In our first ten nights away we spent two camped in the driveways of friends, two in campgrounds and the other six boondocking.
For those unfamiliar with the term, boondocking is camping without services. We had no electrical hookups and the only water was what we had on board. In other words we were self-contained and didn’t require anything extra. On two occasions we plugged in a portable generator for a short time once was to use the air conditioner to cool the van enough to sleep and the other time was to have light to read by and power to charge our phones
On these nights our campgrounds were parking lots, either at a gas station truck stop or department store. We would check online for free RV parking in our destination city. After parking in an area that wouldn’t impede customer traffic we would go into the business and ask permission to spend the night on their property.
To show appreciation we would purchase any supplies we needed from the business allowing us this privilege. We showed respect for their property by being quiet and unobtrusive as well as ensuring the area was left clean and tidy.
I was actually surprised by the number of RV’s that would be in a parking lot overnight. We were never alone and this is an excellent way of stretching our travel dollars. We always had access to clean washrooms and often could also get free wifi. This is definitely the way to travel
We’ve been told about some other good boondocking areas on our journey and look forward to checking them out.
Travels with Tandy 