A Rant

April 4, 2020

I am going on a rant today as I'm fed up with the knee jerk reactions of state and local governments, especially in how it pertains to us and the millions like us. I get the trying to control this plague we all are experiencing. I get social distancing, shelter in place except to grocery shop and exercise. I get closing of non-essential businesses though I can't help but question how that is determined. Sorry folks, but no, gun shops should not be considered essential businesses and yet libraries are closed, and yes, I know a lot of you are going to have something to say about that. Don't bother you're not convincing me. I get so much of what is being done and a lot of it I applaud and wish they had done sooner.

Right now my concern and head shaking is about the ridiculous panic mode before thinking it through that concerns campgrounds. There are estimated to be several million Fulltime Rvers, and more than half of those have no actual sticks and bricks home. They live and some work in their RVs. Of that almost half again of those are people who are retired and over the age of 60. Now do keep in mind with this plague 60 seems to be the magic number they have come up with to decide risk factor.

So what are state and local governments doing? Closing campgrounds or putting severe restrictions on them. Almost all states have closed their state park campgrounds and now are trying to close private ones as well. And yet they are leaving parks open to day use?!?!?! This makes no sense. Close the bathhouse facilities, yep I get it, close the amenities, yep again, not allow tenters and other camping units that are not self contained, oh yes, no problem. But to close campgrounds to RVs that are fully self contained no, that makes no sense. Our unit and the units I am talking about have kitchens, full bathrooms, have fresh water tanks and tanks for waste water. We don't have to leave our “home”, except to shop for food. Talk about the ability to Shelter In Place. And yet they are taking away that option, they are taking away Where we can stay. Latest is many states are not allowing campgrounds to be open to overnight or short term stays and have strange and ridiculous travel bans in place. So now you have thousands of RVers that do have options to go to a sticks/bricks and how many more that have been wintering in the south trying to get home BUT CAN”T. Oh and some states have closed rest stop along highways. Great move folks, I guess I should give them credit for opening them back up to truckers eh.

What really takes the cake in all this nonsense is the fact that Hotels, Motels, B&B, and the like are allowed to stay open and receive overnight guests. REALLY?!?!!? who makes these rules up. So it's okay for someone to exposed themselves to the germs that can be found at these establishments, the surfaces touch by many many persons, sleep in beds that someone else slept in last night, interact with hotel personnel and have to find somewhere to eat, but it's not okay for us to spend the night in a campground, sleep in our own bed, cook in our kitchens, use our own bathroom? Would you rather have RVs park on the side of road, in parking lots and anywhere else they can find a space? You tell me how that makes a lick of sense.

We ourselves are fortunate, though all the reservations we have made to go different places have been canceled, we are in a campground that is able (at this time) to allow those here to stay here until April 30^th. After that, well time will tell. We are safe and we are thankful for that. But my heart goes out to the thousands if not millions that aren't so fortunate. Yes, we all have to do what we can to help stop the spread of this horrific virus but can we please just stop and use a bit of common sense?