RV camping with kids

Choosing a park kids will love

Kids do not care about concrete pads or 50-amp service. They care about a pool, a playground, other kids, and a place to ride bikes. The parks that reliably deliver this are family-oriented private parks: KOA Holiday and Resort locations (jumping pillows, pools, weekend activities), Jellystone Park Camp-Resorts (water slides, character events, and a fee to match), Sun Outdoors family resorts, and state parks with a beach or a lake. Filter for RV parks with a pooland cross-check the reviews for the words "playground" and "kids."

Questions worth asking before booking:

• Is the pool open in the month you visit, and is there a lifeguard or is it swim at your own risk? Most are unguarded.
• Is the playground within sight of the sites, or a walk across the park? A site next to the playground is loud but lets you watch from a chair.
• Are bikes and scooters allowed on the loop roads? Some resorts ban them; state parks usually welcome them.
• Is there a scheduled activity program in summer (crafts, movie nights, ranger talks)?
• What are the quiet hours, and is the park mostly families or mostly retirees? A 55-plus resort will not enjoy your kids and vice versa.

For a first trip, a two-night stay at a family park within a couple of hours of home beats a long haul. Our first-time checklist covers the setup routine.

Sleeping setups that actually work

Sleep is the difference between a great trip and a miserable one. The common configurations:

• Bunkhouse travel trailers and fifth wheels (Grand Design Imagine, Jayco Jay Flight, Keystone Bullet, Forest River Salem bunkhouse floor plans) have two to four bunks in a rear room with a door. Two kids each get a bunk; toddlers use the lower bunk with a bed rail.
• Class C motorhomes put a bed over the cab that kids love and parents hate to climb into. Perfect for two children age 5 and up; add a mesh net or rail.
• Dinette and sofa conversions work for a weekend but not for a week; the cushions shift and the kids wake up when you make coffee. A 3-inch memory foam topper cut to size helps a lot.
• Babiessleep well in a Guava Lotus or BabyBjorn travel crib on the floor of a slide-out, or a pack-and-play in the bunk room. A portable white-noise machine masks the neighbor's air conditioner cycling.
• Teens often prefer a tent on the site (check that the park allows it; many private parks charge for an extra tent, and tents-welcome campgrounds are listed here).

Bring blackout curtains or clip-on shades for the bunk windows; summer sunrise at 5:30 am is an argument nobody wins.

Safety at the campground

• Roads. Loop roads are shared with 40-foot rigs being backed in. Set a rule: bikes stop at every intersection, helmets always, and no riding after dark.
• Water. Pools are usually unguarded and lakes have drop-offs. Life jackets on non-swimmers near any water, no exceptions. Many state parks lend loaner jackets at the beach.
• Fire. The fire ring is off limits until it is cold. Teach kids the marshmallow stick stays in their hands and the stick end stays over the fire, not near faces.
• Site boundaries. Kids naturally cut through neighboring sites; explain that every site is someone's yard. It is the top complaint in campground etiquette.
• Getting lost. Give each child a whistle and the site number, and make the rule that they tell you before leaving the site. Walkie-talkies (Motorola Talkabout, cheap and effective) let older kids roam within reason.
• Wildlife. In bear country (much of the West and the Appalachians), food stays inside the RV, not the tent, and coolers stay locked. Raccoons will open a screen door for a bag of chips.
• Inside the rig. Slide-outs can pinch small fingers; move the kids outside or to the bed when running slides. Lock the entry door while driving, and never let anyone ride unbelted in a travel trailer (it is illegal in most states).

Activities beyond the pool

The National Park Service Junior Ranger program is the best free activity in the country: pick up a booklet at any visitor center, complete the age-appropriate pages during the visit, and a ranger swears the child in and hands over a wooden or plastic badge. More than 400 parks participate, and kids will drag you to the next visitor center to collect another. Many state park systems run similar programs (Texas, California, Florida, Michigan, and Colorado among them). See our national park RV camping guide for booking and site length limits in the big parks.

Other things that fill a day:

• Ranger-led evening programs at amphitheaters in state parks and national parks, usually free and around 8 pm in summer.
• A campground scavenger hunt: types of leaves, license plates from ten states, a bird you can name.
• Geocaching with the free app; most campgrounds have several caches within a mile.
• Fishing from the bank with a $15 rod; many state parks have loaner tackle and no license required for kids under 16.
• A $5 star chart or the SkyView app after the campfire, especially at desert parks in Arizona and Utah with dark skies.
• Rainy day: a dedicated bin of card games (Uno, Sushi Go, Spot It), a puzzle, and downloaded movies, because campground WiFi will not stream.

Packing for kids

• One soft-sided bin per child for clothes, stored under the bunk, so nobody digs through a shared bag.
• Two pairs of shoes each: one for the pool and shower, one that can get muddy.
• Bug spray, sunscreen, after-bite, and a bigger first aid kit than you think, with tweezers for splinters and ticks.
• A collapsible wagon for hauling kids, chairs, and cooler to the beach or playground.
• Glow sticks, a headlamp per child, and reflective tape on bikes for the walk to the bathhouse.
• Snacks in labeled bins at kid height, with a rule about how many per day, so you are not the vending machine.
• Booster seats and car seats stay properly installed in the tow vehicle or motorhome cab; there is no safe way to install one in a trailer.

Keeping the routine

Kids handle new places well when the schedule stays familiar. Keep the same bedtime, do the same wind-down (fire, teeth, book), and give each child one job at setup and one at breakdown: chocks, checking the outside lights, holding the flashlight during hookups. By the third trip they will run the departure walk-around better than you do. Find a park to try it at with RV parks near me or browse family-friendly parks in Florida, where the pools stay open year-round.

Frequently asked questions