Dear RV Park Owners, Please Help

[Fastalker64]

In an effort to encourage a high level of marketing in the RV park owner community, and continue to take advantage of the increasing growth in RV sales and new folks camping, I'm offering this advice-

When you're posting a photo album on your privately-owned RV campground's web site, SHOW ME PHOTOS OF THE *&^% CAMPING SITES!

I am weary of doing my due diligence to find highly-rated campsites in areas where we'd like to travel, only to visit the rv park's website to find (under their "Photos" tab) a bunch of photos of septuagenarians around a fire pit, or a parade of kids on bicycles, and then the occasional, partially-obstructed view of some 45' diesel pusher motorhome perched on what I am assuming is the finest site they have, or the only one capable of accommodating one of these behemoths. I don't care.

I don't mean to say that I don't care about people in their 70s, or children enjoying themselves at an RV park, or big RVs, but when I'm choosing an rv park where we are planning on staying I'm likely to choose a park that is proud enough of their actual camping sites to show at least a handful of photos. What I'm assuming, if you don't show those photos, is that the best thing about the campground is the landscaping at the entrance sign, or the smiling face of the woman at the check-in counter, or the pool. This leads me to believe that the sites are pretty skimpy, or pretty awful. I'm assuming that my port slide is going to be over the neighbor's fire pit, because the sites are so narrow.

My wife and I are small business owners and only get to take one real "vacation" per year, so it's very important to me to find a campground where we'll be comfortable for 3 to 5 days in our chosen destination. I'm not into rolling the dice on the campground, when it's a once a year kind of trip.

In today's world of easy-to-manage WordPress web sites, cloud photo storage and cell phone cameras that shoot 14MP images, it's not hard to show photos of some of your sites, WITHOUT CAMPERS ON THEM, so that we can get an idea of the scale, surrounding foliage, distance to neighboring campers, etc. That's what makes a difference to me, not the fact that you have a hayride on Friday nights or that you have bridge players sitting around in your clubhouse. Save those photos for Facebook, and show me the camp sites.

Your assistance is appreciated. Happy camping.

[Ruth]

We have a few campgrounds in New Hampshire that have pictures of their sites. It was for that reason we chose to camp at those campgrounds as the sites were large, well screened and a fair amount of distance between sites. I also feel that campgrounds would get more visitors if they had pictures of their sites, or maybe not if the sites are like stalls in a barn..😂😂😂

[Murff]

You might find this website useful, Fastalker:

https://www.campsitephotos.com/

Not perfect, but could help.

Murff

[Mustang65]

Google Maps/Satellite.. may be a year old but you will get a good idea as to how it is laid out and the size of the sites, washroom locations..... DW does this all the time.

Wait about 5 more years and that will be a video stream, probably will be in REALTIME.

Don

My Registry

RVing with SOLAR

[bankr63]

+1 on using Google Earth to view CG's in advance. Also helps in scoping out navigable gas stations.

The one point I disagree on is having the photos of unoccupied sites. Our Ontario parks post one or two photos of each site, always unoccupied. With no frame of reference it is nearly impossible to figure out just how big they are. I actually wish they would put a standard 2-person tent in every photo so you could get some scale. It is really disappointing when what looked like a 40' oak tree in the photo turns out to be a 4' poison sumac bush in reality.

[Sundancer330]

Since we have a newer reservation system for Michigan State Parks they show pictures of each campsite, sometimes 2-3 pictures. They also list the size of site, weather its level, grass, dirt or paved, distance to comfort station/showers.

[DocBrown]

I concur! While not having photos of sites will not deter me from going to a given CG, having photos of sites may sway my decisions.

[kayakterp]

X2

[norty1]

Many COE parks post site pics but some sp's have one picture, same one on every site.

[NC Roamer]

Originally Posted by Mustang65

Google Maps/Satellite.. may be a year old but you will get a good idea as to how it is laid out and the size of the sites, washroom locations.

What would be perfect is Google driving their Street View cars through every campground, public or private.

[ccso2213]

Originally Posted by NC Roamer

What would be perfect is Google driving their Street View cars through every campground, public or private.

One came through last year while we were in Montauk SP in Missouri. I never checked to see if it made it on maps.


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[North of 49°]

Same here in Manitoba, and we’ve had it for a few years. Some sites are sort of halfway between a pull-through and a back-in, and we don’t like those. Knowing that when we’re making reservations really helps.

[Berg]

Google maps is good unless the campsites are heavily wooded. The satellite can't see through those leaves.
Street view would be fantastic.

[redsnapper]

The same applies to not showing rates......up front and not buried in the "site map"...

No rates posted......click.....on to the next park.

[2nOZ]

We usually check out the campground on reserveamerica or sometimes the campground website. When on the campground site map, we click on the different site icons and it provides a picture of that specific site. Been lucky so far in that we know what the site looks like before we get there. We have also used Google Earth to view the campground and fuel stations.

[Fastalker64]

I'll check it out, thank you!

[Fastalker64]

Point taken, and I've seen what you mean 😉

[Fastalker64]

Originally Posted by norty1

Many COE parks post site pics but some sp's have one picture, same one on every site.

Yes, they do, and that is very helpful. I'm mostly addressing the private owned parks, who tend to show photos of Halloween parties, rather than site
photos 😉

[Siamese]

I know exactly what you mean with regard to the photos they show. A few semi-closeups of people having fun.

I want pictures of individual sites, but even with pictures, you don't know if they're going to put you in a site that is almost impossible to get in and out of.

At the very least, I'd like enough pictures to get a sense of the place.

Why don't they do it? Because they're either lazy, stupid, or trying to hide the truth. I'm leaning toward lazy and stupid, though.

This weekend we camped just outside of Dearborn, so we could visit the Henry Ford Museum. We also wanted to visit the historic River Rouge complex. If you visit Ford's site for the Rouge, you can't find anything useful about the tour. And you'd think those Ford people would be smart enough to anticipate what a visitor to their website would want to see.

We toured the museum and the Rouge. By the way, we found the Rouge tour to be kind of a dud. Oh, well. The museum and Greenfield Village...always fantastic.

We had time to visit the Yankee Air Museum, which was near our campground, but once again, the website was nearly useless. Do you think it might be useful to show pictures of the airplanes? Shoe me the stuff! The website was so bad, we didn't bother going there.

Pictures are easy to post on a website. And people want them!

[NCMFFD]

Google Earth user here but agree individual pics of actual sites would be helpful.