2024 Camping Adventures Recap

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2024 ended up being the year with the most nights camping for me so far. I did some camping and dancing in between rounds of chemo and surgery in 2023, but I did miss out on some adventures. I feel like I was making up for lost time. I've seen new places, done new things and danced in more dancehalls. I've met (or reconnected) with new friends and did lots of things this year. 

I like staying in the Texas State Parks because I get good discounts with my Parks Pass and I am trying to scratch off more places on the map. I like campgrounds much better than RV Park(ing lots). 

Look for my adventures on this blog, on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and anywhere you see #nativtxntravels. 

36 Outings - 67 Nights

This number does not include the trip to the service centers. Sometimes it was 1 night at a location up to 4 nights. The typical stay is 2 nights over a weekend, but some of these were back-to-back to make a longer total trip. 

*Parks with 🆕 were new to me. 



Types of Parks

Boondocking/Dry Camping

  • Diamond I Venue - Dime Box - 5 trips - 5 nights
  • J5 Show Barn - Normangee - 2 nights 🆕 Thanks Richard!
  • Silver Wings Ballroom - Brenham - 3 trips - 4 nights
  • Moochdocking with friends - 1 night 🆕 Thanks Patti & Joe!

City/County Park

Good Sam Parks

KOA Parks

Private Parks

State Parks

👢 Dancehalls 🎻

Most of the time I camp, I am with a group of friend at or near a dancehall. Some of the dances are two or three-day events. We like the old Texas dancehalls with great honky tonk music. If you don't have a fiddle or steel guitar, don't even bother. It's not true country music. 

Other Adventures

There are some other adventures I have worked in as well. Getting out in nature, visiting with other RVers, drooling over new RVs and gadgets... I enjoy walking on trails in the parks. Look for my trail stats at AllTrails. 🥾

🚘 Mileage

This year, not counting the service trips listed below, I have travelled 6144 miles on the camper. The average gas mileage was 9.43 mpg while towing with my Silverado 1500. This does not include extra mileage for any of the events, this is just on the camper tires. 2326 miles were on the new Goodyear Endurance tires that I had replaced in the summer after THREE blowouts!


💲 Costs

  • Total camping fees $2113.92. I saved $649.61 using memberships and group discounts.
  • Total gas costs, including trips for service/upgrades $1950.91
  • Total of camping fees and gas was $4064.83, not including food or entertainment.
I use discounts whenever possible. Texas State Parks Pass (my favorite), Good Sam, Texas Campgrounds, Group Rates...

🛠️ Service and Maintenance

The year didn't start off great. It almost seemed like I needed to take the Passport in for service every time I took her out. One service took over a month. I did some upgrades as well - a solar inverter, lithium battery, sewer hose holder tube, KoolRV, SoftStart, Goodyear Endurance tires and SnapPads. I took down the window boxes and semi-private blinds on my own and put up rods and blackout curtains for privacy and to keep heat out. 

13 trips to/from the shops - 454.4 miles!

The RV Shop - Bryan. service and some upgrades. Love these guys!
Chad's Mobile Wash came out a couple of times to wash/wax my trailer while it was in for service/upgrades. 

T&S RV and Sport - Bryan. Warranty repairs

Discount Tire - Brenham. Replaced all 4 tires after THREE blowouts within a month this summer!

Boondockers Welcome

I have been a Boondockers Welcome  (now through the Harvest Hosts site) host since May of 2021 and am considered an Ultra Host. This year, I hosted 17 times. Some were couples and some were solo travelers. I've had small, single-axle trailers up to Class A motorhomes in my driveway and have meet some of the nicest folks through this program. Some of them have even been from abroad and have shipped their rigs to the US or Canada for their travels. 

I haven't gotten to use it as much since most of the places I go are with a group of friends or to new parks I'm wanting to try out.  

If you're interested in becoming a member and staying at host sites across the country or becoming a host, please be sure to contact me. 

Final Notes

2024 turned out to be a pretty darn good year, with the exception of losing a good dog. I got the camper out quite a bit and danced a lot and got to travel and do things with friends and even got my family to go along once. I do enjoy some solo time though - on my own schedule. IThe year started off with New Year's Eve with Kenny Orts and a parking lot full of friends at Diamond I and it ended the exact same way. Good Times!!!


Be sure to check out my Gadgets & Gear page to see other products from Amazon that I have used. It costs you nothing if you use any of the links, but it might send a couple pennies my way.
See the map below for places I have hit on my travels. There are more, of course, but these are related to my camping adventures. Click on the pins to see more pictures and info. You may see up to 10 photos, but I only put one or two per pin.


How do I keep track of it all? The technical details, I keep in Google Sheets. Yes, I'm a geek like that. And there's lots of photos. I set the trip meter for each leg of the trip and take pictures when I get to the destination with the camper. 


To keep track of the activities and such, part of it is in the spreadsheet (especially if I have paid for the reservation and tickets to events), part of it is in OneNote (it's great for collecting reservation info, entertainment info, maps, etc). and I got a book last year from My Nature Book Adventures with all of the info for the Texas State Parks and more. I started filling it out when I got the new Passport in July 2023. I enjoy collecting stamps from the various State Parks, especially when they have more than one. I put them in the Nature Book and the Texas Parks Passport book. 

The pages for each trip in the Nature Book were nice, but I came up with my own log sheets, printed them, pulled off the spiral binding on the Nature Book and put it together with my own pages in an 11-disc set up. Now I can add pages as needed and I'm keeping track of the info that *I* want to keep. What trails did I walk, what wildlife did I encounter, where did I dance, who played, etc. 

After the trip, I make a collage of pictures, print it out and mount it with repositionable tape. I can put stickers and more notes below the picture. I like small stickers that I can put on the sides by the Park / Site info. I can (and do) put a lot of info in OneNote and and my blog, but sometimes it's nice to sit in the camper or in the living room and thumb through the pages and pictures totally unplugged.  🔌