so i'm waiting outside the office of this rv park to see if we really have a reservation
i am never doing this again
just over this wall is an rv park that shall not be named and inside the office of that rv
park is a guy named rick and rick and i just had a very illuminating conversation about our
reservation finding and keeping a reservation in an rv park this summer has become a blood sport
and it's gotten me thinking what's going on why are these parks over booking why is it so
hard to keep your reservation so i did a bunch of research i'm going to tell you what i found
out and how we're going to respond to it now let me run back and get inside my rig before they try
to run me off this property again that's better you know albert einstein said that adversity
introduces a man to himself and in that spirit i'd like to thank this janky rv park for reminding me
why it is that i prefer to boondock now no disrespect to all the park dwellers out there you
know i'm all for whatever type of camping suits each of us for me that is to camp in serenity in
beautiful natural places without a neighbor and a timeline and a hookup you might be wondering
how we ended up in this rv park well we didn't mean to but our plan was to drive about seven
hours to head up north stay in a rest area then drive another hour to meet our friend
but along the way we had some electrical issues we stopped to get lunch and realized that we had
no lights on our fifth wheel even though we were plugged into the truck we had to pull over and
disassemble a bunch of stuff and figure out where the problem was which we did but it took hours we
knew we were never going to make it as far as we wanted so we jumped online from the car and found
an rv park just a couple of hours up the road that said that it had a bunch of spots and they were
all pull throughs there were six to choose from that were available so we booked it and headed
that way our first hiccup came when we stopped for gas and called the rv park to tell them we might
get there a little bit after hours and we wanted to make sure it was okay to just drive into the
spot that was confirmed on our reservation there was some confusion about our reservation and our
site number and when i questioned it the guy on the phone just kept saying don't worry about it
my boyfriend called just a little bit ago to tell you guys that we were running late they said that
we were inside 16 in case we got there well your reservation tells me that i'm inside site 28
my reservation email yeah you did did you do it online yeah yeah well it's you're in 16.
don't worry about what that says yeah don't worry about it you do have a package here
um i you know he told me that i don't know that i do i didn't order anything maybe you got something
from someone else i don't think it's for you after all what's your last name no you're right this
isn't for you so anyway i was like well that's weird maybe i'm sleep shopping again i don't know
i don't know what do you know what it's from where um no i didn't order it i didn't order
anything i don't know why she thought it was you it has another nail in here so
in any case not to worry right thank you so much okay appreciate it we'll see you tomorrow then
unless you you know bye okay bye-bye so we didn't we didn't worry about it we found this great
picture online of the park and these big spots we were really excited to get there and take a shower
of course when we got there it didn't look like the pictures they never do that's okay we know
that the park operators are trying to cram as many spaces as they can onto the property to make as
much money as they can perfectly okay but let me tell you this site was really tight see right here
behind me that's a tree and that tree is about an inch from our window when we pulled in here
we actually had to choose between putting out our staircase and putting out our slide so we finally
figured out that we could put the staircase down between the bolted down table and the tree and
that if we maneuvered a little bit we had to back in and back out we could open up our slide with
this much room to spare it's tight and of course later that first night we had an earthquake it
was 4.9 and we were shaking back and forth it was doug's first earthquake so that was kind of fun
but the first thing i thought of was oh please god don't let that tree shatter our window while
we were here watching rigs squeeze down these tiny lanes where everybody was holding their
breath hoping that they didn't get sideswiped and looking around we saw that there were no spots
i remembered that that online booking system said that there were six spots available here
there were not six spots here there was maybe one spot here and i remembered that the last
park we stayed in had the exact same reservation system exact same pictures exact same format and
they also said there were six spots even though there were no spots and i found that curious i'll
tell you what happened to us in just a minute but first let me tell you what i found when i
dug in and did a little research first i'm sure everybody out there knows that rv sales
are booming if you search the headlines right now you'll see things like this is the year of the rv
2021 the year of camping sales at an all-time high but if you dig into review sites like these that
i found on tripadvisor you're going to find quite a few that say things like overbooked
kicked out and cramped now i thought that only hotels and airlines overbooked but not rv parks
not true anymore during covid rving and staying at campgrounds and parks became really popular and
people of all kinds were booking out these spots way in advance and a lot of them are canceling
last minute to hedge for this some of these parks are overbooking and others maybe like
the one that we're in are just ill-prepared for this boom or just exhausted because they've been
too busy if you go to an rv park that you find and you say reserve now and it takes you to a
reservation system it might be software that they purchased that is just integrated into their site
so it looks like their booking system the problem with this is that that software is only as good
as the information that the park staff is putting in so like in this park there were no actual
pictures of the sites and it said there were six available and we looked again it always says there
are six available that's probably because the staff is not going in and updating the software
with the reservations they really have so if they have a walk-in or they have someone that
calls on the phone to make a reservation one of the people that are already here extend
if they don't share that information with the online reservation system double bookings just
naturally occur and why has this gotten worse in 2021 why are there hardly any spaces to book for
rvs it's because this year there are more rvs than there are spots to put them in they're 20 more rvs
but less than one percent more rv spots and of all those new rvers most of them want to stay in an
rv park rvtravel.com just did a poll and only 28 of their members said that they could camp
in their rv without a hookup this year it's kind of become a recipe for disaster
and we don't really want to participate in it especially after the plot thickened in this
park okay here's what happened we were planning to leave the park but saw on the weather report that
there were going to be winds on 395 with gusts about 50 55 miles an hour the morning that we
were leaving well after what we just experienced on 395 between lone pine and bishop we decided
that we didn't want to risk it so doug went into the office here to see if we could extend our stay
the not so pleasant lady in the office told doug that there were no spots at all we couldn't stay
and we couldn't move and that we just had to vacate our spot in the morning later on though
another employee told us that there was a spot so about 10 o'clock that night we looked online
and sure enough it said there were six spots so we booked the spot again of course we were nervous
we knew by this time that that wasn't an accurate number and that if we didn't follow through we
wouldn't get a refund because they require us to tell them that we're not going to be here with
72 hour notice but they're not required to tell us with 72 hours notice if they're overbooked
we would have had to leave by four or five in the morning to avoid the wins but the
office didn't open until eight so we called the casino that's attached to this park and
they said yeah no problem if you were able to reserve online of course there's a spot
so we decided to wait till the next morning and just make sure we had a reservation
at the office it was a beautiful morning the birds were singing the sun was out
and i was walking around the park and i decided to go sit in one of the many chairs on this giant
porch outside of the rv park office and wait for them to open about 7 45 one of the employees
threw up in the front door and asked me what i wanted he actually yelled at me
for sitting on the porch and really i thought i was being punked i couldn't believe it i realized
the guy must live in the back of the office and so i said oh i'm sorry do you live here i didn't know
i didn't mean to be rude he said i never get any time off it's 24 7 and all i do is work work work
and everybody needs a break and i said of course we can wait till after the office opens no big
deal but he asked me to come inside and we looked at my reservation long story short he told me
the same thing that that other lady told doug that there were no spots that there might be
a spot they couldn't move us they could move us he was all over the board and again he said that
the reservation system that we used online was not the system he used in fact he turned his computer
around to me and said do you see a spot i don't see any spots here and i said look i don't see
your system when i go to reserve something online i thought maybe this reservation was legit and
we could stay in the same spot and lo and behold all of a sudden it opened up and we were able to
stay in the same spot even though five minutes before he told me there was nothing available
no big deal we just decided to take the win and brush our shoulders off and go back to doing what
we do and love best and that is boondocking we're out of here sayonara rick bye rick
we're home yes no more rv parks no neighbors no more reservations
and how much was it doug that's right totally free to stay in this spot
we've almost got this spot all to ourselves it's beautiful it's quiet it has a scream and sell
signal it's less than a mile away from free water and trash in a really rad town now next sunday is
our final view queue of the year because after that we're starting a brand new travel series
where we're going to show you how we avoid the rv parks by camping in beautiful mostly free
spots just like this if you haven't subscribed already please do and ring the little bell for
notifications because we're going to bring you along with us and show you how we camp and how we
find places like this nuts to bolts until then we hope you're all doing well and staying happy and
healthy out there we'll see you next sunday until then everybody have happy travels and be free