RV LIFE Podcast
The RV LIFE Podcast, created by one of the premier companies in the RV industry, is for the RV Community with a mission to Educate, Entertain and Explore the RV Lifestyle. The Podcast will explore all things RV Life: living, working, exploring, learning. With hosts Dan & Patti Hunt, full time RVers, content creators, educators and explorers.
RV LIFE Podcast
RV Campgrounds: They Are Not All Created Equal
All campgrounds are not created equal. The best RV campgrounds starts with great owners. As Dan & I make our Spring and Summer camping plans we can't help but marvel at the uniqueness of each campground we've encountered. We are often asked, "What are your favorite campgrounds?" the answer...
we love different campgrounds for different reasons.
On today’s episode we had a lively conversation with Ali Rasmussen, owner of Spacious Skies Campgrounds, with 15 locations. She is one of our favorite campground owners and answers questions such as...
How do I find a campground that fits my needs?
What should I look for in a campground?
When should I make reservations and can I get last minute reservations?
What about inclusivity within these campgrounds?
Why do Dan & I call Spacious Skies Campgrounds one of our favorites?
Want more information go to Spacious Skies Campgrounds.
Our special announcement…
Dan & I were named Newmar’s Brand Ambassador
Many reason we chose Newmar... their commitment to their customers.
Inspiring Video
RVTV RVer’s Got Talent coming soon
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Do you believe that all campgrounds are created equal? You're listening to the RB Drive Podcast. I'm Dan Hunt with my incredible wife, patty Hunt. She's right over there and we are really, really excited about today's show. We have some great announcements today and some great partnerships coming up, but after three years and over a thousand nights in campgrounds, you could say that Patty and I are experts on campgrounds. And guess what? All campgrounds are not created equal. We have found that great owners are the key to great campgrounds.
Speaker 2:And right now. Camping season is right around the corner and it's time to start planning and booking your campsites. We are so excited about our upcoming travel plans and, as most of you know, we have been full time for three years and have been and had many incredible experiences, having been to many campgrounds, and we're so looking forward to our plans for this year.
Speaker 1:Now that sound means it's time for today's fun fact. Fun fact is brought to you by Open Roads Resorts, and they have four great locations two in Montana, one in Idaho and one in.
Speaker 2:Texas. Now the fun fact for today in a recent customer survey by Outdoorasy, they found that 93% of campers feel more relaxed or mentally refreshed after time spent camping versus other kinds of vacations.
Speaker 1:Now, you know, a lot of my friends call me up and say, dan, how's your vacation going? Well, guess what? Patty and I live full time in our RV. So I have to say I am more relaxed now than I have ever been in my entire life. I have had three years of constant meditation and I got to tell you it is great. It's a lifestyle for everybody.
Speaker 2:It sure is. Now let's talk about campgrounds. Our sponsor, open Roads Resorts, has Red Rock RV Resort, which is right outside of Yellowstone, and it is the only park outside the western gate that is now offering, for the first time, a monthly low cost price. So the longer you stay, the lower the price. This is new this year and it gives you the opportunity to see Yellowstone, big Sky and the Tetons. We are really excited, as this year that is our plan to be in Yellowstone.
Speaker 1:And stay longer. Yes, now, our guest today is the CEO of a different set of campgrounds. It's called Spacious Skies Campground. They have not one, not two, not five, not 10. They have 15 locations and they got those all in just one year. So we're going to talk all things campgrounds today on the RV Life podcast.
Speaker 2:Yes, and we, I can tell you like, honestly so excited about this conversation with our guests today. Now let's talk about I want to talk about something else that is so important while you're camping and that is clean, fresh water. So we have to talk about tank fresh from Clear2O, provitalizing your RV's water system with Clear2O tank, fresh water tank and system flush. Now, dan and I used this product to clean our fresh water tank and we love it because there is no chlorine, no bleach. It took less than an hour. It just cleaned out the fresh tank. It cleaned out the water line, the fixtures. It is great, perfect for starting the new season, storing your RV, just ensuring fresh, odor-free water anytime. One gallon treatment treats a hundred gallons of water, so our hundred gallon tank, just one gallon of water. It is biodegradable, bleach-free and safe for your family and pets. Visit Clear2Ocom today for a fresh water experience with Clear2O, and not only that. Wait for it.
Speaker 1:If you go to the show notes, there is a discount code for our listeners and I'll tell you what you know how, when you camp in a campground your driver's side, where all the water bays are, and then there's the next campsite, so you're kind of in their living room when you're doing this work Well, the gentleman that was next door was so interested in what we were doing. He went out and bought a bottle of tank fresh right there while he was sitting there. He thought it was the greatest product since Apple Pie. So we really really enjoy Clear2O and we really really enjoy working with Keith and Barbara.
Speaker 1:This is the RRV Life Podcast, and our guest today got her Masters of Business Administration from B Duke University After receiving her bachelor's degree of music in classical voice from New York University. She is a mother of three, yes, a super mom. During COVID, allie and her husband Eric took their three children on a camping adventure of a lifetime that changed their lives forever. She fell in love with the lifestyle, and Allie convinced her husband to buy not only one, not only two, not five, not 10, but 15 campgrounds, expanding their workforce from just two employees to over 150 employees. Allie is now the CEO of their collection of campgrounds, unified by the cosmic night sky theme. Speaking of night skies, look, it's a bird, it's a plane, no, it's super Allie. Right here on the RRV Life Podcast.
Speaker 2:We are, as you can hear, incredibly excited today to welcome our guest, allie Resmusin, to the RRV Life Podcast.
Speaker 3:Welcome, allie, thank you so much for the best introduction I have ever been given by far. I'm excited to talk to you Great.
Speaker 2:Now I have to tell our listeners about when and how we met. So it was five months ago and we were at the Hershey event and we actually the three of us were attending a private event for Harvest Host and you sat at the table with us and Dan and I and you, allie, we hit it off from the moment we met and you were there with your Kate, one of your.
Speaker 3:With Kate, our director of communications. Director of communications.
Speaker 2:It's hit it off with you guys and we're sitting there and Dan Dementzki from RVTV comes over and we introduce you and he is directing a TV show.
Speaker 1:They're in development for a brand new TV show that's going to be on the RVTV network.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:And it's called.
Speaker 2:I thought he said it was a go, it's called RVers Got Talent Right. And Dan, in the way he does it, says, well, who has talent? You say, well, I sing. And of course Dan said, okay, get up and sing. And this is what Dan does. I don't know why he doesn't sometimes get slapped a little more often, but he like said, you just get up and sing and without a hesitation or a miss, you did not miss one beat, you just stood up and sung and everybody in that room stopped dead in their tracks.
Speaker 1:You know what I have to embellish on this? Just a little bit. It wasn't just everybody in that room, that's done. The whole world had to take a pause because, I have to tell you, it was the most beautiful 30 seconds of an audition that I have ever heard.
Speaker 2:It was an opera song, no less belted out an opera song and we were also incredibly impressed. Dan Dabinski was like, yes, you've got to be part of this show when it comes together RVers Got Talent. So we'll see how that all works out, but it was amazing and it just led to an incredible conversation after. But we got to ask so opera singer, business degree to campground ownership and yet tell our listeners that there's got to be a story there.
Speaker 3:There is a story. I mean to make the early part quick. I went to I studied music for throughout childhood. High school obviously went really serious in college and then after graduation, it dawned on me fairly quickly that making my art into my career was not what I wanted to do. It was making it, you know, something that I loved and was passionate about, too stressful and serious, and I learned that quickly. I wish I'd learned it before I completed a degree in it.
Speaker 3:But it's all good. Undergrad degrees are good no matter what. And so a few years after undergrad and I had been working in the music industry that whole time, sort of in the back end, marketing and PR and artist management the company that I was with I didn't have really any any more mobility. So I applied to business school, thinking that I would be the most cumulative education that I could get in a grad program. And so I did and really learned everything from scratch. I think most people taking this business school as party time and really networking. But I, like, had to go to school. I had to learn accounting, I had to learn statistics, I had to learn business. And that was where I met Eric and he was at UNC, I was at Duke and we hit it off. We were both alternative business school candidates. He was also similarly like, not in the same tract as all the finance guys and consulting people. So we, we both knew that you know, together we would do something entrepreneurial someday. He has been. He's a real estate professional through and through. So it sort of made make sense where we have landed. So, yeah, fast forward. We.
Speaker 3:We had a bunch of kids and moved around a bit for Eric's job during that time and I was home with just child rearing and running the house. And that was unintended I'll say that accidental completely, because I, you know, I have this pedigree and turn all of this education. It's like, okay, so I'm going to raise some kids now, which was an education in itself, for sure. And then the pandemic hits and the world shuts down and, like many people, we were getting cabin fever with our eight months old, two and a half year old and five year old. So we we bought an RV and learned how to put some things together. We took two days to get ourselves acquainted with it and then we hit the road.
Speaker 1:Two whole days.
Speaker 3:I didn't even see the rig before my husband drove into the driveway with it because that was pandemic time right. Buying a rig was like look online, pick one single model for them to bring out, and then you get there and it's like yes or no, and so he just came back with it and that first camping trip we I mean it was fly by the seat of our pants.
Speaker 3:We didn't know where we were going, we didn't know where we were staying. Every day was okay. We're ready to stop in an hour. Let's look on, you know, all of these new apps that we're exploring and find a place to spend the night, and it was unintentional market research, as I like to say.
Speaker 3:We I mean every, every night that we camped that summer, which was, like you know, 25, 30, 35 nights. Nearly all of them were spent in a different campground, and it was private campgrounds, chain campgrounds, national parks, state parks, nicely beautifully manicured kept parks, giant resorts, things that were run down and, or, you know, run by the same family for generations. It was just literally every type of campground as you full-timers? Yes.
Speaker 1:Yes, you have been in everything that you had just described, plus five more.
Speaker 3:Exactly right. Yes, yeah, like some Harvest Hosts, and I mean all of that, we did it all. And it was we were somewhere in Pennsylvania and we had just put the kids to bed and we were around our campfire and just like taking it all in and looking up at the night sky, at the stars, and it hit us. We should do this, we should put our collective superpowers together and do campgrounds. And yeah, we had. It was crazy. We had explored, I mean, like I said, we thought we would do something together forever and we had explored other real estate related business, but it just boom, boom, boom all came together.
Speaker 1:Let me paint this picture for our listeners. So COVID has hit the world, has shut down A lot of uncertainty in the world. You get in a brand new camper that your husband bought for you without showing you, and you're at a campground somewhere in Pennsylvania, thank you, and with three small children.
Speaker 1:let's add that in Very small children and definitely a case of wine. And you decide with your husband two highly educated people decide that a good life for us from this point forward is to have a campground so other people can enjoy the beauty and serenity and fun that we are enjoying with our kids right now.
Speaker 3:That's exactly right. We are motivated so genuinely by touching as many lives as possible and sharing this leisure, this pastime, this lifestyle with as many people as possible. It is as simple as that and the experience that we love is on the simpler side of things. We don't need to go somewhere that is highly amenitized. We have enjoyed ourselves very much at bigger resorts with huge activity programs, with all of the water parks and amenities. We've enjoyed them, but that's not our favorite thing to do. And we have enjoyed being in super rustic, no hookup types of super nature experiences. We've enjoyed that, but we can't do it for more than enough.
Speaker 3:So we have found, you know, a spacious guys campground is a collection of campgrounds that represent this happy medium, this super accessible experience that is like a Goldilocks camping experience that we love as a family and assume that the majority, you know, there's like a large chunk of people that camp that would enjoy this same way of camping. So that's how it all started and it gets crazy, and I'm sure it does, but it just.
Speaker 2:It goes back to what we talked about as the question in the beginning of this podcast, which is not all campgrounds are created equally or equal, and because of that, because different people want, needs, look for different things, and you know what you're saying is and we're going to dive into your campgrounds and it is certainly a different, incredible way of camping.
Speaker 1:It really is Now. Me personally. I'm the elder of this group of three of us right now, much older than these two ladies, but we're at 1000 trails Orlando right now, so we're about 20 minutes from Disney and we have a Disney annual pass, so we don't even need the amenities in the campground. We've gone over to Disney and just walk around. We walked around, had a wonderful dinner my favorite dish is beef Wellington and we were at Epcot the other night and there was a stand, you know like a cart stand, and they had beef Wellington and we're like, well, we got to try this.
Speaker 2:It was amazing.
Speaker 1:It was amazing, it really was.
Speaker 2:And we're picky. It was amazing.
Speaker 1:Ramsey's in trouble because I got to tell you this stuff was good.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was fresh made. It was truly amazing. But let's get into a little bit of the detail. There's so many directions we want to go. Our listeners have to really stay with us. So here you are, around the campfire talking about campgrounds. You might not have said 15 in the very beginning of that conversation, but let's face it. Campgrounds are expensive. How do you come up with the money part of it? Can we talk a little bit about that?
Speaker 3:For sure. Yeah, we didn't have some endless pocket full of money to go do all of this. So you know we, we had to say bye.
Speaker 1:No we.
Speaker 3:But we essentially had to convince a whole bunch of people that it was a good idea, that we would be able to execute on this great investment idea, and we got, I think, 13 friends and family to pitch in and help us purchase that first campground. So it was hooping it for one campground acquisition. It was a lot of effort and so I think from that campfire to closing day on campground number one was about nine months or so, where we had, you know, found a few deals and worked with a broker and we landed on that first one and we did all the fundraising and also hired a third party management company to run the day-to-day operations. We thought, you know, eric, and I did not think that we would be starting a company as like sort of significant and serious as the one that we're running now. We thought that we would be, you know, cute little investors of properties and that we would you know I'm marketing and branding, you know for sure, and so we would focus on that, but that for operations, for all the hard stuff, we would hire somebody to do that.
Speaker 3:Long story short is that on closing day I went up to the property like ceremonially, because it was COVID right, you could close real estate, you know, virtually. But I went there because I wanted to, you know, meet who is going to be running our campground. You know we'd been speaking to the company for weeks and weeks and weeks in advance, being assured everything was going to be okay. I wanted to be there with the sellers and to visit some comps in the area throughout the week. Just, you know, have a nice little business trip that I show up on closing day and I'm there with the sellers and no one else is showing up. Oh, this is, by the way, the Wednesday before Memorial Day weekend. So we have a campground that is running. Nobody shows up to run the property. You might be asking what state was the number one in.
Speaker 3:This is.
Speaker 1:Maine, Up in Maine okay.
Speaker 3:Spacious guys. Walnut Grove is campground number one. It's like 30 minutes away from the southern Maine beaches. It's really peaceful. It's actually got some of the biggest, most beautiful wooded sites and then they have some open air sites too, but it's a great campground.
Speaker 3:Anyway, it dawns on me that I might be, my plans might be changing, and you know, I'm a performer, I'm an improviser, I am a face saver, so I'm acting like this is going all according to plan. The sellers don't know what our plans are going to be to run their life's work after they sell it to me. So I'm like, okay, well, why don't you train me on this and let's go through that? And I call Eric and I say you know he's home. He's home in New Jersey with our three kids, thinking that I'll be gone, like you know, five days. And I said, eric, no one's here to run the campground. I am, I don't think I can come home and I don't know when I'll be back, and that was that.
Speaker 3:So the company that we had hired ends up sending one corporate employee at a time to come run the campground with me, and the sellers of this campground were pure mom and pop. They did not have a staff right. So I'm not there with staff, I am there. The sellers have trained me on the office. They have trained me on the equipment, they have trained me on the honey wagon, which was okay. And then I have this helper person from the third party management corporate office who comes and says wait, I thought I was here to train the staff on software, so there's no staff.
Speaker 3:You were told wrong. Or the next person would come and say oh, I thought I was here to do a catwalk. No, you were told wrong. You're here to run this campground with me. That was. It ended up being two weeks, which is a lot shorter than it could have been, because they eventually hired somebody as a manager that I was okay, leaving my baby property in the hands of, because I had to get home to my, my and to Eric. And so there was there's a lot of drama between that time and when we rested control back of campground number one, but it was.
Speaker 1:That was the that day, that first day, eric and I knew Was there a conversation at the dining room table or at the kitchen table one day and said, hey, this is so much fun, let's go buy another one.
Speaker 2:We already had three others and under contract, so you have this three main going on, not the way you had envisioned it, and three more already in contract. Wow, in the pipeline, wow, okay.
Speaker 3:So that's but a series of fortunate events that we, we there's fate comes into play. Plenty right that first week that I was honey wagging.
Speaker 2:I just want to start because some of our listeners aren't familiar with what a honey wagon is, so I just got to. You know there's some new RVers that listen to the podcasts and people who are used to full hookups. A honey wagon for people is a truck wagon type thing that comes around and dubs the black and gray tanks for you. If you don't have sewer hookup at your site, that is probably the lowest job, the most useful when you don't have sewer at your site, but probably one of the lowest jobs at the campground, you know industry ever, it sure is, and it's only necessary when you have, like, seasonal campers on those non hookup sites which we have, immediately, you know, change the structure of at that campground, cause we do have.
Speaker 1:Okay, so I'm just going to say that you know we've been in spacious guys and I went around. We have electric bikes so I drive around the campground. I check everything out and look at everything and it looked like the campground in Tennessee that we were at. There was an area that was not when you bought. It was not a sewered up or full hookup sites, they were partial hookup sites. And you guys came in and you've got the magic wand now because you made all those sites full hookups and full cement pads and everything else. It was beautiful.
Speaker 3:It is a beautiful campground. I wish I could take credit for Bell Ridge, but Bell Ridge is actually the newest build that we purchased. The sellers built that campground six years ago, so it was new. It was a new build, but we can't take credit for that.
Speaker 2:Let's just back up here again. Dan and I had the opportunity to go to Bell Ridge, which is a spacious guys campground. You're saying it's the newest, it's in La Rae.
Speaker 1:Tennessee, Probably three or four days after we met. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Monterey Tennessee.
Speaker 1:That's it, monterey. She's in La Rae. We worked someplace out of La Rae.
Speaker 2:It's a different campground We'll talk about that in a minute Monterey, Tennessee, and let's just paint the picture here. You know again, all camps crowns are not created equally. Let's paint the picture, Dan and I, that's all. I did Just think Monet I mean it's that beautiful.
Speaker 1:You just you look at this place and you're like, oh my God.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it is. It's hard to describe. It would be like describing somebody's picture, a famous painting. It's hard to put into words. Thankfully, people could go to your website and see pictures. Our experience we were headed across to the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta and we spoke, and a couple of days later we were there at the campground and it was right off of 40. So it was right on the way. Correct me if I'm wrong here. It was a long trip. We had that day, Okay, so it was very conveniently located. You pull in and it is gated. So you pull into the gate, it's gated. Somebody answers the box and they let us in and we go into the office and there was a woman there and I can't remember her name. It was not the manager and I'm sure.
Speaker 3:Was that Abigail? Yeah, the daughter.
Speaker 2:No, it wasn't the daughter, it was somebody else that worked there. We met Abigail.
Speaker 3:Donna at the time, I think.
Speaker 2:She was just, I felt like I was being welcomed. I thought I was a family member being welcomed. I literally walked out after we signed in and we talked to her and said wow, I feel like I've known this woman, I feel like we're family. I feel and this is how we see a campground from the very beginning that to us, to Dan and I, is the most important thing. That first person that you come in contact set your camping experience from then on out and we knew it was gonna be great.
Speaker 2:And then, when you take in the sights of this campground, it was beautiful. Now I do have a complaint about our stay and that complaint is it was too short. I that was a campground. I'd left kicking and screaming because, again, we were on our way to Albuquerque and a lot of times we have certain hard dates that we absolutely have to be somewhere and we can't change. But that was a campground. I did not wanna leave and truly such an amazing experience and I wanna talk. Let's talk a little bit about that campground and what made it so special for us. You were talking about how you liked walking down into that cave.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's an area to the back of the office area that you go back there and there's a couple of houses back there and she showed me a trail. She said just walk down that trail. She said you won't believe what you see. And we walked down that trail and we'd literally come to a stream that's going through all these overhanging granite pieces. It was like walking into a cave and I'm like I'm the first human being that's ever been here. Yes, it was so beautiful. It was so you know the green and the moss that grows on the rock and it was so beautiful.
Speaker 2:And then and you just can't describe it and that's where I think, like you said, there are campgrounds like Thousand Trails, Orlando. Not only is it right out of Disney, they have tons of amenities, and I'd like that sometimes but then to be at Bell Ridge and be in nature in a way that I have to say I've never been like the things I saw the mountains.
Speaker 1:The gazebo that they put right on the edge of one of the cliffs that overlooked the entire valley and we watched the sunset, watching the sunset there. It was surreal. I mean, it's an experience that if you don't experience it, you haven't lived yet. Listener, you have not lived until you have been to some of these places it's just beautiful.
Speaker 2:And even with kids. You know, I see online all the time people say what's a good campground? What amenities are there for the kids? Well, Dan and I have five kids, so we have experience with kids. We have nine grandkids. We have experience and sometimes that ability to run in nature, to be by the there's a little lake there to just be to walk around. I think for, and we have grandkids that range from five up to 16. So we've got the range. I think all of them, even though there might not be specific activities, I think there's so much to keep a family of any age, kids, occupied, busy, engaged. Just the history there, Like we can't say enough. So that leads us to. There are 14 other campgrounds and we're wait, wait, wait, wait.
Speaker 1:I'm not done there, I'm not done there. Okay, so we stayed there the first night and then we got up the next morning and we realized that we had not gone to the store properly for like a really good I love my breakfast. I love a really good breakfast. So I moseyed on into the office there and the manager was there. What is her name?
Speaker 3:Her. She was Angel and we love Angel. She retired, so she could be a full-time grandma.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:We still, yes, we still know and love.
Speaker 1:Angel. Well, angel suggested that we go down into the town. That's right there. What is it? Do you remember the name of the town? No, do you know the name of the little?
Speaker 3:Monoray Crossville.
Speaker 1:It was Monoray Monoray, so we go into Monoray and we went to a little teensy restaurant that they just did breakfast and coffee and she sold some artifact types, that already RT type stuff I bought a hat from her from. But I will tell you that it was just such a personal healing of being in this restaurant. The local sheriff comes up and he comes through the restaurant and he sits down at the counter and they give him his. He doesn't even say a word, they just give him his coffee and they bring him over his breakfast. So you know, it's like that norm feeling. You walk into a place like that and you automatically feel like you're at home.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so not only the campground, but, yeah, the area. And then we I don't know if it was good or bad, but we found the little bakery.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:And you know four items later which I don't know that we needed all that, but it was just the cutest little bakery and again that same warm small town feeling. You know, let's talk a little bit. And again, you know, as we always tell our listeners, none of this is scripted and we go off way off. We talked about being near Yellowstone. You know where we're gonna head after we go up the East coast and hit some more of the spacious skies campgrounds. Okay, a lot of people often talk about the national parks. Anybody who's listened to the RV Life podcast know that Dan and I have yet to hit one single national park, and this is why this is one of the reasons, because when we went to Bell Ridge, that is like we're just in awe. So I know I have to go to the national parks, I wanna go to some of them, but that was just amazing. So now let's talk a little bit about some of the other parks. First of all, are there any near a national park or are they more located in these little towns?
Speaker 3:So we have the Spacious Sky. Shenandoah views is in the Shenandoah Valley, so that one is near the Shenandoah National Park and we have a number that are on sort of like the Appalachian tract. We have Spacious Sky's Baradun that is on like directly on the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina, but that is. It's a national. I think it's a national park or national roadway or something like that.
Speaker 2:I haven't been to any so I can't help you answer that yeah, I mean, I think that we have a park in southern New Jersey at Spacious Sky's Country.
Speaker 1:Oaks. That is right near a national park. It's called the New. Jersey, turnpike, exit 4.
Speaker 3:There you go. It's near the national shoreline and it's actually at the very southernmost tip of the Pine Barons which is a protected area.
Speaker 3:I mean we do focus on being in nature at our campgrounds and in our selection of what campground is going to join the collection. We are nature lovers and, yes, we like the creature comforts that come along with the type of campground that we have at Spacious Sky's, but it is a focus of ours that we want to be either immersed on the campground with it or be really close by to a state park. We have a lot of state parks. We have one, spacious Sky's Adirondack Peaks. That's in the Adirondack Park, not a national park but a natural area that everybody knows. Spacious Sky's Balsam Woods is our northernmost outpost in Central Maine and that one is near. I think it's an hour from Katahdin, which is the uppermost point of the Appalachian Trail, and it's near a Dark Sky National Park. So that's yes.
Speaker 1:Dark Sky and Spacious Sky.
Speaker 3:You can look up and see the Milky Way with your naked eyes. It's crazy. We have gosh there's not many. I mean the three that we have in the western Carolinas Spacious Sky's Baird, and I mentioned Spacious Sky's Hidden Creek is in Marion, north Carolina, and then Spacious Sky's Peach Haven is in Gaffney South.
Speaker 2:Carolina we're going there and there's so much here. There's something for everyone. Go to SpaciousGuyscom. You could see all SpaciousGuyscampgroundscom.
Speaker 3:I've been. Spaciousguyscom is my white whale sign. I have been working with Go Daddy, but it's Spacious.
Speaker 2:Sky's Campgrounds Campgroundswithinassatheendcom. I have it written. I said it wrong.
Speaker 1:It'll be in the show notes.
Speaker 2:Thank you, it will definitely be in the show notes. All of them will be there. We talked about Gaffney.
Speaker 1:Our listeners might want to know why we're going to Gaffney. Because our superlistener and his name is Jeff Sather and he is the president and CEO of Freightliner Corporation In Gaffney, in Gaffney, it's in Gaffney, south Carolina.
Speaker 2:Yeah, kids, I have excited. We are because Dan and I and I've said that about five times during this show already, but that's just a fact because these campgrounds are just amazing. But as we're planning our route to go up north, where we have certain places that we know we want to go Freightliner and Gaffney was one of them and then to see a spacious Skye's campground, it's like within a half hour. I think it's less than a half hour. How awesome is this.
Speaker 1:And we're going to go there for meetings we're in the process of and we're going to talk about this later- in the show.
Speaker 2:You can't give it away yet. I'm not going to give it away. No, no, no.
Speaker 1:But we are in the process of looking. Everybody knows we're looking for an RV.
Speaker 2:Okay, everybody knows we're looking for an RV. We do have a special announcement today.
Speaker 1:We do have a special special announcement.
Speaker 2:Maybe that's why we're also excited here. But let's talk about making, as we're planning our trip.
Speaker 1:But I got to get a plug-in for Freightliner then.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, absolutely, because our new RV will be on a Freightliner.
Speaker 1:I see, for sure it will be on a Freightliner.
Speaker 2:But let's talk a little bit about all of the traveling that we do and we'd love to share with our listeners way to either save them money, help them make the trip easier, better, and that is with open roads, and open roads. We've been talking about their fuel card, which gives our listeners or anybody discounts on diesel fuel. So whenever you go to the pump, you could save on diesel fuel. The car itself.
Speaker 1:Well, you have to go to a truck pump.
Speaker 2:You have to go to a truck pump. Yes, do you actually? Yes, yes, I do. Okay, didn't know that. Good to know. The car itself is free. So open roads, fuel card, and now they have added on a toll pass. Get this. You could go to all 15 of Alley Species Skies Campgrounds with this toll pass. It doesn't matter where in the country you go. This toll pass works in all 48 states.
Speaker 1:Now, that's the 48 states that are connected. Connected 48 states yes, there's a couple others that aren't connected out there.
Speaker 2:Yes, and it won't. From what we understand it won't work there. Now I got to tell you I have some I'm I'm. This toll pass will save Dan and I this year in fines. I have paid well over $250 in toll fines. Here's why. Here's one of the reasons.
Speaker 2:Okay, partly I was it an idiot, did things wrong. But those toll passes like in Texas where you go through and it says they'll mail you, you know you're, they'll send you the toll in the mail Great, but where it went to until I've received it and then they give you 25 days to pay it. So on day 27, when I called, I had to now pay the tolls on the fines Plus other tolls. In Virginia have had it happen there too, because our toll transponder didn't work. We actually had a toll transponder. The nice thing about this toll pass, if that happens in any of the 48 states where you get a fine or something goes wrong, they have a concierge service that will handle it for you. So for our listeners there it is the transponder costs $24 for the year and then you could use it in all states.
Speaker 1:It is.
Speaker 2:There will be links in the show.
Speaker 1:It's the best cap secret in the RV industry. Yes, it really is until now Link in the show.
Speaker 3:Because I've got it all in everybody up.
Speaker 1:There will be a link in the show notes. Yes, so you can get your diesel gas card. Now you know, you don't just get the diesel gas card and buy diesel at the truck stops. You get discounts, and I mean significant discounts 30, 40, 50, 60 cents a gallon.
Speaker 2:And sometimes, I'll be honest even that five cents a gallon, and we'll sometimes go to a different gas stop just for five cents, because in a hundred gallon tank, a hundred gallons right, it adds up quick. It adds up quick, yes, it adds up quick. So now let's get back to spacious skies, because the other thing I really love and Allie and I have had a number of conversations the other thing I really really love is spraying bloom trail and the fall wars. Can you talk to our listeners about that?
Speaker 3:Absolutely so. We have designed basically a road trip with the spacious skies collection and that was intentional. We kept it regional and every campground that will be added to the collection is sort of it has to make sense geographically. So we have laid it all out for you. In the spring you can start from Savannah, which is our southernmost campground, and you can follow this road trip that we have designed and it actually is out there right now.
Speaker 3:We sent out a release and it's being covered in a few places, but you travel up the collection through the road trip and we have given information on what the native blooms are in each region and each location. I just think that's really cool to be able to follow it and take that all in and hunt for those blooms and then the other way around. In the fall we paint a fall color trail picture for you because you're chasing leaves at that point. You're chasing the changing colors and you start in Maine at Baltimore Woods and work your way down. I have done segments of these tours, just naturally, and it's just another fun thing and it's spectacular. We line up more ideas on area events at each stop and what other things you can do when you're doing your tour, but I know that we have some people competing for the first guest to hit all 15 spacious guys campgrounds.
Speaker 3:We just met. As far as who's telling us, we've just met a couple that had done nine or 10 so far and that was really exciting. I can't wait for someone to tell us. They've been told.
Speaker 1:That sounds amazing. My plan and our plans got combobbled up here because we had to go do some other thing. But my plan coming out of the Tampa RV show was to do all 15 and go from Florida and do all 15 spacious guys all the way up to Maine and then work my way over to Yellowstone. That was my plan.
Speaker 2:Right Now, the goal is to hit as many as possible.
Speaker 1:Yeah, now. Our current thought is to hit as many as possible.
Speaker 2:States are constantly changing and that's where that announcement in a few minutes comes in. But you wanted to ask about.
Speaker 1:I want to ask about this thing I've got on my screen up here you have something called the Cosmic Camper Loyalty Program. I want to be a Cosmic Camper Loyalty person because I'm cheap and I always want discounts. I know that it's on the top of mind of a lot of campers is to get the best possible pricing and save as much money as they possibly can, and I think this program, when it was first described to me, it does exactly that. So why don't you tell the RV Life Podcast listeners all about the Cosmic Camper Loyalty Program? Um?
Speaker 3:Happily. So if you're going to do any part of those trails that we just talked about, you will certainly get the best deal and the best rates If you join our Cosmic Camper Loyalty Program and become a Cosmic Camper. It's a small annual fee. It's $31.90 right now, which is actually a call-out to our Founders Day. Spacious Skies Day is March 19th, so we're trying to be a little cute there and that gets you 12% off all of your stays under 28 days. So it makes up for itself very quickly and we have found that.
Speaker 3:You know Cosmic Camper's are. They are loyal, they are what we have asked of them and we see in our data that Cosmic Camper's are returning, you know, either to the same campground even. It works if you're going to plan on staying anywhere more than once or if you're a traveler and you're hitting up multiple locations in the collection. But it's very simple and we give like a special newsletter. You're the first to hear of any. You know additional deals that might be even better than that 12%. You get a Cosmic Camper pin and I'd love to talk about the Spacious Skies pins because those are my favorite collectible. And yeah, it's just, it's a simple program right now and we hope to build it up even more, but you know 12% off is pretty compelling. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Real quick. I know Dan has a question, but I just want to clarify. Spacious Skies Day is March 19th. I want to put that in the show notes for our listeners, who you know aren't writing this down. I'm going to have that in the show notes Now.
Speaker 3:Dan, you had a question and we do a deal every Spacious Skies Day. So look at it. Oh, okay, it's a deal. Look for the deals.
Speaker 2:Every Spacious Skies Day. And, dan, you had a question.
Speaker 1:I do have a question, or actually it's my job right now to move the show along and say you know what, we have to take a break. But after the break we're going to come back and talk to Ali about planning and reservations and how early should you make reservations to get in and make sure that you get in to your Spacious Skies Campground, and we'll be back and talk about that right after this. National Indoor RB Centers. With over 1,000 motor homes available across multiple locations, national Indoor RB Centers continues to provide an outstanding, hassle-free motor home ownership experience. National Indoor is the number one New Mar dealer in the nation and also features brands like Integra, winnebago and much more.
Speaker 1:Visit NIRVCcom and become a part of the National Indoor RB Centers family. You know, other than Spacious Skies, there's not another company out there other than National Indoor that I can't talk about more. In this business it's just it comes from the top and I said that at the opening of the show. Good ownership makes a great company and you know Brett and Angie and Chuck and the entire team over at NIRVC, they just really know how to do it and to go on the trip, the Snow, the Blossom Trail and the Fall Trail and all that kind of stuff. You need to have good RV to do that.
Speaker 2:Brett Davis you're talking about is the president. I'd like to clarify who we're talking about the president and CEO of NIRVC. And again, it comes from the top. When you talk to people like Allie and like Brett, that are just good people with a mission, I'm going to say, and doing things right and the passion behind it. We heard Allie's story of how and we have more of Allie coming but you know the challenges around creating not just the first part, but then 15 of them and that stick to itness. And NIRVC has six locations across the country. It is definitely the dealership we will purchase our next RV from, because of the trust you know. And then, I guess, is what it comes down to their incredible service and the trust that we have in them as a company.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and on top of that, as we were getting started with the RV Life podcast, I was fortunate enough to sit down and talk with Brett and Allie. It was really like the time that you and I sat down together. I did not want that meeting to end. You know, we're sitting at a table having bad Domino's Pizza and War and Coke.
Speaker 2:The meeting we were at with Allie. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But I just didn't want it to end. It was just such an enjoyable night. We just clicked on so many levels. Well, brett knows so much about the RV industry, all the numbers, and this works this way. And this works this way and this is why this is this way. We could just Brett and I literally could talk forever.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's a little technical for me, but Brett's commitment to making the industry better is amazing, truly amazing.
Speaker 1:Now that song Horn will stop me from talking for a minute, because that means it's time for this week's Question of the Week. It's brought to you by Open Roads Innovative Tolling that tolling transponder that goes in your RV. We talked about it earlier. But, man, it is great. We can go anywhere and not have to worry about paying the tolls. It works, it's just, it's great. Now, Allie, I need you to stick around for this one, because this question comes from social media. However, it is almost directed directly at you.
Speaker 2:I picked it for that very reason, because I'm on social media and when I have my finger on the pulses they say I think it's the expression of what people want to know and what they're asking, and this kind of question, these types of questions, come up all the time. So it's a two-part question. We're putting you on the spot. And the first part of the question is when should I start reserving my camping spots for spring and summer, and I know those dates and times might be a little different. So let's start with that. Take it away, you're the expert.
Speaker 1:I have an answer to that I think. You know that glimmer in your eye, that baby that you're thinking about. You should start reserving camping spots for that baby that's not born yet right now, because I am sitting in one of the largest campgrounds in the entire thousand trail system of over a hundred campgrounds. There's, I think, 1,500 sites at this campground, so a lot of people. This place is packed, I mean packed to the brim.
Speaker 2:Right, so winter in Florida can be packed. Do you have some insight on different places? Different states will let you take it away.
Speaker 3:Yes, and we yeah, I mean we have so many different campgrounds in different regions that have different booking patterns and for sure it's like in Balsam Woods, for example, up in the north and in central Maine a lot of people get their trips booked right now because it's a destination, it is up there, and so February, march, april is when we are seeing the most bookings happening for the north. There and because those northern campgrounds except for one French pond in Hennepin, new Hampshire, that's our year round campground up there, but otherwise you only have a short, short season. It's like six months, five, six months of camping. So you've got to get those bookings in February, march, april for the north and then in the south, where we have year round campgrounds. I would say that if you're looking out to spring and summer, I mean it's yeah, it is definitely now, because your season is longer, you get warmer quicker and if you want to, you know, do a spring break trip.
Speaker 3:This is last minute booking, right now for sure. But even into summer, you know, if you want to come camp during those holiday weekends, it is. Now is the time. If you can camp on an off weekend or even midweek you have a little bit more time, but there are a few campgrounds where we see the most like same day, same week bookings. The one in Fayetteville is Spacesky Sandy Run. You'll have you know if you can plan ahead for your trip down 95, you'll have some good luck with that one, because if you're driving by and you think, oh, I got to stop now that one's a little bit harder but you should still try. Same with Savannah because it's on 95. So I would say that on average you're coming up.
Speaker 2:You're coming up on the peak booking time and that's why we wanted to get you on. So whether people are looking for Spacesky's bookings or other campgrounds, I mean the point is still, you know, your summer months, as Dan said, in Florida, tougher to do your northern areas, shorter windows, people book, they plan ahead holidays, as you said and that was the next part of the question last minute reservations. What I heard you say is look, some campgrounds book up but people should still try because there's always that last minute cancellation right, so people could just call.
Speaker 1:We're the kings of the last minute cancellation. We were booked all the way through June and then we had a booking that we had to do here in Orlando, so we had to cancel all of our reservations because they never fit together.
Speaker 2:Rescheduled, so the bottom line is after the Super Bowl.
Speaker 1:we're homeless and we're heading towards Savannah, so we're coming yeah.
Speaker 3:Well, welcome you with open arms. But I don't want people to get discouraged hearing that, oh, it's so hard to book. Camping is still one of those things, as you just described, that you know a lot of people have to make last minute changes and while you fully intend to plan ahead, it's just, it's not a perfect science, so I don't want anyone to be discouraged. You can always, you know, call and check to see if there's availability, and we have.
Speaker 3:I mean, we have right, we'll put your name on a waitlist and we're actually digitizing that waitlist, so it's going to be even easier for that like order to be said and for you at the top to get notified right away. So no discouraging.
Speaker 1:No, I, you know, for two years we have what we call our current thought, where we're going next and next and next and next. It's just our current thought because our life is so fluid in the entertainment industry and you know, you get a gig here, you get a gig there, you get a gig there. They want you to come here and speak. So it's just our current thought. But we have not been completely homeless on the side of the road one night ever in three years.
Speaker 2:And there's been a night we've spent at a cracker barrel. Actually, we've planned that because we're in between two places. We have not once had to go to cracker barrel because we didn't have any booking, so I'd love that you said that. I think a lot of people are in panic mode. There's a lot of information out there about oh my goodness, everything books up. So while people should and we're putting this episode out right at a time that people should start looking at reservations and booking, and if your plans change or it doesn't work that way, then you know, check with the park. But cancellations do happen, so don't panic. So thank you for clarifying.
Speaker 3:We have flexible cancellation policies and we do a reschedule. That's all possible. That's awesome.
Speaker 2:And a big question for our listeners. Okay, we are ready for that big announcement, dan right.
Speaker 1:I've been waiting to get this announcement in. So we this week have finally come to an agreement and, as everybody knows, we are looking for a new RV. And everybody knows wait a minute, let me we're looking for a new RV because we have a 2002 diplomat made by Monaco. Within the first six months we started looking for our next unit because a 2002, I mean, every time you drive the thing it's like an earthquake going down the road. So there's some problems here and there and I mean I'm always, always half my time it feels like it's just fixing this or fixing that or doing something for the RV. So we have been looking. In the last three years we have worked six RV shows and we have visited over a dozen dealers. We have sat in, we have crawled through, we have discussed hundreds of different RVs, hundreds of different floor plans and we have finally decided on a manufacturer of an RV that we have. We've got it down to one manufacturer and that is Numar. That is the brand for us.
Speaker 2:Over the last few months we have been speaking with Casey Tubman, the CEO and president of Numar, and actually been talking to him over the last few years, and his team I mean and his team and we have just a few days ago, come to the agreement that we will be the brand ambassadors for Numar. And I can't even say that without like.
Speaker 1:I'm just so excited, so excited and so honored To have a major corporation.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Tap us to do that sort of thing.
Speaker 2:Now working with Casey has been a dream come true. Numar has been the brand that we always resonate toward and always have gone back to. Now I gotta add something on here that is just so incredibly touching. We got a message that said from his team, his marketing team. That said, when a new Numar is ordered, the people who are buying the RV, their picture is taken. So they take a picture of them and that picture is then distributed to every single person who works on the RV and every single one of those people sign off on it.
Speaker 2:So every day, when they're, ali said wow, I know right, and Dan's scaring up, it's giving me ideas so every day, when that RV is being worked on, the people working on it are looking at the couple, the single person, the family, the people who will actually be in this RV, and they are building that RV for those people. How amazingly touching.
Speaker 1:Now Numar has shared a link to that video and we were so touched by this video we're going to share that video with all of our listeners and I will put it in the show notes. It's just every once in a while. You hear a story on social media or somebody will tell you a story, or see something on TV that just wrenches your heart like you've never seen. Watching this video is one of those times. It's really incredible.
Speaker 2:I'll send it to you.
Speaker 1:Get the Kleenex out. Yes, I'll send it to you, ali, when you watch this video.
Speaker 2:And for our listeners. We could see Ali and Dan, and I can see each other and Ali's shaking her head, and it truly is. And I responded to them by saying whoever came up with this idea needs a gold star Like a solid gold star.
Speaker 1:He was a teacher for a lot of years.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I wanted to be solid gold because whoever came up with this idea, I went them on our marketing team for sure, and I think I know who it was and we find out who it was. If I confirm that, we will definitely share that because just wow.
Speaker 1:So this is one of Dan's top 10 recommendations for life. You wanna take a minute and watch this video because it is truly, truly heartwarming and it's one of the many reasons that we chose NUMAR as a company that we want to represent. Now, I know not a lot of you know this, and in social media and YouTube world and all that kind of stuff, youtubers and we all are pushing or promoting things all the time. We will not promote a company or a product that we haven't used, that we don't know about.
Speaker 1:No like you no like trust, like the people, yeah. It's just our commitment to our listener. I don't know that I could talk about Spacious Guys' Campgrounds the way that I talk about Spacious Guys' Campgrounds unless I had been there and experienced it and watched a manager take care of people that were yelling and screaming and hollering because the power went out. We just had a thunderstorm. The power went out. Of course it did. It's not you know. So it's the people. It's people helping people and watching.
Speaker 2:Is that a song? Isn't that a song?
Speaker 1:People, okay, people who need people Wait a minute, that's how you say it. No, no, no, don't, don't, don't, because it's not, it's not, that's not a freebie we can't, we can't. Barbara will come after me.
Speaker 2:Yes, but but you know, and again, ali, let us give you. Is there anything you want to wrap up with? We covered a lot and we probably could go on for another few hours of chatting. We can't wait to come to New Jersey and sit around the campfire with you in our new yeah, Newmar RV.
Speaker 1:So is there anything else you?
Speaker 2:want to add to our conversation.
Speaker 3:Yes, I do, and it's that part of our mission at Spacious Guys and part of what is deeply ingrained in our culture, is this commitment to inclusivity in the outdoors and in camping in general. It is a space that has, you know, not seen as much diversity In. You know, every way that you speak about diversity as other, you know forms of hospitality, and we are in partnership with a few really wonderful organizations that promote that. We are in partnership with Black folks Camp Two. All of our team members, everybody who works at Spacious Guys Campgrounds, goes through their Unity Blaze certification, which is a really simple, easy to digest way for us to understand what has historically kept Black folks and other people of color or other orientations or religions or whatnot, from feeling safe and comfortable in campgrounds and in these settings, and what we can do as campground owners to change that. And I say simple because it really is. It is just about intentional invitation and intentional welcome, and that is what we are working very hard to do. We have a long way to go, of course, but that is something that is deeply ingrained in our culture.
Speaker 3:I am Hispanic, my mom is Cuban, and so I know that in our culture, you know, we don't see a lot of people who are out there camping and taking camping trips and doing all of that. We love the outdoors and you know not to make any generalizations, this is just patterns, right, like we Hispanic folks love a great picnic and love going outside with family is a huge part of it, right, and that is what camping is all about is family. But the education on what RV camping is is simply lacking. And so there is that element. We also, you know, we support an organization called Latino Outdoors and they are really wonderful with their mission.
Speaker 3:We are also in partnership with LGBT Plus Outdoors and, you know, in the name I think it is clear as well their commitment is to getting more people in the LGBT Plus communities out enjoying the space safely, which is a really important word to use, right, and that means that there's some work to do on, you know, the campground owners and for sure, in ensuring that safety. And then we also have a partnership with Girl Camper and Girl Camper Janine Pettit, the editor of that magazine and the founder of the organization. You know, she and I have a lot of things in common. We're both, you know, find ourselves as solo female campers out there pretty often. And so that is you know, safety again, right, like how do you enjoy yourself without feeling safe? And so that is our commitment as Spacious Skies, our culture. It is ingrained in us that that is part of it all. We want as many people as possible from every walk of life to be able to enjoy themselves and take in what nature and what camping is all about.
Speaker 1:And now you have one more thing in common with Janine, because Janine was a guest on the R. She wasn't only a guest, she was the first guest on the RV Life podcast yeah, she was.
Speaker 2:And we love that and that's been a part of like when we I talked to a lot of people and I felt like I've become a mentor. There's a couple of women now that are like I just I'm just starting out, like what do I do? I don't even know how to hook anything up. And okay, you know, one step at a time. First of all, be part of Girl Camper magazine, because in the Girl Camper Facebook group and yeah, and so everything you're talking about is just who Dan and I are. So thank you for taking the time.
Speaker 1:I really enjoyed spending some time with her at the Tampa RV show too.
Speaker 2:But all of this you know all of what you're talking about, the inclusivity and it's so important and you're right, it comes from the campground owner and thank you, thank you, thank you for doing this and making this part of your campgrounds and hopefully it spreads like wildfires to other campground owners. I'd love that.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:We take the honor and the responsibility very seriously.
Speaker 2:Okay, I'm going to ask our RV Life podcast listeners, you know, a review, a comment, whether it's on the podcast channel right here or on our social media RV Life podcast, facebook or Instagram, apple, spotify.
Speaker 1:That's where it really helps.
Speaker 2:Yes, but any feedback, you know, certainly helps our guests. Spacious guys, campgroundswithanaskcom, please, you know, let us know, let us know what your thoughts are.
Speaker 1:Right, and you can get links to everything that we talked about today in the show notes, including that touching video.
Speaker 2:Yes, and we have to thank you so much, ali, for taking the time to be on the show and just sharing and creating these campgrounds Like truly. Thank you for creating these amazing campgrounds.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 3:Thank you for having me and giving me a chance to share.
Speaker 1:Well, I'll tell you what You're welcome. Coming into one of your campgrounds is why camping is so wonderful. To Patty and I anyway, we just really, really enjoy it. You're listening to the RV Life podcast and our big announcement is we just signed a promo agreement with New Mar Corporation. They will be an advertiser from now on on the RV Life podcast and we are reminding you to have a great rest of today and an even better day tomorrow.