All fulltime RVers have experienced it. We will be talking to somebody about our life on the road, and invariably they will ask us where our favorite place in the country is. We always reply that just as we could not choose which one of our children is our favorite, it would be just as impossible to choose just one favorite location. But, we sure can tell you some our least favorite places!

While this list reflects just our impression, and we know RVers that love some of the same places we dislike, here are our Top (or actually Bottom) Ten, in no particular order.

1. The Rio Grande Valley in Texas – Most RVers just refer to it as “The Valley,” a stretch of land that begins down in southwest Texas at Brownsville, and stretches north past Mission. This is a popular snowbird roost, where you can find RV parks in every price range, and with every kind (or lack of) amenity. A lot of people love it, but to us it was just crowded, lacking in scenic beauty, and unappealing in every way. What grass there is was full of thorns that stab your feet, and the general RVer population is so old that people joke that “every time you hear an ambulance siren, another RV site just became available.”  

2. West Texas – Just because you drove north out of the Rio Grande Valley doesn’t mean you’ve entered the land of milk and honey. West Texas is endless miles of boring scenery, road kill, and not much else.

3. Chicago, Illinois – We’ll drive 75 miles out of our way to avoid Interstates 80 and 90 through Chicago, and have, many times. The traffic is always hectic, and it has some of the most aggressive drivers in the world.

4. Utah – How can I dislike an entire state? Well, easy… it is Utah, after all! Yes, there are some beautiful places, such as Zion National Park, but overall, my impression of the Beehive State is pretty negative. I remember a trip to Saint George years ago, when Miss Terry cut her arm on a broken rack in a supermarket. When she went up to the Customer Service counter to get something to contain the bleeding, the manager and his staff were more worried about who was going to pay for the paper towels than they were about the woman bleeding all over their store. Things like that leave a permanent bad taste in my mouth.

5. Southern California – With the possible exception of the coastline at La Jolla, I’d have no problem if we gave the rest of California, south of Pismo Beach, back to Mexico. It truly is the land of quakes and flakes.

6. Montgomery, Alabama – When we visited Montgomery a few years ago to gather some stories for the Gypsy Journal, we were amazed at how consistently rude so many people were. At the Rosa Parks Museum and Dr. Martin Luther King’s house, now a memorial to the Civil Rights movement, the people on duty absolutely refused to allow us to even take the standard tour of their facilities once we told them that we were there to do a feature story for our publication. We managed to get a few stories in Montgomery, but we would have loved to hang around longer and cover all that the city has to offer. But, we kept hitting brick walls at too many of the places we wanted to write about.

7. El Paso, Texas – I lived in El Paso for a short time as a kid, and I didn’t like it then. Time has done nothing to change my mind. Traffic is always terrible, the city has no aesthetic charm, and I would not be comfortable staying anywherin the city overnight. However, if you like truck stops, fast food restaurants, strip clubs, and rundown strip malls, your opinion may be different than mine.

8. Billings, Montana – Even before a local campground owner convinced the city to ban overnight RV parking (a move that was quickly rescinded when RVers from across the nation let the city fathers know that we would all boycott their town), I have not liked Billings. We have stopped there several times, and received anywhere from poor to rude service in restaurants, shops, and even motels when we were traveling without our motorhome.

9. Houston, Texas – This is another big city with nothing to offer except heavy traffic and rude drivers. It’s always a pleasure to be driving away from Houston, instead of toward it, and it’s even better when we can avoid the city all together.     

10. Lewiston, Idaho – While the surrounding area is beautiful, with some of the most impressive scenery in the West, we found Lewiston to be a dumpy little town, with the nauseating smell of the local paper mill permeating the air.

Okay, that’s my list of my 10 Least Favorite Places. What about you? What are some of the places you have visited and are in no hurry to get back to, and why?

While I was working on this list, which I admit some may find to be a bit negative, Bad Nick was on a roll, putting together a fun little Bad Nick Blog post titled I Need Therapy. Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – Worrying works! 90 percent of the things I worry about never happen.

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We were so tired Saturday night that we were in bed by 9:30 p.m. and I waited until Sunday morning to post the blog. We had a rainy night, and were wide awake before 7 a.m. Sunday, and on the road before 8 a.m., which was a new record for us.

We passed through Montgomery with only a few cars and trucks to keep us company, and pulled into the Flying J truck stop a few miles south of town to take on fuel, and decided to try their breakfast buffet, which was surprisingly good.

Back on the road, we had an easy run to the Escapees Plantation RV Park in Summerdale. We checked in at the office, where we got a warm welcome, and then were assigned to a site. As we were unhooking the van, Jack Mayer came by to say hello. The battery in our van is getting weak and didn’t want to turn over, so we got out our battery charger and Jack helped us put some juice into the battery to get the van started.

By the time I had backed the motorhome into our RV site and finished hooking up our utilities, several people had come by to say hello and welcome us back, and to commiserate over our recent misfortune. We had pretty much a steady stream of visitors until we went to the Activity Center a little after 5 p.m. for their Chocolate Decadence event, in which for $3 each we had our choice of dozens of chocolate goodies, everything from brownies and cookies, to fudge, and even chocolate covered chicken wings. I passed on the wings, but sure tried to sample as much of the rest as I could. 

Following that, they had the Sunday evening Ice Cream Social. And everybody managed to save enough room for ice cream too. RVers love to eat! It was nice to see so many folks we know, and to be made so welcome. And it is wonderful to be warm again! It was 72 degrees when we arrived at Summerdale!

After I reported in yesterday’s blog that we were spending the night parked behind the Moose lodge in Prattville, Alabama, I got three or four e-mails from people asking if we were not afraid of being victimized again.

We have dry camped all over this country without a problem for years, and though we will exercise more caution in the future and not allow ourselves to become complacent again, the reality is that we could spend another 20 years on the road (which we hope to do), and never have a problem again. Of course, we also realize it could happen again tonight. But, we refuse to live in fear, or to give up our freedom because of what “might” happen.

Keep in mind, too, that our crime did not happen while we were dry camping in some out of the way place. It happened at an established RV repair shop’s camping area, which had 24 hour surveillance cameras, which large signs plainly announced. Crime can and does happen at any time, anywhere. The luck of the draw was that we just happened to be the victims this time around.

Now that we are finally out of the deep freeze up north and getting the inside of our Winnebago back to normal, we are still discovering some other things missing, including the handheld Garmin GPS we use for geocaching, a digital photo frame with pictures of our granddaughters, and Leatherman pocket tool. On the flip side, we found a small digital camera we thought was gone, so that’s a good thing. Life goes on.     

Thought For The Day – Worrying is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do, but it doesn’t get you anywhere.

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In a blog a few days ago, I wrote about the dumb mistakes all of us RVers make from time to time, no matter how long we’ve been at it. Just to reinforce that message, let me tell you about my latest blunder.

I was getting the motorhome unhooked and ready to hit the road yesterday morning, and since we might be overnight in a parking lot or two on our trip north to Indiana, I was filling our fresh water tank. Normally we only carry about 1/3 of a tank full of water, to keep our weight down, but when we know we might need it, we fill up.

After the water tank was full, I moved the knob in our Winnebago’s utility bay from the Fill Tank position back to the normal position that we use when in a campground with a water hookup. Then I reached over and slid the brass collar free on our Quick Connect fitting that connects the hose to the motorhome, never bothering to turn the water off at the campground outlet. Rainbow Plantation has darned good water pressure, which is a good thing, except on a chilly morning when you pull a stunt like that! I got a very cold shower before I could run over and turn the water off. Miss Terry got a real laugh out of that one! I’m glad one of us enjoyed it.   

We wanted to get an early start yesterday, but leaving an Escapees campground is never a quick thing. There are too many folks to say goodbye to! Dutch and Di Irrgang were parked a couple of sites down from us, and we stopped to see the complete re-do they had done on their beautiful Carriage fifth wheel. Dutch said they had been considering buying a new fiver, but they liked the floor plan of their present one so much that they had it remodeled for a whole lot less than the cost of a new rig. It came out great, and we were really impressed.

Between saying goodbye to several people and checking out at the campground office, it was 10 a.m. when we finally pulled out. We had an easy run north on State Route 59 to the junction with Interstate 65 at Bay Minette, and then took 65 on its path north across the state. We ran in a mixture that ranged from a light mist to showers until we got past Montgomery, with one stop for fuel at a Flying J. The Silverleaf and Miss Terry’s calculator agreed that we got 7.75 miles per gallon on our last tank of fuel.

Traffic began to get heavier as we approached Birmingham, and soon we were in a tangle of construction zones, kamikaze drivers in four wheelers, and truckers trying to dodge them as they merged without yielding,  and changed lanes without signaling. I don’t remember traffic in Birmingham being this hectic on past trips through the area, but after yesterday, I’m in no hurry to get back.

Once we were clear of Birmingham, we rolled north, making good time, and began to see blue sky above us, which was a welcome sight after the gloom we had been driving in.

By the time we crossed the Tennessee State Line it was late in the day and we were running out of time. It was getting pretty dark by 5:30 p.m., and though I had hoped to get past Nashville by the end of the day, it just wasn’t going to happen. We pulled into the Tennessean Truck Stop, about 60 miles south of Nashville, and parked way back in the furthest reaches of the lot, well away from the truckers. After a nice dinner in the truck stop restaurant, we returned to the motorhome, shivering all the way. The temperature had really dropped! We started the day wearing T-shirts, but walking back to the motorhome wearing a T-shirt, sweatshirt, and jacket, I was still cold! We fired up the Onan Quiet Diesel generator and turned on the heat pump to warm up the rig.  

Even with our late start, we covered 392 miles yesterday, and that’s a lot of driving in one day. Certainly much more than most RVers usually cover in a day. Usually 200 to 300 miles is a good day of driving in an RV, and gives you time to relax along the way, and get off the road and set up someplace early. But we’re not in a relaxed RV travel mode where we’re playing tourist, we’re in our “go fast” mode to get up to Elkhart and take care of our business up there. It’s too cold to play tourist!

Thought For The Day – Anger hurts you more than the person who upset you.

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