|
Sparkie, Welcome to "The Best Darned Forum on the WWW". We have found that joining a "camping club" or purchasing a park membership is a highly individual thing. A lot depends on your style of "camping" and whether you travel a lot or whether you are full time, or weekenders or just a couple weeks a year. As full timers that travel alot, not stationary, we feel that belonging to as many discount clubs as possible is a wise choice. We decide where we want to go and then locate a park or cg that fits that locale. Having said this, we are 1000 Trails members, Good Sam, Passport America, Escapees and RPI. We also use the military Fam camps and COE Parks. The only one we are truly vested in is 1000 Trails. This is a membership organization that has many CG's. However, not many in the upper midwest and east. Costing $1000's to get into and an annual dues setup the beauty is that you do not pay an overnight fee. The preserves, as they call them, are more rural and not usually located at "destination locales", mostly country campgrounds with lots of familial activity during the summer months. This is in direct contrast to the "RV Parks" that are mostly concrete and asphalt with lots of amenities that you may or may not take advantage of. When we are in an area to sightsee, we don't need a lot of amenities, other than full hookups.
Good Sam, PA and Escapees offer a quick return on your investment dollar in that they pay for themselve in just a few stays. 1000 Trails is a lifestyle that takes some time to see a return on investment.
Our preference for a CG would be 1000 trails first, then a Good Sam Park, then the others. I have stayed in some Passport America locales and ended up in the back 40 with or without full hook ups. Passport America does not own any parks but they have agreements with certain parks, and , has been said earlier, some offer the discount for one night or for a full stay.
Our RPI membership is through 1000 trails and we have used it several times and one time, after a one month long reservation, showed up at a CG to be told our reservation had been cancelled and they had no room for us. Luckily we were able to get into a nearby military base. We could never find out how that happened, but after calling RPI they informed me that they did not cancel and the individual park must have done so. This was a 5 star resort and over the 4th of July weekend. We had a feeling that they overbooked the park and rather than cancelling existing members they cancelled RPI folks as we weren't the only ones in that boat. That was the only time we had a problem with an RPI park....
Many folks pay nothing for camping. They boondock at different parks, COE grounds, BLM property and anywhere else public lands are available. This appeals to me, but I have not equipped my rig for boondocking yet, but may do so in the years to come. Need to make my investment back from 1000 trails first.
So, these are some things to take into consideration with the clubs/memberships mentioned. I would define my style of camping and then look into a plan that would commpliment that style.
|