RV Guide - The Savvy Campers

Being more efficient with planning your next camping trip can save you time when towing your travel trailer or driving your RV. From pre planning to better equipment, you can shave 2+ hours on your drive, setup, and mealtime. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORuaWJiJpoE Andersen Levelers with Levelmate Pro If you utilize the Andersen Leveling System which is one of the best travel trailer levelers out there along with the Levelmate Pro, leveling and chocking your travel trailer will go as quick as possible. No more in and out of the vehicle to check for level, you can sit in your truck and look on the app to find when you are level. Simply drive up on the ramps, apply the parking brake, then chock the levelers and you are done, as simple as that. See why the Andersen Leveling System is a top leveling solution in our article on leveling systems, and watch our unboxing video below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ob55GV1m-Es The Levelmate Pro is a simple install which will save time on your campground setup every time you use it. It uses an app on your phone which is available even if you do not have cell service to tell you if you are level and how much leveling your trailer will require. Utilizing a Levelmate Pro as well as the Andersen Levelers can save you about 15 minutes of guesswork and entering and exiting the trailer several times to check for level. Drill Attachment for Your Travel Trailer Stabilizing Jacks A simple drill and drill attachment can save your arms as well as time on your trailer setup. Instead of releasing your stabilizing jacks each by hand spinning the socket over and over, simply buy a drill attachment and drop them down in about 3 seconds each. Use this drill attachment if you have a 3/4 socket (most trailers) or this one if you need a t adapter (our Winnebago uses this one). This gadget should save you about 5 minutes as well as protect your arms from tennis elbow. There is nothing worse than the monotonous work of lowering your leveling jacks. Read our article on how to stabilize your RV. Plan your campsite setup and items beforehand. Before you head out the door you can save time on your campsite setup by knowing how you will drive your vehicle in the site. Having your approach planned can save time from having to turn a travel trailer around in a tight campground if you make the approach the wrong way. This helps if you have a pre booked site and can get a good satellite image off of Google or am familiar with the campground. Packing only the necessary items on your trip as well will keep you from tripping over all of your excess items and keep your storage areas uncluttered to make everything visible and easily accessible making setup a breeze. If you practice both of the items, you should be able to shave about 20 minutes off of your setup time. RV Specific GPS to Save Drive Time Utilizing a RV specific GPS like this Garmin can save you time especially if you have a tall trailer and there are low bridges on your route. Enter your height and weight of your trailer into the GPS and destination, and it will route you around low bridges or roads with weight limitations. This can save you from a potential detour which can cost you time as well as gas money. Another benefit to this is to be able to see roads when out of cell service as maps are made available offline. Our current vehicle does not have navigation so we use our cell phones. On a past camping trip through Glacier, as we don’t have service we cannot look at nearby roads and different routes. After waiting through a construction site for about an hour, we discovered another road to our campsite that was out of a construction zone and was straight with little elevation unlike our normal route which has many curves and lots of small steep hills. This alone shaved an hour off the return trip this year and could shave an hour off of yours. Premake Meals at Home If you plan to do a campfire foil meal or have items which are diced up or complex meals, it will save you quite a bit of time to premake these meals at home where you have a comfortable place to chop and prepare as well as have a quicker cleanup not using your precious limited water supply in your trailer. Pre-choping your onions, mushrooms, green peppers, etc. and placing them in Ziploc bags will make meal prep a breeze, simply take out only what you need and make your meal. This trick could save up to a half hour or more every meal you utilize these items on. Think about all the less chopping on the uneven picnic bench as well as all the washing you will not have to do out on your camping trip. Think of all of the meal prep that went into the meal into the photo on the right. If you are still reading and are not starting your time saving tips, here is a bonus 6th tip on meals when we go camping. When we go on a camping trip for a few days, we pack a small Costco lasagna and throw it in the oven on the first night. This typically will feed us two dinners and a lunch. Remember, to make your camping trips relaxing and not worry about huge meals and cleanup. If you put all of these items into use on your camping trips you should expect to save over 2 hours per trip if it is a couple of days or longer. With all that time available, use it to spend more time with your family, friends, and nature.