Yamping = Yard Camping. Being full time RVers, we catch ourselves Yamping every few months for a variety of reasons. It’s a great time and allows us to enjoy situations more than we would if we were staying off-site.

Yamping = Yard Camping

Although we Yamp with our 5th Wheel as our home, there are some general questions we recommend you ask yourself before you go Yamping.

• Where will you park? Many cities don’t allow RVs to be parked on the street, some driveways will be tough to fit into, and some yards might have soft ground after the rain that you may get stuck in. All these are things to consider.

• Will you have hookups? My parents installed hookups at his house for when we visit but you won’t find this at most places you Yamp at. For them it was a win/win to make that investment for us to have the luxury of our home and office to stay in so we feel at home while we stay with them. Which means we will most likely spend more time with them and they will get to see us and our kids for longer amounts of time. (hint to parents and grandparents, if you make it more convenient for your kids to visit the odds are you will see them more and it will be less stressful during their time with you). Not having hookups means you most likely will need to have propane for your fridge and gas for the generator to provide power.

Why do people Yamp?

There are a lot of different reasons people Yamp, here are a few:

Yamping with Friends or Family

We’ve both had so many friends throughout the years that we were close to that when life gets busy we lose touch. New technology advancements like Facebook and Instagram have allowed us to virtually follow and keep up with what our friends are doing but it doesn’t beat that physical connection you get when you visit someone in person. We visited many friends while traveling in our RV in the past year and a half. We took this picture while staying with our friends Mike and Neena in Waveland, MS.

We also have spent a significant amount of time with my family Yamping at their house. As I mentioned earlier, they installed electric hookups and we use their hose for water. Although they’ve offered for us to stay in their house with our own room, bathroom, and office; we’ve found it the best to live in our 5th wheel while we stay with them. We have our space, our amenities, our privacy yet we get the benefits of spending quality time with them at night and in the evenings. In fact, we joke that back when I owned my marketing firm in Orange County and when worked as a corporate executive I couldn’t hardly get away and almost never saw my family. When I was able to get away and fly back to visit them, the time always seemed rushed. Now that we’re living the RV Life, we’ve spent more time with both of our family in the past year than we had in the past 8 years combined! At some point in life you have to ask yourself what are my priorities and what changes must be made to align your lifestyle with what’s important to you. It’s great to have our normal routine living in our 5th wheel, and then to spend time at supper or evenings with them.

Yamping at a Business

Many Full Timers that we’ve met on the open road are RVing for business. They might have a job where they have multiple locations and bring their camper rather than getting on a plane, dealing with car rental, and getting a hotel. Others choose to turn their work trip into a camping trip for the family so they can do fun activities locally with the kids while their significant other works. Businesses will often allow employees who choose to do this to stay in their parking lot or the yard of the business.

Yamping at an Event or Venue

When you’re at a fair, festival, races, or concert it’s a pain to drive home for the night just to have to drive back in the morning. It’s so much more convenient and fun to bring your “home on wheels”. We recently went to the Sprint Car Races in Brainerd, MN and Yamped in their parking lot. My best friend who use to race at this track, showed up with his camper and Yamped along side us.

Another neat event we spent time at last week was the Snowmobile Grass Drags. There were a lot of fellow yampers that came together for a 4 day weekend full of racing and fun! We even saw some Toy Haulers that brought their snowmobiles to this crazy event.

Yamping before Camping

It wouldn’t be a good time to head out into the wilderness for a weekend getaway with your family, just to find out that one of the major components of your RV isn’t working. To avoid this, set your camper up in your yard and use all the major functions to make sure they are all working properly.