RVT.com RV Trader Blog

North to Alaska! Getting There Is Half the Fun

Alaska is America’s last great wilderness and the dream destination of many RVers. In the September issue of Insight from RVT.com, we share travel tips from a summer tour of Alaska. (Click here to sign up for our monthly enewsletter.) This week we’ll share additional information about things to do and see, cool shops and restaurants, and more helpful RV travel tips you can use to plan your own RV tour.

Getting to Alaska is an adventure. Divided by huge mountain ranges, much of Alaska is accessible only by boat or plane. It’s a land of few paved roads, most of them located in the south central region connecting Fairbanks to Anchorage and the scenic Kenai Peninsula. Because many roads and scenic areas are inaccessible once the snows start in late September, you’ll want to plan now for a trip next summer. Summer travel in Alaska is pleasant. In July, daytime temperatures were 70-80F., dropping to 50-60F. at night. Be glad of the cool weather; Alaskans don’t have A/C.

If you want to travel in your own RV, you can take the long drive up U.S. Route 5 from Seattle or across Canada. Or load your RV onto the ferry at Bellingham, Washington and connect with Alaska’s extensive Marine Highway System in Prince Rupert, Canada. You can ride the Alaskan ferry through the Inland Passage, along the southern coast to the Kenai Peninsula, Kodiak and the Aleutians. If your time is limited, fly into Anchorage and rent an RV.

RV Travels in Wine Country

A tour of wine country makes a delightful RV vacation or weekend excursion. America is home to many fine vineyards that produce excellent vintages equal to any of the world’s finest wines. You don’t have to take your RV to France or Napa Valley in California to enjoy fine wines. Excellent regional wineries dot the American landscape, making wine country tours accessible to most RVers. Gather a few friends, stock the RV with cheese and crackers and head for one of these noted American wine regions:

Texas Hill Country. Texas is home to 180 wineries. Head to the town of Grapevine near Dallas for GrapeFest from September 17-20. Take part in the grape stomping contest and you could win the coveted Purple Foot Award. Then tour the Hill Country to sample Texas’ best vineyards. Find info and maps at TexasWineTrail.com.

Yakima Valley, Washington. Plan your tour the valley’s 60 wineries with info at WineYakimaValley.org. Try your hand at wine making at Two Mountain Winery’s Winemaking for a Day class on October 17. Cost is $40; sign up at TwoMountainWinery.com.

Southeastern Virginia. Taste the high life at the King Family Vineyards near Charlottesville. On Sundays through October you can watch a polo match while enjoying a sumptuous picnic accompanied by the vineyard’s most popular vintages. Info at KingFamilyVineyards.com.

Leelanau Peninsula, Michigan. Put your personal stamp on a case of wine at Burgdorf’s Winery in Haslett. Select a grape, then help blend, bottle, cork and label your personal vintage. Make reservations at BurgdorfWinery.com.

‘Green’ Driving Practices Save Money

Cheap gas prices have encouraged RVers to hit the highways this summer. The price of a gallon of regular unleaded hovered at a relatively comfortable $2.63 a gallon at the beginning of July, according to AAA’s Fuel Gauge Report. That’s an average $1.50 less per gallon than we were paying last year, but it can still make for a hefty charge when you’re filling up the tank on a Class A motorhome. More RVers are adopting “green” driving techniques to maximize fuel savings and keep gas charges low.

Promoted by the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, EcoDriving USA offers tips to help RVers and other motorists save money at the pump and reduce their carbon footprints by up to 15%. Here are some of our favorite tips.

> Turn off your engine while you’re waiting at the curb while mom runs in to pick up a gallon of milk. You can save half a gallon of fuel for every hour spent idling.

> Remain calm while driving. You can increase fuel economy by as much as 33% by avoiding rapid starts and stops and driving less aggressively.

>Slow down. Sit back and enjoy the scenery; after all, isn’t that one of the reasons you RV? Gas mileage diminishes quickly at speeds above 60 mph. Every 5 mph over 60 will cost you the equivalent of 20 cents more per gallon of gas.

>Pump up. Check tires often and keep them inflated to manufacturer’s specifications. Properly inflated tires can boost RV mileage by 3.3%.

Family Bonding Real Prize on RV Reality Show

Tonight’s the night. The Coote and DiSalvatore families duke it out for the big $100,000 prize on the finale of NBC’s Great American Road Trip (8 p.m. Eastern, 7 p.m. Central). The prime time reality show has brought the fun of RV living into America’s living rooms as we’ve watched seven families traveling by motorhome trek from Chicago to Los Angeles. The cross-country tour has been peppered with weird attractions, comic competitions and an undeniable love for RV traveling.

“Our RV became our home away from home. I would do it again in a second,” competitor Amy DiSalvatore told RVIA. Families travel in Fleetwood’s Bounder Class A motorhomes.

“The competing families all found the experience of RVing to be rewarding and fun, with many families who were sent home saying that the trip itself brought them closer together, and that family bonding was the real prize,” RVIA VP Gary LaBella said in an RVIA press release. RVIA assisted the show’s producers.

The show has been great PR for the RV industry which just got another boost with last week’s premier of Glenn Martin, DDS on Nick at Night (8 p.m. Mondays). A collaboration between Nickelodeon and former Disney honcho Michael Eisner, the stop-motion animated comedy follows a dentist — voiced by Saturday Night Life alumnus Kevin Nealon – and his family on a cross-country RV road trip. Once again, RV living brings together a dysfunctional family that has lost touch with each other. What’s next? An RV super hero?

RV Renters Soon Become Owners

Try before you buy. That’s the advice a lot of experienced RVers pass along to folks who are curious about the RV lifestyle. Renting an RV for a weekend getaway is a great way to try out the RV lifestyle before you plunk your money down. Once you choose your dream RV, rent it for an extended vacation trip — at least a week — to get a real feel for RV ownership. Most renters enjoy the convenience and comfort of RV travel so much, they soon become RV owners.

You may want to try out several different RV models to see which one best meets your traveling needs. If you enjoy the simple life, a “pop-up” folding trailer or truck camper may be all you need. If you plan to do a lot of touring once you reach your vacation destination, a detachable travel trailer might be your best bet. If you’ll be traveling with kids, you may want the extra space found in a Class C motorhome. If you like long vacations or plan to retire to an RV, you may want the roomy luxury of a Class A motorhome with a slideout or two.

RVT.com makes it easy to rent an RV and take it for a spin. Use RVT.com’s handy state-by-state RV rental locator to locate RV rentals in your state or arrange a rental in a distant state if you’re planning a fly/drive vacation. Then book your RV rental online on RVT.com and start packing!

Rising RV Demand = Good Time to Sell

Like flocks of migrating birds, RVers have taken to the highways this August. Whether enjoying some vacation time, trying to beat the city heat or in search of one last great adventure before the kids go back to school, RVers are taking advantage of still low gas prices to tour the country. RV sales are up, spurred by the recovering economy and a growing interest in economical vacation travel. Increased demand led Keystone RV to acquire a 140,000-square-foot plant in Goshen, Indiana where it will hire 200 new employees for a fall start-up. With interest and demand rising steadily, this is the perfect time to sell your used RV.

RVT.com makes it easy to sell your RV online. Our easy 5-step process walks you through each step of creating an online ad from selecting your ad options to writing ad copy and adding photos to creating a secure account to handle communication with interested buyers. North America’s leading online RV seller, RVT.com offers helpful tips at each stage of the selling process, sharing with sellers a decade of tried-and-true online sales experience.

When you place an ad on RVT.com, there’s no word limit to cramp your style. Our low price allows you to add 12 photos to your ad (more for a slight additional charge). You get unlimited free ad updates, ad tracking, secure email link, Email Ad to Friend feature, free phone and email support, and national exposure to thousands of motivated RV buyers who visit RVT.com every day.

Protect Email from Hackers While Traveling

Staying connected is important when you’re on the road, particularly if you’re one of the many RVers who have adopted a mobile RV lifestyle and live and work from your RV. In our August 14 post we discussed how easy it is to stay in touch with family, friends and business clients via the Internet when you’re RVing. Many RV parks now provide free or low-cost WiFi; however, open WiFi networks can make your email account – and the personal information stored there — vulnerable to hackers.

Security experts recommend taking the following basic precautions when using open WiFi networks:

> Create a dedicated email account for use on the road.

>Create a unique password for your travel account. Avoid using your bank or credit card passwords.

>To create a strong password, Microsoft password checker recommends a minimum of 8 characters and preferably 14 or more, including a combination of upper and lowercase letters, numbers and symbols that would be hard for someone to guess. If your system supports use of the space bar, consider creating a three- or four-word pass phrase. Just don’t get too carried away with the cloak and dagger stuff; you do need a password you can remember.  

> Disable file and printer sharing.

> Delete your browsing history when you log off (under Tools in Microsoft Explorer or choose Private Browsing in Apple’s Safari menu).

> Keep security programs up-to-date. Business users might want to consider a Virtual Private Network that encrypts transmissions to prevent interception.

Staying Connected on the Road

Unplugging from the rat race used to be part of the allure of RV travel; still is for many vacationers who happily leave their computers at home. But with more full-time RVers on the road and more folks working from their RVs while traveling, staying connected to the Internet has become an essential element of RV life. Even vacationers are choosing to stay connected t0 plug into digital photography and scrapbooking sites, update their Facebook page or blog and follow the Twitterati.

Staying connected when you RV is easy, even for the technologically challenged. Many RV campgrounds now provide WiFi free or for a nominal fee. If your notebook isn’t already WiFi enabled, all you need to do is buy an inexpensive WiFi receiver card (about $50) that plugs into a slot in the side of the notebook, allowing it to pick up the broadcast signal. If you use a desktop computer or have an older notebook without an appropriate slot, you can use an external USB adapter. USB adapters run about $40. Plug it into an open USB port and you’re ready to go. 

If you work from your RV, you should consider purchasing a mobile broadband card, available for both notebook and USB adapters. Mobile broadband service can be purchased from any major cell phone provider. It uses a cellular device to access the Internet and allows you to connect wherever cell phone coverage is available from your provider. Plans and costs vary, so read the fine print.