 If you live full-time in an RV or a van or you're a part-timer or a wannabe or a soon-to-be, you might be wondering if this life is still possible with COVID-19 restrictions that change state by state. And yes, I'm here to tell you that it's still totally possible. You need to have an arsenal of options and today I'm going to give you everything you need so that you can hit the road right now. This is 10 tips to plan your trip. You're planning than the average bear anyway, especially if you travel from place to place. But in the age of COVID restrictions, it can be a little bit trickier because if you live in a house or an apartment in one place, you only have to track the restrictions in your area. For us, if we're on the move, we need to track the restrictions going from place to place, which means that we need to have a lot of backups. So today, I'm going to give you everything you need so you can securely hit the road right now. Really quick, I'll tell you, if you're not a subscriber, please do and ring the bell for notifications because coming up Wednesday, so in four days, I'm going to take all of the resources I'm going to give you right now and actually show you how I integrate them so that I can plan an actual trip with a plan A, B, and C. You can see it in action. So everything I'm going to talk about today, all of the options, the apps to find those resources and up-to-date websites that give you information on the closures that I found were great are all in my blog. I couldn't list all the links below, there are a ton. So I put one link to my blog, it's pinned at the top of comments, pop over to my blog, subscribe if you haven't already, and check out the article because it gives you everything you need that I'm going to mention today. Okay, let me get into all the options and I'm going to say right here, camp like you. I have resources for every type of rig and budget and style. Everybody has a different life and we all need different things at different times. I never thought that I would be in an RV park. I imagined that I would find a boondocking spot and just, you know, drive out to the spot I chose and it would be right there and it was just going to be glorious. It's not like that. You always need to have a backup and keep your mind open. The good news is that things are opening but they are a little bit in flux. So let me go through the options and for each one I'm going to tell you how COVID is affecting them and things you might need to take into consideration if you want to add that into your trip planning. The first thing is RV parks and private campgrounds. Now, when the COVID closures first started, there was a big muddled patchwork of openings and closures across the country and people were scrambling because every state has different rules. In the beginning there were several states that said all RV parks and campgrounds must close and in other states they said they were essential businesses services or housing and in other states they took them all on a case-by-case basis. So you can see that for travelers this made it a little bit difficult. It is better now but every state has a different rule and some places close and reopen and close again so you really have to do some research and call in advance. Now here are some things that you want to take into account if you're going to go to an RV park. Of course, they're nice because usually they have a level spot, you can make a reservation in advance, they might have water power, a Wi-Fi signal, dump, laundry, whatever else you might need on site. Some of them do have that but they can be pricey and it's not like you're getting back to nature. You know they cram as many people as they can usually onto these properties which means you'll have a beautiful view of your neighbor's slide every night instead of a sunset but for some of us right now maybe the pros outweigh the cons. The problem is that it's summer and normally in summer RV parks are full anyway and now that more people are going out to these parks it can be hard to find a spot. Now if you're lucky and you find a spot you might call and say I'm a long-term renter, what's the price? If you're a long-term renter, let's say in the fall winter months where there's not that much demand, you can get a nice monthly rate at a lot of these places but not in the summer. A lot of times in the summer you have to look out for something called the weekly daily because they do not charge a monthly rate in the summer, a lot of these places. They only charge by week or by day so your cost might be three times more than it would be if you were a long-term renter over the winter months. It can get expensive doing it that way but if that's what you want to do look out for the winter months because a lot of people book those a year in advance so if you think you want to stay in an RV park through like April a lot of you have to book it now because they will kick you out to get their long-term renter in if they have one coming. You know it's funny RV sales are exploding right now and demographically it's a lot of people that never thought about being in an RV. They want a socially distanced or they can work remotely now or maybe they're just rethinking their life and a lot of these dealerships tell them that RV parks and campgrounds are the way to go but not so. There are a lot of other ways to camp so let's get into those. The second camping resource I want to tell you about are federal campgrounds. Now you might not know it but there are three big federal agencies that actually offer camping one is the National Park Service one is the US Forest Service and the other one is BLM which is the Bureau of Land Management. They all do a bunch of different stuff besides campgrounds and because of that they're under a bunch of different offices in the federal government so they all have different rules and requirements and these campgrounds are in different states so same thing you really have to do your diligence and look and see what the rules are in the exact place that you're going. The good news is that I'm finding that these federal campgrounds are open more than maybe some private campgrounds are because they're usually more out in nature which means a better view than your neighbor's slide and they don't take as much staff to manage but every place is going to be different so most of these places you make a reservation through reservation.gov again all the links are in my blog post but if you go into reservation.gov they're going to tell you that they're not responsible for updating you on COVID closures so before you hit reserve make sure that you call the actual local office that manages that campground yes you can do that it's easy and they pick up the phone so let's say you find a campground that you like you checked out the reviews you look on reservation.gov it looks open hold on don't make the reservation yet google that campground and it will tell you which local office of BLM or USFS or whatever actually manages that campground of course they're there during regular business hours but they're going to tell you what their restrictions are and actually the restrictions are really interesting because some of these places are closed because they don't have the staff to maintain the area like fire hazards for example or road maintenance or camp hosts now some of these places will tell you that when you get there they want you to quarantine which like hello we're at an RV no problem or that you have to be prepared to bring your own cleaning supplies if you want to use their bathrooms for example because they don't have the staff but a lot of them are open which is great you can make the reservations in advance which can make you feel a little bit more secure but a lot of them also have walk-in sites now when i first started i thought that walk-in spots meant that you had to like throw a backpack on and like walk into the spot that there wasn't even room for a car to drive in not so in most places a walk-in spot is just a non-reservable spot so if you're in a jam and you need a place to go federal campgrounds are not a bad place if they have an available walk-in spot these campgrounds are usually quite a bit less than RV parks or private campgrounds but they mostly don't have water dump electric although there may be those services nearby so if you choose one of these you have to plan in advance which i'll show you so that you can get those resources before or after you're in the campground okay the next way to camp is boondocking now if you're not familiar with boondocking check out the playlist for be a nomad change your life i have videos that explain it and tell you exactly how to find spots or check out my book under the same name on amazon boondocking is my favorite way to camp for a few reasons first of all i'm in nature right there is no neighbor next to me unless i want one and it's super inexpensive usually boondocking is completely free which is nice for my budget and allows me to live the life that i want without having to worry about the expense of an RV park but right now the downside to boondocking is that usually you have to move every 14 days which means you actually have to find the resources and another spot every 14 days which can be a little bit trickier right now that it may have been six months ago for the most part though most boondocking spots are open i called a couple of blm offices that manage really popular areas and they said yeah we can't shut down every road that goes out to every place now if it's a place that is carefully monitored for fire or something like that and there's one road in that they can close they might do it if they don't have the staff to actually go in and check on the spots it's not because they're worried about the spread of covid or they don't want us there it's because they don't have the staff they need to make sure that the land is okay but do call in advance they're going to tell you and again they answer the phone now if you're not familiar with boondocking it basically means that you're going out into an area on your own where you're usually going down a dirt road so uneven dirt roads uneven spots and you don't have access to water power electric trash those are the things that you really have to plan for in advance that means you need to be prepared to get the water the power the propane the food whatever on your way in and to pack out everything else leave no trace I'm going to show you how to plan for boondocking spots in Wednesday's video but again in my prior videos I actually show you how to find a spot on BLM land when covid first happened I was boondocking with a bunch of people and we thought oh well just circle the wagons you know a lot of us had um solar extra water bladders you know we thought we were just going to stay out there and covid was going to affect everybody else and not us but what we found in the beginning like for everybody else is that we would have to go into town to get propane or something and the business would be closed so if you plan to boondock do look at what the business restrictions are not just where you're camping but also in the local area so you make sure that you can get what you need there okay the next thing to add into your arsenal of camping options is boondocking on private land now a lot of us have mooch docked where this thing began a term I had never heard before but it basically means you're staying on a friend's property I did that for a little bit but I needed to move on because I didn't have a cell signal or great access to water so you got to be able to adapt and pivot a little bit if you don't have a friend's property you could stay on or you don't have the services you need you might consider boondocking on other private property so let me turn you on to some things you may not have known about before this the first resource I want to tell you about is hip camp hip camp is free for us to go on and find camping that is provided by private land owners I was actually going to go through hip camp to stay on a private alpaca farm that had six acres and I could drive out anywhere I wanted on the property the landowner provided water and it was $15 a night now my plans had to change because of some other things that came up but that gives you an example of what's available now a lot of people that have private property now are loving hip camp because it helps them pay their mortgage especially if they have a big property and they can have responsible campers that come out stay for however long a lot of these places don't have restrictions on time and then they move on think about it as the airbnb of boondocking camping spots there are also hip camp spots in cities people will literally rent out their driveway so it all depends on what you need the next resource I'm going to tell you about is boondockers welcome now I just tried boondockers welcome for the first time I'm a fan there's a membership fee I think it's 40 to 50 bucks a year and basically once you're a member you have access to all of the different free places you can camp that are provided by other members because people that have properties and are RVers get a few free months of boondockers welcome when they offer their property out for other people and look in the beginning I was unsure about it because I don't know about going out to somebody's property I don't know and then I had a bunch of friends who loved it and depended on it to find a spot on their way to somewhere else and they loved their host and they've had a really good experience you can't beat it especially if you want to meet other RVers the third way to boondock on private land is through Harvest Hosts Harvest Hosts is essentially 79 bucks a year to have access to hundreds and hundreds of these spots if you look down below I have a link that will give you 15 percent off the cool thing that Harvest Hosts does is it finds host locations at organic farms and lavender fields and wineries and museums and all kinds of places that you would never normally see you know when I first started my first couple years it was like highway highway highway boondocking highway highway treks stop rest area boondocking right and I didn't really see the local towns I didn't experience the local people Harvest Hosts changed that for me when I'm on my way somewhere and I need to stay overnight a lot of times I'll choose Harvest Hosts because I can stay on a like a you pick them berry farm or something now it's free to stay there and you do need to call in advance and you are expected to go in and support the local business so strictly speaking it's not free you do want to go in and spend the guidelines as about 20 bucks but I'll tell you guys I have found the most amazing things or you know you pay the $14 entry fee into the museum or something it's worth it you get to experience things you wouldn't otherwise now like all other businesses the host locations can be affected by local closures so when you go into the Harvest Hosts site there's a trip planning guide literally you can say I'm going from Colorado to Oregon and it will show you every Harvest Host on the way you can click on every single one you can go to their website you can call and see what the restrictions are the good thing is that a lot of these places are farms and you can go outside or you know maybe go into their store and buy some produce it's still open and it's still absolutely doable and something you can keep in your arsenal so that you have places to stop in a pinch or on your route okay the final resource I'm going to talk to you about is overnight parking in businesses there are still businesses that allow overnight parking in their lots and actually invite RVers to do so generally speaking Walmart Cracker Barrel Cabela's and some casinos allow this in addition to that there are also rest areas and truck stops now wait a minute I'm going to talk to you about that in a second but let me talk about the private businesses first Walmart has a corporate policy about RVing if you haven't seen my video is Walmart over that actually shows you the guideline which by the way is my most watched video ever I actually show you the guidelines you want to be a good citizen and of course adhere to those guidelines Cracker Barrel is a restaurant that actually has RV parking in a lot of their locations nice big spots but you want to make sure that the Cracker Barrel is open Cabela's also has huge spots like you guys may have seen because I got clipped by a Semi in one recently for RVs and Semi's but all of these locations have restrictions that may come because of COVID or because of local ordinances now yes it's private property but if a local ordinance says people can't stay overnight you cannot stay there and usually overnight parking is at the discretion of the local manager so even if you see that a Walmart allows it or does not allow it on apps absolutely call I have had apps that told me a Walmart for example does not allow it and I call and they do but they want you to park in a certain space be out by seven something like that and the flip side is true also so you always do want to call on your way we can also stay in rest areas and trek stops now before anybody gets on me about that I don't know anybody who travels full time that wants to stay in a parking lot now some people do camp like you personally I don't but I do have all of these things in my campaign arsenal so that I have a place to stay on the way to a beautiful location just like everybody else I don't want to drive so much that I'm a danger on the road and you shouldn't want me to either so if I need to pull over at a rest area or a truck stop I do to be safe but I always make sure to adhere to guidelines about that I have a video about how to find rest areas scenic overlooks places like that and see if you can stay overnight there and what the rules are and I have videos on staying in a truck stop I recommend that we never take a truck or spot I recommend staying in the RV parking or staying over to the side somewhere where they can get in and out and don't put out your slides in a truck stop I also recommend a handy app they can tell us which truck stops are full and which ones aren't so that we can be good citizens and leave spots for the truckers that need them also a lot of us have stayed overnight at casinos most of those closed down but they are starting to reopen I have resources for that also in the blog now this isn't even all the stuff that's out there there's more but even if you just take this group RV parks private campgrounds public campgrounds boom docking either on public or private land mooch docking and places to stay overnight when you're en route to a new place you absolutely right now can find camping that will work for you and that you can feel secure knowing that if you're on your radio spot and something falls through you've got a backup and a backup and a backup to that and a reminder all the links you need for all of these resources today are at my blog on creativity rv.com I'll see you guys Wednesday when I show you how to put all of this stuff in action until then I hope you're all having happy travels and be free