10 Things You Need to Know Before Your RV Trip

10 Things We Learned on Our First RV Trip

We just got back from our very first RV trip a few days ago. It was a blast and we had an awesome time. We are SO excited to start full-time RV living soon!

Here are some of the things we learned along the way. Some of them are good things, some of them not so good. But hopefully, by reading this you can learn from our mistakes and copy our successes to have a smooth RV trip of your own!

1. There are a LOT of RV accessories you are going to need before your RV trip and buying them all is going to be pretty sad, but you have to do it anyways.

You bought an RV? That’s amazing! Time for your first RV trip.

Woah there, not so fast. Buying the RV itself is, of course, a critical component to taking your first RV trip, but unfortunately, there are probably still lots of RV supplies you are going to need before you can hit the road.

Unless you want to have broken back, no electricity, and a tank you can’t dump… Trust me. You’re going to want to avoid all those things. Lucky for you, this post has all the information on what you need to get RV life started off on the right foot.

Our total cost of all these RV accessories was around $650. It sucked. I wasn’t expecting it to be that much. But it was necessary.

So here’s what we bought, and what you should too if you want to be a happy camper. Luckily Joel did a TON of research to figure out what we needed so you don’t have to.

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my full disclosure policy for details. 

Essential RV Accessories

Before you can go on your RV trip, there are several RV supplies you need to purchase to make sure you can hook up at your site. Here is a quick rundown of what you need and why.

The power items linked here are specifically for a 50 amp motor home, however, if you have a 30 amp connection, you can get many of the same products but just make sure it is for 30 amps. Otherwise, you will be sad.

Everything for the water will work for most motorhomes and travel trailers. Of course, be sure to double check what you need before making any purchases.

Electrical Plugs and Adapters

1. Twist Lock 50amp RV Adapter Plug: If you have a larger or Class A motorhome like us, chances are you are going to need to purchase this adapter. See the video below if you aren’t sure whether you have a 50 amp or a 30 amp outlet.   

This adapter plug attaches directly to the plug on your RV so that you can attach an extension cord from your RV to the power source at your campsite.

2. RV Extension Cord: The next RV accessory you are going to need is a heavy duty extension cord. Sorry, the one you have lying around in your garage isn’t going to cut it.

But if you want power to your RV, purchasing this accessory is a necessary evil. The good thing is it really is heavy duty so it should last you a good long while.

3. 50 Amp Voltage Surge Protector / EMS (Electric Management System): Moving further out from the connection on your RV we are getting closer to finally being able to attach to your power source.

This next RV accessory is kind of like insurance. Most of the time you won’t “need” it, but if you do need it and you don’t have it you’ll be screwed and fry your RV’s power.

Do yourself a favor and fork over the money now so you don’t end up with a fried electrical system and a HEFTY bill to get it all fixed.  

4. 50 Amp to 30 Amp RV Adaptor: Assuming you have a 50 amp connector on your RV, you are going to have a 50 amp to 30 amp adaptor cable amongst your RV supplies. This is because even though you have a 50 amp hookup, not all campsites will have a 50amp connection at the power pole.

What that means is that if you don’t have this adapter to allow you to plug into a 30amp outlet, you won’t be able to get any power to your RV. Chances are, somewhere on one RV trip or another, you are going to need this bad boy.

Woohoo!!! You can finally connect your RV to the power. Pretty crazy that it takes 4 different pieces of equipment to safely do so, but such is the RV life.

RV Accessories for Water

So now that you’ve got your RV supplies for the electrical side of things, let’s move onto the water-based accessories. This will allow you to hook up to city water.

1. 90-Degree Hose Elbow: Finally something that doesn’t cost a fortune to add to the list! Starting closest to your RV, the first thing you will want in terms of water connection supplies is this 90-degree hose connection.

Using this will take the stress off of your house and allow for better water supply into your RV when you are connecting to city water.

2. Drinking Hose: The next RV accessory you will need for your water supply is, not surprisingly, a hose. It is best to get a hose specifically for drinking like the one here so that you aren’t risking the possibility of chemicals from a traditional garden hose leaching into your water supply.

Nobody wants that. A drinking hose will also help you avoid obnoxious kinks that would otherwise stop your water supply. Probably mid shower, because that’s how things always go.

3. RV Water Filter: While technically this isn’t a necessary RV accessory, it really is a good idea to have it. And it doesn’t cost much, so you might as well get it. Having an RV water filter will help improve the safety and quality of your drinking water.

4. Pressure Regulator: If you don’t want city water spewing out of and potentially damaging your RV water pipes, you’re going to need a pressure regulator. This attaches to the spigot (a word I just now learned how to spell. Thanks spell check). You then screw your hose into it and you are ready to have water to your RV.

RV Supplies for Sewer

I mean, are you really going to make me explain this one? You are… ok. Well, what goes into your RV must come out, and these are the supplies you need to make it happen without finding yourself in a….crappy…. situation.

1. Sewer Hose Kit: While you can get cheaper sewer hoses, it really is worth it to spend a few extra bucks to get something that won’t leak. Because, ew, who wants to deal with that. NOT ME. This is the best sewer hose out there and will help ensure a smooth dumping experience.

Just note (that is very important!) if you aren’t connected directly at your site and you have to go to a dump site. You’re going to want to put a rock on top of your hose when it is dumping so the end of your hose doesn’t go flying everywhere.

 It is a good thing Joel is an engineer and thought, “hm, there is probably a reason this very large rock is right by the dump station”.

If it were up to me, it probably would have been a sad day. So be like Joel, use the rock.

2. RV Sewer Support: This nifty little gadget is another great RV accessory to have especially when you are hooked up directly to the sewage system from your RV campsite.

It is especially important when your site isn’t level as it will help ensure smooth flow from your RV to the sewer so you don’t end up with any backup (barf!). It will also protect your hose from damage and from getting all dirty when you’re hooked up at your site.

So basically, if it stops me from getting crap all over my campsite, I’m gonna buy it. The sewer support is definitely a worthwhile investment.

THE BEST RV BED IN THE WORLD!

The last RV accessory that I have to recommend, and also the most enjoyable purchase, is this amazing RV mattress, the Zinus Deluxe RV mattress.

The RV mattress that came in our motorhome was a complete piece of junk. We slept on it one night and you could feel the coils and it offered 0 support. That’s when we decided we needed a new mattress.

We decided to give the Zinus a shot, and it is AMAZING!!! It is more comfortable than the bed we have in our house currently. I don’t think I have slept so well in years. This mattress is super comfy just the right amount of give from the memory foam but 100% supports you so you aren’t sinking in.

So if your RV mattress is from the dark ages, you will definitely want to upgrade. Plus, the Zinus mattress is an absolute steal in terms of the price for the amazing comfort you get.

And since it is designed for an RV or trailer, it is short enough to fit comfortably in your RV and allow enough room for you to get by it easily.

What Else We Learned on Our RV Trip:

Phew, we finished going over all of the RV supplies and accessories you really need to have before taking your first RV trip in order to ensure smooth sailing. Now let’s get on to even more fun things (and sometimes not so fun things) we learned on our very first RV trip!

2. Don’t assume people won’t park you in

Yep. We got parked in and couldn’t get out of our spot the morning after we camped out at a truck stop.

“They’ll see where we are parked and not park next to us,” we thought to ourselves at around 10 pm after a long day of driving. Wrong.

So there we were, 9 am, trying to meet our friends at 10. Only we were stuck in the darn parking lot.

It was then that we started to ask ourselves lots of questions. Like why the heck did we park here in the first place? How are we going to get out? What if the trucker who parked us in sleeps all day? Can we knock?….

We were definitely floundering. Eventually, another trucker, who was parked next to the one who parked us in sensed our dilemma. He moved his very loud truck, which thankfully woke up our trucker who then kindly backed up so we could get out.

Lesson learned though. Make sure you ALWAYS park somewhere where you can pull straight forward to get out. Don’t put yourself in a sticky situation and you’ll be much happier.

3. You will probably punch the ceiling when you are changing and hit your head on lots of things if this is your first RV trip. Especially when the slides are in.

Since we are going to be living in our RV, it is pretty darn spacious. But the bedroom is slightly elevated compared to the rest of the RV. So every. single. time. I went to change, I punched the ceiling. And I’m not even tall. I’m sure it’ll be fine once I get used to it, but it is definitely something to watch out for.

Also, beware of sneaky little corners that jump out at you and hit you in the head when the slides are in. It is a miracle how much more space there is once you open those up.

With the slides out, you will feel so comfy and spacious. It is actually hard to believe how roomy things are. We have opposing slides which makes our RV seem even bigger.

Slide number and position is definitely something you need to think about if you are considering full-time RV living. I think those alone could make or break you in the long run.

4. Strangers will be excited to talk to you about your life at the gas station

This is a funny phenomenon that we have noticed with Jimi (our 1977 VW Bus) and then again with this RV trip. Nowadays people don’t usually just strike up a conversation at the gas station.

But man, drive a nontraditional vehicle and people are pumped to talk to you. It has been pretty fun to get to tell people about our plans and the fact that we are going to be full-time RVers pretty soon.

It is less fun when they ask how many miles per gallon that sucker gets. The numbers are not pretty, my friend. Which brings me to our next point.

5. Even though you know it will cost a million dollars for gas, you will still be sad.

Filling up with gas is kind of a tragic experience with an RV. If you are planning out how much it will cost to take your RV trip, I hate to break it to you, but you are probably going to have to calculate your MPG at about 5-7.

And we didn’t even have the trailer with the Jeep on this trip. It is definitely in your best interest to get a good credit card that has awesome rewards so you can at least get something out of all that gas.

We actually scored an absolutely AMAZING credit card deal, purely by happenstance. We got the Smith’s Grocery store credit card which I just happened to see advertised while shopping one day.

Smith’s is a Kroger brand store and there are hundreds of others throughout the country, so we know we will get a lot of use out of it on our travels all over the county.

The Smith’s Credit card was running a promotion where for the first year you can get an additional 55 cents off per gallon (up to 35 gallons. Darn limits.). Combined with our grocery store rewards points we scored $1.15 off PER GALLON on our fill up after this first RV trip. It ended up saving us about $40 and the card has NO FEE.

Also, they gave us $100 in free groceries just for getting the card so I’m feeling like a money-saving machine now.

I don’t know if they will run such a promotion again, or when, but be on the lookout, because it will save you TONS of money if you frequently take RV trips. Currently, you can get an additional 25 cents off, but that is subject to change as well.

6. Don’t run out of propane otherwise you’re going to eat cold chicken

So we didn’t fill up our propane tank when we had the chance thinking, “we can just stop somewhere along the way and fill it up”. Big mistake.

Since most places don’t allow you to pump propane yourself, you have to hope that someone onsite is certified to fill your tanks for you. If there isn’t anyone there, then you are just out of luck.

We seriously attempted to get propane FOUR times at FOUR different places and had no luck at any of them. Which leads us to the cold chicken. I guess it wasn’t technically cold but we at dinner at 11 pm because it took so darn long to cook it over the fire.

The fact that I forgot to thaw it out may have been a related factor….

7. Bring earplugs if you’ll be camping out at a truck stop on your RV trip

Chances are if you are taking an RV trip cross country, or even for a longer weekend trip, at some point in your RV life, you are going to stop for the night at a truck stop.

This can be super convenient, because it is free and truck stops are set up for semis so you can (hopefully) find a place to park your RV.

The main problem with truck stops though is that they are NOISY. Air breaks don’t mess around. So do yourself a favor and have some earplugs tucked away in your medicine cabinet so you always have them when you need them. You’ll get a much better night’s sleep if you do.

8. Scout out your route in advance on Google Satellite

Thank goodness I have Joel in my life, because he thinks of things I wouldn’t have thought of otherwise.

Our first RV trip brought us to an awesome place called City of Rock in southern Idaho. It was a totally amazing spot to be, but it did have some questionable dirt roads for an RV.

In order to make sure we wouldn’t end up stuck somewhere in a spot where we couldn’t turn around, Joel scoped out the route we would have to take to the climbing spot beforehand using Google’s satellite view.

He was then able to figure out if it was a good idea for use to head down said dirt road in the first place and to find up the perfect spot to park where we could easily turn around at the end of the day.

9. Search the biking route on Google maps to see the elevation gain

Another little helpful tidbit for planning out your route for your RV trip is to check out the elevation changes by switching google map directions to “bike mode”.

By doing this, you can get an idea of what kind of crazy mountain passes you may have to drive over. In some cases, it might even make more sense gas mileage wise (and terrifying break wise on the way back down) to take a longer, flatter route.

Obviously, this isn’t always possible, but sometimes it is, so it is definitely worth taking a look at before you hit the road for your trip.

10. If this is your “shakedown” trip before full- time RV living, you aren’t going to want to go back to regular life!

Our first RV trip was just a “shakedown” trip.  We don’t leave for full-time RV living for a couple of months yet, although we are in hardcore “decide what do we need” mode. I have to say though, coming back to reality after this trip was a bit of a downer.

We did catch a few things that need to be tuned up before becoming full-time RVers, which is definitely good. So taking a shakedown trip is 100% a good idea.

But all we wanted to do when we got “home” was go back to our new home (the RV). Seriously, we had a blast.

I am so excited for the time when our nights are filled with eating dinner outside at a picnic table and sitting around a fire chatting. I think RV life will help us to disconnect and enjoy life even more.

Being able to simplify your life and focus on what really matters instead of on all the “stuff” just cluttering up your life is truly amazing. It was just for a weekend this time, but soon it will be for a lifetime.

And I want you to be able to join in on the journey!

Are you a full-time RVer or wannabe? What did you learn on your first trip?