By Cheri Sicard
Travel days in your RV can be hectic and stress filled. The team from Today is Someday produced a video of practical actionable tips to make RV travel days easier.
In the video, the team had a 1,200-mile trip ahead of them, so what better time to focus on RV travel day tips? In addition to the tips in the video, they recommend working off a checklist so you don’t forget things. This is the checklist they use.
The tips are interspersed within the video of this trip that the couple virtually takes you along on. There’s some gold in there, but this could have been edited into a shorter video.
Nonetheless, here are some of the practical tips they give to make RV travel days easier. A lot of these tips involve being proactive. In other words, you are preventing potential problems before they get the chance to happen.
#1 Safety: Check your tires and don’t forget your toad tires too, check the propane shut off, check the roof, do a light and brake check, etc.
#2 Plan your fuel stops before leaving: Personally, I find this to be a bit overkill and it is not something I have ever done on the road, save fueling up before remote areas. But maybe if you are driving a rig as large as the one in the video, or if you need diesel fuel, it could make sense. Since they needed to fill propane, it did make sense in the case of the tip in the video. Watch to discover the apps they use to find fuel stops.
#3 Plan your overnight stops: This one I always try to do because there’s nothing like being tired after a day of driving and not being able to find a place to park for the night. The team in the video uses Harvest Hosts for a lot of travel days, as do I. It’s hard to beat the deal of a safe place to park that is usually attached to something interesting like a winery, brewery restaurant, or farm. And unlike boondocking in Walmart or Cracker Barrel parking lots, there’s no problem opening the slides and getting comfortable. They suggest using Google Earth to check your overnight stops in advance, just so you are not greeted by any unexpected surprises. Again, I don’t do this but if you are driving a super large rig, it makes good sense. Before leaving the next morning, it’s time to check in with the trusty checklist again before moving.
#4: Do a few quick walk-around checks while en route: Every time you stop for fuel or snacks is a good time to do a quick walk-around visual inspection of the rig, hitch, etc., just to make sure everything is as it should be.
#5 Monitor the weather: It’s a good idea to check the weather where you stop and where you are going in case you have to adjust plans.
#6 Always check inside doors before moving: Check that all doors and cabinets are well latched before moving as things can fall out and doors can break if not properly closed.
#7 Check inside cabinets and fridge: Always secure items so they don’t fall out or break.
#8 Choose your numbers: By this, they say to choose your schedule in advance. For instance 4, 4, 4: four hours of driving, stop by 4 p.m., no more than 400 miles. This gives you goals and an anticipated reward.
#9 Have a plan for meals: Having a plan for what you will eat when you stop will make everything easier. Follow this link for a delicious, easy, make-ahead RV travel days recipe I recently came up with.
What are your RV travel day tips? Be sure to drop them in the comments below.
##RVDT2124
Thanks, Cheri! Yes, as you say, the size of ones rig affects many aspects of travel. We developed the habit of always planning fuel stops several miles ahead with our previous 43′ DP and continue it now with our 36′ DP. (Our towed vehicle added an additional 20′ of length, almost always limiting us to truck stops.) We use the Open Roads application to find fuel. Bathroom breaks that cannot be combined with fuel stops are planned/identified with the iExit application. After almost leaving a campsite with our power cord attached to the pedestal, we created and follow written checklists for departures (one for inside, one for outside, and one for the toad).
Love this couple and have been watching them on YouTube for a while. They do a lot for our Veterans 🇺🇸
All of the above was way easy to do when we still had Street Atlas and a GPS puck. If the POIs were loaded and you tethered your phone, the copilot can look up fuel prices on Gas Buddy so you can fuel before the price change at state lines. You can also plan an entire route of a thousand or more miles months in advance. Oh, and if you elected to make an unplanned stop, include it and the change will wrinkle through the entire plan. A Great Loss.
These guys actually fun to watch. We watched the whole video!