California's newest Casino RV Park

California's newest casino RV Park is located at Jackson Rancheria, New York Ranch Rd, Jackson, CA -- 60 miles southeast of Sacramento. Open year-round the RV park has 100 full hookup sites, wi-fi throughout, heated pool/spa, free cable TV, showers, rest rooms and laundry. Horseshoes, volleyball and walking paths are at the park and RV guests are invited to use the luxury amenities at the hotel including pool, salon and fitness center. Free 24-hour shuttle service is provided.

The Jackson Rancheria is a popular destination for groups of RVers who enjoy camping out at a casino with their friends. The park has a clubhouse with kitchen, fireplace and big screen TV.

Daily rates at the RV park are from $35. Good Sam and AAA discounts are extended (but not on weekends or holidays.)

The 24-hour casino features 1,500 slots/video poker and live action at 65 gaming tables.

More information about the Jackson RV Park is available at 800-822-WINN.

Casino expansion in California

NuWu Casino: An Environmental Assessment report on a proposed casino and RV Park development in Twenty-Nine Palms, CA will be released to the public next Monday. The new KOA RV Park will be located adjacent to the NuWu Casino on tribal land in a beautiful high desert location where spectacular star-gazing is popular. The RV Park will include 100 RV, tent and cabin sites along with hiking trails. The 29 Palms Band of Mission Indians is planning a 2009 opening for the casino and RV Park.

Foothills Oaks Casino: Owned by the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, Foothill Oaks Casino is expected to open later this year. Currently under construction, the 88,000 square-foot gaming facility is located in Eldorado County, east of Sacramento.

Pay the machine, please

A unique RV Park is now open at the ROLLING HILLS CASINO, located next to exit 628 of Interstate 5 in Corning (at Liberal Ave), CA. The gated RV Park welcomes RVs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week at the self-check-in machine -- credit card or cash accepted.The rate is $25 per night. RVs are accomodated on a first-come, first-serve basis. Once you've checked in, select one of the 48 full-hookup, pull-through sites. The modern RV Park is designed to accomodate self-contained big rigs...level gravel pads are 75 feet long. Tent camping is not allowed. The RV Park is walking distance to the casino and shuttle service is also available. The RV Park can be reached at 530-385-1445. For RVers who prefer to blacktop boondock, free overnight parking is still available in the truck parking lot, also walking distance to the casino.

Rolling Hills also recently opened a fantastic 18-hole golf course -- Sevillano Links. Designed by professional golfer John Daly, every hole on the course can be converted to a par 5. It can accomodate skins games. But individual RVing golfers will find the course to be fun and challenging. The golf course and the RV Park have teamed up to offer a good buy on stay 'n play packages. For more information call the golf course at 530-528-4600.

More Casino Getaways for Snow Birds

RVing Snow Birds are nested in for the winter season across the Snow Belt. When it's time for a casino getaway, here are additional casino RV Parks to consider:

Hollywood RV Park in Bay St Louis, MS is the only casino RV Park on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Everything is new on the Gulf (since they had to rebuild from scratch following Hurricane Katrina.) The RV Park at Hollywood Casino features about 100 full hookup mostly shaded sites. There is 24 hour shuttle service to the modern casino that also has four restaurants. The golf course is beautiful and challenging. The legendary Pete Fountain provides entertainment every Tuesday and Wednesday evening. This month temperatures are in the 70's during the day and 60's at night. The RV Park is very popular, so advanced reservations are suggested. The Good Sam discount is extended.

Pechanga RV Park in Temecula, CA has a full service RV Park with a heated pool and spa. Shuttle service is provided to the casino 24 hours. There are eight dining venues from fine dining to informal and quick snacks. Live entertainment is featured on weekends and you can check out the lineup on the website. The casino has an extensive non-smoking area. Pechanga is located in the beautiful Temecula Valley where outdoor activities abound. The Temecula Wine County is nearby. Advance reservations are suggested -- The RV Park extends Good Sam, AAA and AARP discounts.

Thunder Valley Casino to allow RV parking (maybe)

By Chuck Woodbury
editor, RVtravel.com

A representative of the Thunder Valley Casino in Lincoln, Calif., told me Thursday that the casino will once again allow RVs in its parking lot during the day while the RVers are gambling, dining or enjoying other activities at the popular casino, one of California’s largest. It will not allow overnight stays in recreational vehicles.

However, an updated message on the casino’s website on Friday suggested otherwise. “Unfortunately we are unable to accommodate RV's or trailors during our construction phase,” it reads, and yes, the spelling of trailers is incorrect.

In early December, we ran a letter in this blog from a Washington state man who had driven his motorhome to the Sacramento-area casino but was informed by a security guard that RVs were not allowed in the parking lot unless they could fit into one space. He was told instead to park on the street. As expected, the letter brought a flood of mostly angry comments from RVtravel.com readers, most with promises to boycott the casino.

A representative of Thunder Valley told me that the casino had disallowed RVs in its parking lot primarily for space reasons. The casino is undergoing a huge expansion with a 23-story hotel, two ballrooms and a performing arts center that will connect to the present 200,000-square-foot casino. So during construction, parking space is limited.

“They have to think about having parking space for the 2,000 employees of the casino,” said Doug Elmets, whose public relations agency represents the casino.

Elmets said there had been some problems with some RVers in the past that had contributed to the casino’s decision to simply ban all motorhomes and trailers unless they could fit into one parking space.

But when I informed Elmets of the casino’s “No RVs allowed” statement (without offering a reason why) on its website’s front page and how that served as a slap in the face to the RV community, he called the casino manager to see what could be done. In banning all RVs, I don’t believe the casino had any idea of the size of the RV community and its potentially positive economic impact to its business. And I wondered if the casino's managers knew how virtually all other large casinos not only allow RVs in their parking lots, but go out of their way to welcome them.

Elmet called back a few hours later. “The casino will find a way to squeeze in RVs,” he said. I suggested that the casino change its front page “No RVs allowed” message to something more accommodating. Instead, a day later, the message was essentially the same, although it did add that RVs were not allowed “during our construction phase.”

So my suggestion is that for now RVers avoid going of their way to the Thunder Valley Casino until it removes the “No RV parking” message from its website or in some other way shows an interest in welcoming RVers. Or if they go, be ready to park on the street.

New Indian Casino, RV park coming to So. Calif.

The Twenty-Nine Palms (Calif.) Band of Mission Indians will unveil plans this month for the first phase of a multi-million dollar, multi-phased economic development project to be built entirely on and within its 160-acre reservation in Twentynine Palms that will include the the Nuwu Casino Resort & RV Park. Phase 1 of the development will include the approximately 60,000-square-foot casino, a state-of-the art KOA RV campground, and miles of dedicated hiking trails. The RV park will offer more than 100 RV, tent and cabins sites, along with a number of amenities. The park will be managed by the Tribe through a franchise agreement with Kampgrounds of America (KOA).

Thunder Valley has issues

BLOG UPDATE (12-8-07) from the RVtravel.com editor: As you will see from the comments below, many readers have complained that the posting here does not go far enough to explain why the casino changed its policy from allowing RVers to park in its parking lot to banning the practice. I agree, and will talk to the casino management personally next week to get the true and complete story.

As y'all know researching RV-Friendly casinos for our Casino Camping guide book is an ongoing project for me.

Since Thunder Valley is the prime topic of conversation these days, I went back and checked my notes from earlier editions of the book. When we were gathering info for the first edition of Casino Camping in 2003 we visited many California casinos personally, including Thunder Valley...the management and marketing people were very hospitable at that time and they were delighted to be listed in the book. They wanted us to be sure and mention that they offered shuttle service from the parking lot for RVers. The first Casino Camping came out in July 2004 and Thunder Valley was lsited as RV-Friendly.

Our visit the following year was a different story. When we called on Thunder Valley they requested not to be listed in subsequent editions because they no longer allowed RVs in their parking lot. They would not say why, but they were quite adamant about it. So when the 2nd edition of Casino Camping was published in Nov 2006 a special note appeared in the California section to alert RVers not to go to Thunder Valley. I was perplexed (because they had been so hospitable the previous year and there surely is enough room in their parking lot) so I did some checking around. It appeared they had very good reasons for their decision to exclude RVs from the premises. Although when I asked them about what I'd heard they would not confirm or comment. So they join the ranks of the RV-UNFriendly casinos...and there are a number of them throughout the country for a variety of reasons. Some simply don't have room in the parking lots...some aren't open 24 hours and don't want RVers out there overnight when they can't provide security. Construction, expansions and unexpected events like hurricanes cause casinos to become temporarily or permanently UNfriendly to RVs.

But, like my friend & colleague Mac McClellen said, there are plenty of casinos that want us -- too many to worry about the few that don't! Central California has lots of very nice RV-Friendly casinos...check 'em out!

Please remember, when you go into a casino it's always a good idea to check in with Security or a member of management to verify their parking policy for RVs, especially if you plan to dry camp overnight in the parking lot.


Camp for FREE! "Don't pay to stay!" Visit FreeCampgrounds.com to learn about where to camp in an RV for free or nearly free in the USA.

California Casino RV Parks

Currently, California has the most Indian casinos of all the states...and California's casino industry outranks all but Nevada in size. There are 53 Tribes operating casinos in the state, with the heaviest concentration of gaming destinations in Riverside and San Diego counties.

Although most California casinos welcome RVs to visit and even stay overnight in their parking area, there are only 5 full-service RV Parks at casinos in the state. For those RVers who want to pull into an RV Park, hookup and enjoy amenities not offered in a parking lot, the selection is slim, but varied.

In the southern part of the state, Pechanga in Temecula offers a lavish premier destination resort with a 168-site upscale RV Park popular for rallies. The resort has headline entertainment every week...the big Vegas-style casino and variety of dining choices are attractive. On the southeastern side of the state is Havasu Landing RV Park, that offers lots of outdoor activities and a small casino with limited hours. It's located on the river at the Arizona border.

In central California, two casino RV Parks are located on Clear Lake. On the north shore the Robinson Rancheria in Nice has an RV Park about two and a half miles east of its casino. It is a good fishing destination that offers casino activity nearby. Konocti Vista in Lakeport is on the west side of Clear Lake where the RV accomodations are within walking distance of the casino and water activities abound during the day.

In northern California, Feather Falls KOA, in Oroville, is located next to a friendly and cozy casino with about 1,000 slots plus live blackjack and poker and tournaments frequently. There are 43 sites in the modern RV Park and RV guests get excellent casino coupons every day that just about equal the camping fees. It's a good place for a relaxing hiatus. Because of the many incentives given to RVers, Feather Falls is very popular, too, so reservations are suggested.

Coming next year...a brand new RV Park at Jackson Rancheria is expected to open on February 1st.

Reminder: You'll always find accurate directions to casinos throughout the country in Casino Camping, Look for it in the RVBookstore!

Casinos closed due to fires

A heavy concentration of casinos can be found in Riverside and SanDiego counties and many of them may be affected by the fires currently sweeping across southern California. Casino Pauma, Casino Pala, Harrahs Ricon, Valley View and Barona Valley are closed due to evacuations. A number of others in the San Diego area have their fingers crossed, as everyone in the nation prays for the winds to subside and the fires to be doused. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the folks in California.

Roads That Lead To Redmond

Thousands of RVs will be en route to Redmond, Oregon this summer for two big events in July and August. This week, our Casino Camping blog will highlight RV-Friendly casinos located along major interstates that might be on your route.

If you are approaching Redmond from the south and/or west, you may be interested in some of these casinos in central and northern California:
On the 101 coastal highway, look for casinos in Lakeport (with an RV Park) and Hopland, just south of Ukiah and another casino just north of Ukiah. Further north, there are casinos in Ferndale, Trinidad, Crescent City and Smith River. All are RV-Friendly, so if it's time to stop for the night, you'll find free overnight parking there. If you're traveling through central California RVers get a warm welcome and valuable cash coupons at the KOA at Feather Falls Casino in Oroville. Each RV guest receives a $20 coupon for casino play and a discount meal coupon. For RVing couples that amounts to a free overnight stay plus. Oroville is east of I-5. There are also casinos near I-5 at Corning and Redding.

Along the western shore of Oregon you'll find: The Mill (with RV Park) in North Bend, Three Rivers in Florence, Chinook Winds (with RV Park) in Lincoln City and Spirit Mountain in Grand Ronde. The popular Seven Feathers Casino & RV Park is visible from exit 99 along I-5 in southwest Oregon. Also, in the south part of the state, Kla-Mo-Ya Casino is on US-97 near Klamath Falls (Redmond is also on US-97.)

A Good Buy In Central CA

Many RVers like casinos for the free overnight parking they offer. But some RV gaming fans don't like to do the "dry camping in the parking lot" thing. Where available, we prefer the casinos that have an RV Park because of the added convenience and security. We'll end up staying a few days longer at a casino if it has an RV Park. In many cases, RV Parks at casinos offer incentive coupons that will offset the camping fee.

In central California there's a pretty 43-space KOA RV Park at Feather Falls Casino in Oroville that gives incentives. We stayed at this park last year shortly after it opened and we were delighted not only with the comfortable site, but with the casino coupons we received. Every day they give each RV guest a $20 coupon for casino play plus a discount meal coupon. That's coupons every day for every RV guest. So, for us, we got two sets of coupons each day. This RV Park is still relatively new...if you haven't heard about it by now, it's worth a trip into Oroville for a few days of relaxation and gaming.