Our family took our first major RV road trip just three months after purchasing our travel trailer. While shopping for, and eventually buying, our RV, we talked about traveling around the country to explore National Parks. But those conversations were whimsical. Daydreams. They started with “wouldn’t it be cool if….”, and “maybe one day we’ll….”
Full credit goes to my husband for that first trip. Our 2020 summer vacation – nearly two years in the making – had to be canceled due to pandemic complications. Without a hitch, Mike looked to the camper as a safe solution to get out west and visit National Parks. In less than two days time, he had what would become the trip of a lifetime planned for us.
“So….where have you camped?” is a common conversation between RVers at every campground we’ve visited. RVers love to share their travel stories, and love to get recommendations for new destinations from other seasoned travelers. When we share our RV tales of traveling from Pennsylvania to South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona, and Utah, we’re often met with the same response: “Ahh, we would love to do that one day.” And I always think to myself: “but, why not today?”
I get it. Planning a big RV trip can seem daunting. When your map app tells you that the National Park you desperately want to visit is more than 24 hours of driving time away from your home, it can be easy to chalk the trip up to an impossibility. But our family isn’t special, and we have done it. And done it successfully, more than once! So, like all big tasks should be approached, here are the seven baby steps we take to planning each of our RV road trips.
Set Your Dates
We’re fortunate to be teachers with long summer breaks for traveling. That said, the longest we’ve been on the road is 23 days – and that trip included seven National Parks, 15 states, and six campground stays of two nights or more. We feel incredibly lucky to have had those 23 days to dedicate to travel, but the trip definitely could have been pared down if needed. That longest trip was also book-ended by big obligations. Snow days pushed our school dismissal later into June, and I needed to get back to teach summer school in July.
We work with the days we have and remain flexible. As our boys get older, our calendar becomes a little more full, and a lot less predictable. We do our best to guesstimate what our available travel dates will be by basing our calendar on prior years’ events and adding a few days as a cushion. If the last baseball game was played the first weekend in June last year, we won’t plan to travel before the second weekend of June this year, etc.
If your dates are a little more flexible than ours, consider traveling on dates that are optimal for your destination. Mike and I have been to Crater Lake National Park three times, and on each visit the Rim Drive was still closed to travel due to snow and the Wizard Island Bout Tour wasn’t open for the season yet. We have also experienced temperatures over 110 degrees Fahrenheit when driving through Arizona’s Painted Desert and Petrified Forest National Park. I’m looking forward to the day that our travels aren’t tied to school years and extracurricular schedules! In the meantime, I’ll just keep crossing my fingers the AC in the camper and truck don’t quit, and daydreaming about that boat tour to Wizard Island.
Determine Your RV Trip Highlight
Our first RV road trip was all based on Mount Rushmore . It seems silly to even type now, as that site – though memorable – was relegated to one single morning of a 17 day road trip. But it was the jumping off point, and to plan a big trip, all you need is ONE destination. One National Park. One National Monument. One family member or friend you’d like to visit. One professional sports team you’d like to see play. One museum you’ve always wanted to visit. Just pick one thing.
That first trip to Mount Rushmore led us to Custer State Park. Which led us to Badlands National Park. And Wind Cave National Park. And Crazy Horse Memorial. And Devil’s Tower. And Deadwood. And Spearfish Canyon. And Wall Drug.
And then we realized how relatively close we would be to Rocky Mountain National Park. So we added Colorado to our trip.
Our next big trip all began with Grand Canyon. A 23-day, 15 state, 6,000 mile, seven National Parks trip all began with “let’s go to the Grand Canyon”. Every epic RV road trip needs a starting point. Pick a landmark, and the rest will fall into place.
Create Your Travel Map
You’ve got your travel dates, you’ve got your one highlight destination, now how do you get there?
We like to travel in loops, rarely traversing the same road back as we went out. Researching different travel routes to and from your destination is integral in planning all of the other pieces of your trip and allows you to…..
Research Other Destinations on Your Travel Route
This is really, in my opinion, what makes an epic RV road trip truly EPIC. This is how “Let’s go to the Grand Canyon” becomes 23 days of memories and adventures. This is how “let’s go visit my uncle” becomes two weeks, four campgrounds, an ocean, two lakes, and many beautiful hikes.
One of our favorite trip-planning resources is National Geographic’s “Guide to the National Parks of the United States”. We have the 5th edition of the book (though I see they are currently on the 9th edition of the book), and it sits on an end table in our living room. But it is NOT a “coffee table” book. It is a well-used, well-loved, dog-eared gem of a text. The National Parks are organized by region, and the introduction offers a US map with all National Parks marked in bright yellow. It’s helpful to see the proximity of different parks and establish travel routes to each to round out a trip.
In addition to adding several close National Parks and monuments to our trip, we also try to break up our long travel with one to three night layovers in interesting locations. On our travel to Arizona from Pennsylvania, we chose Oklahoma for a two night layover/travel break. Mike researched different Oklahoma towns along our route, finally deciding to book a site at a Jellystone Campground on Keystone Lake in Mannford, OK. As it turned out, the Mannford/Keystone Lake Jellystone is an awesome destination, and our two nights there were a huge hit for our whole crew. In fact, Mike claims that our site there was his favorite campsite yet!
Book Your Campsites
With your travel dates in hand and a route planned out, you can begin to fill out your trip, deciding how many nights to stay in each location. Our family has realized that we need to add one hour for every four of travel time. We make a little bit better time when traveling late at night, or early in the morning, but our reality traveling with kids is that if our travel time from one destination to the next is 6 hours, it will take us 7.5 to get there.
On our longer trips, we’ve utilized the RV Parky app to find safe, accommodating dry camping options for single overnight stays. We always have a plan for how many miles we’d like to cover in a day, and use the app to find Cracker Barrel, Walmart, and travel station parking lots that welcome RVs overnight. My parking lot dry camping limit is one night. We attempted two on our way to Mannford, Oklahoma from Pennsylania, but wickedly hot temperatures on night two prompted a last minute hotel reservation. Never have I ever appreciated A/C, a shower, and hotel lobby coffee more than I did during that brief hotel stay. I decided then that our family couldn’t handle more than one night of dry camping en route to our first campground reservation, though never say never I suppose.
We base how long we’ll stay at each campground on what time we estimate we’ll arrive, and what we’d like to accomplish in the area. On our way to the Grand Canyon, we planned a two night stay in Mannford, Oklahoma. The Keystone Lake Jellystone Campground boasted an inground pool with splash pad and two water slides, and a wibit inflatable water feature on Keystone lake. The experience did not disappoint. Once parked, we didn’t get into the truck again until we left two days later thoroughly relaxed and rejuvenated from our stay.
For longer travel, our MO is typically: dry camp one night, book a site at a campground for a night or two, repeat until you reach your destination.
Create Your Daily Itinerary
Now you know where you’re going, when you’re going, how you’re going to get there and back, and where you’re staying while there and along the way. With all of those pieces in place, you can write up an itinerary of what each day of your trip will look like.
Our family likes to make sure everyone’s interests are catered to at some point on the trip. An afternoon at Moab Giants for our dinosaur fan – a whitewater raft down the Colorado for mom – a slick rock UTV sunset tour for dad – a visit to a rock shop for our budding geologist, we let everyone choose some of the fun.
Planning National Park visits can be especially tricky when trying to determine how long different hikes will take. It can be even more difficult to plan when traveling with kids, as your hike times could vary wildly. We always err on the side of caution, and try to schedule conservatively. It is always easy to fill time, but having to eliminate activities from your itinerary because you overlook can be disappointing, especially if one or more of your family members was REALLY looking forward to the activity you ran out of time for.
Once we’ve created our itinerary, we try to buy all tickets/passes in advance when possible. It saves time, often saves money, and always helps to budget our larger trips to have as much of the cost of activities planned out in advance.
I always plan our meals with our daily itinerary too. I make sure I have a plan for what we’ll eat for meals and snacks on travel days, what I would like to prepare once we’re at the campsite, and know in advance what days/meals we will plan on eating out. We eat out very little when traveling in our RV. We do enjoy eating out, but our whole family tires of it very quickly if we eat out too often. And nothing irks me more than spending a lot of money on a meal just because we didn’t plan well and ended up at a restaurant. It’s just a personal quirk, I guess. So if we’re going to be out exploring all day, I’ll plan to have something in the crock pot when we get back to the RV – or if we know we’ll end up finishing up an activity in a fun new place at dinner time, we’ll research restaurants ahead of time, and look forward to that meal out when the time comes.
Be Flexible
Whether planning or executing an epic RV road trip, flexibility is key. Campground of your dreams all booked up for your dates? Great opportunity to try a new chain or privately owned campground. An attraction you were hoping to stop by is closed on Sunday, the day you’ll travel through? Look for a hiking opportunity instead. Really want to prioritize that attraction that is closed on your travel day? Consider switching up your routes to and from your destination, or staying an extra day in one place and a day less in another. Kids really sick of driving? Allow for a few hour stop somewhere fun. (We once spent three hours in the Johnny Morris’ Wonders of Wildlife Aquarium in Springfield, Missouri because our boys needed a driving break. It was a decision we definitely didn’t regret!)
Some of our greatest road trip memories were last-minute decisions that wouldn’t have happened if we had been rigid with our travel plan. One of the greatest parts of hitting the open road in our RV is knowing that, while we have a plan, the possibilities for our adventures are endless.
So – where are you headed next in your RV? Please comment and let me know! And if you have any questions on planning on an epic RV road trip for your family, please don’t hesitate to ask – we would love to help!
