by Bill Moeller
The Complete Book of
Boondock RVing
Camping Off the Beaten Path
Bill and Jan Moeller
Copyright © 2008 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Manufactured in the United States of America. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
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Contents
Acknowledgments
1. What Is Boondock RVing?
Why Boondock?
Extended Boondock Camping
A Sample Boondocking Trip
2. Where to Go Boondock RVing?
Public Boondocking Sites
Boondocking Sites: Private and Commercial Property
How to Find Boondocking Sites
3. Selecting a Rig
What’s Available?
Selecting Your Rig
4. Water, Sewage, and Trash
Water
Holding Tanks
Trash
5. Food: Stocking, Cooking, and Storing
Propane Supply
Stocking the Pantry
Cooking
Storing
Good Food, New Friends, Great Fun
6. Heating and Cooling
Heating
Cooling
7. Communications and Navigation
Cell Phones
E-Mail
Internet Access
Satellite Radio
Global Positioning System (GPS) Receivers
8. Boondock Electricity Made Easy
Basic Boondocking
Your RV’s Electrical System
Battery Basics
Types of Batteries
Battery Capacity: The Elusive Amp-Hour
Building a Battery Bank
Phantom Loads
Wet-Cell Battery Safety
Wet-Cell Battery Maintenance
9. Monitoring and Charging Your Batteries
Monitoring Your Batteries
Charging Your Batteries
Charging Methods.
Battery Life Cycles
The Rule of Twenty-Fives
Charging Devices
10. Engine Alternators
Alternators and RVs
Voltage Drop
Testing Alternator Efficiency
Battery Switches, Isolators, and Combiners
11. Generators, Converters/Chargers, and Inverters
Generators
Converters and Battery Chargers
Inverters
System Size
A Few Words of Caution
12. Sun and Wind Power
Solar Power
Selecting a Solar Power System
Solar Panels
Solar Panel Tests
Solar Controllers
Installing Your Solar Power System
Wind Generators
Appendix 1: A Selected List of Boondock Campgrounds
Appendix 2: Resources
Appendix 3: Recommended Reading
Index
Acknowledgments
We wish to thank the following people and companies for their help and support during the writing of this book: Chuck Campbell, RVing writer and photographer; Ben and Barbara Bachman of Bachman Enterprises for their TurboKOOL photos and charts; Chad Christ of East Penn Manufacturing Company, maker of Deka batteries; Miriam Robbins of Southwest Windpower for the wind generator photo; Gary Baxter and Tony Boatwright of Magnum Energy, maker of pure-sine-wave inverters; Rich Zinzer of Northwood Manufacturing for a good selection of photographs of its Nash and Arctic Fox trailers; Pamela Gray-Hann of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory for the great map of solar brightness in the United States; Daren Hatfield of Iota Engineering, maker of smart battery chargers; Stan Hackathorn of Wrangler NW Power Products for his help with high-powered alternators; Dave Needham of Progressive Dynamics, makers of fine RV products including converters; Sharon Halcomb of West Marine and Steven E. Paley of Navimo USA for the picture of Navimo flexible water tanks; and Bob Neudecker and Denis Pichii of Xantrex Technology, for pictures of several of their products. We also wish to acknowledge Greg and Deb Holder of AM Solar for working with us and adding to our knowledge of solar power. They are truly two good friends.
We also wish to thank two more very dear friends, Bob and Lynne Livingston, who have encouraged us in our writings, photography, and RVing. Bob is the man who knows the answers to all RVing problems. Thank you for being such good friends, and for having such a great sense of humor.
Lastly, I would like to thank my late wife, Jan, who was a superb writer, photographer, and traveling companion. I am giving her half of the authorship of this book even though she couldn’t contribute to the work because of her illness. She did, however, encourage me to finish the book. Back some thirty years ago, when we wrote our first book, she did 95% of the work, but very generously gave me half the credit. She was a wonderful lady.
CHAPTER 1
What Is
Boondock RVing?
Webster’s New World Compact Desk Dictionary defines boondocks as "a jungle; the back-country; or a hinterland." As Jan and I understand it, the word derives from the Tagalog word for mountain—bundok—and was picked up by U.S. soldiers after the Spanish-American War when they were sent into the jungles of the Philippines. It became more popular during the Vietnam War and has been used more and more by the general public ever since.
Boondock RVing (or camping) is, by an RVer’s definition, camping with your RV in a place where there are no electrical hookups, water faucets, sewer drains, and phone or cable TV connections. This is also called dry camping or primitive camping. Boondocking RVers are people who have their RVs equipped for this type of camping.
We first started boondocking in the 1960s, and during that time, we had two different RVs. Our first rig was a rented pickup camper, which we took on a grand tour of most of the western states. It had minimal equipment aboard: an icebox, two 110-volt lights, a two-burner propane cookstove, a water tank with a hand pump at the galley sink, a Humphrey propane mantle light, and a chemical toilet, which was just a large wooden box with a seat and cover, filled partly with water and chemicals to control the smell.
(RVIA)
The trip was boondocking at its best. Our home was always with us, and we were able to pull off the road whenever we chose to eat, sleep, and rest. Camping life was simple then—and delightful. At night we would park our camper in a forest campground. With a gas light hissing away, we had comfortable warmth with plenty of light for reading and a battery-powered, shortwave radio for entertainment. The only problem we ever encountered was the lack of a furnace or heater, which we keenly felt when an early September snowstorm in Yellowstone Park left behind 6 inches of snow.
After that trip, we bought a small Tow-Low trailer, which was a big improvement. Among other things, it had an AC/propane refrigerator, a convection furnace (although no fan), a pressure water system (using a hand pump to pump up the air pressure in the water tank), and a Porta-Potti toilet. With this RV, we traveled from New York to Nebraska, up through Canada, then into New England and down the coast to our home in Connecticut, enjoying boondock camping wherever we could find it.
Today’s RVs are much different from our early rigs. All the appliances and electronics in modern RVs make them seem more like houses than vehicles, what with washing machines, dishwashers, slideouts, and the like. But with the right equipment and some thoughtful planning, you can still take off in these modern RVs and enjoy the wilderness.
WHY BOONDOCK?
Ask any number of boondockers why they boondock and you’ll probably get as many different answers. For example:
Enjoy the freedom.
Save money.
Experience primitive camping.
Camp in our national parks and Forest Service campgrounds.
Convenience.
Visit the grandkids and other relatives and be able to park in their driveway.
Get away from it all—cell phones, PDAs, faxes, e-mails, meetings, computers, and modern life in general—as much (or as little) as you want to; these days it’s easy to stay "connected" on the road.
Fun and Freedom
First and foremost, boondocking is fun. Imagine camping by a backwoods stream and having the option of either watching a football game on your satellite TV system or doing some fishing in the stream. Or you wake up with the early morning sun pushing through dense forest leaves, step out the door of your RV and onto a hiking trail. A few hours later, you come back, turn on the coffeemaker, and e-mail your Aunt Tillie all about your morning.
With boondocking, you get to enjoy freedom of choice because you’re not locked into camping in a full-hookup campground. You can choose a private campground as well as a place off the beaten path. You can live simply and rough it, or pile as many amenities into your RV as you can.
We’ve roughed it and enjoyed it tremendously. But we also occasionally missed some of our favorite television shows, particularly football games. So we eventually got a small, black-and-white, 12-volt DC TV with a good AM/FM radio. And with our shortwave radio, we could still listen to the BBC from London, the Voice of America, or even the Voice of the Andes even if we were really in the boonies. These gave us immeasurable pleasure. Today a satellite dish operated from an inverter does the job, giving us plenty of movies, news, and sporting events to watch.
We believe it’s all worth it because many of these modern conveniences make for happier camping. Boondock camping is all about being able to do what you want, when you want. Some of our books, at least in part, have been written in the comfort of our fifth-wheel trailer while we boondocked. And we’ve enjoyed every minute of it.
Save Money
If the main reason for boondock camping is to enjoy the experience, the second main reason is cost. RVing is one of the least expensive ways to live or travel. Many fulltimers living on fixed incomes from Social Security or pensions have found this to be true, as have families who take vacations or spend weekends camping in their RVs. Boondock camping is a wonderful way to make this experience even more affordable.
Additionally, the cost of staying in private campgrounds is increasing, going up by a dollar or more per night each year. We recently read an article in RVBusiness magazine, written by a campground spokesman, that stated the industry envisions campground prices will eventually reach a level of 50% of the cost of a midlevel hotel or motel. Consequently, if you would normally pay $100 a night for a hotel room, you would pay $50 a night in an RV park. Even those RVers who can afford those prices may appreciate being able to average out the yearly campground fees by boondocking as much as possible. If you pay $50 for one night’s camping and then boondock for the next three nights at no cost, you have reduced your average cost to only $12.50 a night for four nights of camping.
Please understand we are not advocating ripping someone off by free camping. We have seen some RVers sneak into a private campground after the office was closed, fill their water tank, dump their sewage, leave their garbage, use the electricity, and spend the night, then leave early in the morning before the owner or manager arrives. To us this is stealing pure and simple. As you’ll see in Chapter 2, there are many places where you can camp for free without cheating or stealing.
Fuel Costs
In these days of high prices for gasoline and diesel fuel, doing a little boondock camping can help equalize your RVing expenses. RVers are worried about the high fuel costs and justifiably so. On a recent solo trip with our fifth-wheel trailer from Ventura, California, to Billings, Montana, and then to Albany, Oregon, Bill spent $1,035 for fuel: 326.9 gallons of diesel fuel at an average cost of $3.15 per gallon. (Our usual mileage while towing is about 10 miles per gallon.) Bill also spent $743 for campground fees and boondocked for six nights. So figuring $25 per night, Bill saved about $150. It would have been even nicer to have boon-docked throughout the whole trip. It’s possible that fuel prices may come down . . . but they may also keep going up. In any event, saving $150 is always a good thing!
A recent Recreation Vehicle Industry Association (RVIA) news release poll discussed this issue of fuel costs in light of RVing trends. Some of the results are listed below:
45% of RV owners said they may stay closer to home for their camping than they have in the past.
52% said they will stay a week or longer at one site to save on fuel costs.
67% said they will still use their RVs more than in the previous year.
37% reported that the cost of fuel would not affect their RV travel plans.
So whether you alter your RVing habits by traveling less or make no changes at all, you still can benefit from boondocking.
Experience Nature
There are many good reasons for staying in private campgrounds. You can enjoy the convenience of electrical hookups, cable TV laundry facilities, a sewer dump at the site, and free running water. And there are times when a
private campground is a necessity. In fact, we stay in them the majority of the time, particularly when we have a writing project to do or when we are in a hurry to get to a certain place.
But there are other times when we feel the need to get out in the wild and feed our psyches by being free. And being free means camping in an out-of-the-way place, so we can smell the mountain air, hear the waves crashing on an ocean beach, or enjoy a scenic view. The wilderness is our particular religion, our place of worship, our nourishment.
Sometimes the wilderness is just an adventure in the unexpected, such as the time in Waterton Lakes National Park in Canada when a bull elk looking for his bride decided to bugle 20 feet away from our trailer at 2:30 in the morning. It got our attention real fast, but it has also given us something to talk about ever since.
While some people may see boondocking as a means to beat the high cost of private camping, we believe most RVers think of it as a way to be close to the environment in a natural setting. Falling asleep at night listening to an owl hooting near your rig or waking up in a beautiful location, perhaps close to special activities you like—such experiences are part of the joys of boondocking.
We are fortunate to live in a country that offers so many places to get close to nature, such as our national parks and forests and recreation areas, all of which have boon-docking campsites (see Chapter 2). Most small state and county parks are also dry camps. A few may have electricity available, but that is all, and it will most likely be an old 15 amp outlet. Some dry camps might even have a trash station, but in effect you are still boondocking. A lot of the parks in the mountains or along our beaches have nothing more than a space in which to park your rig.
RVers boondocking on the beach at Seward, Alaska.
Convenience