Disaster on the Gulf Coast

RV Community Mobilizing Relief Efforts

Reports of relief efforts by the recreational vehicle community continue to surface in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

Anne Pierson, whose family owns Shiloh Resorts in northern Louisiana, was on the periphery of the storm, but found herself working the front line with regard to offering assistance to RVers who were forced to evacuate their homes.

"Today (Sept. 1 ) was very sad at our park," she said in an e-mail. "We have had half a dozen families leave to go closer to home, but they won't get very far south, as the National Guard is not letting anyone go south of Hammond on I-55.

One couple at our park lost a son who was to begin the fall semester at Tulane University in New Orleans. Others are still consulting blogs and making fruitless attempts on cell phones to reach family members they haven't seen since before the hurricane."

Select this link to read the rest of the article.

Hurricane Relief Effort

Members of the Circle of Trust RV Family organization are coming together to help provide relief to those effected by the hurricane. The Circle of Trust established a "Hurricane Relief Store" where 100% of the proceeds go toward the relief effort.

All Merchant Services, Happy Camper Club, RV Education 101, Chuck Woodbury of RV Travel, Affinity Group, Mountain Moms, Cruising America, Roundabout Publications, and many others have donated time, products, and resources to the effort.

You can help by making a donation or purchasing a product in the "Hurricane Relief Store." Select this link to learn more.

Touring America

Bucktail Scenic Byway

Bucktail Scenic Byway stretches for 100 miles through the Sproul and Elk State Forests in north central Pennsylvania from Lock Haven to Ridgway. It follows the Old Sinnemahoning Trail used by Native Americans to travel between the West Branch Susquehanna and Allegheny Rivers. The byway is named after the Bucktail Rangers, a famous regiment of woodsmen that traveled this route to join the Union during the Civil War.

Seven state parks (Bendigo, Bucktail, Hyner Run, Hyner View, Kettle Creek, Sinnemahoning, and Sizerville) are within reach of this byway with access to hundreds of miles of remote hiking trails and many other outdoor recreational activities. The unspoiled forests, beautiful hills and steep valleys are breathtaking at any time of the year but especially during the fall, when the foliage is alive with blazing colors. Watch for hang gliders as you near Hyner View and elk as you travel northwest of Renovo. Elk viewing sites are nearby at Winslow Hill and Sinnemahoning State Park.

Camping is available in Hyner Run State Park, which offers 30 rustic sites. Kettle Creek has a total of 71 campsites; 50 of which have electrical hookups. Sinnemahoning State Park has a 35-site campground and Sizerville has a 23-site campground. Camping fees range from $10 to $19 per night.

RV Vacation Planner

by Donna Flanders

Donna is retired from computer programming. After 20 years of computer work, she now devotes her analytical, organizational and research skills to developing vacations for others. She is a list maker and she shares her lists with you at RV Vacation Planner.

Snail Mail - One Size Does Not Fit All

Why write an article about snail mail when there is so much written about it already? As with the idea of a "best campground," there is no such thing as the best solution to getting your snail mail. What works for some does not work for all. So if someone tells you "This is how you should get your mail," take pause. One size does not fit all. This article points out several ways that might work. What works on one trip may not work on the next trip since conditions may vary.

First, think about the mail you get. Can you eliminate some of the mail? One of the things I like to do is respond to the "prepaid postage" bulk mail. I cut out my return address and mark it "remove this address from your mailing list." Then I put it in the envelope and mail it for free. I have no idea if this actually works, but I get pleasure from knowing that this bulk mailing business had to pay twice to mail something that I did not want in the first place. Silly? Maybe. But I enjoy that.

Select this link to read the rest of the article.

Fun Stops U.S.A.

AuSable Light Station

The AuSable Light Station within Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore near Grand Marais, Michigan, is listed on the national register of historic places. It was built in 1874 to warn mariners of a dangerous reef off AuSable Point. Now automated, the light station is being restored to its 1910 appearance. Guided tours are only offered in July and August but the grounds are always open. Access is limited by snow from November to April.

Camping is available in three National Park Service campgrounds (Hurricane River, Little Beaver Lake, and Twelvemile Beach) within the national lakeshore.

Road Trip Dreams

by Carol White

Phil and Carol White are the authors of Live Your Road Trip Dream, a book that describes how they turned their dream of traveling into reality -- and how you can do the same.

Southerners Know How to Have Fun

From the quiet splendor of the Gulf Coast, to the grand "floating" Casinos of Biloxi, to the challenge of the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail courses, to the craziness of Mardi Gras, and onward to the regal mansions of Natchez and historic Vicksburg we saw people really enjoying life. From the tiny college town of Oxford MS, to upbeat Graceland and Beale St. in Memphis, and finally to soothing Hot Springs National Park, we found Southerners to have an incomparable easy going outlook on life.

Since we left you last month, we have been on the move. Although we enjoyed the excitement of the well-known beach locales in Florida, we really felt the scenery and fine sand beaches of the Northern Gulf are underrated. We felt so relaxed on nearly deserted, lovely beaches from the panhandle through the Alabama and Mississippi coastlines.

Alabama showed us real variety. The Bellingrath Gardens were well worth the trip - one of the top 5 gardens in the US. After enjoying a nice afternoon there, we headed for more history in Montgomery and Selma. Still seems impossible that a mere 40 years ago, conditions in the South were so deplorable.

Robert Trent Jones, in partnership with the State of Alabama, has built a string of golf resorts throughout the state. We chose the Capitol facility, near Montgomery to sample. Each location has at least two regulation courses, and often a third or executive course too. We played "The Legislator" - a tough track, but we enjoyed the outing through trees and bayous with beautiful hanging moss.

Select this link to read the rest of the article.

RV Dump Stations

Hundreds of changes have been made to the RV Dump Stations web site in the past several months. If you've not been to it lately, be sure to check it out. Here are some recent additions:

Discovering Your Public Lands

White Mountain National Forest

White Mountain National Forest was established in 1911 and encompasses nearly 800,000 acres in New Hampshire and western Maine. Visitors come to the national forest for wildlife watching, hiking, fishing, camping, and photographing autumn's display of color.

There are about 20 campgrounds scattered throughout the national forest, ranging in size from seven to 176 campsites. Camping fees range from $16 to $18 per night. Facilities vary from primitive to developed. Several can accommodate RVs but none have sites with hookups or a dump station. An Adobe PDF file is available for downloading that provides basic information about each campground within White Mountain National Forest.

RV Tech Tip

by Mark Polk

RV Tires 101

Today we're going to discuss one of the most important components of your RV and probably the most neglected, your RV tires. We all tend to take tires for granted. You know what I mean, when was the last time you checked the inflation pressure in your tires? Especially the inner duals if you have a motor home. Better yet, when was the last time you had your RV weighed? Overweight RVs and under inflated tires are both unsafe, send operating and repair costs sky high and can cause unexpected downtime. Much of the reason for neglecting our tires is because we don't really understand what is required to properly maintain them.

Did you know that nearly a quarter of the RVs weighed by the Recreation Vehicle Safety Education Foundation had loads that exceeded the capacity of the tires on the RVs? On average, these RVs were overloaded by over 900 pounds based on manufacturer specifications. In a separate survey conducted by Bridgestone/Firestone, 4 out of 5 RVs had at least one under inflated tire, a third of which were dangerously under inflated and at risk of failure. An under inflated tire can't carry the load of a properly inflated tire and the extra weight causes greater heat build up in the tire, which can lead to tire failure. 40% of all rear tires were overloaded. Improper weight distribution resulted in 28% of all motor homes being out of balance by 400 pounds or more from one axle end to the other.

With multiple slide out rooms, amenities like washers and dryers, holding tank capacities and the ample amount of storage space available on today's RVs it's easy to see why so many RVs are overloaded. We have a tendency to fill every nook and cranny of available space. Another problem is out of balance loads. Properly distributing the load can be difficult to determine when you're loading the RV. The bottom line is overloaded RVs and under inflated tires are extremely dangerous. Our goal today is to keep you from becoming a statistic in relationship to overloaded RVs and under inflated tires.

Select this link to read the rest of the article.

From the Bookstore

National Park Service Camping Guide

This book provides detailed information about camping in America's National Park areas. Includes descriptions for more than 400 campgrounds in over 100 areas.

Rest Areas & Welcome Centers

Quickly and easily locate rest areas, welcome centers, and much more along America's Interstate highways. Also find the location of discount stores and travel centers that often allow RVers to park overnight for free.

RV Camping in State Parks

In this new directory, you'll learn about state parks that have camping facilities suitable for RVers. Over 1,500 state parks and recreation areas in 49 states are included.

Scenic Driving Alaska and the Yukon

Pack up the car and enjoy thirty-one drives through some of the most spectacular scenery in the North Country.

To learn more about these titles and many others, visit our online bookstore.

Exploring State Parks

Rock Creek Station State Recreation Area

Rock Creek Station is a 40-acre campground adjacent to Rock Creek Station State Historical Park in south-central Nebraska. The campground has 25 sites with electrical hookups for $14 per night. There's also ten sites without hookups that cost $9 per night. Visitors will find modern restrooms, showers, and a dump station.

The nearby state historical park's Visitor Center overlooks some 350 acres of prairie hilltops, timber-studded creek bottoms, and rugged ravines and draws. Deep ruts, carved by the many wagons that traveled the Oregon Trail, are plainly visible. The Pony Express Station and Wild Bill Hickok are also part of the park's history and are displayed at the Visitor Center.

Information about all of Nebraska's state parks is available at the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission web site.

Gadgets & Gizmos

Propane Campfire

There is nothing like a real wood fire, but there are many times when a nice smokeless fire would be just the ticket. If you visit campgrounds that do not allow wood burning fires, just want a fire for a short time, or hate to bother with firewood, then you might want to look at the Outdoor Campfire from RV Upgrades.

Legends of America

by Kathy Weiser

Kathy is a personal friend and webmaster of the Legends of America web site. Her site focuses on the history-rich travel destinations of the American West.

Harvey House Hotels & Restaurants

Though the famous Harvey House lunch rooms, restaurants and hotels pre-dated Route 66 there were many decades where the two happily co-existed. But, change is inevitable and ironically, Route 66, was in part, responsible for the death of this famous chain. As the roads got better and automobiles more affordable, passenger service on the many trains across America began a gradual decline. Overland trucking was also on the rise, reducing the amount of cargo shipped along the rails. Years later it would be upgraded transportation that would once again spell a death knell for Route 66, when even faster cars began to speed across the interstates.

Many of the old towns that sprouted up because of the railroad and later survived primarily because of the many travelers of Route 66, died when they were bypassed by the Interstate highways.

Fred Harvey was just 15 years old when he emigrated to the United States from Liverpool, England. He first worked as a dishwasher in New York for just $2 per day. Saving his money he soon moved on to New Orleans where he worked again in the restaurant business learning the trade from the ground up.

In 1853, he moved on once again, this time to St. Louis, Missouri. Six years later, he and a partner opened a restaurant in St. Louis. Alas, it was just the day before the Civil War broke out. His partner soon joined the Confederacy and, with no patrons coming through the door, Harvey was broke.

Select this link to read the rest of the story.

Bumper Sticker Wisdom

• I'm not really a driver, I just play one on TV
• Not all who wander are lost
• Earth is the insane asylum for the universe

Camping in City and County Parks

Sanborn County Park

Located two miles west of Saratoga, California, this 3,600-acre county park is nestled in the Santa Cruz Mountains. To reach the park from town, follow CA 9 west for two miles to Sanborn Rd and then south one mile to the park. The campground here has 15 sites with water and electricity for $25 per night. The maximum RV length that a campsite can accommodate is 31 feet.

Roundabout Roundup

The Joy of Hitching

Hitching up. Those two words can convey the anticipation of an adventure on the road, a day on the lake or on horseback, or maybe a long-awaited camping getaway.

Of course, "hitching up" also refers to the actual process of combining vehicle and trailer into a single rig. Dropping the coupler onto the ball, plugging in the lights and securing the safety chains – these are fairly pleasant activities, especially when done while whistling a cheery tune and thinking of the fun soon to be had.

Unfortunately, the whistling often stops long before the rig is pronounced a happy couple. This is largely due to the one formidable, but inevitable, task that precedes the actual coupling: getting the ball located directly beneath the coupler. Read More...

RV Unfriendly

This web site is dedicated to finding and sharing information about any place that has RV parking or other restrictions.

Campground Reviews

For more than 250 campground reviews submitted by RVers like you, visit RV Buddy. You can contribute to the site by sharing your own camping experiences with other RVers.

Happy Vagabonds

This web site is dedicated to enhancing your RV lifestyle whether you are a dedicated boondocker looking mostly for free campground sites, prefer to park your fifth-wheel, travel trailer, or motorhome in full-service parks, or your RV travel is just a short trip.