Advance reservations

[Nomad Hiker]

Just curious, How far in advance do you make campground reservations? We leave at the end of April and we are up to July 5th in reservations, then we head to Canada. We want to get reservations for a month, but they require full payment, no refunds at all. Since this is Canada's 150 year celebration, we figure spots might be hard to come. At this time we know of no reason we wouldln't be there. Just wondering what the rest of you do with scheduling.

[Ray,IN]

The only place we make long-range reservations is Florida for the winter. In fact, most everything is already reserved by current renters (who have first dibs), I'm on 2 waiting lists now for the 17/18 season. One motorcoach resort only accepts reservations for 2 yr. period seasonal rentals.

[AFchap]

It is extremely rare for us to make reservations. Only when we want/have to be in a very popular place at a busy time would we even think of making reservations.

[sandsys]

I rarely made reservations. Even the place that required them I usually called from the Walmart parking lot in town to tell them I'd like to come today. It's all about FREEDOM! The freedom to go when I'm ready and stop when I'm ready and stop to see whatever sights appealed to me along the way. I did make reservations for Escapades, though, as I wanted to be sure I got a spot.

 

Linda Sand

[rdickinson]

I'm out of Victoria BC and find some do and some don't. I hat to pay in advance with no refund for a spot at John Prince park in Ft Worth that said it had Wi-Fi which turned out to be borderline at the best. I couldn't get my money back if I wanted to move so tuffed it out.

 

A problem with booking through an agency not on site is they don't know the physical constraints of the park, get it wrong about pullthrus being available, power provided. Saying the pad has 50 amp when it only has 30. So you would need to google up the layout and grill them about access to the site. The Agency for Pioneer Village in Ft Meyers sold me a pull thru that only a 20 ' trailer could be place on with the truck disconnected. My Hauler wouldn't fit let alone the trailer. With them I only gave 60$ to hold the spot. I paid for the first week only but have been able to get accommodation elsewhere so will leave Saturday. I'm parked in the back of the park on the Dumpster row.

 

Provincial parks in BC for the most part do not have power, were built when rigs were not as big as they are now so access can be tight and low as well. Can't speak of the Federal Parks.

 

If I were to do this again, I'd prefer a privately owned park unless someone who had stayed there could give up to date accurate info.

[SWharton]

Unless we are going to someplace that we know will be difficult to get a site we just call that day. We don't like the idea of reservations, doesn't allow for any freedom of decision. Maybe on a busy weekend someplace. Most cgs keep some sites for overnighters or short stayers. Snowbird territory might be best to make a reservation.

[Kirk W]

Like many others here, we do make reservations for a spot if we particularly want in that specific campground in a busy place and at the particular date. In most cases when traveling, we don't even know for sure where we will stop at the end of the day until at least lunch time. Thanks to cell phones we do call ahead to check before we actually arrive in each park, but usually we are no more than an hour or two away from that particular park before we call. If you travel with a smart-phone, there are plenty of apps that will allow you to choose an RV park while traveling. Actually, I don't use the phone while driving, but my copilot does so or we pick a spot while stopped for lunch. Most days, about 2 pm we start to consider where we want to spend the night.

 

If you are thinking of places to stay near the major cities of Canada and this year when it could be busy, then you may not have much choice but we didn't make reservations when we traveled in Canada. I suppose it might be especially busy around Ottawa or some other cities, but perhaps some of our Canadian members could chime in to offer advice.

[SWharton]

This may just be a terminolgy problem but what "agency" makes reservations? Other than State and Federal i just call the park. The Stateand Federal sites seem to have pretty good descriptions of each site.

[richfaa]

We rarely make reservations as we rarely know exactly were we be or for how long. We have not had problems over the years finding a place to stay. We do make reservations when traveling to Florida for the winter as thousands of Rv'ers are in travel.

[GR "Scott" Cundiff]

I make a lot of reservations and only travel without them when we're doing a rare one night stop. If nothing else, I suggest you nail down holiday weekends and popular spots during prime camping season.

 

However, the requirement of full payment with no refunds would be a real problem for me and I understand your concern.

[remoandiris]

I make a lot of reservations and only travel without them when we're doing a rare one night stop. If nothing else, I suggest you nail down holiday weekends and popular spots during prime camping season.

 

However, the requirement of full payment with no refunds would be a real problem for me and I understand your concern.

 

+1.

[The Quiet Assassin]

We only made reservations for holiday weekends and always for popular National Parks like Denali and Yosemite. In fact I quickly learned to find out when the bookings were released and sat on the lappie at midnight poised to book at 1 second past.

 

We always traveled with empty waste tanks and some water and were happy boondocking on the odd occasion we found our chosen park full.

[2gypsies]

We don't do reservations either except for special occasions like Denali Nat'l Park's - Teklanika campground.

 

This summer in Canada is going to be a zoo. If it were us we'd go next year even though there's a free entrance to the parks this year. It still doesn't cover your camping fees and we'd rather have a more relaxed time next year and pay the entrance fee.

[Twotoes]

I make my reservations a day or two in advance as I travel. That way I can stay longer somewhere if I want to. However I have worked in state parks and they are always full May, June, July, and Aug and require an advance reservation. Also depending on the location and time of year some places fill up fast, like Omaha NB during the College World Seres or anywhere in CA near the beach any time of year. Just call ahead and ask the park what they recommend.

[Mark and Dale Bruss]

We got into this habit when we had 65' of truck and trailer.

 

We start with the route for the season and then lock in reservations for the holidays. Then we check for high popularity locations and lock those in. The overnight stays we generally schedule about a week out.

 

We have a smaller rig now but we like having planned stops.

[rdickinson]

The Agency is a central booking # you call. They are not on site at the RV Park. They don't know the specifics of the park, ie is there sat reception in this or that location. The mess up on whether the pad is 30 or 50 amps, backin or pull thru, don't know the length of the pad as in my case Saturday.

[SWharton]

This is in Canada correct? Do all campgrounds use this system(private,Provincial and National). Is it one system or are there many? Can you just direct call a cg or must you use the agency? Just for my education.

[Nomad Hiker]

This is in Canada correct? Do all campgrounds use this system(private,Provincial and National). Is it one system or are there many? Can you just direct call a cg or must you use the agency? Just for my education.

Please understand I only know a little about Canada since trying to investigate where to stay. It APPEARS to me that the National and provincial parks are similar to National and state parks here; however reservations are not always accessible on-line. Many have only electric hook-up, but none other. There is a water/dump station on the grounds. If we are considering staying a month, we prefer full hookups. The ones we have been looking at are privately owned, small and run by the owners, not an "agency". I guess we've not run into the "agency" situation yet. Most contact has been email, but there is a phone number listed for the ones we have been looking at. I just prefer email at this point. If the answers to my initial questions are what I want then I may call. IDK if we get the owners when we call or some sort of booking agency. I know the emails I have sent were responded to by the owners.

[Nomad Hiker]

Thanks for all the responses. Since we are new to this, it is helpful to get the input. We read each response and pictured how it would work for us. At this point, I think we prefer to know where we are going. We tend to like more secluded sites and scheduling in advance gives us the opportunity to google earth the park and decide (as best we can) if it will meet our needs/wants. I'm sure there will be times we wish we could leave, wish we had stayed longer somewhere else, or wish we could take a totally different route, and if that often becomes the case then we will change our game plan. Based on your responses we have decided to look into other Canadian RV parks that do not require a non-refundable payment up front. While a lot of them do require 50% down and a full refund only if you cancel up to 30 days ahead, that is still better than "no refund". With this being Canada's 150th celebration, I think we would be wise to have something locked in.

[SWharton]

Most Provincial and National Parks are more rustic than commercial parks(maybe electric, maybe water). Many times there is also a time limit of 1-2 weeks, this allows more people to enjoy the park. For longer term stays you probably need to go commercial or BLM dispersed camping. My only experience with central booking is with recreation.gov and they have a picture and a description of every site in my experience. Some County and City parks, fairgrounds, have full hookups and I don't think a time limit.

 

I wouldn't go too far out in reservations in case you break down or become ill. Maybe just the critical locations should be reserved.

[teacher's pet]

The only reservations made in advance is at a COE park near my family's reunion site, that I make 6 months ahead. Other than that the KOA close to our daughter's home about 2 months out since it is a heavy tourist and college area. I usually call about two hours before our arrival in an area to check on availability as we travel. Has worked well for 11 years of full timing.

[Nomad Hiker]

I think once we get through Canada we will roll the dice! A little bit of both (scheduling /free-wheeling) the first year!

[Kirk W]

Try it, you'll like it! I think that most of us do occasionally make reservations ahead when we want a specific location or when going into an area that is usually filled at busy periods. One of the niceties of traveling with cell phones is the ability to call ahead to a prospective park when you are nearly there. We do a lot of that type of thing nowadays where we used to just drive in.

[NKA]

I just finished my first six months of full-timing, and my first winter in FL. After reading all the warnings on this and other sites about the difficulty of finding parking in FL in the winter months, I have to say it was not nearly as difficult as I feared. Due to my work, i didn't know my itinerary more than a few weeks in advance at best. Looking just a few weeks out, I found that there was always some reasonable place to park near enough to where I needed to be. It may not have been my first, second, or third choice, but there was always something reasonable available. From Jacksonville to Naples, I moved every couple of weeks. Lots of places had something they called "overflow" or something like that. They may not have been the prettiest sites, but they were good enough - usually located near the entrance, which I liked. 

[Nomad Hiker]

1 hour ago, NKA said:

I just finished my first six months of full-timing, and my first winter in FL. After reading all the warnings on this and other sites about the difficulty of finding parking in FL in the winter months, I have to say it was not nearly as difficult as I feared. Due to my work, i didn't know my itinerary more than a few weeks in advance at best. Looking just a few weeks out, I found that there was always some reasonable place to park near enough to where I needed to be. It may not have been my first, second, or third choice, but there was always something reasonable available. From Jacksonville to Naples, I moved every couple of weeks. Lots of places had something they called "overflow" or something like that. They may not have been the prettiest sites, but they were good enough - usually located near the entrance, which I liked. 

Ya, we will probably "fly by the seat of our pants" as my mom used to say on occasion, but I know we also like getting our 1st or 2nd choice! I guess we are high maintenance?!  Perhaps that is because we are "seasoned" yet.  that may change with time.