

Some folks drive their RVs solo, and although I can’t say much about hitching and unhitching a motorhome and car combo, our good friend Bob has found a great way to hitch and unhitch a fifth wheel trailer solo. He marked the front landing leg that’s near the extend/retract button at regular intervals all the way up and down the leg.

Fifth wheel landing leg marked with hash marks

Hash marks on a landing leg help get the rig back to the right height before hitching up.

Then he numbered each hash mark. He keeps a pad and pen in the hatch near the landing legs button. When unhitching, once he’s raised the trailer to where he can drive the truck out from under it, he jots down the hash mark number that is visible on the leg. Then he drives out, parks, and returns to the trailer and raises or lowers the landing legs as necessary to get the trailer level.

When he hitches up again to leave, he adjusts the trailer height to the exact position where he unhitched. That way, when he gets in the truck to hitch up, he knows the trailer will be at the correct height as he backs the truck up into the hitch pin (and he doesn’t have to get in and out of the truck several times to check and adjust the height of the trailer).

We marked our landing legs at 1.5″ intervals and have not numbered them. There are only 6 hash marks, and I make a mental note of what mark we were at when we unhitched. Frequently, by the time we leave, I’ve forgotten where we were at before we leveled the trailer, but I’ve developed a good eye for knowing how much to raise or lower the rig as Mark backs the truck towards the trailer.

We also marked the centerline of the fifth wheel pin box and pin plate so it is easy for Mark to line up the hitch with the pin box and king pin when he is backing the truck into the trailer.

Leveling the Trailer

There are many methods for getting a trailer level, and hydraulic leveling is a blessing that takes all the excitement out of it. For those without hydraulic leveling, we found in our early years that with two 5′ lengths of 2″x8″ board and one 5′ length of 1″x8″ board we could always find a combination that worked to get the trailer level from side to side. A 5′ board is relatively easy to drive onto and provides a solid platform for the trailer’s wheels.

We store the boards in the bed of the pickup. When using two boards, we stagger them a few inches so the trailer is driven first onto one level and then up a step to the next. We have to remember to back up when coming off stacked boards or the upper one will tip up and hit the bottom of the trailer while driving off it (think of a sailor walking the plank).

Leveling boards fifth wheel RV trailer

This was an extremely unlevel spot where we used quite a few boards and strips of horse stall mat.

If you don’t like the idea of hauling long boards around in your truck, there are nifty plastic leveling board kits (here’s another type) that are very popular.

We also use plastic wheel chocks whenever we park on a steep incline to prevent the trailer from rolling, especially while unhitching and hitching up.

Our friend Ken introduced us to using a sliced up horse stall mat rather than pine boards. We cut a 4’x6′ sheet of horse stall mat into five 1×5 strips and four 1×1 squares, and those have worked really well for us. They hold up to the elements really well and they roll along with the contour of whatever crazy surface we might park on. It is also possible to drive off of them either forwards or backwards because they don’t slap the underside of the trailer.

The only disadvantage is that they are much heavier than pine boards, but we can drag them around and they don’t disintegrate. We use the 1’x1′ squares under the landing legs and scissor jacks for cushioning.

We also have four large blocks made of three 1′ lengths of 2″x8″ boards screwed together. We put handles on the ends to make them easy to lug around. In a really unlevel site in the Smoky Mountains we had to stack them on top of each other AND extend the jack legs all the way!

RV fifth wheel landing legs

A very unlevel spot that required two blocks plus all the leg length.

What Is Level and How Do You Know?

Determining what constitutes “level” inside an imperfectly constructed RV is an interesting trick. We used a carpenter’s level on our kitchen floor, in several directions, and on our table, and on the bedroom floor. Of course, none agreed! But we found a good compromise and then mounted some RV levels on the outside of the rig to give us a reasonable guess when we’re setting up.

There are two different types of levels: Bubble Levels that have an air bubble that floats to the high side, and Ball Levels that have a ball that drops to the low side. Bubble levels are more responsive (the bubble moves more quickly as the RV moves). Ball levels take a few seconds to react. If you use both types, you can get confused because they move in opposite directions.

We have a large Level Master level on the fifth wheel pin box that is easy to see from inside the truck. We also have two small bubble levels on the trailer on the corner by the landing jack power button, one facing forward (for left to right leveling) and one facing sideways (for front to back leveling).

RV Fifth wheel hitch level and center mark

The ball style level (visible from inside the truck) shows which side of the rig is low.
We painted a line on the pin box to help with hitching up.

Our pin box mounted Level Master, a ball level, is easy to see from inside the truck. When the trailer is higher on one side than the other, the Level Master ball falls to the low side.

Our smaller levels on the front corner of the fifth wheel are bubble levels, so the one on the front of the rig showing the side-to-side level has a bubble that rises to the high side. This is the opposite of the ball level on the pin box, and sometimes, when we are struggling with white line fever from hours on the road, this messes us up.

RV bubble levels on a fifth wheel trailer

Small bubble levels show left/right and front/rear level near the landing jack power button on our fifth wheel.

I’d recommend sticking to either ball levels or bubble levels and not mixing and matching like we did! A good solution might be to mount a ball level like this on both the pin box and on the front of the trailer near the landing jack power button.

Why do you need two side-to-side levels? When I’m running around placing the boards in line with the wheels for Mark to drive onto, I want to see a level on the fiver easily myself, and the front of the pin box is impossible to see from the side of the truck when we’re hitched up.

However, lots of folks rely on a single pin box mounted level that has both side-to-side and forward-back levels in it. There are a few from Camco and Hopkins that are very popular.

You can forego all this nonsense with a slick hydraulic leveling system. However, this does introduce a complicated and expensive system into your life, and we’ve heard many stories of the jacks falling down while driving, or not retracting properly and systems failing in other ways. On the plus side, though, you can easily jack up the trailer to change a flat!

 

Cordless Drill for Easy Jack Setup

We don’t have electric stabilizer jacks on our fifth wheel trailer (nor did we on our travel trailer). However, we use an 18 volt cordless drill, and it’s very easy.

Cordless drill set up for RV stabilizer jacks

Ready for action with the drill, extension and socket for the stabilizer jacks

We use the following setup to crank the scissor jacks:

We keep the 1/4″ Hex to 3/8″ Socket Adapter in the drill. Mark glued the extension and 3/4″ socket together with JB Weld, making it ultra easy to grab the extension, jam it in the drill and go.

18 volt cordless drill, 8" extension and socket for RV scissor jacks

18 volt cordless drill, extension, socket and adapters for RV scissor stabilizer jacks

This setup worked on both the four stab-jacks on our travel trailer and the two rear scissor jacks on our fifth wheel. We keep the drill right inside a basement hatch door so it’s easy to find during both setup and breakdown of the trailer.

RV stabilizer jacks with cordless drill

Raising and lowering the jacks takes 2 seconds!

Rigid Drill Set Radio

This goofy radio is in the Rigid Drill Kit (along with an impact driver & regular drill & lithium ion batteries and charger). We love it even more than the other stuff!

Camco makes a special Leveling Scissors Jack Socket that replaces those three pieces, but there is no 8″ extension. Personally, I like the long extension because you don’t have to crawl in so far to make contact with the scissor jacks.

Last year we bought a Rigid drill kit which includes a regular 18 volt drill, an impact driver (awesome for the lug nuts when changing a tire) and a radio as well as two rechargeable lithium-ion batteries and a charger.

After going through three different 18 volt drills during our years of RVing and sailing, we’ve been really impressed with this Rigid kit. The Lithium-Ion battery charges up in about 15-20 minutes and it’s good for a really long time.

The kit comes with two batteries, so we use one for the drill and one for the radio. And what a hoot it is to have a portable radio. In this day and age of slick electronics, we’ve gotten such a kick out of this thing…

 

Cleaning the RV

No matter where we park, the slide roofs need attention before we bring them in. Either they are dusty, in the desert, or they are covered with twigs and leaves, in the woods, or they are wet from rain. Slide toppers might help with this, although I have heard that they tend to make noise in high winds, sag over time, and sometimes end up with leaves and twigs trapped underneath.

Mark has a long handled squeegee he uses to get the water off, a broom for the leaves and branches, and a California Duster and/or broom for the dust. Getting up on the roof is also useful for checking out all the rooftop items like hatches, TV antenna, solar panels and wiring. His favorite cleaning tool for all this is a telescoping scrub brush that we used for cleaning our boat.

Scrub brush on RV roof

Our telescoping brush from our boat is a favorite for cleaning the rig.

He just loves this soft bristled brush. Murphy’s Oil Soap mixed with water is a good solution to wash the roof. To get rid of black scuff marks on the outside of the rig, he uses Mr. Clean Magic Eraser sponges.

Telescoping Ladder

Telescoping ladder on an RV

A second ladder is really helpful!

Telescoping ladder

.

The first trailer we lived in full-time didn’t have a walk-on roof, and the signature of an RV without a walk-on roof is that it doesn’t have a built-in ladder.

We got a telescoping ladder so we could get up on the roof, and we have kept that ladder and used it ever since, even though our fifth wheel has a built-in ladder.

You may not think you need a second ladder when you’ve got one on the rig already, but polishing the front cap is one job where you do.

Washing or working on any part of the rig that is high up and out of reach of the ladder on the back is much easier with a second ladder, including the high corner of the rear end opposite the built-in ladder!

 

RV Patio Mats

A beautiful patio mat extends your living space and defines your outdoor area in an elegant way, and we love ours.

RV Patio mat defines outdoor space while camping

A classy patio mat extends your living space into the outdoors.

But they can be pricey if you’re just getting started with weekend RVing. An alternative is to get some green indoor/outdoor carpeting. We had this with our popup tent trailer, and it fit the bill perfectly (and our friends who now own our popup still use it!).

Popup tent trailer indoor-outdoor carpet patio mat

Save a few bucks and use green indoor/outdoor carpeting!

Waxing the Fifth Wheel Cap

Unfortunately, there’s no quick fix for getting the fifth wheel cap to have a deep shine. It’s made of ABS plastic and shows every swirl mark of a first-pass at waxing. The only way to bring back the luster it had when it was new is to use an orbital buffer and fiberglass polish and a whole lot of elbow grease.

Polished front cap on RV fifth wheel trailer

An orbital buffer and 3M Marine Cleaner Wax give the front cap a nice shine
but leave Mark’s shirt speckled with white spots!

Mark likes the 3M Marine Cleaner & Wax that we used on our sailboat. Unfortunately, you’ve gotta do this a bunch of times, and the worse condition the front cap is in, the more times it takes. But eventually you can get the shine back. Just be sure you keep the buffer moving lightly across the surface at all times so you don’t dig a hole in the plastic!

We have more cleaning tips for giving an RV that extra shine while boondocking here: Tips for Washing an RV While Boondocking

 

Truck Overloads

Timbren SES Suspension System for truck

Timbren SES Suspension

Our 14,000 lb. fifth wheel was right at the weight limit of what our 2007 Dodge 3500 could tow, and the pin weight of the trailer along with all the things we carry in our truck loaded down the bed of that truck quite a bit.

When hitched up, although the rig looked quite level, the truck sagged a bit, leaving the front wheels a little light and giving the truck a tendency to wander.

To alleviate this, we installed a Timbren Suspension Enhancement System between the axles and leaf springs of the truck. These are solid rubber donuts (not airbags) that fit between the axle and the leaf springs. That made the truck sit better and wander less.

We had that setup for eight years. In 2016 we purchased a 2016 Dodge Ram 3500 dually truck which had a much higher weight capacity in the truck bed and could handle the pin weight of the trailer along with the additional weight of the water jugs and leveling boards we carry in the bed of the truck much better.

How to Put Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF) in a Truck

Our 2016 Dodge Ram 3500 has a five gallon Diesel Exhaust Fluid tank which needs to be refilled every thousand miles or so. We’ve got some tips for where to get this stuff cheap and how to get it in the truck without spilling here:

How to Put Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF) in a Truck and Which Brand is Cheapest

How to put Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF) in a truck without spilling

Putting DEF in a diesel truck is a new necessary evil, but there are tricks to make it cheap and easy…

RV Grill Operating on the RV’s Propane Tanks

Mark loves to barbecue, and ever since our first popup trailer, we’ve had a wonderful, small RV barbecue, the “RV sidekick grill.” It comes with a mounting kit to hang it on the side of an RV. Flipped sideways, this same kit becomes legs so the grill can stand up off the ground.

RV grill attached to fifth wheel trailer

The RV sidekick grill is designed to hang on the side of an RV or stand on its own.

We had this grill installed on the side of both our popup tent trailer and travel trailer, but with the fifth wheel, Mark installed an extra gas line and valve coming from the RV’s propane tanks so it can run from them. A quick disconnect LP gas hose goes from the grill to this gas line.

RV grill gas pipe connection

An extra gas line and valve lets the grill runs from the trailer’s propane tanks.

We’ve had this little grill since 2005 and it still makes a great meal!

 

RV Water Toys – Water Spigot Connections

In many dry camping campgrounds where there are water spigots available but no water hookups at the campsites, the water spigots don’t have threads. We’ve found a water bandit makes it possible to thread our water hose onto the spigot so we can fill up with water easily.

Water Bandit spigot adapter for RV fresh water at campgrounds

The water bandit makes it possible to connect a fresh water hose when there are no threads on the spigot.

In cases where we get water hookups and leave the water hose connected to the trailer, we screw a 90 degree elbow onto the trailer so the hose can hang straight down rather than come out of the our city water connection horizontally and then droop down towards the ground, putting pressure on the connection and potentially causing drips. We discovered this nifty little elbow when we lived on our boat in a marina before our cruise.

In addition, a water pressure regulator keeps the water pressure down to a level inside the rig that prevents any unexpected damage or leaks. A quick release makes it easy to connect and disconnect the fresh water hose. Mark also keeps a Y valve in his water hose arsenal. This is handy if the rig is connected to city water and we want to fill pails with water for washing the truck, or if an RV dump station has only one water spigot and we want to fill our fresh water tanks and run the black water flush at the same time.

Lots of folks like to attach a water filter as well. We used various filters at first, but no longer use any, although we periodically add a cap full of bleach to the fresh water tank. When we got a new fresh water tank, we were surprised that there was no sludge of any kind inside the old tank, even after 7 years of use.

Changing the Inner Rear Tire on a Dually Truck

We have a Dodge Ram 3500 dually truck with a B&W fifth wheel hitch, and wouldn’t you know it, the first time we had to change a tire on it, it was the inner rear tire. Ugh!

We had always wondered exactly how you went about doing this, and we found out. Here is a blog post that explains the entire process:

How to Change the Inner Rear Tire on a Dually Truck

 

INDOOR RV TIPS and TRICKS

Creating STORAGE SPACE with Seating for Four in the Dinette

We replaced the two chairs in our dining area with two wonderful storage ottoman benches, and this has increased our storage space by quite a bit. The storage ottomans we chose have a nice faux leather padded top that is really comfy to sit on, and they have voluminous storage space inside.

Storage benches in RV dinette

Our dining area – lots of storage and seating for four.

We have his-and-hers benches, and we keep our camera gear in them. The great thing is it got rid of all our clutter and gave us a place that is low down in the trailer and slightly ahead of the trailer’s axles (a smoother ride) where we could make custom padded storage for this delicate gear.

For more info and more pics of our benches, see this blog post about our setup: Making STORAGE SPACE in an RV.

You can buy the storage ottomans we purchased HERE, and you can get ideas of other brands and sizes of storage ottomans on the market HERE.

Protecting the Carpets Under the Slide-Outs

The carpets take a beating as the slide-outs roll in and out. Some slide-outs aren’t quite square and one wall or the other presses particularly hard on the floor while driving. You can buy fancy carpet protectors that fit under the slides. We went a cheaper route and bought a package of four flexible plastic cutting boards.

RV tips - cutting boards under RV slide-out

Flexible cutting boards taped together protect the carpet under the slide-outs.

We used packing tape to tape two of these together, end-to-end, and each pair fits under the slide-out walls perfectly yet are thick enough to protect the carpets. I keep one pair under one slide-out wall while driving, because that slide is crooked and its one wall gets wedged against the floor pretty tightly. The other slide-out walls hover above the carpet as we drive, so I pull the plastic cutting boards out from under them so they don’t get lost underneath while in transit.

Keeping the Cabinets Closed

After having a cabinet door fly open while driving over a bumpy road, causing two unbreakable Corelle bowls to fly across the trailer and break in half, we now latch every cabinet door with 6″ bungee balls. For drawers we use mini 10″ bungee cords with a hook at each end, hooking the top and bottom drawer handles.

RV tips bungee balls and bungee cord on RV cabinet doors and drawers

Bungee balls and bungee cords ensures the cabinets and drawers all stay closed.

Rolled up Carpets

We have a large pots-and-pans drawer that occasionally likes to open. We roll up our throw rugs and place them so they can’t unroll in front of the drawer to keep it closed.

How to keep RV drawer closed in kitchen

Rolled up throw rugs keep this big pots and pans drawer closed while driving.

Rubber Shelf Liners

Rubber Shelf liners are invaluable, keeping everything in its place on each shelf as we travel. We try to make sure no plates, mugs or glasses are touching each other when we set out.

Shelf liner for RV shelves

Shelf liner keeps things in place when we drive

Closet Organization with Plastic Drawers

Our bedroom has a marvelous 8′ wide closet with sliding doors on it, but the interior is just open space with a rod for hangers. We don’t use it as a hanging closet (we have a different closet for that). Instead, we put stacked plastic drawers inside to give us more drawer space as well as a horizontal surface on the top.

RV closet plastic drawer organizer

We created more drawer space in one closet with lightweight, inexpensive plastic drawers.

These drawers don’t latch closed, so Mark drilled a hole through each drawer and the frame, and we simply slip a screw through each hole to keep it closed as we drive.

How to keep RV drawers closed

A screw through each drawer keeps it from opening in transit

Book Organization with Special Bins

We like to keep our heaviest items, like books, on the floor, as shelving in an RV tends to be quite flimsy. I found an awesome line of Rubbermaid “All Access” bins that have a clear plastic latching door on the front. Ours fits neatly under our desk (which we never use as a desk, so it’s wasted space). We can move the whole thing easily, can load it from the top easily and can get at the books from the front easily.

Rubbermaid All Access storage in RV

Rubbermaid’s “All Access” bins have clear front opening doors!

Dish Drying Mat

We do several small loads of dishes everyday, and I just love our little dish drying mat. It soaks up all the water, and once I move the dishes off of it I can hang it up to dry. Every so often I throw it in the laundry with the dish towels, and it comes out just fine.

RV dish drying mat

A dish drying mat sops up water, can be hung out to dry and thrown in the laundry.

How to Defrost an RV Refrigerator in 20 Minutes!

Propane RV refrigerators build up a lot of frost very quickly. After trying many different methods for defrosting our fridge over the years, we’ve outlined the steps we use to get this job done quickly:

How to Defrost an RV Refrigerator in 20 Minutes!

How to defrost an RV refrigerator

Defrosting the fridge doesn’t have to be a big nasty chore…

LED Wax Pillar Candles

I love romantic lighting, and there’s nothing like candles for that. But having an open flame isn’t great. Sailing friends of ours introduced us to pillar shaped LED candles made of real wax, and they are delightful. We’ve had ours for five years now, and we’ve had to change the batteries just once. They are wonderful for dim lighting in the pre-dawn hours or late at night, and they are a nice light around the rig when we watch a movie. The best part is they really look and feel like real candles, but you don’t have the risk that comes with an open flame.

RV tips LED flameless wax pillar candles in RV

LED pillar candles add warmth and create romantic mood lighting

Departure Checklist

RV Departure Checklist

All our mistakes on one page
with the worst ones underlined!

We thought we could memorize all the things that need to be done when we pack up the rig for towing, but a few mishaps taught us otherwise.

We now have a checklist taped inside the same cabinet that houses the main slide-out controls.

A quick glance before we leave ensures us that indeed all the hatches are closed, the shower door is latched, the window-mounted hummingbird feeder is not stuck on a window somewhere, etc.

This list is a comedy of errors made over several years of RVing. I’m sure more items will be added in the future!

 

Simmons Beautyrest Mattress

An RV can be outfitted with ordinary residential furniture, and we have upgraded our recliners to comfy La-Z-Boys.

More important for full-time RVers, there is no need to sleep on some funky RV mattress every night. We upgraded our mattress to a Simmons Beautyrest and just love it.

One important note is that many RV mattresses are non-standard sizes. An “RV Queen” is shorter than a standard Queen, and an “RV King” is narrower than a standard King. Here’s a chart showing the differences:

Standard “RV” Size
Queen 60″ x 80″ 60″ x 74″
King 76″ x 80″ 72″ x 80″
Simmons Beautyrest Plush Pillowtop mattress for RV

A good night’s rest…

In most rigs that have a Queen bed, the floorplan clearly states whether it is an RV Queen or a regular Queen. However, in virtually all RVs that have a king bed, it is an RV king. If you are buying an RV with a king bed and think you might want to upgrade to a residential mattress someday, make sure there are 4″ of extra width on the sides so the mattress can fit, even if it hangs over a little.

 

Laptop Lap Insulator

I mentioned that we don’t use our desk, and that’s because we use our dining room table for writing things out by hand and we use our laptops on our laps in our recliners. To keep from frying our legs with our laptops, we each have a laptop sized thin piece of foam that was part of the packaging of a solar panel. If you don’t have that handy, there are laptop lap insulators that can do the trick.

Laptop on thin foam insulation

A thin piece of foam keeps our legs from cooking under our laptops

Cleaning the Ceiling

We have a fabric ceiling liner and twice we’ve had to clean a stain from it. Each time we used spray bleach and the results were miraculous. You couldn’t see where the stain had been. Just make sure you cover everything nearby before spraying bleach in the air or you’ll have not just a clean ceiling but white spots on the rugs and upholstery too.

 

HEALTH and COMFORT in the RV LIFE

Living in an RV is not all that different than living in a stick-built house, so anything you enjoy in a conventional life is more than likely going to be something you can enjoy in your RV life. Here are some goodies that we use everyday, that have made a significant difference in our lives, and that we will continue to use daily no matter what kind of home we live in:

Amazing Grass

Amazing Grass powdered wheat grass drink

Helps keep fair haired people with thin skin from bleeding!

Mark has found that when he works around the rig, it is really easy for him to get little cuts and blood spots on the backs of his hand his hands. This turns out to be common with fair haired (red haired) formerly freckle-faced guys over 50. After some research, we found that the remedy is bunches of Vitamin K, and it turns out that wheat grass is loaded with Vitamin K! It has lots of other beneficial nutrients as well.

As long as Mark drinks a small dose of wheat grass everyday, his hands are as tough as when he was 20. But miss that wheat grass for a few days, and the next time he does any work around the rig, the slightest flick of his hand against something breaks the skin and he’s bleeding again. The best brand we’ve found is Amazing Grass.

Sound weird or too good to be true? We’ve suggested this crazy remedy to formerly red-haired friends, and they are now big believers and wheat grass connoisseurs too. Mark mixes it with fruit juice and actually loves the flavor! For those who don’t like veggies, the claim is that a spoonful of this wheatgrass powder is akin to a bushel basket of veggies. I don’t believe that myself, and I keep putting broccoli on our plates, but I think this stuff is worth its weight in gold when it comes to toughening up thin skin.

Hand-held Electric Massager

As former athletes, we’ve both spent a lot of time looking for ways to soothe aching muscles. We’ve owned a lot of different hand-held massaging tools over the years, including the very popular massager, and they’ve all been okay. But many of them ultimately wound up in yard sales because they had bad habits of pinching skin or were awkward to use.

 electric massager

electric massager

We’ve found that the hand-held massager is really fantastic. Because it has just one ball head on it (rather than the more common and goofy twin ball heads), you can place it over any sore spot and get instant relief. Rub it slowly on your leg muscles after a hike or bike ride or rub it on that weird spot in your neck after you sleep funny and wake up unable to turn your head, and you’ll feel better right away.

This massager was a lifesaver for me after a bad cycling accident I had years ago that messed up my shoulders and collar bone for a very long time, and Mark recently relied on it heavily when he wrenched his back. We’ve never had it pinch our skin at all.

The neat thing about these massagers is that they increase the blood and fluid flow in the sore area, which is really helpful for getting nutrients into the injured spot and getting waste fluids out. You don’t need to press hard on it — just place it on the sore area and you’ll feel the muscle relax instantly.

We have had ours for four years now, and we used it both on the boat and in our RV. It’s amazing just how kinked up you can get living in a small space, and it is so helpful to be able to get unkinked in a matter of minutes. We keep it in our living room so it’s always handy.

Sonicare Toothbrush

Sonicare toothbrush

Sonicare toothbrush

If only these Sonicare toothbrushes (and toothbrush heads) had been around when we were kids! It may seem ridiculous to spend a bunch of money on an electric toothbrush, but brushing your teeth with one of these makes your mouth feel like you just came from a cleaning at the dentist’s office. I’ve used a Sonicare toothbrush for 13 years now, and what a difference it has made in the overall health of my teeth.

One note for boondockers and off-the-grid RVers living on solar power, Phillips, the manufacturer of Sonicare toothbrushes has noted that the rechargeable batteries do not like modified sine wave inverters very much. I read this years ago, and have always charged ours on our pure sine wave inverter. Perhaps the batteries are better in newer models, I don’t know.

Also, for tech junkies who like to collect tech goodies, the magnet inside the Sonicare toothbrush heads is incredibly strong. Mark has saved a few of the magnets from our discarded Sonicare toothbrush heads and has found all kinds of interesting uses for them, including gluing one onto a long stick to retrieve tiny metal objects from hard to reach spots in the bowels of something.

Other RV Tips & Tricks

We have loads of other tips and tricks for RVers on this website. Many of the links can be found here:

RV Tech Tips and Product Reviews

A small sampling is below:

A wonderful website dedicated to RVing tips and tricks is RVtravel.com

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2008 Hunter 44DS Sailboat

Hunter sailboats are the best kept secret in the boating industry.  Here's a review of our 2008 Hunter 44DS

Groovy - '08 Hunter 44DS

sv Groovy layout

Hunter 44DS Floor Plan

s/v Groovy main salon

Main salon.

SV Groovy nav station

Navigation station.

s/v Groovy galley

Galley.

sv Groovy Master stateroom.

Master stateroom.

This page describes our Hunter 44DS sailboat, including all the equipment we have added for full-time liveaboard cruising in Mexico.

Long settee for napping.

We have a large cockpit, a nice feature on a liveaboard sailbot, and great for sailing too.  SV Groovy cockpit

Spacious cockpit.  We can sit face-to-face with our legs

stretched out, and our feet don't touch.

On a cruising sailboat it is essential to have large uncluttered decks.  s/v Groovy deck.

On deck.

When we sail on overnight passages while cruising Mexico we appreciate our forward looking windows.  sv Groovy forward looking windows.

Sitting inside on the companionway stairs, you can see where you're going, a wonderful feature on a

cold overnight passage.

s/v Groovy - it's just a groovy boat.

It's just a groovy boat.

The twizzle rig is a twin headsail rig that we have flown on our boat during our cruise to Mexico.  SV Groovy - twizzle rig

Twizzle Rig - twin headsails flown on

matching whisker poles.

Sailing down the Pacific Baja coast on our cruise to Mexico we anchored s/v Groovy in Bahía Sant Maria, Mexico

At anchor in Bahía Santa Maria, Mexico.

Hunter Marine sailboats are the best kept secret in the boating industry.

Under sail.

One of the finest anchorages in Pacific Mexico isin Zihuatanejo, Mexico -  s/v Groovy.

At anchor in Zihuatanejo, Mexico.

Three 185 watt solar panels provide

awesome shade over the jump seats

Hunter 44DS Sailboat: s/v Groovy

Groovy has been sold. Pics, listing and Sales Spec Sheet here!!

Groovy (named for Simon & Garfunkel's song Feelin' Groovy)** is a

Glenn Henderson designed 2008 Hunter 44DS (Deck Salon).  A

fractional sloop, it is 44 feet long and 14' 6" feet wide with two

staterooms and two heads.

Hunter 44DS Model History

First introduced by Hunter Marine in 2002 as the Hunter 426, the aft

cabin was changed a little and the model name changed to "44DS" in

2003.  Production ran from 2003 to 2008.  In 2008 the the deck and

cabin were modified to accommodate twin helms instead of a single

helm, the forward berth was changed from a v-berth to a pullman style,

and the window pattern was changed to a wraparound band to match

the popular Hunter 45CC.  These changes saw the model name change

to "45DS," and as of 2012 it is still in production.

Along with the Hunter 426 and 45DS, the 44DS shares its hull with the

Hunter 44AC (Aft Cockpit) and Hunter 45CC (Center Cockpit).  Each of

those boats has the same hull but a different deck and cabin layout.

Groovy is hull #252 for the 44DS model line, where the numbering

started at #101.  Built in May, 2007, it was the last Hunter 44DS ever

built.  Click here for more information on the Hunter 44DS.

Groovy is a stock boat with Hunter's "Mariner Package," a collection of upgrades sold as a unit.  Because the boat was built after

the replacement model (45DS) was in production, it features a few of the components that are standard on that model, including

a laminate cherry interior, which we love, and a larger fuel tank, which has come in very handy.

Specifications

Length Overall (LOA)

43' 4"

Waterline Length (LWL)

39' 2"

Beam

14' 6"

Draft

6' 6"

Displacement

22,936 lbs

Ballast

7,237 lbs

Mast Height

60' 8"

Sail Area

975 sq. ft.

Fuel Capacity

66 gallons

Water Capacity

140 gallons

Holding Tank Capacity

45 gallons

Water Heater Capacity

11 gallons

Yanmar Diesel Engine

54 hp

CE Classification

A/10

We installed many upgrades to enable comfortable cruising where we can stay at anchor for months at a time without having to

rely on marinas for water or electrical connections.

House Batteries

640 Amp Hours (Four AGM 4D 12 volt) - plus one 70 Amp Hour AGM start battery

Charging

555 Watts Solar / 100 Amp Alternator on engine / 130 Amp 110v Charger (via shore power)

Inverters

600 Watts Pure Sine Wave / 2500 Watts Modified Sine Wave / 2 portable Modified Sine Wave

Watermaker

60 Gallon per hour engine-driven Echotech watermaker*

Downwind Sailing

Twin jib "Twizzle Rig" set on two fixed length whisker poles.

Anchors

60 lb Ultra primary with 300' 5/16" G4 chain

32 lb Fortress FX-55 secondary with 20' 5/16" BBB chain and 300' 7/8" Nylon Rode

15 lb Manson Supreme stern anchor w/ 5' 3/8" G4 chain and 230' 1" Nylon Rode

Dinghies

10' Porta-bote with a Suzuki 6 hp outboard

Hobie i14t tandem inflatable kayak

A GAZILLION BOATS FOR SALE... WHICH ONE

WOULD MAKE US HAPPIEST?

When we set about buying a boat, the major trade-offs we found

were age, size, price and manufacturer's prestige.  In an earlier life I

owned two boats back to back that were the exact same model, the

Nonsuch 36.  This is a wonderful boat for cruising and living aboard,

and I lived aboard for four years in Boston, Massachusetts in the

early 1990's (brrrr...those winters were cold).  The first year I was on

a 1984 model that had been ridden hard and put away wet.  After

watching in great distress as my then-husband repeatedly chased

down a spider web of unmarked cables and miles of smelly plumbing

hoses in a putrid bilge, we upgraded to a 1991 model of the same

boat that had been lavishly commissioned and meticulously

maintained.

What a world of difference.  You would never know they were the same

model boat.  Instead of him spending hours kinked up in impossible

positions in noxious nooks and crannies fixing problems and spending

boatloads of money on spare parts at West Marine, we enjoyed three

terrific summers of boating together.  We watched sunsets and sunrises

in pretty anchorages and experienced countless utterly brilliant days of

sailing.  There is nothing like an almost-new boat made up of sparkling

clean parts that work.  Therefore, when Mark and I started thinking about

buying a boat, our first two criteria were that it be in superior condition

and as new as possible.

After living in trailers full-time for so long, we also knew that size

mattered to us.  For full-time liveability, we found bigger is better.

With age and size the top priorities, and a maximum budgeted

price, there were only three manufacturers whose boats we could

afford: Hunter, Beneteau and Catalina.  These are the Ford-Chevy-

Dodge of the sailboat industry (not in any particular order).  All

three are American made.  Beneteaus are French designed but

built in South Carolina.  Hunters and Catalinas are designed and

built in Florida.

Our top priorities for livability included a huge cockpit where we could

stretch out to sleep, a long settee in the main salon where we could

nap, and two good sized staterooms (rather than three as in many

models).  Brokers thought we were crazy when the first thing we did

as we stepped aboard a prospective boat was to lie down in the

cockpit to see if the benches were long and wide enough to sleep on.

But hey, this boat would become our home, and we like to be

comfortable and relax!

Next in importance was a large swim platform and cockpit shower, as

we envisioned frequent swims off the back of the boat and we knew

we would need easy access to the dinghy when we lived at anchor,

especially hauling groceries, daypacks, trash and laundry bags in and

out.  Lastly, we wanted an airy, spacious interior.  Other than that, we

weren't fussy, but after attending dozens of boat shows, visiting fifty

or more boats with brokers, and many Caribbean charters, we found

that the Hunter models spoke to us more than the others, and of

those only the Hunter 41DS and 44DS made the cut.  The faltering

economy worked in our favor, suddenly making the larger of the two

boats a viable option.

A visit to the Hunter factory assured us that not only are their boats

cleverly designed and chock full of innovative features, but they are well

built to boot.  We came away from every contact we had with Hunter

impressed that it is a quality company that employs a loyal group of

happy employees.  Their phenomenal customer service since we

purchased Groovy (15 minute turnaround time on almost every emailed

question we've ever sent) has driven that point home to us time and

again.  Hunter sailboats are the boating industry's best kept secret.

Best of all, Groovy is a dream to sail.  With an easily driven hull,

the boat is light on its feet, easy to reef, responsive and

forgiving.  A delight to live in and fun to sail, it is an excellent

platform for extended cruising.

** When we named our boat, it was the only boat with the name Groovy in the US Coast Guard Documentation database.  So we

were quite surprised when we discovered over a year later that she has a sistership of the same name bearing a non-US flag:

Jimmy Buffet of Margaritaville fame races his Groovy in the Caribbean.  Far out!!

*Echotec's official "rating" is 40 gph, but since we installed high capacity membranes, our timing measurements have never

been less than 58 seconds to fill a one-gallon jug in the tropics (the speed is 44 gph in San Diego's cooler water).

More info in the links below...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The following clip is a VIDEO WALKTHROUGH of our boat which we did before it was sold:

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Our 555 watt solar power system is described in detail here: Sailboat Solar Power System. There is lots more info about solar power solutions for boats and RVs here: Solar Power Articles for Sailboats and RVs.

Our 60 gallon per hour engine driven watermaker was featured in an article we wrote for Cruising World Magazine. The article can be read at this link: Water, Water Everywhere – Installation of a 60 gph engine driven watermaker.

Our cruising itinerary and all of our blog posts from our cruise can be found at this link: A Groovy Cruise of Mexico.

There is a ton of info on this website about planning a Mexico cruise and anticipating what to expect. To get oriented and find out where we keep all the good stuff, visit this link: Cruisers Start Here

.

To help you plan your cruise and get you inspired, we created the video series, "Cruising Mexico Off the Beaten Path - Volumes 1-3," shown below. This is a fun-to-watch and easy-to-digest introduction to Mexico from a cruiser's perspective, giving you lots of valuable information that isn't covered by the cruising guides. Each video is available individually at Amazon, either as a DVD or as a download. For discount package pricing on the whole series, visit our page Cruising Mexico Video Series.

Volume 1 (left) reviews the geography, weather and seasons in Mexico and shows you what the best anchorages between Ensenada and Manzanillo are like.

Volume 2 (middle) gives detailed info that can't be found in any of the guidebooks about the glorious cruising ground between Manzanillo and the Guatemala border.

Volume 3 (right) provides all the info you need to get off the boat for an adventure-filled trip to Oaxaca.

Our Gear Store also has a boatload of ideas for your cruise!