In our newest newsletter, Barb made reference to our overnight stay in a Wal-Mart parking lot in Mineral Springs, Texas. Many of our readers will be surprised that this was our first time to camp at Wa;-Mart. When I mentioned in the last newsletter about never having stayed at a Wal-Mart (even though we had planned to), a good friend jokingly said that his idols had “feet of clay” and he was worried that our full-timing credentials would be seriously challenged. Even though we have boon-docked in truck stops and rest areas, we had never stayed at a Wal-Mart. We kept it a secret because we didn’t want Joe Peterson (president of Escapees Inc) to know. Joe and Kay would never think of paying for an overnight stay in a campground while enroute to a destination. He has kidded us about that before.

So why, up to now, have we never stayed at a Wal-Mart?  First of all we think that Wal-Mart is very generous and RV friendly for allowing overnight stays when possible. It just doesn’t work for our normal travel mode. If you have attended any of our full-timing seminars you have heard us talk about traveling 200 miles and staying a week. The weekly stays haven’t worked for us lately because of business and other commitments, but we do try to hold to the 200-300 mile range. Even with a late morning start we are off the road no later than 3:00 p.m. and frankly that is too early for us to spend the afternoon in a busy parking lot. We try to make traveling a fun thing and it’s nice to relax with the awning and lawn chairs out or perhaps a stroll around a quaint little town to stretch our legs.  We have even been known to duck into an old fashioned soda fountain and ruin our dinner with a soda.

We sure don’t knock staying at a Wal-Mart and our one stay was a good one. Hopefully we won’t have to use them that much. Not because we don’t like them; we just don’t like to travel late into any day. Note: On our one stay we did ask for permission and the manager gladly gave it.  It was a win-win situation because we spent $80 in the store. Thank you Wal-Mart for being a good neighbor.