Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I'm going to tow a travel trailer from Arizona to Alaska in the near future and I definitely plan on using Walmart along the way. I just need a place to park overnight. Why pay an RV park when I don't need any services? RV parks are great if you plan on being somewhere for more than a day and you want the hookups, but for traveling, Walmart or something similar is perfect. I can easily travel three or four days before I need to dump and take on more water. I have a bunch of the Allstays apps, so it's easy to find Walmarts that are accommodating, as well as dump stations. An added benefit is that there is no setting up or tearing down. Just park and go to sleep. Take a quick shower in the morning and hit the road.
I'm going to tow a travel trailer from Arizona to Alaska in the near future and I definitely plan on using Walmart along the way. I just need a place to park overnight. Why pay an RV park when I don't need any services? RV parks are great if you plan on being somewhere for more than a day and you want the hookups, but for traveling, Walmart or something similar is perfect. I can easily travel three or four days before I need to dump and take on more water. I have a bunch of the Allstays apps, so it's easy to find Walmarts that are accommodating, as well as dump stations. An added benefit is that there is no setting up or tearing down. Just park and go to sleep. Take a quick shower in the morning and hit the road.
IMO, a very reasonable plan.
With a fully self-contained unit and in-transit, paying for an RV campground site to obtain full hook-ups when you're "just parking" for the night doesn't make sense ... especially when many RV camps can cost $30-50/night.
"boondocking" makes sense for your trip requirements. As well, I've spent many a comfortable night at interstate or state highway "rest stops" for convenience while enroute to distant locations. Some even have sanitary dump facilities available at no charge and potable water to refill your tank. Even at the sites posted "no camping allowed", I've never been asked to leave with my self-contained rig ... even when there was a "host" on-site to keep the rules "enforced".
WalMart stops can make a lot of sense, too ... from the standpoint of sanitary facilities and convenience. Using their bathrooms saves your water supply and tankage use. Of course, it's polite to do some "shopping" while at their locations ... so I make a point of buying some small items at every such stop. As a business traveler, the credit card paper trail helps keep my travel records ... and there's times where the WalMart has some of the best local fuel prices, too.
I can easily travel three or four days before I need to dump and take on more water.
have cdl license? the filled water tanks may put you over weight limit and need be weighed at the stations
casinos are good for rv hookups/sleeping
lowes/home depot parking lots seem to have rv in them here. no clue if it is common like walmart, but its an industrial zoning, so a trailer isnt a problem and stores dont own the parking lot... so they dont care either
have cdl license? the filled water tanks may put you over weight limit and need be weighed at the stations
Are you serious?! I don't need a CDL for towing a travel trailer with a pickup. And I'm well aware of the weight limits of my trailer. A full tank of water does not put me anywhere near the limits of my gross weight limit. And there certainly is no requirement for me to stop at a weigh station. Have you ever even owned an RV or a travel trailer? The amount of misinformation in your post is absolutely stunning.
We had several retail stores that once welcomed RVers overnight. I said "had" because all have since stopped the practice not due to regulations, but abuse by the RVers. The closest Walmart has a sign saying No Overnight Parking. I know the county has no restriction on private property so my guess is more abuse that forced them to say "no more". I think camping in parking lots has gone from the occasional night to almost the plan for the whole trip.
We had several retail stores that once welcomed RVers overnight. I said "had" because all have since stopped the practice not due to regulations, but abuse by the RVers. The closest Walmart has a sign saying No Overnight Parking. I know the county has no restriction on private property so my guess is more abuse that forced them to say "no more". I think camping in parking lots has gone from the occasional night to almost the plan for the whole trip.
I'm thinking you may be reading more into the signage than is the case. My bet is that you're not an RV'er, especially not a self-contained RV.
I've pulled into a number of regional WalMart parking lots with "no overnight parking" signs on them with my RV and asked the front desk/manager if my overnight self-contained RV was OK to stay the night. The managers thanked me for asking in advance and assured me that I was welcome to stay. Their explanation was that too many folk had taken the WalMart hospitality for granted ... but the folk that "asked for permission in advance" seemed to be a group that they were happy to host.
Their biggest concern was during parking lot snow removal months that many RV'ers simply were too dispersed through the parking lot and made the snow plow operators job rather difficult. By directing the RV'ers who asked for overnight parking permission to a location of the manager's choice, the concern was well under control.
There's only one WalMart that I've been to that generally wouldn't allow overnight RV camping, and it wasn't due to county regs or "abuse by the RVers". It's in a Colorado resort town area and the local RV resort operators and resort lodging outfits didn't want the competition, So they asked WalMart management to curtail overnight RV parking. Especially in high tourist season time of the year. The least expensive RV parking in the town there for my 19' Class B RV, self contained ... no hook-ups needed and their central bath/shower rooms still "closed for the season" due to the cold weather freeze-up potential for the facilities ... was $79/night plus 11% local "lodging tax". That was for a parking spot on a barren pea-gravel site without anything else. "mind, don't park on the sprinkler heads next to the spot, you need to be careful that you're driving only on the pea gravel."
Kinda' outrageous price IMO, and the manager there wasn't going to budge off that overnight fee. I told them to pound sand and that I'd find a place to park for the night that welcomed RV'ers. The local state park facility was still "closed for the season" ... I asked the ranger there "why?" and he advised that their state lease for water use had a limited season; we were two weeks away from them having their water turned on so that they could have their bathhouse opened for camper's use. The ranger thought he'd help me by "allowing" me to park at one of their accessible sites for "only" $35 for the night as long as I understood that there were no bathrooms, no showers ... and I had to use only my own sanitary facilities, no dumping. Oh, and no hook-ups since they didn't have the power turned on to the campsites yet for the season.
I then went back to the WalMart, bought some groceries, and asked the manager again if I'd be OK to spend the night since I'd checked with the only open local RV park and their fee was outrageous for a parking spot for the night. The WalMart manager said I'd be welcome to stay for the night and assured me that their bathrooms would be open, too. He was so nice about helping out that I wound up going back into the store and bought some fishing lures and tackle to try out that year.
As I was traveling a multi-state region via my Class B RV and spending extended time out on the road calling upon remote area clients, it was highly beneficial to my overhead expenses to be able to stealth camp frequently at conveniently located parking lots in small towns in my territory. It wasn't uncommon for me to find that I had other commercial traveler RV'ers at those locations, too. Like me, it was a planned way of travel and much appreciated that the parking lots would allow us to do so. I never saw a conflict with shoppers, never saw any trash or garbage problems, and never had any noise complaints.
As I was traveling a multi-state region via my Class B RV and spending extended time out on the road calling upon remote area clients, it was highly beneficial to my overhead expenses to be able to stealth camp frequently at conveniently located parking lots in small towns in my territory. It wasn't uncommon for me to find that I had other commercial traveler RV'ers at those locations, too. Like me, it was a planned way of travel and much appreciated that the parking lots would allow us to do so. I never saw a conflict with shoppers, never saw any trash or garbage problems, and never had any noise complaints.
I can't remember if you've got a Rialta or a Roadtrek, but yeah you can slip under the radar with either.
I was at the Lake Havasu Walmart at 10 pm one night debating whether or not to spend the night while watching Security going around knocking on the doors of the RVs parked on the fringes of the lot. I can usually spend the night at a Walmart but this guy seemed pretty diligent. He might have suspected the silver van was an RV.
So I hit the road again and pulled into a hotel parking lot in Kingman. No one noticed me spending the night there and I saved $90.
Sometimes I stealth-camp at home just for the fun of it. There are 24-hour Safeways all up and down the Peninsula. Haven't had a problem yet.
We're talking about getting a bigger RV, maybe much bigger, and that would be impossible to stealth-camp with. One thing I've noticed about the big-rig folks, though, is that they sometimes arrive in the daylight and spend some number of hours on the fringes of the Walmart lot. We saw one that was camped in the Bakersfield Costco lot one afternoon, the owners obviously napping. Nobody seems to mind as long as you don't spend the night. We pulled over next to them and took a nap, too.
Apparently I'm the one on crazy pills, but what in the F is a Park N Lot? Have we lost the plot so badly that people no longer have the ability to spell or understand the word Parking?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
