Barbaraok

You don't need to go all the way to Livingston, you can renew at any DPS office in the state. If coming across on I-20, then stop in Longview and renew.

You can also renew Class A a& Class B BY MAIL.

OK, they have redesigned the Escapees website - where are the forms and booklets now? My eyes must really be going because I don't see them anywhere.

We all find that we really don't need to take that many clothes with us because we seldom see the same people each week, etc. You can always pick up more Tees if you need them along the way. Same for "dressy clothes", if needed there will be somewhere to get something appropriate if needed.

Zulu, I didn't say that you were derisive, what I said was that I have heard people make comments through the years about those who took a lower immediate income but had better retirement packages. As you said, the terms you used probably weren't the best.

Did you call the people in Taylor county and ask them to help you? That is one thing about Polk County, all levels of the government KNOW about fulltime RVers and are very helpful.

For years I have heard ‘friends’ deride people who work in local/state/federal governments/education, etc., as to our ‘getting’ something for nothing. Yes, we have a good retirement, but that was because we were generally paid less than someone in private employment, we Made the determination to do with less in our immediate pockets to have a little more latter on.

Call the Polk County Auditor and they will walk you through the process. If you are domiciles in Polk County you have their phone number on your current vehicle registration

Best decision we ever made. We had each had a life-threatening illness, want to enjoy how ever much time we have and do it when the body is still able to have a little 'get up and go' left in it.

I looked at your 6 month review and didn't notice any health care costs? Also Long Term Care insurance?

But if you are using city water from spigot, that isn’t going into your fresh water tank, is it. Get the bowled covered, black tape if nothing else.

But municipal water systems are not creeks.

You aren’t that different from us. Once we had to flush out. Otherwise, we dump fresh water and fill with municipal water on a fairly regular basis and don’t sanitize. We do dump water and refill when taking out of storage each spring, and then dump the desert water as soon as we get to the coast as the desert water is so high in TDS.

Ray, how is the water in your fresh water tank being exposed to sunlight?

Ray, are you using municple water to fill tank as needed all year long?

Welcome Aboard. 😁

Ray I'm a chemist and wouldn't use it for our motorhome. I see no need to add additional chloride to our daily intake. And while the claim is that the triazine ring breaks down without any problem in the mouth/stomach, my biochemist husband calls that claim suspect at best because there are so many factors in each of us as to the pH of both mouth and stomach depending upon the different medications and disease processes we may have. Others may disagree. It is so easy to just get a small bottle of bleach when needed and use and then make sure to always dump and refill regularly from municipal water systems.

Sodium Dichlor is dichloroisocyanuric acid. It is designed to slowly release chlorine in swimming pools where sunshine causes regular hypochlorite to break down to fast to maintain effective free chlorine. NOT designed for potable water use. And no, I would not use it in our rig. Barb

No it is not the same as bleach. and yes, I am a chemist.

But they can be renewed by mail. All you need is to get one form notarized. Instructions for out of state on the DPS website.

People wait until thirsty to drink, that is too late. Need to drink on regular schedule

When we first started fulltiming we also that that we would utilize a lot of state parks. Turns out that can be down right expensive, especially with a motorhome, since a lot of states will charge extra per night for your tow car. Plus with online reservation systems, most state parks are reserved for Thursday through Sundays from Memorial Day through Labor Day - - we just gave up on them. We do like COE (Corps of Engineers) parks in the midwest and they can only be reserved 6 months out and tend to have more open spots that you can get into without reservations. As to why more than one membership, it is because every membership park will set aside a certain number of sites to be used by each affiliate system they belong to such as RPI, C2C, AOR, ROD. So if C2C has 10 slots at park XYZ and you want to stay there during a certain time frame, those 10 sites may be booked. However, AOR might also have 10 slots at the same park, but because it isn't as well know as C2C, it has fewer members and there might be a site available. We go with ROD first because there is a $0/night fee with them, but they also are booked out first, and then C2C or AOR will almost always have a site for us, but at $10/night or so (most parks now add on a surcharge for 50 amp). Takes a little practice to get in a rhythm with membership parks, but if they are in areas where you will be going (PNW if full of them) then you can save a lot of money using them. This week we are staying under AOR, it costs us $70 for a 50 amp pull through site with full hookups and a view of Mt. Baker. This is the ONLY nightly fee we will pay until the middle of August, all the rest of our time will be under TT and ROD, as will most of September. Works for us.

What other memberships will you have. Remember, C2C is an affiliate and you should really have more than one to ensure you get into parks that you want to stay in as you travel. All affiliates have a certain number of sites at each park and when those are reserved you are out of luck, but with more than one membership you may be able to get in during the time frame you want. If this is part of the negotiation for a membership at a home park, make the Deluxe part of the package. We get by with the Classic, but we also have AOR and ROD which both have 2 week stays (as well as TT) so the C2C is usually our week out somewhere. BTW, if the park you are interested in is a Classic only park, you still only get 1 week and it is 60 days out to reserve.

Pack rat, in your planning remember to subtract Medicare Part B from your SS each month.

Agreed. We had my folks as an example, so we started our retirement plan when I was 35. 😉 They retired early and though Dad’s health wasn’t great, it was good and he lived 17 yrs. My FIL kept working, high stress job and dropped dead never getting to enjoy a retirement.