RV Parks and Long-Term Residents

One of the most useful RV-related sites I have bookmarked on my computer is RV Park Reviews . This site features reviews of RV parks all over the country and can help you find a park that will meet your needs. Along with basic information about facilities and links to their websites, there are candid reviews by RVers who've actually stayed there (I've contributed a couple of reviews myself). Once in a while you'll run across a review that warns emphatically, "DO NOT STAY HERE!" These warnings are reserved for the most run-down parks catering to run-down, debris-strewn units (as in long-term). Some reviewers report they didn't even stop their vehicle but just kept going, with a comment like, "This place is scary."

Then, in many reviews, you will see a somewhat disdainful reference to "many long-term residents."  Here, we're talking more than for a season, which is what most of us were thinking when we signed on to this RV life. We're talking people who have reached the last stop on their RV journeys.

But the reality is, many parks rely on long-term residents for day-in, day-out income, particularly in warmer climates where year-round RV living is really feasible. Here in Grants Pass, in Southern Oregon, full time RV living is very common. There are many RV parks in the area, and some of them seem to be populated almost exclusively by long-term residents; those parks, you won't even see listed in RV directories, but they dot the countryside. And by long-term, I mean trailers with porches, trailers that haven't moved for ten or fifteen years. Trailers that are starting to look a little...worn.

Our park here in Grants Pass, Oregon, has a nice upper section catering mainly to the short stay RVs, with cable television and Internet. It is close to the office, laundry, lounge, and showers. Around the perimeter of the upper area are a number of long-term residents who can afford these higher-priced sites and the services that come with them. Jan and I are among the few who are in a kind of intermediate category, here for several months, but definitely moving on, and we are in the upper section.

Then, down a little hill, is a large section of longer-term stays, some intermediate, like us, but mostly....permanent. Some of these people don't even own a car, let alone a tow vehicle. The space rent there is less, but does not include Internet or cable television. Many of the units are nice, but  almost as many are aging, and frankly, seeing them is rather sad and even distressing.

One couple relies on $750 a month Social Security and food stamps, for instance.

All of the park is well-maintained (great managers). The only difference, really, is the occupants. I've met a few of the long term residents at the Thanksgiving and Christmas open houses, and seen others around the park. They seem to be mostly on fixed incomes, some with apparent disabilities.  The travelers and the residents are two different groups of people, really, with different realities and different priorities. They don't mix much. Again, we're sort of in between.

We may be traveling very slowly, but we plan to keep traveling, God willing.