moremiles

I'm on the road right now with the Walmart Straight Talk pay as you go ATT hot spot (router) and am quite happy with it as a backup to my Verizon hot spot. It provides Wi-Fi to connect with your phone or tablet or laptop or whatever you would need. I get 5 gigs of data for $50 and it's good for 60 days. I keep a spare 5 gig $50 scratch off card with me all the time and have it ready to add more data when needed. My 60 days ran out on the 9th and I haven't added new data yet since where I'm traveling and camping right now I feel it isn't necessary but when I head on down the road I'll probably fire it up again since I never really know where Verizon might not cover and AT&T would have coverage there. It has saved me a few times on this trip when there was no Verizon and I'm quite happy with the cost and everything. I would recommend it. I don't know if this Straight Talk hotspot is available in anything other than ATT but for traveling around the country I would not even think of anything but ATT or of course Verizon. All the other carriers have huge gaping holes outside of the major cities and freeways. Also if your data requirements are minimal I don't think you have to get a 5 gig card. They have lesser available.

I think any of us that get a big insurance increase take it very personally but we are just a number among many numbers on their computer and when they make adjustments based on what they're seeing in their data we just get swept up with everybody else. If the computer is seeing 25 foot fifth wheels towed by Brand X pickups driven by 45 year olds are having a significant increase in claims they will just make an adjustment to everybody in that group and you get hit. It can be that random and dumb to us I supposed but to the insurance company they are seeing actual data and they act on it. I suppose you could say the purpose of insurance should be to spread the risk among all of us but that's probably for another very lengthy posting.

If you absolutely have to have 100 percent coverage at all times riding down the road I think you're out of luck. But if you could accept some downtime then your best bet would be to go with both a Verizon hotspot and an ATT hotspot to insure the best possible up-time when on the road. (And of course you would have to travel on roads offering cell phone coverage.) There is no in-motion internet satellite dish available as a consumer product. Perhaps if you could talk in terms of tens of thousands of dollars for equipment and service it might be possible as a commercial product Recently, though, two fixed position Internet dishes have become available. One is offered by a company back in I believe Virginia that costs 5,000 dollars and must be mounted on the roof of your RV. I believe it automatically locks on to the satellite. And they seem to have very favorable service terms so far as bandwidth cost and a minimal service contract requirement. The other newly available service seems to cost around $1,000 for a standard tripod dish type arrangement in which you must manually lock onto a spot beam satellite. Apparently it can be a bit time consuming to do that and requires some training. Data costs extra of course. Going to a dish would only be if you wanted to boondock away from cell towers. Hope this gives you approximate idea of your choices. Perhaps somebody into internet service on the road more than I am could suggest some better solutions.

Rinsing stuff always seems to me to be the big water waster. I can wash kitchen things with barely any water at all. Removing the soap though takes much more. (And of course you can collect that water for other purposes.) I've found that washing everything immediately with minimal soap & water is way more efficient that letting a sink full of dirty dishes collected. But we don't "cook" either. All our food preparation is totally heat something quick & easy up. And unless you are out boondocking extremely water saving measures are not required anyway. But it's nice to know all the tricks for when it's necessary.

QUOTE TIREMAN9 BUT when I dismounted the tires to remove the original internal TPM sensors, I discovered that one tire from a dual position had severely stress cracks at the edge of the tread & sidewall so it had to be scrapped. The cause for the cracks was a slow leak last winter in it's mate resulted in it's mate to carry excess load, I believe that if I had used the RV I would have have discovered the low tire, fixed the problem (leaking valve core) and it's mate would never have been overloaded. - - - This caught my attention. I suspect most RVers don't worry much about one dually going low during the storage season. Just bring it back up and head on out for the summer. The key word of course is "significant" But in the future I'll be much more concerned about any slow leak when I'm not on the road for a while.

Below is a link to a list of campgrounds for both those on the Trace and also nearby private campgrounds. Most of the Trace has you way out in the countryside so it's a good idea to have some notes with you of nearby services. http://www.nps.gov/natr/planyourvisit/upload/Campgrounds-2-9-14.pdf

You should perhaps first decide on how much of a park you want for your first time there. Some of them are full service that will keep you busy from sunup till sundown and way later. Others are more of a place to park and sit and relax. Perhaps you might want lots of free time go out and just travel around the area. And of course the cost for these two extreme types of parks are different also. My thought is perhaps just a basic park that will give you lots of time to go out looking around and become familiar with the area and what's available for future years in Arizona. Why pay for a bunch of services that you perhaps won't use.

The FMCA has always had an "upscale" or do I dare say "blue nose" feel to it. Not everybody is comfortable spending their time in that atmosphere even if these days membership has been opened up to them. On other forums I can read a subject line and if it's slightly off color I almost know it's going to be a truck camper post. It's a big world out there and not everybody is from "salt of the earth" down home rock solid 1950s stock. The world has changed. Not all RVers are 72 years old - - especially in mental outlook.

We like the Amarillo KOA because it's back away from the town area and freeway, etc. Thus more quiet and peaceful than closer in to town. Spent a week there a couple years ago and really liked the place.