Thursday, March 12, 2020
Welcome to another edition of RV Travel’s Daily Tips newsletter. Here you’ll find helpful RV-related and living tips from the pros, travel advice, a handy website of the day, tips on our favorite RVing-related products and, of course, a good laugh. Thanks for joining us. We appreciate you. Please tell your friends about us.
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Page Contents
Today’s thought
“No man was ever wise by chance.” ―
Need an excuse to celebrate? Today is National Plant A Flower Day!
Tip of the Day
RVing: Be safe and happy every day with the 3/300 rule
By Greg Illes
Before I bought my RV, I thought I knew a lot about driving around the country. With almost 50 years of driving experience and several cross-the-U.S. trips, I didn’t think I had much left to learn. Wrong!
RVs are different vehicles. Not only do they proceed – shall we say – more sedately, but they coax us all into a more easy-going attitude. At least, that’s the way it’s supposed to work. So my 500-mile-per-day automobile jaunts were not so easy to achieve in my RV. Continue reading.
Do you have a tip? Submit it here.
Curing the curse of hard water RV plumbing issues
Spending time in the Desert Southwest, with “mineral deposits” in the water supply, can create trouble such as deposits in pipes, fittings chewed up and a whole host of plumbing nightmares. But there is a way that can help you counteract the negative aspects of hard water. Find out how in this article from Russ and Tiña De Maris.
Yesterday’s featured article: Keeping your powder – er, paper – dry
Reader poll
Quick Tip
Save time crossing the border
Planning on an RV adventure into Mexico or Canada, but on a tight schedule? Call ahead to the border crossing (or, better yet, check online at U.S. Customs and Border Protection) and check for crossing times. If there’s a long wait, check and see if another nearby crossing has a better offering.
KEYSTONE RECALLS SOME 2020 TRAILERS. Click.
Random RV Thought
Make the kids or grandkids a deal around the campfire: The more mosquitoes they kill for you, the more marshmallows they get later on.
Hide dirty laundry, and save space too!
Sometimes where to put those worn clothes waiting for wash day is the pits. Many hide a basket in the shower stall, but here’s another approach: Hang that dirty laundry out – not for everyone to see, but on the back of a closet door. Zippers on this one make it easy to open when it’s time to disgorge the dirties, and the company includes a couple of different hooks to help you hang it. You can find it on Amazon for a good price.
Website of the day
The best small towns in Nevada you need to visit
Surely you pass through Nevada every now and again, whether to visit Las Vegas or Reno, or just to get a good desert fix. Here are the best small towns in Nevada that you may have overlooked or driven right by in the past.
And the Survey Says…
We’ve polled RVtravel.com readers more than 1,500 times in recent years. Here are a few things we’ve learned about them:
• 66 percent always wash their RV themselves
• 37 percent of men never dry their hands on their pants after washing them
• 8 percent dream mostly in black and white
Recent poll: Have you ever stayed overnight in your RV in a Cabela’s parking lot? Tell us here.
Trivia
It’s impossible to hum while plugging your nose.
…
You just tried, didn’t you?
What does the White House have in the basement?
A) A movie theater
B) A flower shop
C) A billiards hall
We told you yesterday.
Is this airplane on steroids? It sure looks like it… Click here to be amazed.
You won’t “wine” about this!
Well, it’s official. We have a new RV accessory that we’re obsessed with. How cute are these?! This motorhome wine stopper (and this trailer one) belongs in every wine drinker’s RV! It would also make a cute gift.
Leave here with a laugh
I’m not sure I believe all this stuff about genetically modified food being bad for you. I feel fine and I just had a really tasty leg of salmon.
Today’s Daily Deals at Amazon.com
Best-selling RV products and Accessories at Amazon.com. UPDATED HOURLY!
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Editor and Publisher: Chuck Woodbury. Managing editor: Emily Woodbury. Senior editor: Diane McGovern. Advertising director: Jessica Sarvis. Financial affairs director: Gail Meyring. IT wrangler: Kim Christiansen.
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I wonder how many folks, like myself, thought of “RV’ing” as a separate and distinct activity from everything else we enjoy doing, and bought their RV with that mindset. My wife and I were unsure if we would enjoy the RV life, and were fearful of committing a huge amount of money to something we were unsure about, so we ended up buying a smallish travel trailer that we could comfortably tow with our large SUV (I had no desire to have to buy a truck). This travel trailer really has everything we need, and about nothing we don’t need. But traveling with this trailer means leaving behind some of things that I most enjoy in my retirement, my motorcycles and my large flat screen TV (although I have a small TV in the camper, the noise from the a/c unit makes it virtually unusable since most of our camping has been in hot weather). And even though my wife cannot bring along her sewing machines (yes, plural) and warehouse size collection of fabrics, she finds she can hand sew her quilts while we travel and is fully happy. But I now regret not buying a much larger RV, one that would have allowed me to take at least one motorcycle with us, and one where I could watch on something similar to the 65 inch flat screen I have in my home’s living room. Yet buying that larger RV, even if the least costly alternative, i.e. a travel trailer of some sort, would require a truck, and again, a much larger financial commitment that the current market situation has me especially hesitant to do. So once again I am back to questioning myself as to whether or not the RV life is really for me. But I have a feeling that as the weather warms up, and I get my camper de-winterized, I will likely head out for the West coast, visiting our oldest children who live there, and stopping to see some of the sights we have yet to visit.
Where do you get that Leg of Salmon? I need to try some of that.
Our truck camper bathroom is so efficient we can sit on the toilet, shower, and lean over to brush our teeth in the sink all at the same time. Hygienic multi-tasking to the max! As for keeping the TP dry, that’s a no-brainer. A recycled square one-gallon ice cream bucket (with handle!) and snap-lid to the rescue. Fun to empty, and perfect for purpose.
Our RV came with two bathrooms, the second with only a toilet and sink. We removed the toilet (plugged the hole) and put a small chest freezer in its place. Then we added wire shelving over the sink. It is now a much more practical use of space for us as fulltimers.
I confess that I plan our trips by first finding towns that are about 300 (or close to) miles apart from each other. I then google rv parks in the vicinity and check out the different feedback for each and then choose one for our overnight stay. I will do this for the entire trip and then make reservations at each making sure that each park has a decent cancel program in case we have problems that may cause a delay. Spontaneous? Nope, not at all… but it does give us confidence that we will have a nice park to stay at each night. We typically leave around 9-10 am and get to our destination between 3-4 pm and usually keep the speedo set at 60 – 62 mph.
The list of towns to visit in Nevada is pretty good. That’s about all the towns THERE ARE! Ha. But, Virginia City is just a HUGE tourist magnet. Lots of true cowboy and Nevada souvenirs, made in China.
Thanks for the chuckle Tommy. When we lived in Calgary Alberta with Banff National Park down the road 80 miles we spent a great deal of time in (and around camping) that tourist town before it got so busy you could barely breathe, We always got a great chuckle out of Asian tourist’s buying “souvenir’s of Canada” – “Made in Japan”
We have had a bath and a half in our last 2 Class A Motor Homes. There are rigs that have 2 full baths but they are mostly in very high end rigs. Bath and a half has become more common since our first one in 2007. Once you have a bath and a half RV, you never go back to a single toilet rig.
Similar to having two doors in your trailer. Once you get a two-door rig, you’ll never go back to a single . . .
I figured my average miles per hours driving over the past 5 years and 50,000 miles. I averaged 54.7 MPH. I try to stay within the 3/300 each day. We usually start around 9 am and stop before 3 pm. We try to drive a little more or less than 300 miles per day. That formula makes for a better trip. I like to sightsee. My wife tells me to keep my eyes on the road. She is right because a motorhome requires more concentration driving. The less miles and hours I drive each day the better. It gives me more time to enjoy other things.
To be exact, 1.5 bathrooms, but that wasn’t an option.
Same here, but I’m pretty sure that’s what the 2 bath option had in mind. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a coach with 2 full baths.