10 RV Camping Essentials
My husband and I have had a small RV for about 4 years now and we’ve learned a lot over those years on what we believe to be essential (must haves). As you read through this blog post, please feel free to leave a comment of things that you believe to be essential when RV camping in a small trailer.
1. Storage
When camping in a small RV, with
very little storage options, you have to get creative. One way that we figured
out how to do this was to use wall space when storing items such as towels or
toiletries. I bought an over the door metal basket from Target, took the hooks
for the door hanger off of it, and used command hooks to hang it from the wall
to place extra rolled up bath towels into. This comes in handy when you want to
utilize your cabinet storage for something more important (junk, food, etc.).
Another thing we use for bathroom
items is durable closet hanging storage. It has pockets that can easily fit
wipes, soap, hair dryer/flat iron, along with other important bathroom items
that you use.
Plastic bins with handles have also been helpful in providing us with extra space in cabinets and the refrigerator. We use these to store plates, cups, plastic utensils, collapsible food storage containers, and food items in the refrigerator. As you may know, it is essential to utilize ALL space in a small RV and make it work for you and your family.
2. Medication
When we’re home, we have all kinds of medications that we will use, but when camping we only take the most used items such as Tylenol. Pepto, Aspirin, and any prescription medications that we are taking at the time. We also pack medication that the dogs are taking, if any, at the time (heartworm, flea/tick).
3. First Aid Kit
We haven’t had a major injury during our camping experiences, but we are always prepared just in case. You can either buy a premade kit or you can create your own using the items listed below.
ü Varying types of bandages
ü Gauze pads and rolls
ü Rubbing alcohol and peroxide
ü Hand sanitizer
ü Anti-itch cream
ü Triple antibiotic ointment
ü Tape
ü Eye wash
ü Antiseptic wipes
ü Elastic support bandages
ü Cotton balls and swabs
ü Various medications (stomach, pain, swelling)
ü Sunscreen and sunburn relief
4. Extra Bedding
I am a very light sleeper and I
get cold easily at night. I make sure that there are extra blankets before
leaving on a trip.
We have four dogs and if you have
dogs, you know that they can get into things that they are not supposed to.
When we were camping at the Gulf Coast in Texas, our dog Charlie ate so much
salt water that it made him sick and he had an accident ON OUR BED. We were
prepared and had extra sheets and blankets. We didn’t expect THAT to happen,
but it did and we were ready.
It's also important to have extra bedding for your furry family members. Often times, in cooler areas, I will cover my pups up to keep them warm and we cover up our couch in the RV as well to make it more comfortable for our dogs. We take two dog beds (again we have four dogs) that we’ll stack on top of each other during the day to have more floor space and we’ll up stack them to make a “floor bed” for them to sleep on at night.
5. Layers
Clothing is obviously NOT
OPTIONAL, but it is important to pack in layers in case you are traveling to a
state that get cold at night in the summer. We travel to Colorado during the
summer sometimes, and we make sure to pack multiple layers or clothing and
jackets. For example, we take long underwear, sweaters, hoodies, a light
jacket, and a heavy jacket. These are all used by me most of the time that we
are down there because I get cold very easily. My husband can usually go
without a jacket.
We also bring a variety of different types of shoes so that we have a shoe for different occasions.
ü Hiking boots/shoes
ü Tennis shoes
ü Sandals
Even though we’re on vacation, we try not to eat out regularly. We make sure to bring our cast iron skillet and a couple a pots (big and small) to use for cooking a variety of meals. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy of course. There was one time that we brought out Instant Pot, but we didn’t really use it too much. If you’re the type to use it a lot, it might be beneficial to take it along when you’re camping.
7. Water
Rarely do we ever drink water from our freshwater tank, so we bring jugs of water and water bottles on our trips. Recently, we bought a 45 gallon collapsible water storage tank and an NSF approved water pump. We did this so that we didn’t have to use smaller 6 gallon jugs that are heavy to lift up and pour into the freshwater compartment. We bought it from Camping World (Gander RV) and have used it once on our recent trip. It was very useful, but it doesn't have an on/off switch so once it's plugged in, it will begin pumping. Make sure that you are ready to pump water before plugging it in. You don't want to run it dry. Since our freshwater tank isn’t quite 45 gallons, we have some water left over that we pour into water jugs as a backup source of water. With this collapsible water tank bag, it can be used with or without a water pump. If you decide to buy it and not buy a water pump, it can be used as a gravity flow tank. You just have to make sure that you have it at a level that is above the water tank so that the water can flow in.
8. Camping Chairs
It really doesn’t matter what kind of camping chairs you have, just DON’T FORGET THEM! You don’t want to be stuck without a chair when you want to sit outside and enjoy the scenery or sit around a campfire in the evening.
9. Command Hooks
These are good to have even when
you’re not camping, but especially when you’re camping in an RV. Command Hooks
are a MUST HAVE when camping in an RV (big or small). We use command hooks to
hang our hats, light jackets that we’re using and that aren’t packet away,
keys, headlamps, and dog harnesses for our four dogs. I wouldn’t go anywhere
without extra command hooks and strips or varying weight limits. You never know
when you might think of a good idea on how to use them (wall space).
We use heavy duty command hooks/strips to create a pantry area with white wire shelving for our non-perishable food items. We recently went on a trip to Colorado (2020) this Summer and those hooks and shelves made things a lot easier for us to access our food. Before those shelves, we were putting our food items over the RV couch, which had small doors, and everything would slide around in there. I’m very pleased with our decision to put shelves and make it into a pantry instead of a miscellaneous closet.
10. Grill & Propane
When we first got our camper, it came with a grill that attached to the side of the RV. It served us well for a few years, but eventually it began to rust and it was time to replace it. We bought a Blackstone Griddle that can be used to cook different types of meat, eggs, pancakes, veggies, you name it. There are accessories that you can buy for it to make it more diverse, but we haven’t done that yet.
I hope you enjoyed reading about our 10 RV camping essentials and hope to see comments from you about the most important items you need to have when camping in your RV.
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