Hm. It seems like it would be cheaper and less hassle to do what my folks always did on our family vacations: rent a hatchback, bring a hot plate and some basic cooking gear, and drive cross-country staying in Motel 6s and Super 8s and cooking dinner in the rooms.
You are definitely minimizing the convenience and quality of an RV-style vacation.
With 2 adults & 2 toddlers who want to visit several national parks, I would absolutely recommend an RV over what you describe above.
Here is a snapshot of the trip staying in Motel 6s...
- Check in/out of a different dirty hotel every night, schlepping your belongings in/out of the car every day.
- Spend hours driving to/from your cheap hotel to the national park sights.
- Waste time searching for restaurants, stops for bathroom breaks, driving to your hotel, ect.
- Nowhere for tired/crabby/excited children to nap/play/eat.
With an RV, you stay in the same "place" the entire trip. You always have a clean bed and bathroom to use.
It isn't an ordeal when your kids get hungry, need to go potty, need a nap, ect.
You actually get to stay in and experience the parks 100% of the time.
Would you rather wake up to the beauty of the park, eat breakfast outside while watching wildlife, then get an early start sightseeing...
OR... wake up at the Motel 6, eat a crappy breakfast in the hotel lobby, pack up your belongings, drive 1-2 hours to the park, then hope to get a few hours of sightseeing in before you have to drive to back?
I've never stayed in a Motel 6, and although I have encountered dirty hotels at some points in my life, I haven't seen one in a long time -- not since I finished college and quit choosing by price alone.
You have a point about getting toddlers in/out of hotel rooms. We made this trip with teens, so each of us had two assigned items to bring in /out of the hotel each day -- very easy. In all honesty, I'd think twice about a road trip with toddlers. They're not the easiest of travelers and cannot help with the luggage, as I described above.
On our trip, we included a wide variety of activities: state and national parks, museums, cultural attractions -- and we chose hotels near the activities we'd planned. An RV would've increased, not decreased, our miles -- at no point did we stay 1-2 hours away from our intended activities. The worst crowds we encountered were INSIDE Yellowstone National Park (July is insane there). Yes, we enjoyed the beauty of the parks -- and we rented cabins inside the parks a number of times. It worked out very well. But we also enjoyed city outings where we could walk to a downtown ballpark to see a game, walk to interesting shops, etc.
Yes, an RV gives kids a place to play, but it happens to be the same spot you and your spouse are using for your own quiet relaxation after a day of driving /enjoying nature. By staying in hotels, we didn't have the same space every night. Every couple days -- or on days when we knew we'd have been cooped up in the car for a long drive -- we opted for two adjoining rooms (or a suite) so our teenaged daughters could spread out a bit (and on days when we knew we'd be getting in late, we skimped and chose a basic room for four). We all benefited from the extra space every couple days. Also, most hotels offer a pool, and my kids found that to be an ideal way to relax in the evenings; it was a rare night when they didn't swim.
As for restaurants, do you have trouble finding them? We don't.
I hear this rationale a lot, but it simply has very little impact on this type of vacation.
Say the OP intends to drive 1000 miles and gas is $2.50/gallon.
- RV fuel costs would be about $300 assuming 8MPG.
- Minivan fuel costs would be $100 assuming 25MPG.
We drove almost 4000 miles on our trip, and we traveled when gas was well over $3/gallon. We did the math ahead of time. Could not make the RV "work".
If you plan to stay in national parks you'll want to book your campsites in advance by 6 months.
Absolutely true. The National Parks are crazy-busy during the summer months. I noted on my calendar when "the dates would open up", and I called ON THE VERY DAY to get my reservations. I specifically remember that for the Grand Canyon (North Rim), I called mid-morning and was assigned to the next-to-last cabin. If I'd waited an hour, I probably wouldn't have been able to get that reservation. Admittedly, we checked in on July 3rd, so that's probably as extreme an example as one could give.
OP: Super 8s and Motel 6s are full of drugs and criminals.. Not to be an alarmist but you really want to cook ramen on a hotplate with 2 toddlers in a motel 6 to save...what? $500?
Who suggested staying at crappy hotels full of drugs and criminals? With all the hotels out there, you can certainly find something that won't give you Hep-C as a parting gift. We read lots of reviews and only stayed at nice places.
We didn't really "cook" on our trip. We tended to "fix" sandwiches and salads from the cooler, and we ate out one meal a day ... we often had leftovers, and hotel rooms these days always have refrigerators and microwaves in the room.
We have spent our whole lives car/tent camping. You pay much less at the campsite than in a camper van. You can also do wild camping, but need some flat gras in a private spot. This is definitively the cheapest option. But you'll need some proper gear so that you are warm and comfortable enough. Why not go this year for a combination of tent and hotels/airbnb?
We love camping, but when we camp it's for the sake of camping. We're outdoors. When we did our western road trip, we wanted to see and enjoy a wide variety of attractions -- if we wanted a month-long camping trip, we could've done that at home.
We briefly considered the combination of a tent and hotels ... but we rejected it because of space in the car. If we'd brought along camping equipment, we would've had to "upsize" our vehicle -- a tent, sleeping bags, sleeping pads, pillows for four people wouldn't have fit into a small space.
As for tenting with toddlers, I remember that being a great deal of work.