Reservation Timeline

[Luna18]

We are one year from going fulltime.

How far out do you make your rv resort reservations?? One month, two months, 3, 6 ??

Or do you just go with the wind, stopping where ever for the night?

[ventrman]

I have never made an advance Reservation at an RV Park. I may call ahead when I decide where I want to stop. I have never had an Issue. I pulled my 5th Wheel all the Way up the Eastern Seaboard to Bar Harbor Maine.

[arhayes]

We never pull in somewhere without a reservation as I do t want to waste my time. That reservation. May have been made an hour before from the road. Otherwise, we rarely get too wrapped up in reservations other than for ones around major travel holidays or in resort/high raffia type venues.

Have fun - it’s a great country!????

[doxiemom11]

We have been full-time for 7 years and have only made reservations around holiday times or at a location that is popular with tourists. We have gotten the last spot once, but otherwise never turned away by just calling ahead or driving in.

[lj2654]

We are going full time next June and I am making State Park reservations now as you can do them 11 months out. COE's are mostly 6 months and the Military campgrounds are all different.

[2gypsies1]

Depends on a lot of issues... do you need specific types of parks? in a popular attraction area? do you need hookups? what kind of full-timing will you do... staying in one place for a long time or moving around weekly or every two weeks to explore the areas?

We full-timed for 16 years and if we had to make reservations for all that time we wouldn't have gone full-timing. We likesto explore all areas of a state, not sit in a RV park. We love national parks, state parks, national forest service campground, boondocking and especially done in the West. Rarely did we make reservations unless we absolutely had to be somewhere at a certain time such as visiting family.

[MarkTwain]

RV Parks/Resorts that are frequently used by "Snow Birders" every winter require reservations 8 to 12 months in advance. Areas like Arizona, Indio, Ca., or Southern Calif. need reservations well in advance. Winter season generally means Dec. through March. The longer your reservations the lower the cost. i.e. 3 to 4 month reservations are much lower than I month. Flying by the seat of your pants and trying to make reservations as you go in popular RV areas is not a good idea. " you have everything to lose and nothing to gain" by not making reservations well in advance. Reservations do not lock you in to a rigid route trip, you can always call and cancel. Just make sure you ask what the cancellation policy is for each reservation you make.

[azdryheat]

Our favorite place to stay is Chula Vista RV park near San Diego. Loads of folks stay there for a month or more. Gotta reserve early because all the weekenders fill the place up and bump out the long termers. (Add to the fact that their office personnel don't know what they're doing).

[Bill_Satellite]

It depends upon how long you plan to stay there, how important it is that you stay at that specific location and the time of year.
Holiday weekends or popular events require a good deal of pre-planning. If you want to be at the Presidential campground for the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta you need to plan 1 year ahead. If you just want to attend the Fiesta and don't care where you stay you can likely wing it or make a reservation somewhere nearby a month or 2 in advance. The longer you want to stay and the more important that stay is will determine how far out to plan. We very, very rarely make reservations and if we do it's usually only a few days in advance. I use the Balloon Fiesta as an example as I have done it all. We first made "on-grounds" reservations a couple of weeks out, we made reservations for the Presidential 1 year out, the very first day they accepted reservations and 3 times now we have had no reservations and dry camped at the local casino for free. You just need to consider your plans and how other campers plans might affect your plans.

[Dutch_12078]

It depends on where we'll be going and our experience or knowledge of the area. For Florida in the winter, for example, we make most our reservations for the following winter while we're there for the current winter in order to get the best site selections. In some cases such as the popular FL state parks, they fully book within seconds of the 11 month online reservation window opening for the winter months. We also book reservations for major holidays well ahead of time for the same reasons. Other times, we just "go with the flow", sometimes only calling a park an hour or two ahead of time to see if they have a spot for us for a few days. Most of the time that works fine, although we don't always get into our first choice park. Now, you did mention "resorts" though, so assuming you mean only those high end parks that cater to those of us with bigger checkbooks and high end RV's, they can be more selective in what they will allow in, no matter how far in advance you check with them. But there are also a fair number of parks with "resort" in their names that are really not worthy of the label, so "buyer beware" very much applies in park selection. Do your homework...