Where to stay when you're exploring

[mechmike10]

My wife and I live in Pa. We usually spend time in FL every winter (not the whole winter, but 1-2 months), anywhere between Jan. and Apr. So we spend a lot of time on I-95. Our experience has been that it is very difficult to find open campgrounds along I-95 from North Carolina to the north during that time period. I suppose it is too expensive to heat buildings and water for showers for the small number of people using the facilities, and if their water system is subject to freezing, they winterize it and it isn't available anyway.

 

[dcawd]

... Because I have no co-pilot, I typically need to pull off the road to manually search for many resources on multiple cumbersome devices (cellular and GPS).

...I would like to be able to glance at my Garmin and see icons displayed of every resource of interest **TO ME** (not of interest to Garmin’s paid advertisers) within 5 miles of that location.

Even better, I would like to tap the icon and be delivered waypoint navigation instructions directly to it. .

Exactly this. For those of us traveling in unfamiliar territory without navigators, pulling over regularly to search multiple apps and sites for places to stay or visit, check for cancellations, etc, is frustrating (first get a signal), a huge time waster, and gets old really quickly to the point where one misses (or just gives up on) potentially promising opportunities to explore. The ability to bring this together in one app, customized to one’s wants, would be huge. Multiple bonus points if one could download areas in advance for off line utility.

 

[InterBlog]

.... Last resort is Pilots and Loves truck stops unless you can't sleep with noise.:bow: ....

At many of them, the larger problems are:

(1) Hostility from truckers who do not want vanners taking up limited space, and

(2) Crime, and

(3) The cumulative impact of all that engine exhaust in the same space. If you pick a truck stop, you would be wise to know which way the wind is blowing.

But in the deep south, wind can't be counted on and heavy moisture-laden air can stand impossibly still at night - not the smallest hint of breeze. I've been in truck stops where it was unbearable to be trapped in a pod of truck exhaust, which of course contains carbon monoxide. There was no way I could remain there overnight - I value my health too highly.

There are anti-idling regulations coming into being, and commercially-supplied hook-ups for a/c and heat. I first saw one of these racks at a truck stop near the Louisiana-Texas border:

 

[peteco]

I have never had to park close enough to the trucks to have a bad odor problem. Noise yes, odor no. The truck stops I have stayed at (mostly Flying J) have a large enough general parking lot that I can park there at the edge in my B and stay away from the trucks. Maybe it is just Flying J but many RVs park in the parking lot. I have never felt unsafe at one, but maybe I am being naive. I usually roll in around 10-1030, gas up, park, pull curtains and sleep.

 

[InterBlog]

.... I have never felt unsafe at [a truck stop], ....

One of my good friends is a specialty trucker - right now, she is hauling vaccine under armed guard and the most elaborate security procedures ever devised (very interesting link BTW). She has scolded me about staying in truck stops, which she believes are too dangerous for women.

This was one of my most memorable truck stop moments - the neighborhood watch crowd with binoculars parked beside me, doing their level best to identify something of intense interest to them, with my bet being on prostitution and/or drug activity.