Hunting and Fishing News Blog Articles

“Conventional” has never been part of this RV traveler’s vernacular. After selling all her personal belongings and hitting the road in a 1978 Dodge Commander, Jessy Mueller set off on a solo RV journey that doesn’t seem to be losing any steam. Since 2017, her approach to deliberate living has slowly taken her around the country, living in the moment while sharing the joy, humor, and unfiltered moments of nomadic life along the way on her blog and on Instagram.

Before her great escape, Jessy was a 30-something single from Minnesota who was looking for a change. After 14 years working pizza delivery and later in marketing and branding, she began saving money for her future rolling digs. Following a solo vacation to Colorado, she came home inspired to make her daily life more centered around nature, travel, and living with less. For her, RV life was the answer.

Renovation Rejuvenation

Without experience in renovations or even RV travel, she scoured Craigslist until coming across her vintage Dodge Commander motorhome. With extensive water damage in the back, she spent over a year rebuilding the walls and ceiling, while also remodeling the rest of the RV. With intentions of mostly boondocking, she installed solar panels and ditched the original toilet for a compost toilet. For many, this kind of a project would seem overwhelming, but Jessy doesn’t shy away from challenges.

Subscribe to the Camping World YouTube channel for the latest RV service and maintenance tutorials.

Camping World’s RV product specialist Ian Baker and Camping World Service Technician Sean Harless provide helpful tips on maintaining your RV, including DIY maintenance tasks and frequently asked RV maintenance questions.

Guides to Maintaining Your RV

Make sure you download Camping World’s RV ownership and maintenance booklet to track your RV’s seasonal maintenance needs. Then you’re ready to learn more about the ins and outs of maintaining your RV.

For any task on this RV maintenance checklist, you can always schedule service at your local Camping World.

Washing Your RV

Recommended Frequency: After each trip

Locals in the Upper South welcome spring with fun-filled events that dazzle even the most jaded travelers. Go where the air is filled with the scent of blossoming flowers, succulent barbecue and the sound Southern-fried rock. RV travelers can experience Southern spring with great hospitality to boot.

The following are just a few of the big events unfolding in the Upper South during spring.

Arkansas Roots Festival, April 1, Johnny Cash Boyhood Home, Dyes. Ready to Walk the Line? Celebrate the Man in Black as top musical acts showcase their talents a the small town of Dyes.

Good Sam Campgrounds in the Dyes area:

RV water systems supply potable water to various fixtures – kitchen and bathroom sinks, toilets, indoor and outdoor showers, etc. In this article, we’ll focus on the design and function of your RV’s water distribution system and provide tips for using and maintaining it properly. 

How Do RV Water Systems Work?

Most RV water systems can operate as self-contained systems – meaning you draw from a tank of potable water on board. This tank is usually called your freshwater holding tank. This must be sanitized regularly to ensure safe water for drinking, dishes, and more. 

Potable: (adj.) safe to drink

Your RV water system pumps water throughout your coach using a water pump – a device that pressurizes the plumbing lines to drive water from the freshwater tank out through your faucets, fixtures, and hot water heater. The water heater must be turned on to heat water, which the pump distributes to hot water lines. 

Your RV water system also heats and distributes water to fixtures when connected to a city water source. A check valve in your water pump prevents your fresh water tank from filling when connected to city water. Another check valve at the city water inlet prevents water from flowing backward out of the inlet when the pump is running.

Nathan Fluellen of World Wide Nate is an adventure traveler-turned-TV-host who’s visited 50 countries and six continents while bringing an entertaining and joyful perspective along the way. Now he’s finished an important bucket list goal of visiting all 50 states in the US.

Visiting His 50th State in a Rented RV

To complete Nate’s bucket list item to visit all 50 states, he rented a Class C RV through Good Sam Rentals and made his way through South Dakota to wrap up one incredible experience.

On this trip, Nate experiences the open road, an underground cave, goes ATVing on some trails, visits Mount Rushmore—one of America’s greatest National Memorials—and even takes to the sky in a hot air balloon while explaining the importance of living life without regret and checking off items from your bucket list.

Learn how to plan a bucket list road trip from World Wide Nate

RVing Gateway Arch National Park is easier and more accessible than in more remote national parks. In fact, this park is located in an urban setting, giving visitors unique opportunities to discover the important role St. Louis played in the Westward Expansion of the United States in the 19th century. 

Why Visit Gateway Arch National Park in an RV?

Gateway Arch National Park is located along the banks of the Mississippi River in the heart of St. Louis. Because it’s in the city, parking can be a challenge at any time, regardless of your vehicle’s size. This makes setting up at a nearby RV park a great option, allowing travelers to visit the park using the bus or light rail. 

The park’s main draw lies in its collection of US history – from Thomas Jefferson’s involvement in America’s push westward to the story of the Dred Scott trial, one of the most important court cases ever tried in the early history of the United States. 

There’s also plenty to do in Missouri and Illinois, as this park is located right along the border of those two states. From riverboat cruises to museum tours, this region is brimming with the potential for urban exploration. 

When to Visit Gateway Arch National Park

The park surrounding St. Louis’ 630-foot tall Gateway Arch is open year-round, excluding major holidays. The most popular time to visit runs from just before Memorial Day through Labor Day weekend, when the park’s hours run from 9 am to 8 pm. During the offseason, the park is open from 9 am to 6 pm. 

Packing your RV trip-by-trip is a good habit. You bring only what you need and stay organized. In this way, you ensure food isn’t wasted by creating a meal list with needed ingredients. You plan out your activities to know what supplies and equipment to bring. And you pack appropriate clothing for the expected climate. But what do you bring for unexpected emergencies? An emergency supply kit is what you pack to ensure you have essential supplies for an emergency, and it’s important to include one on every RVing trip.

So as you prep for spring and summer RVing this year, carefully consider the items you should carry if for any reason your trip goes awry. There’s a difference between having sufficient backup supplies and overkill, and building an emergency supply kit is a good way to decide the difference.

So what do you include in your emergency supply kit? Here is your step-by-step approach to building out an emergency supply kit to keep in your RV with just the right amount of gear and supplies to be at-the-ready for the unexpected.

When would I need an emergency supply kit?

Things go wrong: breakdowns, bad weather, acts of God, strandings. In these emergencies, we might end up somewhere unfamiliar with fewer resources than we expected and with fellow travelers and family members relying on us for basic necessities.

Spring in North America officially arrives when the Earth’s angle to the sun appears directly over the equator. This is the equinox and happens on March 20 this year. Also, Around this time, snowbirds heading north start their long treks home.

For lovers of the outdoors, spring engenders feelings of delight as the temperatures slowly increase and trees and plants start budding. The spring thaw slowly sweeps north as each day passes. But even as the weather improves, some potential snags may stand in the way for travelers.

Spring Forward (With Caution)

The spring thaw can present certain challenges to road travelers. Northern-bound snowbirds traditionally encounter much heavier traffic as they make the long trip home. This higher volume of RV traffic fills many of the available campgrounds relatively early as dark falls. RV owners that forge on into the night hoping to gain a couple of extra hours often have trouble getting a campsite.

Additionally, most RV owners are used to arriving at their destination RV park well before sunset. This is probably due to the night falling dark later during most of the summer season. However, for those traveling a long journey, as many snowbirds heading north, keeping such arrival habits may be difficult. This leaves the challenge of backing onto an unfamiliar campsite in the dark. Here, the driver and parking spotter should agree on a communication signal, with a flashlight or similar device, to ensure safe docking.

Tent campers (also called pop-up tent campers and tent trailers) are a nice go-between for those that still love tent camping but want to be off the ground when they sleep. The thing is, all kinds of critters also love pop-up tent campers. 

Because many folding tent campers feature screens and fewer hard materials, they’re easier for pests to invade – and they love chewing through the screens. That said, some of these tips apply to keeping critters out of all types of RVs. 

How to Critter Proof a Pop-Up Tent Camper

Here are a few tips to help you critter proof your pop-up tent camper, whether you’re putting it away for the winter or getting it ready for a trip.

Store Food Properly

Food is the biggest reason critters make their way into your camper. Be it insects, mice, or something larger, the aroma of something delicious will bring them out in droves. 

Keep food sealed in airtight food storage containers or zipping plastic baggies. Because space is limited inside most pop-up campers, consider using a hard-sided camping cooler for sealed food storage. If your campsite has a food locker, use it.

Welcome to the Good Sam camping news spotlight, where we cover some of the month’s notable trends, events, news stories, and information helpful to campers and RVers. This month we’re taking a look at the pricing changes for Starlink customers, an ambitious new trail connecting two national parks, BLM updates to the beloved Alabam Hills, and more.

Starlink adjusts their prices 

In a recent email to Starlink customers, SpaceX revealed that they will be adjusting their prices for residential users based on capacity. 

The message noted that residential users finding themselves in a “limited capacity” area can expect to pay $120 a month ($10 higher than the previous cost), while those in excess areas will actually be paying $20 less at a total of $90 a month. With that, RV customers can expect a $15 increase to $150 a month.

Additionally, they announced that plans with portability (allowing you to move back and forth from a home address) will no longer be available; and you will essentially need two different plans in order to maintain that level of flexibility.

You don’t realize the urgency of having the best RV insurance you can afford until things go sideways. This fact became clear to us on a cold night in Texas, when a mysterious cracking noise woke us up. We stayed there in silence for a few minutes, listening and wondering what it could be. The noise grew louder, almost like the crackling sound of hot flames leaping up from a roaring campfire. “FIRE!” I yelled while jumping out of bed. But when I ran into the living area, there was no orange glow or heat to be found. That’s when I saw the cause. The tempered glass on our dinette window was shattering into a mosaic of tiny pebbles, and falling all over the cushions and table.

RV Insurance Comes Through When You Need It

Most of us accept RV insurance as a necessity. Anything can happen when moving from place to place. But as my husband covered our window with cardboard and I cleaned up the mess, we were flummoxed. Our fifth-wheel had been stationary for a month, sheltered from the effects of potholes, bad drivers, and icy roads. At least we thought it was safe. At breakfast, we remembered seeing a campground worker wrestling with his weed whacker near our gravel site. At one point we thought we heard a rock hit our window, but shrugged it off.

Later, when the claims adjuster visited, he found a tiny hole in the glass. Upon inspection, he surmised that our fiver had been hit by a flying rock. When hot afternoon temperatures gave way to a steep, unexpected hard freeze at night, he deduced that the weakened window lost its integrity and shattered to pieces. We will never really know if that was the real cause. But what we do know is that getting the best RV insurance coverage we could afford is why we had a new window installed in less than 72 hours.

Your Lifestyle, Your RV Insurance

Insurance is something you never want to use. But the peace of mind that RV insurance can provide in a bad situation is priceless. Our shattered window was a minor incident, but now I know that if we ever had a bigger problem, our policy will help us get our life back in order. But just don’t ask me what kind of plan we have, because, after all, my RV is not your RV. I can’t guarantee that the coverage we selected for our RV is the best protection for yours. We all have different RV insurance needs, but we can learn how to shop for RV insurance from each other. Here are some of the things I considered when I was looking around for a policy.

RV owners typically have a lot of questions surrounding RV insurance. It can be an overwhelming topic, and it’s not always clear whether you need it for your type of RV, how you’re covered under a given policy, and what you need to have covered.

Here we’ll break down each of those issues and more. Because the more you understand the options and legality — and price — the more informed your decision-making will be.

Legal requirements exist for having RV insurance, and most states require a minimum form of liability insurance for RVs to travel legally. But there’s more to the issue than legality. Your RV is an investment. And you should have a broad understanding of how to protect your investment with products like roadside assistance, extended warranties, tire protection, or even RV insurance.

And as RV rentals have gained in popularity, owners now have additional questions about RV insurance and what’s covered for those renting their RVs out.

Standing 14,410 feet in height, Mount Rainier is one of the most iconic and imposing sites in the entire Pacific Northwest. The mountain’s snowcapped peak looms large on the horizon, even 70 miles away in the city of Seattle.

The breathtakingly beautiful mountain sits at the center of a vast wilderness expanse that is Mount Rainer National Park, a place where visitors can find glacier-fed waterfalls and lakes, miles of Douglas fir forests, and vibrant flowering meadows.

This wild and untamed place is a vast, spectacular playground for outdoor enthusiasts and nature lovers alike. Adventurous travelers will find the national park holds an undeniable allure that is hard to ignore. The mountain is calling, and you must go.

Why Visit Mount Rainier National Park in Your RV?

Despite its remote and wild nature, Mount Rainier National Park is actually very accessible by RV. Located just an hour outside Seattle, this wilderness setting is perfect for day trips or extended camping excursions.

Inside the park, visitors will find endless opportunities for adventure, including the chance to explore lush rainforests, hike through alpine meadows, and camp in the shadow of the titular mountain—which happens to be an active volcano.

One of the greatest perks to camping in an RV instead of a tent is reliable cooling and heating. It’s much more comfortable to wake up and prep your coffee in a heated recreational vehicle than climbing out of a wet tent to light your camp stove and try to get a fire going. 

Just like residential units, RV heating systems require regular maintenance. But how can you service or repair an RV furnace if you don’t know how it works? To maintain an RV furnace, you’ll need to know how it works.

An RV furnace heats air and then circulates it through your RV using a fan. Most RV furnaces operate on DC power even when your RV is plugged into shore power, allowing them to work at a campground or when camping off-grid.

But there’s much more to it. So let’s dive into everything you need to know about operating, servicing, and troubleshooting RV furnaces.  

How Do RV Heating Systems Work?

There are two main types of RV heating systems: forced air furnaces and hydronic heating systems. 

If you’re looking to go camping for the first time this year, you’re in for a great experience. And you’re certainly not alone, considering camping accounted for about 40% of recreational trips last year. Camping continues to be one of the most affordable and enjoyable ways to unplug and reconnect with the people and things that matter most.

But if this is your first time getting out there, it might be a little daunting knowing where to begin. Do you need to make a reservation, and if so, what’s the best way? What’s the proper etiquette when staying at a campground? What kind of camping gear will you need?

To guarantee a great first experience, here’s a first-time camper’s toolkit to keep in mind.

Before we began full-time RVing, we had a household refrigerator with freezer, and a giant deep freezer in the basement for extra frozen goods. Downsizing to an RV refrigerator and freezer was one of the biggest challenges we faced when exploring the RV lifestyle. 

It required frequent trips to the grocery store since we couldn’t stock up like we used to. Then one day, we got the bright idea to get a cooler to supplement our RV’s refrigerator space.

Is the Camco 350 a Regular Cooler or Electric Cooler?

The first cooler we tried was one of those large models that are advertised to hold ice for days. It worked okay, but obviously, the ice melted. It left us with wet, soggy groceries too many times. Frequently draining and restocking ice in a traditional cooler isn’t ideal for a full-time RVer. 

This led us to explore portable electric coolers. The Camco 350 portable electric cooler is a game changer for RVers needing more fridge or freezer space or even those who hate dealing with ice. 

Once we got this electric cooler, we could stock up on more groceries, keep them longer, and avoid soggy cooler messes. We recommend an electric cooler to fellow campers because we have loved ours so much.

Being able to build a reliable, strong fire at the campground is a must! Whether you’re a veteran camper or you’re just starting your RVing lifestyle, learning how to make the perfect fire in no time is a great way to improve your camping experience. Get these east RV tips for building a great campfire below.

Use the Fire Pit

If you’re staying at a campground, you’ll likely have a firepit as a part of your campsite. This is where you should build your fire every time. It’s designed to be a safe spot that is far enough from your camper to prevent potential problems, and it will already be set up to keep the fire contained safely.
If you are boondocking, you’ll need to either skip the fire for the night or find a safe place that is clear of debris and build a fire ring from stones to keep the fire contained.

Make Sure You Have Tinder

Tinder is the smallest part of your campfire. It’s what you’ll want to put in the base of your firepit. It’s easy to catch fire, but it burns quickly. Some good options for tinder are:

Gather Kindling

Kindling is the next step up from tinder. It’s slightly larger, takes a little longer to catch fire, and burns a bit longer. Having the right amount of kindling helps you to build a strong enough flame to catch the firewood before the flame dies.

Kindling Options:

Your RV’s holding tanks need to be maintained properly for you to enjoy camping to its fullest. Most RVs have three holding tanks for fresh water, gray water, and black water. Only one is responsible for providing safe water for drinking, showering, and washing dishes: your fresh water tank. 

To ensure it does that, it needs to be drained and sanitized regularly.

How Often Should You Sanitize Your RV Fresh Water Tank?

Some manufacturers recommend sanitizing your fresh water tank “after each use,” but this is interpreted in two ways. Most RVers sanitize their fresh water system each year, usually in the spring, when dewinterizing their RV to prep for spring camping.

Others perform this task every time their RV has sat unused for up to 2-4 weeks. Either way, this routine maintenance task guarantees safe water for drinking, showering, dishwashing, and laundry on the road. It doesn’t require special tools; you can do it with bleach or a more environmentally-friendly cleaning solution. 

If you’re reading this before storing your RV for the season and want to know how to winterize it, watch this step-by-step tutorial on RV winterization.

RVing requires more forethought than a typical trip by car because more components are involved, and you have more to plan for, especially in the case of roadside recovery. Factors like RV size, terrain, distance, type of towing vehicle, and type of towable can each make a mechanical problem more difficult to address and more expensive. That’s especially true in the case of towing.

As RVers, we’re used to self-reliance, and RV ownership means we tackle many problems on our own. But when it comes to getting towed, the best way you prepare for a trip is by being informed:

Not only does RVing require more forethought than a typical car trip, but the costs of certain services often come at a heftier price tag, like roadside towing. While the typical towing incident for an automobile averages about $109 total, RV towing by a professional service provider can cost between $135-$150 an hour. And the more complications, the higher the price tag.

Knowing what to expect makes a difference, and if you choose to travel without a roadside service plan, better to know the risk than be surprised by the cost of your particular setup. Here we break down a couple of the factors that could increase the price tag of a roadside breakdown tow.

So you’re looking to go camping, and for good reason considering that 8.3 million people had the same idea last year. Taking in the beauty that our country has to offer and cultivating community on the road are just a few of the many upsides the outdoor lifestyle brings.

But if you’re a first-time camper, knowing where to start can feel a little daunting. Where should you camp? What kind of campground is the best fit for you and your crew? How much should you expect to pay, and what should you expect to bring?

To eliminate any guesswork and to improve your odds of finding a spot you loves, here’s a comprehensive guide to finding the right campground, along with some helpful resources.

Plan your trip

Collect notes and zero in on the right campground. There’s no need to go into your trip blindly, especially when the odds are that there’s been plenty of ink spilled on whatever campground you’re looking into. 

Know what experience you’re looking for

Knowing the type of experience you’re looking for is the key to finding the right campground. Do you want something a little more remote and scenic? Do you want to stay at a park that will keep your kids (mostly) occupied? Something more friendly for dogs?  These preferences will help narrow your search. Rank what’s important to help you create a starting point.