Online RV Forums – Beacons of Help on the Road
I’d love to be able to tell you that I’m a self-learned expert. You know, the type that learns by books and elbow grease, becoming a leading voice on the subject of RVing through hard-earned grit and experience. The truth is that I (we) needed a lot of help, especially when we first started out, and a lot of that came from on-line forums.
In fact, these places have been absolutely wonderful sources of information and continue to be shining beacons of experience and social support for us as we go on our RV journey. Whether you’re baffled by camping etiquette, stumped by wiring, befuddled with tank breakdowns or just looking for a driving route that won’t give you premature grey hairs the online forums are here to help. It’s amazing, in a way, to think that so many people willingly bond together for absolutely no reason other then to help each other, but that’s absolutely what happens. I’m an active user and an active learner and I definitely recommend you be too. Here are my favorite free online forums:
1/ RV.net – This is an incredibly active community. Many sites “feed” into rv.net including Good Sam’s, Motorhome Magazine, Woodall’s, Trailer Life (and probably a few others I don’t know) and they all use the same forum. Their Class A forum is very active and they always have good tips in their campground section.
2/ Escapees – Escapees is a smaller group, but always very responsive. If you want to go in-depth this is a good place to be. I particularly like their volunteering and boondocking sections. You don’t have to be a member of Escapees to use their forum.
3/ iRV2.com – This rapidly growing group is very technically-minded and have dedicated “owners” forums for each manufacturer as well as forums by chassis and power-train. If I have a tech question I go here. These guys have a great little Android App too.
These are probably what I consider the “top 3” in terms of forum activity and response. There are lots of other communities, some of which are growing and worth checking out including rvforum.net (just discovered them recently and learning as we speak), nurvers.com (a group for younger RVers…still a small outfit currently), womenrv.com (a group for women RVers, run by women RVers!), and probably many more I have yet to discover.
So, if we haven’t met in person yet I’ll look forward to seeing you online. You’ll know it’s me when you see my mug shot on list 🙂
As an Escapees member, for an annual $10 download fee, you can get “Free and low-cost RV parking, overnight or longer, by and for members of the Escapees RV Club. The Directory is over 500 pages of listings in almost every US state and Canadian province.”
It’s a great resource for spots to park that may not be listed elsewhere.
Oh yes I love that list! We’re Escapee members and really enjoy the group. It’s one of the memberships we plan to keep. Nina
Another new one I like is cheap rv living forum, geared to the people living fulltime in smaller, cheaper RVs and having to work to maintain that. Singles out number couples, homebrew van conversions are common, as are older class C’s or small trailers. Age varies from 20s to 80s.
Thank you for that tip! I’ll definitely go check them out! Nina
First, thanks for the service you provide!
I just found websites you might like to promote for RVers and travelers…
At http://www.findfuelstops.com/ search by path and distance from origin for 25+ amenities including showers and medical services.
At http://www.truckstopsandservices.com/ search by state, city/hiway, within 25/50/75/100 mi, for 40+ kinds of repairs/services/truckstops — even Walmarts with or without truck parking. See also their app that works offline:
Truck Stops and Services search features right on your mobile device, even without an internet connection! Search our over 18,000 locations from one app. The free app is available today for virtually any mobile device…
Just a question, are all Camping World’s very slow at getting you propane on the Tuesday and Wednesday discount days? My visits to the AZ ones have been a nightmare. Today at Tucson’s after a long wait, I was told the manager said they wouldn’t have anyone to get it. Won’t be buying my 5ver at Camping World, or renew my Good Sam’s membership!