How do you travel? Do you make a beeline for your destination by the quickest possible route, or do you casually meander along until you get there? Do you plan your stops ahead of time so you know where you’ll be every night, or do you worry about where you’ll spend the night when you get tired of driving for the day? Do you go from membership park to membership park, getting the most out of your annual dues?

Are you a planner who gets almost as much enjoyment in anticipation of your journeys, or do you like to be surprised by what you find along the way?

It’s only February, but we are already thinking about our summer travels. With a great big old country out there to explore, it’s hard to decide where to go next.

For several years our summer travels were dictated by our teaching schedule with Life on Wheels. We traveled a lot of miles, but it was always to the same places, and usually along the same routes. While I love teaching, the same old routine had stopped being fun. We’re ready to do something different.

Our Winnebago gives us the ability to travel some routes that we were not comfortable tackling in our bus conversion, and there are a lot of places in the Rocky Mountain west that we’d like to explore. So we may spend some time in Colorado and Wyoming. I’ve never been to Yellowstone and some of the other western National Parks.

Or we may go to the Pacific Northwest. We love the Oregon and Washington coast, and we haven’t been there in a long time. Then again, we really want to go to the big Winnebago Grand National Rally in Forest City, Iowa in July, so that would cut short a trip to the Northwest. Hmmm…. Branson? We haven’t been there in a long time. Our options are open, and our schedule is set in Jello. That’s the way we like it.

Our favorite mode of travel is to have some general idea of where we’re going, but no concrete plans on where or when we’ll be at any given time. We seldom make advance reservations, unless we’re going to be in a high traffic area where it might be hard to get a campsite otherwise.

I do a lot of internet research on areas where we’ll be traveling, and put together a list of places we’d like to see. We also get a lot of tips from our readers, and whenever we cross a state line, we try to stop at the State Welcome Center and pick up tourism brochures to give us more ideas.

When we’re going from Point A to Point B, we don’t stop in RV parks every night. I can’t see paying somebody $20 to $30 or more just for a place to park overnight. That’s why we have a self-contained RV. Between WalMarts, truck stops, city parks that allow free camping, casinos, Elks and Moose lodges, and VFW posts, we can always find a place to stop for the night. A few times we have taken readers up on their offer to park in their driveway for a night or two. If we do stop overnight at an RV park, it is usually a Passport America campground.

Once we arrive at a place where we want to spend a few days, we find a comfortable campground to settle into, and make day trips in a 75 to 100 mile radius to explore the region, in our van.

That’s the method that seems to work for us, but there is no one right way to live the RV lifestyle. It’s all abut what works best for you. So, how do you travel?

Thought For The Day – Everyone seems normal until you get to know them.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

Yesterday I ordered the rally T-shirts. So I can check one more thing off of our To Do list. In the past, we tried having several different colors of rally shirts, but we quickly learned what a can of worms that was. No matter what color we had, somebody wanted the same size in the color that we had just run out of. So we ended up buying way too many shirts, and were stuck with a surplus of them.

Since then, we sell shirts the same way Henry Ford sold his Model T – you can have any color you want, as long as it’s black. Well, actually, as long as it’s red, which is the color for this rally’s shirts. Please send me an e-mail at editor@gypsyjournal.net to reserve your shirts, because they go fast. You can pick your shirts up at the rally and pay for them then. Cost is $15 per shirt for regular sizes, and 2X and larger sizes are $2 more per shirt.

We now have almost 175 RVs registered for the rally, and more coming in every day. Shoppers will be happy to learn that we have 32 vendors so far, and many of them have reserved multiple booth spaces.

While we have had a chilly stay here in Apache Junction, Arizona, I guess I really can’t complain, compared to what folks are putting up with back east. I mean, if you had a choice, which would you rather do, shovel snow, or walk out your RV’s door and pick a fresh grapefruit right off the tree at your site for breakfast? Unfortunately, the cholesterol medication I take isn’t compatible with grapefruit, so all I can do is look at them and drool, but Miss Terry has been enjoying them ever since we got here.

A couple of days ago, I wrote about our commitment to protecting our readers’ privacy and that we never sell or rent our mailing list. We hate junk mail as much as you do. We dropped our Good Sam Club membership after one year, because they insisted on deluging us with junk mail from the day we joined. Solicitations to renew, to buy insurance, to buy campground directories, and on and on. To us, the benefits of the membership did not outweigh the hassles of their junk mail.

A few weeks ago, when we bought our new Winegard automatic rooftop TV dish, I let them talk me into joining Camping World’s Presidents Club for a discount on the dish. When I did, I specifically told them that I did not want to be put on their mailing list or to receive any junk mail. But guess what I got in our last mail forwarding? Yes indeed, a Camping World advertising catalogue! That’s the reason I was not a member of Presidents Club for the past 9 years, and why I won’t be again. What ever happened to respecting the customer’s wishes?

Yesterday we got our annual Thousand Trails renewal, and enclosed was a notice of their privacy policy, which said in part: “We are permitted by law to share all the information we collect…. (1) with companies that perform marketing services on our behalf, and (2) with other financial institutions with whom we have joint marketing arrangements. For example, we may share information with financial service providers with whom we offer products, such as insurance. We may also share all the information we collect, as described above, with other nonaffiliated third parties…. such as insurance companies for whom one or more of our affiliates acts as agents, and non-financial companies, such as firms that offer products and services of interest to our members, such as recreational vehicles and accessories, and products and services related to outdoor camping.”

The privacy policy went on to say that if we did not want them to share our personal information with anyone else, we had to either call or visit the Thousand Trails website to specifically tell them not to, and then “We will implement your request within a reasonable time after we receive it.”

I logged into the website and filled out the form instructing them not to divulge our personal information, but that really ticks me off. Why should I have to tell them to respect my privacy? I guess corporate greed has replaced customer service in every business there is.

Thought For The Day – It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

Overall, the RV lifestyle is pretty safe, in spite of our encounter with the burglar in December. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t have to use common sense and exercise caution. Sometimes bad things do happen to good people. Unfortunately, I have another crime story to report, and frankly, this one scares the hell out of me!

I got a message from a couple whom we met a few years ago at the Western Horizons campground in Casa Grande, Arizona. They said that last week they were in Louisiana, and stopped at a campground near Lafayette for the night. About 3 a.m., the husband got up to go to the bathroom and discovered that someone had slid open the window next to their door, unlocked the deadbolt on their door, and entered the RV while they slept!

They said that all of the overhead cabinets were open, the medicine cabinet in the bathroom was open, and probably most terrifying, the burglar had actually come into the bedroom where they were sleeping, and taken the husband’s pants from the hook where they hung on his side of the bed! They said that a couple of satchels were found outside the RV, and one of their cats had gotten out when the door was left afar, but nothing had been stolen. And this happened in a regular RV park!

Any criminal so desperate that they would come into an occupied RV, and even into the bedroom where the owners were sleeping, scares me a lot more than the thug we caught ripping us off!

Crime isn’t the only thing we have to be aware of. Last weekend, a couple camping at an RV park in Texas were killed by carbon monoxide poisoning from their propane heater. Here is a link to a newspaper story about the tragedy. Folks, be sure your equipment is in good working order, and that your carbon monoxide and smoke detectors are working and have fresh batteries.

We have used a catalytic heater for years, and have never had a problem. But we always make sure were have a couple of windows cracked for ventilation, and we check all of our detectors regularly.

I have had several e-mails from folks who want to know if the Verizon USD 760 air card I upgraded to a couple of weeks ago works any better than the older USB 720 I replaced. Unfortunately, we are still experiencing frequent periods of very slow, and sometimes non-existent, service here in the Mesa/Apache Junction area of Arizona. I think there are just too many snowbirds here overloading the available cell towers. I fear that as more and more people are using cell phones and wireless communication devices, the problems will only get worse in some areas.

Now that we have the new issue of the Gypsy Journal in the printer’s hands, I need to put all of my efforts into the rally, which starts in just a little over three weeks. There are always a lot of last minute details that have to be dealt with, and many of them just can’t be taken care of too far in advance, such as the details for the pizza party, buying supplies, and printing name tags for the rally attendees.

Of course, Bad Nick never slows down. Check out his latest Bad Nick Blog post, We Need A Moat, and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – Every sixty seconds you spend angry, upset or mad, is a full minute of happiness you’ll never get back.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

I got an e-mail the other day from a person who markets a well known product to the RV industry. He was unhappy with the comments I wrote about one of his products that he sent me to evaluate. He called what I had to say a “hatchet job.” While I wouldn’t go that far, I did say that I didn’t feel that his latest offering measured up. I’m sorry, but I don’t write puff pieces. I tell it like I see it, good, bad, or indifferent.

Of course, we also have the people who don’t even send a product to evaluate, they just send us a glowing pre-written review, and then expect us to publish it. I always tell these people that if they have enough confidence in their product to send a sample, I’ll try it, but that only gets them my honest opinion about it. If they just send a press release, I just send them back an advertising rate card.

I also upset an RV dealer who wanted to bring some rigs to the fairgrounds in Yuma to display at our rally. He insisted that these display RVs would be parked where we intend to put our outdoor vendors, so that everybody would have to walk past them, and his salesmen, to go from the indoor to the outdoor vendor area. I told him that wouldn’t work, and that I was not going to do that to our outdoor vendors (or our attendees), but I would let him park the RVs in a convenient and visible area.

The fairgrounds charges us for every RV on the grounds during the rally, in addition to the rental of the facility itself, and I gave him a price per rig that would cover our cost. He was amazed that I would consider asking him to pay. In fact, he expected us to pay him, because he felt that just having his units there would be a feather in our cap. 

A couple of years ago, we had a dealer who wanted to display RVs at our rally in Casa Grande, but he demanded that we supply him with the snail mail addresses, e-mail, and telephone numbers of all rally attendees for his marketing purposes.

Over the years, we have been approached many times by companies wanting to buy our mailing list, and we always tell them no. We never give out our subscribers’ or rally attendees’ personal information. We’re fulltime RVers too, and we don’t like junk mail, spam, or unsolicited telephone calls.

No, I can’t please everybody, but at least I can look at myself in the mirror when I brush my teeth every morning.

It’s time for us to order rally T-shirts, and we’re trying to get an idea of how many we’re going to need. Regular sizes are $15 per shirt, and 2X and larger sizes are $2 more per shirt. We don’t need payment at this time, but if you want a shirt, please e-mail me at editor@gypsyjournal.net and tell me the sizes, and how many you want.

We’ll send the new issue of the paper off to our printer tomorrow, and then we’ll turn our attention to Terry’s dad’s 80^th birthday party until Monday, when we’ll start stuffing envelopes to get them all in the mail. 

Thought For The Day – The engineer knows the glass isn’t half full or half empty: it’s twice as large as it should be for optimum utilization of resources! 

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

There is a phenomenon that takes place this time of year that has mystified me ever since we became fulltime RVers over ten years ago, and that is getting income taxes filed.

No, I understand the process. What confuses me is why people would leave a place like sunny Arizona and return to cold states in the Midwest just to file their taxes. Don’t they know that they have mailboxes in Arizona too?

Yesterday I talked to two different people who are here in Arizona, one in Yuma and another in Tucson, who both said they really wanted to come to our Gypsy Gathering rally next month, but the timing was wrong because they had to go back to Iowa and Minnesota, respectively, to file their income taxes. We have heard people say this ever since we got on the road, and I just don’t understand it.

I guess if you are a snowbird and all of your records are back home, it might make sense, though not as much sense as taking the records with you when you leave for the winter. But I know fulltimers who still go back to wherever they came from to file their taxes. Why? Even the IRS doesn’t have enough clout to make me go where it is snowing!

Besides tires and house batteries, another thing we need to replace on our Winnebago are the slide toppers, which show their age and have several small tears and holes in them.

When Russ Maxwell from Carefree Awnings was visiting the other day, he took a look at them and agreed that they needed replaced, and said he’d have a fellow named Darrell Vliem from a company called Awning Man stop by and give us an estimate. Darrell came by yesterday and did some measuring, and said he would order two new slide toppers, and have them installed before we have to leave for the rally in Yuma.

Yesterday afternoon, Jim and Nancy Tidball stopped in for a visit and to pick up a copy of our RVers Guide To Fairgrounds Camping. We last saw Jim and Nancy last year when we were in Aransas Pass, Texas and they came by so Jim could test paddle the kayak I had for sale. It was nice to see them again, and we had a good visit before they had to run.

Besides all of her regular chores, and proofing the stories as I write them for the new issue of the Gypsy Journal, Miss Terry has been busy helping her mom get things prepared for her dad’s birthday party this weekend. It will be a small family gathering, just Pete’s daughters, grandkids, and their respective spouses, but a lot of time and effort still goes into getting everything arranged.

One final note before I close this blog post. I was told that Mail Call USA, a mail forwarding service in Cleveland, Tennessee has apparently gone out of business without giving their clients any notice. There is a thread about it on the Escapees forum. That can sure create a lot of problems for RVers who depend on their mail service to get their snail mail to them. 

Thought For The Day – Some marriages are made in heaven, but they all have to be maintained on earth.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally