Do you sleep in your Class B or use it as a travel vehicle?

[Nick&Linda]

Side note - Which FitBit do you have. I need to replace my old, not working one.

Thanks,

Nick Murabito

[MsNomer]

Originally Posted by Sleeping Dog

We sleep in the van. Occasionally, particularly if it is going to rain through the evening and overnight, we'll take a motel.

Shucks. That’s when sleeping in the van is best and most convenient. Never even need to open the doors, much less trudge around with luggage.

[ChicagoTom]

I lived in mine for over a year. Very comfortable. I also sleep in it now about once a week and probably another 90 days a year while traveling. Plenty of room. You can only sit in one spot at a time, whether it’s a Class B RV or a 20 room mansion. All JMO

[TMac]

Definitely sleep in our PW Lexor TS. I actually haven’t even thought of getting a hotel while on our adventures - why would I? Seems to be a little counter productive to owning a Cl B in my opinion. We slept up to 3 adults on the almost king size sofa bed with no problems during a couple trips and another in the isle with a roll up camping mattress.

[alaimie]

I sleep in my 2007 Dodge Sportsmobile 170” Sprinter when I travel or camp. I haven’t used a hotel room since I bought it. However, I have used hotel parking lots for overnight parking when needed. My longest was for 40 days.

[pasusan]

I enjoyed reading everyone's answers.

We sleep in ours - we do keep our bed as an always bed and use the swivel front seats to sit in. We use our B for camping and visiting relatives - sleeping in their driveway. It's our little home on wheels.

[MsNomer]

As I browse this thread, I keep thinking, "Why wouldn’t I sleep in it? That's what it's made for!"

[Hatteras Jim]

One of my concerns with using the RV as a travel vehicle and staying in hotels - would be the security of the RV while parked at the hotel. Since you would not fit in most parking garages, you would be outside in the lot for oversized vehicles. Thieves know that you are carrying all of your possessions in the van (except your overnight bag), and you would make an easy target.

[pacificstar]

Qe love our Solis for all of the reason's stated. The length, the parking the less cost along the way. We use it for day and over night trips. Its our going out to eat venue during Covid. We went to the Pacific Northwest for almost a month. We slept in the Solis all except for a 2 night stay at Capitan Whidbey Inn. On our month long trip to Colorado we meet up with family and stayed about 4 nights with them. On our way home because of the extreme heat wave through western Colorado and Nevada we stay in a hotel 2 nights. So you sometimes need to be flexible. We have a queen bed with wonderful lines and a nice topper, a wet bath, a refrigerator & a 2 burner stove. That pretty much handles everything for us. Were a couple with a 65 point Golden Doddle. Enjoy!

[sehsteve@gmail.com]

Oh Yeah my wife and I slept in our 2002 Roadtrek 190P over 40 nights last year and traveled coast to coast and over 12,000 miles in various trips in 2021. During 2020 I think we slept about 45 nights in it. We never stay in motels but do stay with family or friends as available. We have slept in cool weather, low 30's to hot weather, all night with the AC on. It is like a cocoon for humans. Safe travels. Sleep tight.

[reilym]

On our first winter trip south in our RV, we spent 38 days on the road, with exactly 1/2 of them sleeping in the RV and the other half in hotels. We left with no particular plans, except to get away from Michigan to warmer climes and to visit family and friends along the way. The class B was ideal for this and we're looking forward to next winter already.

[Cokkie]

I do 500 miles at most, 5 days sleep in van with wife and dog then hotel or Airbnb. One or two nights clean out van and go again. Large RVs are to difficult and need way to muck planning. I sleep off dirt Rds all the time no one has ever bothered me . Went to a music festival in Vegas (pre Covid) and slept in the city.


the large RV's loose those

the driving experience changes from "i'm driving a big van" to "i'm driving a ryder truck"
and the fuels costs double ( or worse)
and municipal parking regs may limit where you can go



we sleep in our van with yearly trips of a month or so and occasional trips of a few days or a week during the year


In my work life- RocknRoll touring, I travel on a 45' Prevost with 7 or 10 others- I know what it's like to have a full on RV. That's why I choose a B





mike[/QUOTE]

[Kurt Franz]

Originally Posted by booster

We have done 50 days straight in our 190 Roadtrek without issue and without sleeping anywhere else. The longer you are on the road, the easier it gets we find. Way better than any hotel.

I see you have done what I am going to do. Can you elaborate on your thoughts, the goods, the bads, and the uglies so to speak? I would be most interested.....

[booster]

Originally Posted by Kurt Franz

I see you have done what I am going to do. Can you elaborate on your thoughts, the goods, the bads, and the uglies so to speak? I would be most interested.....

For us, very little downside, lots of upside.


The least enjoyable parts are that we are in the midwest (Minnesota) so it is a long ways to any coast, be it East, West, or Gulf. Same with real mountains. We do have lots of nice spots around here, but like variety also. The long drives to get to the good stuff gets old, but we are used to it and van setup to make it easiest for us to do. In a dash home for an emergency, we have done 850 miles in a day, but usually shoot for 600 per day tops going for recreation, and about 150 per day for average on a long trip.


Rainy days are a bit boring unless you are easy driving distance to a nice museum or other interesting thing to do, but the DVD player and microwave gets us through pretty smoothly if needed.



We tend to not be the move every day type campers. On a touring type trip we will go fro 2-3 days in nice spots with good hiking trails or other recreation we like. We also really enjoy longer stays in our favorite spots. We will be doing 2 weeks straight in one site at Custer State Park again this year. We go nearly every spring. We do two 320 mile days with a stay in a county campground on a lake on the way out, to make it less hectic and not having to leave at 6am to get there the same day late in the afternoon. Later this fall we will be doing a 4-6 week, semi flexible trip east and redoing the "parkway tour" we did in 2014 on our first long trip after retiring, which was 50 days and 7K miles. This time it will be about 5K and get us home with a bit more time to get everything done at home before it snows. It will be fun to see how 8 years experience and lots of van upgrades make the same trip we learned a lot on back then.


Bottom line is that if you have any companion, you better get along well and be patient . For us it is important to just accept it isn't all the luxury of home and it should be treated as just go with it, including less privacy and such, sort of like tent camping, but not to that extreme. We don't bring any nice "go out" clothes or expect to do any of that anyway. We are there for the outdoors and adventure.

[joelm]

We've been on the road 5 week in our van. We spent 2 nights in a friend's home the 2nd week and the rest in the van. We're currently taking a few days in an AirBnB, mostly to get to see if we like adding on a 'roomier' part to the trip.

Being in the van gives the huge advantage of waking up in a National or State park or boondock location rather than having to get from the hotel to travel to the place we want to be.

We try to stay for several days in each place (partly to work while traveling and partly to get to know places and reduce the travel stress.)

Bottom line is IF you think it's too small, try it and see. For us, the small size is the selling point and is more than compensated for by the flexibility and waking up in a park!

[Davydd]

We bought the Class B to avoid hotels and airplanes. We sleep in our van just about everywhere including family and friends' homes streets and driveways. We have an ambitious spring schedule of two RV rallies in Arkansas and Ohio, family in Pittsburgh and Indianapolis and the Indy 500 Race, our annual ritual. Summer is local short trips mostly in northern Minnesota and Wisconsin, fall is Texas and Louisiana again and whatever we feel like other places at the moment. We will finally get on a plane to Ft. Lauderdale and cruise the Caribbean on a Viking ship all the way to the Panama Canal. My wife has been busy planning our itinerary with reservations. I like to be a little more looser.

We did this past winter traveling from Ohio to Texas get caught in an unusual heavy snow storm in Louisville, KY and opt to stay in a hotel one night. We figured wherever we parked like a Walmart we might get run down or chased out with a snow plow.

[skiMore]

How many nights do you get before you need to dump the tanks and how many people are traveling?

[parkgt]

Yes and yes.

[Davydd]

Originally Posted by skiMore

How many nights do you get before you need to dump the tanks and how many people are traveling?

Class Bs are widely different in water, grey and black tank capacities and user habits are different as well in use like whether you use public bath and shower facilities or not, your eating habits, your boondocking habits, type of toilet, etc.

Two of us only. I did track my previous van dumping cycle and averaged 14 days between and always took on water after we dumped. We had unusually large tanks for a Class B, 40 gal. water, 28 gal. grey and 18 gal. black.

With our current van 40 gal. water, 26 gal grey and 25 gal black but a macerating upflow marine toilet that uses more water to flush I think we are going to get at least week between dumps. The black tank seems to determine the schedule now whereas the previous van both waste tanks seemed to fill up their respective but unequal tanks together. With a week or more we can plan ahead in dumping at some rest stops, service centers or camp grounds.

[SteveJ]

Originally Posted by skiMore

How many nights do you get before you need to dump the tanks and how many people are traveling?

We had a 2000 200V with a 35 gallon fresh tank. I was good for 14 days solo, 6 days if the wife was with. We do almost 100% dry/boondock camping.

Our Safari came with an Oxygenics shower head. Had we discovered how well that worked and miserly it is with water with the RT I'm sure the number of days between dumps would have been more. We only use 1.5 gallons per shower with the Oxygenics. Good stuff.