 When we set out to become full-time RVers, we never envisioned spending a single night in a location en route to somewhere else. We quickly learned the folly of that mindset and have come to appreciate the respite of overnight stops when trying to reach distant destinations. Not all overnight options are big-rig-friendly, however. That means they can’t all accommodate a class A motorhome or a camping trailer that extends beyond 40 feet in length. Our fifth wheel is about 42 feet long, classifying it as a big rig. In our travels, we’ve found six big-rig-friendly overnight RV stops. 1. Rest Areas  Rest areas are convenient stopping points on a long journey as they offer easy on-and-off access to a freeway. They also provide the added benefit of saving space in the RV wastewater tanks if we choose to use the public facilities instead of those in the rig. Some rest areas even have dump stations. In five years of RV travel, we’ve spent 15 nights at rest areas. Because of the length of our rig, we park with the semi-trucks. Although some run their engines all night long, it’s a constant hum that doesn’t really bother us. Not all rest areas are created equal, however. Some are smaller than others, and some are cleaner and feel safer than others. To determine if a rest area is big-rig-friendly, we examine the satellite view on Google Maps to get a better feel of the layout and ensure adequate space for opening our stairs. 2. Cabela’s/Bass Pro  Many, but not all, Cabela’s and Bass Pro Shops allow overnight RV parking and can easily accommodate big rigs. Some locations are restricted by city ordinances, so it’s best to talk to the manager at the location you want to visit to make sure doing so is permissible. Although we’ve only spent three nights in a Cabela’s or Bass Pro parking lot, this is one of our favorite overnight stops. They’re usually quiet and close to restaurants, offering welcome relief after a long day of driving. 3. Walmart  Like Cabela’s and Bass Pro Shops, some Walmarts don’t allow overnight RV parking, but most do. They also tend to be near restaurants. If not, they have food inside. We’ve stayed at eight Walmarts. This is often our last option because these parking lots can be noisy with people coming and going. At a Walmart in Gallup, New Mexico, we parked near a light pole and heard music blaring from a speaker on it all night long. If you choose to stay at a Walmart, avoid parking spots close to the store entrance and be aware of your surroundings. 4. Casinos  Many casinos welcome RVers with the thought that you’ll go inside and spend money to cover the cost of your spot. Some casinos even provide hookups. And some charge for parking and/or hookups. We’ve stayed at three casinos — one on two separate occasions. With any overnight stop that offers food or services, we make a point to patronize the place as a courtesy for allowing us to stay there. Although we don’t gamble, we’ve found some good food options at casinos. 5. Boondockers Welcome/Harvest Hosts  Harvest Hosts acquired Boondockers Welcome in 2021. The combined entity offers overnight (and sometimes longer) stays at more than 2,400 sites for an annual fee. These locations can range anywhere from residential driveways to farms to museums. These hosts expect RVers to be fully self-contained, but some provide electricity, water, and even sewer dumps for a small fee. We’ve stayed at nine and met some wonderful, generous people as a result. Some shared fresh eggs and garden harvests with us. 6. Love’s Travel Stops  Although a bit costly, Love’s Travel Stops can be a good alternative for an overnight stay if you need to run an air conditioner. They typically offer water and electricity, as well as a dump station. Plus, they have food available for supper and breakfast, including coffee. We’ve taken advantage of this option twice.
Wherever you choose to spend a night, be a good camper and leave no trace. Let’s all work together to keep these big-rig-friendly overnight RV options available. If you don’t feel comfortable or safe in a location, don’t be afraid to move. It’s better to be safe than sorry. You might also like Our Favorite Phone Apps for RVing.
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 South Dakota is known as the Mount Rushmore State. It’s also our state of domicile. As such, we made a point to visit its eponymous monument to the birth, growth, development, and preservation of our country while boondocking near the Badlands. The 60-foot-tall granite faces of Presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln took 14 years to complete. Today, those faces greet more than 2 million visitors annually on a mountain that stands 5,725 feet high in the Black Hills, a 5 million-acre forest plagued by controversy. Only 16 miles away is another, much larger granite monument we didn’t know about at the time we visited Mount Rushmore. This one, of Crazy Horse, is a tribute to Native Americans. Like us, you may have heard of Mount Rushmore and wonder if the Crazy Horse Memorial is worth visiting. Read on to decide for yourself. Envisioning Another Monument The entire Black Hills area was sacred to numerous Native American tribes and was granted to the Sioux and Arapaho tribes through a treaty in 1868. When Colonel George Custer and his expedition team found gold in the area in 1874, the Americans wanted the land for themselves. This led to the Battle of Little Bighorn, which ended with the tribes losing their rights to the land. Before the completion of Mount Rushmore, Lakota Sioux Chief Henry Standing Bear commissioned New England sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski, who assisted sculptor Gutzon Borglum on Mount Rushmore, to carve another sculpture in the area to honor Native Americans. “My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know the red man has great heroes, too,” Chief Standing Bear wrote. Ziolkowski met the chief in 1940. After serving a call of duty in WWII, Ziolkowski agreed to take on the project to create a 100-foot sculpture of Crazy Horse, the Lakota war leader who fought the U.S. government to preserve Native American land and the Lakotan way of life. In 1946, Ziolkowski sculpted a scale model of Crazy Horse. A year later, he moved to the Black Hills to begin working on the full-scale project. Upon arrival, Ziolkowski decided to enlarge the sculpture to 563 feet, even though he knew he could never finish it in his lifetime. While five of the nine survivors of the Battle of Little Bighorn looked on in 1948, Ziolkowski made the first blast on the mountain, seven years after the completion of Mount Rushmore. Forgoing a salary and rejecting funding from the federal government, he pledged that the project would be nonprofit and educational. Exploring Crazy Horse Seventy-six years later, donation-funded work continues on the Crazy Horse Memorial, which became quite a sight to behold on its 50th anniversary in 1998. At that time, during a dedication ceremony, Ziolkowski’s widow, Ruth, unveiled the complete face of Crazy Horse. Although the sculpture is visible northbound on US Highway 385, more than 1 million visitors pay $30 to $35 per carload to navigate the winding road to the Crazy Horse Welcome Center. There, they pay their respects and glimpse the world’s largest mountain carving.  From the parking lot, they’re greeted with a side view of Crazy Horse’s face, outstretched arm, and pointer finger. A round window in the granite marks the beginning separation between Crazy Horse and his horse.
True to sculptor Ziolkowski’s commitment, the memorial grounds include museums, a university, and a conference center. In the welcome center, guests find an informative film, a gift shop, and a restaurant. From the welcome center, visitors can hop on a bus to the base of the mountain for $5 per person — weather permitting (if there’s lightning in the area, tours stop) — to get a better perspective of the size of the mammoth monument. For an extra $125 per person, a van provides a guided tour to the top of the mountain. Even without taking a tour to get closer, the sculpture is truly a sight to behold and worth the visit. We’re glad we got to see it. You might also like Exploring Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada.  Following a successful climb to a remote spot in the Black Hills of South Dakota, the turbo on our truck continued to give us problems. It became obvious that our desire to stay in higher elevations and cooler temperatures as we worked our way southwest would be risky. Not feeling confident our truck could get Tagalong up mountainous roads, we rerouted our course to stay on interstates in lower elevations. That took us to Albuquerque, where high temperatures were in the 80s in mid-September, definitely tolerable. While there, however, the air conditioner (A/C) in our main living area started making strange vibrating noises that rattled the whole rig. The unit continued to work, so we didn’t think much of it. To give it a break, we shut it off in the evenings and relied on the bedroom A/C or opened windows to keep cool. We normally wouldn’t have ventured into the Southwest until October, but it appeared our first grandchild wasn’t going to wait until her Oct. 10 due date to make her entrance into the world. For that reason, we thought it best to keep making progress toward Arizona to help ensure we didn’t miss the special arrival. Warming Up That decision took us to a remote campground in the desert near Deming, New Mexico, where high temperatures hovered around 90 degrees, giving us a very warm welcome to the Southwest.  Despite running both A/Cs, we didn’t feel cool air in our fifth wheel. With sweat beading on his forehead, Bob turned off the main A/C and restarted it. It blew cold air for about 5 minutes, but that was it. With Arizona — and 100-degree temperatures — in our near future, we needed working A/C. After doing some research, Bob climbed onto the roof and took our main A/C apart to troubleshoot. He checked all the simple-solution items. None of those repaired the problem. It didn’t appear the issue would be an easy fix. Meanwhile, we reverted to leaving the windows open and toughing it out, running fans to circulate the warm air and opening our awnings to minimize sun hitting the windows and heating the rig. On hot afternoons, we’d drive a half mile to Dairy Queen for a cool, refreshing treat. But this stop gap could only last so long. It became clear we needed to replace the A/C. Hitting Snags Bob ordered a new Coleman Mach unit from Camping World in Mesa, Arizona, and made arrangements for us to do the work ourselves at an organization we’re affiliated with to save on labor costs. This would also give us access to tools and equipment to help us get the old unit off the roof and the new one on. Our trip to Arizona went smoothly — until Tagalong sent smoke signals on the freeway about an hour from our destination. That incident and the ensuing damage derailed us for five days. When we finally picked up our fifth wheel from Cliff’s Welding, with practically a completely new underside, we drove straight to the location where we had permission to change out the A/C unit so we could get to work. We wanted to have a working A/C before parking and setting up for a monthslong stay. Bob opened the box the new A/C came in and discovered it was not the low-profile one we thought we had ordered. The closest Camping World that had the size we needed in stock was an hour away. Bob loaded the unit into Gulliver and headed out to trade it for the right one. Replacing the A/C After returning more than two hours later, Bob ascended the ladder to our RV roof to disassemble the existing A/C so he could remove it. He took off the shroud and traced around the edge of the unit so we could easily line up the new one in the right place. Then he removed four lag bolts and unplugged the wire harness, setting the factory-installed unit free. Years of dirt had accumulated in the thin space under the A/C. Bob took time to clean the area before installing the new one. We hoisted the new unit onto a scissor lift, only to discover the lift didn’t have enough juice to do the job. It needed to be charged.  Our friend Tim hopped on a forklift and raised the forks up to the roof height of our RV. Bob and I loaded the old unit onto the forks, and Tim lowered it to the ground. Then he reversed the operation and lifted the new unit to our roof.  Bob and I unloaded it and positioned it in place. Reinserting the four lag bolts into the original holes on the roof proved challenging. After struggling for a bit, Bob got three of them to line up correctly. Aligning the fourth required drilling a new hole to ensure the unit would be secure when traveling 70 mph down the freeway.  After straightening the unit’s fins and plugging in the wire harness, Bob had me turn on the A/C from inside the trailer to see that it operated properly. With that confirmation, he installed the cover, cleaned up, and descended the ladder. We relocated, got both A/C’s cranking, and completed our setup in the nick of time. Our granddaughter, Chloe Elizabeth, entered the world about 33 hours later. We couldn’t be happier. You might also like Removing an RV Antenna.  |
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