Should you go to an RV rally or gathering? Absolutely! On this week’s StressLess Camping RV podcast we share all the reasons why you should plan to attend an RV gathering or rally. No matter what your style of travel is, an RV rally or gathering can be a terrific experience and we have a bunch of reasons why.

Other places to hear the podcast

Mentioned on this episode

Our article about Amana Colonies

Our podcast episode with the FMCA

Our podcast episode with Escapees

The recipe Steve and Kathy shared with us - Steve’s Stuffed Pumpkin Stew

Our story about the Thor hybrid EV motorhome

If you’re confused about solar, battery power or just want to upgrade your RV we have found the solutions from ABC Upfitters are both reliable and exceptional.

We have a podcast episode and video where you can learn more here.

Our trusted partners - RV Discounts and Deals

Automated transcript of StressLess Camping RV podcast episode 276

Peggy Barthel

Have you been to an RV rally? 

Tony Barthel

Have you considered going? 

Peggy Barthel

This week on this restless camping RV podcast, Tony and Peggy talk about the benefits of attending an RV rally, gathering, meetup, festival, convention, whatever. 

Tony Barthel

We also have another pumpkin recipe. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. This one's Because you know, fall, y'all. Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

This one's from our friends, Kathy and Steve. They shared it with us and I cannot wait to share it with you and then actually try it. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. We have this week's podcast along with all the notes, the stories, and all of the information that goes with this episode along with discounts, deals, helpful tips, and more at our home on the web at stressless camping dot com. 

Peggy Barthel

He's Tony. 

Tony Barthel

She's Peggy. 

Peggy Barthel

And we're 2 RV industry veterans who travel part time 

Tony Barthel

In this here small trailer, y'all. 

Peggy Barthel

It might not seem like part time because we say that a lot. 

Tony Barthel

Well, we've been traveling a lot. We've 

Speaker 3

been traveling 

Tony Barthel

miles on the odometer. 

Peggy Barthel

Miles and smiles and sharing adventures and helping you with great tips 

Tony Barthel

Tricks. 

Peggy Barthel

And discounts. Stay to the script, man. Just stay to the script. 

Tony Barthel

Oh my gosh. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. Well let's start with, uh, let's start with a downer and then go up from there. We did get a an email this week from the Family RV Association, formerly used 

Speaker 3

to be. 

Peggy Barthel

FMCA. Yeah. Family Motor Coach Association. Now they're calling themselves family. I don't know why they're not calling themselves FRVA, but anyway, the Family RV Association has voted. 

Peggy Barthel

They did meeting and voting and everything in their rally in Oregon, and the price of the annual membership will be going up to $99. Yeah. I think this is still a bargain. 

Tony Barthel

I do too. 

Peggy Barthel

I think that if for no other reason whatsoever that not roadside assistance, but the 

Tony Barthel

The medical, uh, medical assist, I think. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. That I think is worth as a $100 insurance policy and then there's so many other things that FMCA offers. Yeah. I mean, we've we recently spoke with the FMCA, 

Tony Barthel

so we'll put a link in the show notes to that episode. But there's so much they offer and they have now different memberships including one for like Dreamers, you know if you're like I'm thinking of it. FMCA has a really huge library of resources of good information. They have probably the best roadside assistance. Now that's an upgrade. 

Tony Barthel

Right. But they have the best roadside assistance. They have the medical assist. There's so many things because it is a big organization, and so if you're not a member perhaps consider we do have a discount to their membership. The price went up because frankly it's it's just costing more to run the organization. 

Peggy Barthel

Yep. 

Tony Barthel

And truthfully people tend to join stuff less nowadays for whatever reason like your local Kiwanis or Rotary or any of those they're probably they're probably experiencing some challenges too. So maybe consider going to an FMCA convention and joining. We like it. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. You know what you could join though in addition to FMCA or any other Kiwanis is the growing group of people who can boondock without a care in the world. 

Tony Barthel

Well, there you go. I think those people might have visited our friends at ABC Outfitters That's right. For their Mastervolt power system. And Mastervolt, as we say, has come out of the marine industry. It's a really good system of lithium power systems for your RV that is so reliable. 

Tony Barthel

Companies like Rockwood, Flagstaff, Thor Motor Coach, and a number of others actually put them in their RVs right from the factory. But if you're not lucky enough to have one of those rigs, they can put one in your RV. And we've been really impressed watching the folks at ABC Upfitters engineer systems specifically for RVs that just really fit well. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. And in every size we have seen things from gigantic 5th wheels to small class b band b vans not v bands. Yeah. Class b vans, they not only cater to the size of your RV but to what you need the system for. If you just need a little bit of extra oomph, they can do that. 

Peggy Barthel

If you need to be able to live off grid forever, they can do help you with that too. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. So the way to get hold of them is to give them a phone call at 574-333-3225 or 

Peggy Barthel

Check out their websites. I almost said stressless camping or check out their website abcupfitters.com. 

Tony Barthel

Give them a call. Check them out on the Internet and know that we just really like their system because they just work. Hey. What? Have you been to an 

Peggy Barthel

RV rally? That was a tough segue for me. I can't figure out what to say. I've been to a lot of RV rallies. They have because I love them. 

Tony Barthel

So what in the wide wide world of sports is an RV rally? 

Peggy Barthel

It's a rally for RVers. 

Tony Barthel

Oh, okay. Well Okay. Bye. Thank you for listening. You have a great week. 

Peggy Barthel

RV rallies, RV conventions, RV meetups, RV group campouts, all those RV things. They're just groups of RVers getting together and camping and that's really kind of where it ends. It really spreads out from there, but that's the real bones of it. And then it might also be a lot of other things that we're gonna talk about, but that's really it. That's a number of RVers camping nearby each other. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. Well, you It could be that simple. 

Tony Barthel

We'll get into why you want to go to one of these. If you do it all, but where can I find these RV rallies? Besides, of course, one of the good places is you do a remarkable job of keeping our calendar up to date. 

Peggy Barthel

Well, I tried to. 

Tony Barthel

At stresslesscamping.com, we have a full RV show and event calendar. 

Peggy Barthel

The other way that you can do it is by, for example, joining the Family RV Association. Yeah. Formerly FMCA. 

Tony Barthel

They have international as well as regional special interest gatherings like Golden Spike does railroad stuff. 

Peggy Barthel

So they have chapters and the chapters are some of them are regional, but some of them are all the people who love Golden Retrievers might get together and start a chapter. I don't know. 

Tony Barthel

There's also chapters for specific brands. Sure. 

Peggy Barthel

All the everyone who has that kind of a brand. And so there are all sorts of opportunities there. Of course, FMCA overall has 2 conventions a year, 1 in the spring and 1 in the fall, and those are great. But if that's maybe too many for you, it's not the right time and place for you, you know, too many people, I mean. 

Tony Barthel

Because some of those national conventions, there's well over a 1000 RVs. 

Peggy Barthel

1,000 RVs. So, you know, that can be big. There's a lot of benefits to that, but maybe that's too much for you to get started. Maybe you join a local chapter of FMCA or other things we'll talk about. And maybe you go with 5 or 10 other campers and kinda get your feet wet in the whole rally gathering meet up type of a deal. 

Tony Barthel

Another organization that does big and small rally is Escapees. And Escapees, we spoke with Joel Holland recently. They were recently purchased by Harvest Hosts, but that hasn't really changed their focus of being kind of an advocate for We RVer's. And they have regional, local, national gatherings and get togethers. For example, we went to the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta last year Right. 

Tony Barthel

Through escapees. 

Peggy Barthel

There are, again, chapters. There are chapters and there are also what they call birds of a feather. 

Speaker 3

Mhmm. 

Peggy Barthel

And there's the boomers. I think that's actually a chapter. 

Tony Barthel

And one day we'll be old enough to join 

Peggy Barthel

the boomers. Right. One day. So with the boomers group from escapees, we were able to get into the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta, and we got to crew for a balloon pilot, which was an amazing experience. We talked a lot about it a year or so ago. 

Peggy Barthel

We're missing it right now. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. We're It's a matter of fact. Talking it's going on. 

Peggy Barthel

Because we're at some other rallies and they're in a different part of the country, so Yeah. We'll keep talking about that. What we just a lot of people just left yesterday and today from Frogtoberfest. Yeah. So let's unpack that. 

Peggy Barthel

Frog is a Forest River owners group, and we have talked about going to the their international or their national. I think they call it international because there's a lot of Canadians. Right? Yeah. And so we have recently gone to that. 

Peggy Barthel

We've gone to their international rally three times, and we have just finished up a weekend here in Amana, Iowa with Frogtoberfest. Amana puts on an Oktoberfest, which is really fun, and one of the frog members puts together an outing, and we come to the Samana campground. There were, I wanna say, 80 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. I think there were 

Peggy Barthel

80 almost 80 RVs here. And we had dinners together, and we had some events, and we went and hung out at the Oktoberfest. And, you know, different people who were here camping with us, we did have a beer with them or 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

Do a little little hay bale dancing. None of us really got up and danced on the dance floor, but 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

But it was a lot of fun, and then we had that camaraderie of, you know, the the big campfire at night when it wasn't too windy and the dinners together, and they had a bags or cornhole contest. So, you know, if you own a forest river, check out the frog group because they also do uh, also, by the way, there's a group of frogs who are at Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta. They go every year to Durango, Colorado for a few days and then down to the Fiesta. There's also Girl Camper. Girl Camper has 

Tony Barthel

They have a lot 

Peggy Barthel

of of outings. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

They have guides for nearly every state, and those guides put together outings. Those are, you know, kind of a regional thing. You don't have to belong to that state. You can travel from a different state. And we actually since last year, we've been teaching camper colleges, and we've done that kind of regionally or state by state with Girl Camper. 

Peggy Barthel

And so it's there are really super I mean, they've done, like, these big rafting trips, and they do the camper college, which is a very educational trip. And so they do a lot of things. 

Tony Barthel

That's all for girl campers, and it's heavily vetted in terms of who can go. Right. And also, they keep the locations kind of quiet. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. Just because For safety. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Another one that we didn't put on our list, we went to Camp Carpe Diem, which is a beer focused rally. 

Peggy Barthel

Camp Carpe Diem is with April and Ken who have a podcast called Living a Stout Life, which is they're beer chasers. 

Speaker 3

Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

They travel all over the place looking for great beer and they do an annual I this coming up year they have 2 Camp Carpe Diems in different parts of the country and they move around the country so that if you weren't able to go this year to Arkansas maybe you'll make it next year to I want to say one's in South Dakota and I don't remember the other one. 

Tony Barthel

That Arkansas, it's the only brewery at a national park. Yeah. Boy, that was fun. That was just really a great experience. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. 

Tony Barthel

Why are we 

Peggy Barthel

still here? Why are we still here even though the frog rally is over? We are here because this weekend is the RV Miles homecoming meetup. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Our friends, Jason and Abby from RV Miles have put together this annual gathering here in Amana, Iowa, and they have workshops and fun dinners and things like that all the time. 

Peggy Barthel

And they will play Bags. Bags or cornhole. Uh, we will probably just watch because we're not 

Tony Barthel

We'll probably be at Mill Creek Brewing. 

Peggy Barthel

We might be a Mill Creek 

Tony Barthel

Brewing company. 

Peggy Barthel

Is that good? They're also I think there's some talk of the people who don't wanna throw bags might put together some board game tables or something like that. So it's just gonna be a lot of fun and this is our first one. This is our second, but we didn't weren't able to make it last year because we were We're at the Blue Fiesta 

Tony Barthel

with birds of a feather. 

Peggy Barthel

See, there's just too many gatherings. Right? 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. That's the thing. There are so many and then there are some specific to your brand of RV. So years ago we started a Facebook group that's really kind of gone kind of big. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah, 12,000 something. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah, something like that. It's nuts. It's 4 Rockwood Mini Lite and Flagstaff Micro Lite Travel Trailers, and now some of the people in those groups have arranged regional rallies. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

Where they get together and do rally stuff, but also compare notes about the trailers 

Peggy Barthel

and 

Tony Barthel

go on trailer tours. We have friends who have Grand Design Trailers. They have these rallies too. And so if you, you know, whatever Brent oh, I know like the fiberglass egg trailers have rallies like crazy. 

Peggy Barthel

And so some of these are gonna be very, you know, kind of formal like Frog is actually a company. 

Tony Barthel

It is. 

Peggy Barthel

And Frog puts on some of these rallies, but then, for example, these people that just happen to live close to each other and all have many lights and belong to a group say, hey, let's all go camping together at x y z place, and it turns into a rally and they're like, hey, we had so much fun. Let's do it again next year. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Last this year, we've been to one in South Lonnel Beach, Texas. We've been to one in Michigan. 

Peggy Barthel

I'm very proud of you for remembering what two states we were in. 

Tony Barthel

Imagine that. And we've been to local rallies in Santa Fe for FMCA. Yeah. And, uh, I mean, just so many reasons. So why would I want to go to an RV rally? 

Peggy Barthel

Well, the one number one thing I think is to meet new people and make new friends. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Without a doubt. 

Peggy Barthel

Whether you're joining a group of 5 other egg campers or you're joining a group of a 1000 other FMCA, FRVA, f Family RV Association members, you're gonna meet new people. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

And it's gonna be great. 

Tony Barthel

Here's the good thing about those new people, they have something in common with you. Right? We're all RVers. Right. So no matter what if you there's always something to talk about. 

Tony Barthel

Hey, what did you do with this cabinet? Hey, how often do you grease your wheel bearings? Whatever it is, the common topic is always RV ing. Right. And that's so cool, and and it helping people helping people make friends. 

Tony Barthel

One of the funnest things about that was we were at FMCA in oh gosh Arizona. Right? Met some people at the donuts in the morning. 

Peggy Barthel

Yes. Send them. Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

That's another reason to go. They serve donuts. 

Peggy Barthel

Right? 

Tony Barthel

But anyway, met people that we hung out with. Then here we are in Shipshewana, and they're like, hey, is that you that just walked by 

Peggy Barthel

our camper? 

Tony Barthel

And we 

Speaker 3

ended up 

Peggy Barthel

She messaged me on Facebook. She's like, did I just see you walk by? And, uh, we also met Paul and Cindy at an epic at FNCA in Gillette, Wyoming. 

Tony Barthel

That's true. I've 

Peggy Barthel

And now we've been hanging out with them quite a bit. We met our friend Bill Yeah. At a frog rally. We kind of met Jason and Abby at their first meetup. 

Tony Barthel

No. We met them in Vegas the first time. 

Peggy Barthel

First time? Yep. I'm I'm struggling to remember where we actually first met them. 

Tony Barthel

In Vegas. 

Peggy Barthel

I thought we actually came to Amana one day when they were here. 

Speaker 3

We had already met them. Afterward. 

Peggy Barthel

Okay. Well, anyway, we've chased Jason and Abby and Tony and Peggy chase each other around the country and sometimes meet up at rallies. How's that? There 

Speaker 3

you go. 

Tony Barthel

I can't understate the value of the fellowship and the people that you meet, and they're all pretty darn cool people. Like last, well it was last night there was no fire because it was really windy. Night before, it was big old fire. We're all gathered around telling stories and all that. It was it was it's pretty great. 

Tony Barthel

So, and this rally the Frogtoberfest is a more casual, you know, don't think you go to the rally and you're forced to do anything. Correct. You do not have to go to the like our neighbors behind us did not go to the group dinners. They said we're having a good old Midwest Fish Fry and did. Oh. 

Tony Barthel

So Missed that. When you go to these they're really loose in terms of of requirements unless you like sign up for like at the Frog Rally. They have museum tour, the National Frog Rally. They have museum tours, so you actually pay extra and you go to the whatever tours they have that year. So, I mean, that yeah. 

Tony Barthel

If you paid for it, you probably wanna go. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. But that's also a benefit of being at this rally. It might be hard to get a tour of whatever place that is as an individual or as 2 people, but when a group puts it together and they say we're gonna bring 30 people on this tour, you might get a tour that you wouldn't otherwise be able to get. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Some of them are either you go to a place that really isn't open to the public. Sometimes like at Frog, there's manufacturing tours. Or special places that might only be open to the group. So, yeah that's just one of I don't know how many hundreds of reasons to go, but that's one. 

Tony Barthel

Another is at Frog, and I know this is true of the Winnebago Rallies and of the Grand Design Rallies and all of that is you can get factory service at Some of these. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. So in particular, we know frog, of course, because that's what we belong to. That's, you know, where we go. The frog rallies, you can have, like, 3 service items taken care of, like, warranty items. Maybe, like, the 1st year the 2nd year that we went, we had a little tower of power in the kitchen. 

Tony Barthel

Oh, yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

And the first time I pulled it up, I think that it was misformed, but I don't know. I broke it. It broke and the wires were hanging loose and it never got back yeah. So muscular. It never laid back down flat with the countertop. 

Peggy Barthel

So, anyway, that was one of our items. It doesn't have to be something major, a big old flaw, but it was just something that I didn't realize what a tower power is. It's really just an extension cord. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Pretty much. 

Peggy Barthel

So I watched him take the drawer out, replug in a new one, and install it up in the oh my god, I could have done that, but I didn't know. And so we were just very grateful to be able to get that fixed 

Tony Barthel

when we were 

Peggy Barthel

at the rally. 

Tony Barthel

But but yeah, and I know a lot of these manufacturers rallies, That's something you can do. Or another thing is not just factory service, but like Quartzsite, they have bays and bays of I know Redlands RV is there, Dometic was there. I can't remember who all else, but all this aftermarket oh, uh, Moreide was there. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. So maybe you don't have a new rig or maybe you don't go to a rally that specific, you know, that has specific people working on that, but you can go to these kind of rallies where you make an appointment with Dometic and you get your refrigerator changed out, for example, or something like that or any you know, maybe a new air conditioner or and it might 

Speaker 3

be 

Peggy Barthel

it might be something that it's because your air conditioner quit working, or it might be that you found a vendor, which we'll talk about, and said, I have to have that, and then you pull into their bay, and they sell you that thing. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. I mean, I remember at the frog rally, there's all these I don't know what they're called, but man lifts where they had, like, dudes up on the roof putting in new air conditioners and and things like that. 

Speaker 3

Mhmm. 

Tony Barthel

So a lot of time I know ABC Upfitters is at the frog rally for for example. 

Peggy Barthel

For example. That's actually another reason to go to rallies. The ones that are, especially the big ones, will have maybe a whole building or a whole tent or a whole bunch of buildings of vendor booths. Now you might find a new air conditioner. You might find new potholders. 

Peggy Barthel

You might find anything that as a catalog slogan that I used to get. I remember a long time mail order. Things you didn't know existed, but you can't possibly live without. Yeah. Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

A lot of the gadgets and accessories in this RV are because we walked past them in a booth at a rally and said, we gotta have that. 

Tony Barthel

Well, we had Daryl from Wacko Products 

Peggy Barthel

Yes. 

Tony Barthel

Put in an air conditioner silencer. 

Peggy Barthel

Yes. 

Tony Barthel

Just all kinds of stuff. 

Peggy Barthel

We literally did have Dometic put a refrigerator in for us. Yeah. 

Speaker 3

Dometic put 

Tony Barthel

a refrigerator in for us. 

Peggy Barthel

So that kind of service or those kind of just gadgets and things that you can do on your own, we've bought pots and pans. We've bought storage solutions. We bought our bedding, our RV super bag. All these things came from vendors at a rally. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Yeah. Another thing is seminars and workshops. Some of these rallies have really good seminars and workshops. Some of them are sales pitches for stuff. 

Tony Barthel

Let's be honest, but usually the better rallies will tell you this is a sponsored seminar, so you don't go in, you know, thinking you're going to actually learn something and really you're getting a sales pitch. Some of them they are very like FMCA, for example, is really on top of the content. So even if it is a vendor who sells stuff there, it has to have value above and beyond. Hey, buy my stuff. 

Peggy Barthel

Now there are seminars that they're noted as this is and they're not gonna say these words. This is a sales pitch. Right. You know, and 

Speaker 3

some of 

Tony Barthel

them CRV tours. 

Peggy Barthel

CRV tours. They tell you how great, let's say, Australia is, but what they're really telling you is how you can save money by going with them. Right. 

Tony Barthel

And I mean, they they actually, you know, they do a good job with those RV tours as it is. So Right. We're not putting them down by any means. 

Peggy Barthel

But we teach a lot of seminars. So I mean, so you can learn all kinds of stuff even if it's not right. No. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. 

Peggy Barthel

We do teach a lot of seminars we teach at the FMCA. I don't know if if we have to keep calling it that. The FMCA Rallies, the frog rallies, uh, we're gonna teach one here at the RV Miles homecoming. They can be, you know, any topic. They can be a topic from I've Tupperware has seminars at the frog rally. 

Tony Barthel

Probably not anymore. 

Peggy Barthel

Well, maybe not anymore. Yeah. But they have had seminars at the frog rally. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

And you learned how to adjust or maintain the Dexter Axle. 

Tony Barthel

Oh my 

Speaker 3

gosh. Yes. 

Tony Barthel

I was at the Dexter Axle workshop and learned how to maintain the wheel bearings and brakes. We went to Lippert Slide. There was a double seminar of Lippert Slide Systems and that's where we learn more about our slide system. I went to one by Ericcell and learned about the different sealants and all of that. So a lot of them, there's really good actual manufacturers there of stuff. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. But they're also great, like, I'm just gonna show you my pictures from when I went to Alaska. Sometimes those are just great to sit through. If you want, maybe you want to go to Alaska or maybe, you know, you can't ever make it to, um, I don't know, Alaska, Peru, whatever. And someone is showing you the slides for their vacation. 

Tony Barthel

Hey. Here's my vacation slide. 

Peggy Barthel

Some of those seminars are just fun to just kinda sit through and visit places through someone else's eyes or, you know, maybe I'm I'm a little tired of learning right now. I just wanna see pretty pictures and so those are nice. So seminars about everything under the sun. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Another thing at some of the larger rallies, there are new RVs and you can go we were at an FMCA rally and oh, what was his name? Duck on it. The host of Family Feud, Steve Harvey. 

Peggy Barthel

Steve Harvey. 

Tony Barthel

Steve Harvey was there shopping for RVs. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. Right. Now when you go to, for example, an RV show, that's what you expect. You expect to be looking at RVs all day long because that's what you're doing is you're looking to see if you're ready to buy or you're not ready to buy, whatever. That's what you expect to see. 

Peggy Barthel

So at Rally's, you may not think of it as that. And they don't all have new RVs and some of them maybe just have one dealership that will bring 6 RVs. Whatever it is, they're not always there, but some of them are. But new RVs and new gadgets, those are pretty exciting to see. At least for us. 

Tony Barthel

That's true. A lot of times new gadgets. We saw the dude from the RV, my RV school and he had an escape ladder. Yep. So if you're in a 5th wheel, how do you jump down from the second floor? 

Tony Barthel

Well this dude had an escape ladder that you shove out the window and it unfurls and you're safe. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. 

Tony Barthel

There's a fire. 

Peggy Barthel

He also sets himself on fire. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. He 

Peggy Barthel

does. So that's very entertaining. 

Tony Barthel

That's another thing. So Well, speaking of entertainment. 

Peggy Barthel

Entertainment, not everybody sets themselves on fire. No. Sometimes a rally will bring in big or small name entertainment. Some of that local some of those local entertainers are just as entertaining as, you know, the Rolling Stones or whatever. Right? 

Tony Barthel

Never. Okay. We've never seen the Rolling Stones at an RV rally, but we did see 3 Dog Night. 

Peggy Barthel

We did, and that was fantastic. 

Tony Barthel

Gosh. They were good. I was shocked at how on this band was. They were fantastic. 

Peggy Barthel

And sometimes it may not be a concert, and it might be bingo night, which Tony laughed at and then hit 1. Had a really good time. Maybe a dance. Maybe, you know, a lot of parades. We'll have parades and 

Speaker 3

those are 

Tony Barthel

a lot 

Peggy Barthel

of fun. Sometimes they'll have costumes or sometimes they'll just be, like, maybe the whole rally will have a theme. And so every night, you're supposed to show up in a different Oktoberfest hat, for example, or something. And so there's a lot of just fun, and that kind of goes back to that meeting new people. Like, if you what if you happen to both show up in the same beer keg hat? 

Peggy Barthel

Like you're gonna be best friends for life. Right? Right. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. The entertainment and the group stuff. And again, if that's not your thing, you don't have to go to that part of it. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. No one's knocking on your door saying, hey it's time. Get out here and go to the whatever. 

Tony Barthel

I think we know the most about the FMC rallies because we've been to the most of those. Some of them have what are those chapter oh, where you drive around and the chapter has a part of the campground. You go and they like like that's where we learned or we met all the New Mexico chapter folks. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. So, um, I can't remember what it's called either, but it's almost like trick or treating. Right? Like, this chapter will all Truly new. Together, and then they'll have a little party one evening. 

Peggy Barthel

And and we we just actually rode around with someone on their golf cart, and we went from this chapter and had their snacks and learned about them. And then we carted off to the next chapter and we just went and made a bunch of friends, saw a bunch of people, had a bunch of fun food. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Met met our before we even moved to New Mexico, we met the people from the New Mexico region of the FMCA. That's right. So that was good. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. Speaking of food, because don't we always speak of food. These rallies are gonna have they're gonna run the gamut. Right? Sometimes they will have catered meals. 

Peggy Barthel

Sometimes they will have potlucks. Sometimes they'll bring in food trucks. A lot of times, thank goodness, there's ice cream socials. The FMCA in particular has donuts and coffee like, every morning of their international rally. 

Tony Barthel

The Frustrated Maestros, which is another group. It's a chapter of the FMCA, and what it is is it's people who have some musical talent for better or worse. 

Peggy Barthel

Right? 

Tony Barthel

And they get together and they play at these rallies. And it's just it's fun because sometimes they do these little skits and and you know you're eating your donuts and you're getting to know people and they're walking around with umbrellas and 

Speaker 3

that's just I don't know. 

Tony Barthel

I I like that kind of stuff and so yeah. The meals are a definite part of it. 

Peggy Barthel

Now and that's gonna kind of be a little bit depend on the size. Like, you're not gonna maybe have a potluck if there's a 1,000 rigs. 

Tony Barthel

Right. 

Peggy Barthel

Because that would be unbearable to take place. But we did have a potluck with the frog rally, and there were 80. 

Tony Barthel

With Frogtoberfest. 

Peggy Barthel

I'm sorry. Frogtoberfest. Yeah. Because 

Tony Barthel

frog in Indiana, the 

Peggy Barthel

the national 

Tony Barthel

has catered meals every meal. 

Peggy Barthel

Every meal. Well, every yeah. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Just about. Yeah. Right. 

Peggy Barthel

Vendors get catered lunches. 

Tony Barthel

Right. 

Peggy Barthel

But the breakfasts and dinners are all part of the rally fee. But potlucks are great because you get to choose what you want. Again, just like do you want to be involved in all this stuff? You also get to walk over and say, do I really want to eat that or do I want to eat that or and take 2 servings of that? And I get some of my best recipes from potlucks. 

Tony Barthel

This Frogtoberfest, I have to say, was the best, I think, potluck I've ever been to. Because everybody you know a lot of times at a potluck people are like, oh I brought chips and salsa, or I brought grocery store potato salad. Some of these people are known for some of these dishes and it was good. That was good. 

Peggy Barthel

We had so many homemade, a lot of crock pot meals, a lot of baked things Yeah. And salads, you know, fancy salads. Just really, really, really good selection. We did not have only store cookies and chips and salsa. Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

And store potato salad. 

Peggy Barthel

Which can happen at a potluck when we throw a party, for example, and I say, oh, just bring something. Well, do you want it to be a dessert or I don't care. If everybody brings potato salad, then that's what we're eating at my party. But we really lucked out with this one. I didn't unfortunately get any new recipes, but we'll talk about that later. 

Tony Barthel

Another reason to go is because the rallies are held at a place you might wanna go to. For example, we're at Frogtoberfest. It's here in Amana Colonies at their Oktoberfest, and it's just a neat place to be this Amana Colonies. It's an old Mennonite is it Mennonite? Mennonite community right? 

Peggy Barthel

I think so. 

Tony Barthel

They used to have these communal kitchens and everyone would just eat there and it's just a different more relaxed way of life, but it's it's pretty cool. So we really like it here. 

Peggy Barthel

And we love that we were able to, especially in this particular situation, 2 weekends in a row. So we have the week in the middle to kind of go and just wander around Amana when it's not crowded with Oktoberfest patrons, which is also kinda nice. They have a lot of cute, wonderful little shops and The 

Tony Barthel

butcher shop. 

Peggy Barthel

The butcher shop and the Christmas store. 

Tony Barthel

Oh, yeah. The Christmas store and the general store. 

Peggy Barthel

And the chocolate shop. 

Tony Barthel

And the German restaurants and oh, it's just great. 

Peggy Barthel

It's just a great place to hang out. And would we have ever been here if there weren't events here? Who knows? 

Tony Barthel

Well, we have been here, but it was kinda like we stopped for a day. Yeah. And now it's like we're here here. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. 

Tony Barthel

And I'm glad that we're here. For sure. Here. Here. 

Peggy Barthel

Here. 

Tony Barthel

Here. So how would you find us at rallies? 

Peggy Barthel

Well, they will be on, of course, on our website in the events and car show events and RV show calendar. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Wow. We have our our list of RV events, and we we put a thing on there if we're gonna be there. So it's either a thing to avoid or not. 

Peggy Barthel

I'm gonna be honest. I'm a little bit behind on that so I'll be getting caught up, but, uh, if you happen to be at the RV Miles homecoming this weekend, 

Speaker 3

So are we. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. So are 

Peggy Barthel

we. Come say hi. 

Tony Barthel

We will absolutely be at the Quartzsite Sports Vacation and RV 

Peggy Barthel

show. Absolutely. 

Tony Barthel

We are once again managing the seminar tent and we are also giving 2 seminars a day. 

Peggy Barthel

So we'll definitely be at the tent all the time. 

Speaker 3

Yeah. Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

We'll be hard to miss. 

Peggy Barthel

We'll be hard to miss even if you want to, uh, and then after the event is over then as we did last year, we'll find a spot out in the desert with enough space for however many people wanna join us, and we'll just hang out for a week. And it'll be It'll 

Tony Barthel

be an RV rally. 

Peggy Barthel

It'll be an RV rally. All we ever really manage to kind of plan, and sometimes that plan happens like 2 hours before mealtime, is potlucks. 

Tony Barthel

Well, we went to the desert bar. We did 

Peggy Barthel

go to the desert bar. 

Tony Barthel

We went to the adult daycare center. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. But our rallies are a little more loosey goosey. You know, there's not seminars. There's not set things. There's just like drink coffee until potluck lunch, and then drink coffee until potluck dinner, and then have a campfire. 

Speaker 3

Yeah. Pretty much. That's not so 

Peggy Barthel

far too. 

Speaker 3

They're pretty low key and 

Tony Barthel

some people come and go and all that. So it's all good. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

We are also gonna be at the Perry FRV Family RV Association or FMCA rally March 12th through 15th in Perry, Georgia. 

Peggy Barthel

That's right. We are gonna be teaching seminars. 

Tony Barthel

Yep. 

Peggy Barthel

I put in my application. I'm not gonna say that we are teaching 3 because it's possible that I don't get accepted, but that's never happened. Anytime I've submitted 3, we've been scheduled for 3. So we will probably be teaching the big three seminars that we teach, and that will be in Perry, Georgia in March. 

Tony Barthel

Well, we have actually, we have a bunch of new seminars. 

Peggy Barthel

Well, in Quartzsite. 

Tony Barthel

Because in Quartzsite, we have so many. We're doing 2 a day that we I don't 

Peggy Barthel

wanna do the same 3 that many times. 

Tony Barthel

Gosh. No. So we're we have some new ones that we've been polishing up. 

Peggy Barthel

Mhmm. 

Tony Barthel

So we will test them on you if you're at quartzite. 

Peggy Barthel

That's right. So that hopefully, if you ever were like, why in the heck would I ever wanna go to an RV rally? Hopefully, now you have at least some ideas of why you should go. And we hope that we see you at 1 sometime soon. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Yeah. Do go. They are they really are pretty terrific, and if you're gonna go and and we're there, uh, and you need a tour guide or something, we're happy to do it. By the way, I'm looking out the window and there's a golf cart dragging a picnic table. 

Peggy Barthel

Oh, maybe they're bringing it to our site. 

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Peggy Barthel

So as we have said a few times already, we are in Amana, Iowa. We went to Amana Oktoberfest. Mhmm. That was really, I think, really well done. Well, it's it was very interesting, honestly. 

Peggy Barthel

Let's back up a little. It was well done. We had a great time. It was a little bit surprising that the gate you pay to go in and you get your wristband so that you could go in. What was inside was the fest hall where they had bands and lots 

Tony Barthel

Like a giant barn. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. Like a big barn and lots of seating and beer, and then a tent where they had more beer and food, and they had a row of privies, and that was it. Like, I thought there would be all kinds of vendors and stuff. 

Tony Barthel

Well, I 

Speaker 3

would yeah. You would. There weren't. 

Tony Barthel

I mean, I think the idea of this Amana Oktoberfest is to bring people into the town of Amana where they have all these great small businesses like the candy store and the general store and the Christmas store. I think that's the idea. The interesting thing about okay. So, we paid $20 to go to the Oktoberfest, like, in the Oktoberfest for 2 days, and what we got was the ability to buy beer and food, but there's also some pretty great fans, including one that was all tubas. 

Peggy Barthel

That's right. Also, down the street, which really wasn't associated, but takes good advantage of the fact that people are there is at Mill Creek Mill Street. 

Tony Barthel

Mill Stream Brewing. 

Peggy Barthel

They were having an Oktoberfest, essentially. They had tents outside and they were selling beer out of a truck and they had food and 

Tony Barthel

they had their own beer, which is really really good beer. 

Peggy Barthel

And that beer was also being served at the official Oktoberfest, but they weren't related really. So if you just wanted to go to the brewery and hang out at their Oktoberfest, you just did. 

Tony Barthel

Well, the interesting thing is the official Oktoberfest, you couldn't bring beer out of the Oktoberfest, but if you went to Millstream Brewing, you could just walk around with it. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. You just got your beer and then you just wandered around town. So we had to, like, chug a beer so we could go out of the gate and go check things out. And what we first saw was a parade of people drinking beer in the street. And we're like, how did that happen? 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Where is it? 

Peggy Barthel

Because they actually went to another portion of it, which was the keg tapping 

Tony Barthel

Oh. Event. Yeah. 

Peggy Barthel

And so they were there, and they kept tapped the keg, filled their beers, and then paraded through town. So they were that was that was the parade. We have talked about Amana before. We wrote an article. 

Tony Barthel

Article about it. 

Peggy Barthel

Yes. We have an article that Tony wrote, like, about a year ago. So we will put that link, of course, in the show notes, and you can read about the fun things to do at, um, at the Amana Colonies, which is actually, like, 7 little communities right here in this little portion of Iowa. 

Tony Barthel

Yep. Boy, so Steve and Kathy shared a recipe with us. I wanna try this so much. 

Peggy Barthel

It's gonna be so terrific. So I'm calling it Steve's savory autumn stew. 

Tony Barthel

Okay. 

Peggy Barthel

And it is, you know, all the things you would put in a stew, veggies and meat, I guess. But you bake them inside one of those small sugar pumpkins or pie pumpkins, the small ones. Those are the best for eating. Mhmm. You get those big giant ones, they're fun for carving, but the they're not as 

Tony Barthel

That's a lot of stew. 

Speaker 3

Well, they're 

Peggy Barthel

not as tasty also. Well, you could put one in a big pumpkin Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

I guess. 

Peggy Barthel

And then just serve it that way. But the great thing about making them in these little sugar pumpkins is everybody gets their own. It's like a bread bowl, but it's pumpkin. And you lay out all the ingredients, you know, smoked meats and all kinds of chopped up veggies and broth, and everybody kind of builds their own. 

Tony Barthel

Oh, I didn't know that was part of it. 

Speaker 3

Yeah. Oh. 

Peggy Barthel

So you just put in there what you want off of the it's like a it's like a stew bar. Right? 

Speaker 3

So I 

Peggy Barthel

think it'd be super fun to do at a campout. And then the trick is, of course, if you or whoever, when you take the top off of the pumpkin, you have to put little notches or or some kind of design in it. So you recognize which pumpkin is yours. So that if you make your stew with extra onions and I make my stew with extra sugar snap peas, we don't get them mixed up. 

Speaker 3

Yeah. Okay. 

Peggy Barthel

So that's the first fun part. Well, of course, the first fun part is digging all the guts out of the pumpkins. Right? 

Tony Barthel

Well, yeah. I need the stew out of a pumpkin. 

Peggy Barthel

But the great thing is then once you've baked this stew and cooked it all together, you've also cooked the meat of the pumpkin. And so as you take bites, you scrape some of that pumpkin out, so you have your all the things you put in the stew plus pumpkin. 

Tony Barthel

I like it. 

Peggy Barthel

I love it. I can't 

Speaker 3

wait to try it. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. That sounds good. Well, this week, we wanna talk about something, gadget wise, that we've had for a year and 

Peggy Barthel

a half. 

Tony Barthel

So where we live in New Mexico has a ton of ouchie stuff, goat heads, 

Peggy Barthel

and trickling stuff. Just tire 

Tony Barthel

popping stuff. Right? So we got these Tannus tire inserts for our electric bikes. 

Speaker 3

Mhmm. 

Tony Barthel

And we have yet to have a flat tire. Right. We've ridden them in the, you know, up and down the street in the desert and around our property where there's plenty of ouchy things to pop tires. 

Peggy Barthel

Right. We had ours actually installed in quartzite last year. And so even in quartzite, you know, you're out and you might run over a cactus or something by accident. What a Tannus makes me think of is a a pool noodle 

Tony Barthel

Okay. 

Peggy Barthel

Split open and put inside the tire. So that you it protects the it basically protects the inner tube. Right? Just kind of an extra layer of of chunkiness between the inner tube and the outer stickers. 

Tony Barthel

It's a gummy thing that goes inside your bike tire, and it helps if you have a flat you don't get a flat flat 

Peggy Barthel

flat flat. Your flat is less flat. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Your flat is not so flat, and it just protects the bike and keeps you riding. So it's they're pretty cool things. So if you're thinking oh I ride where I get a lot of flats or whatever these tennis bike tire inserts, I like them. Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

Well, we're not gonna talk much about this week's RV because we have a whole separate video about 

Peggy Barthel

that. Whole separate video about the Thor Electric Motorhome, which is in concept still, but maybe a concept whose time is just about to come. 

Tony Barthel

Go and watch if you're at all curious about this, and especially if you're like, oh, I don't like EVs. Go watch this anyway, because Thor actually has a really good way of doing this. So we'll encourage you to do that, and and that's what you get. So if you're curious, we'll put a link in the show notes to that video. 

Peggy Barthel

We have a favor. We would like you, if you have a spooky camping story, we'd like you to submit it for Halloween episode. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. Which 

Peggy Barthel

is coming up. Popular episode of the year, by the way. 

Speaker 3

It is. 

Peggy Barthel

But it's the most fun for us, so we're gonna keep doing it anyway. Yeah. So you can email us at happy camper@firstlesscamping.com, or if you're in all those social places where they have private messaging, go ahead and use that. We'll we'll find it. We'll find you, and you can get a story to us. 

Peggy Barthel

Then we'll either read it or maybe we'll even have you call and read it to us Yeah. So that, you know, maybe we don't have the right inflection on the word. Please, if you would like to do that, submit that to us as soon as possible so that we can get that episode put together and ready for Halloween. 

Tony Barthel

We're working on our Halloween episode now, and we are only working with a skeleton crew. 

Peggy Barthel

So Oh, boy. We have a ghost of a chance of getting this done. 

Speaker 3

Yeah. And we don't mean 

Tony Barthel

to be haunting you with 

Speaker 3

this, but there we go. 

Peggy Barthel

Okay. Are we done? 

Tony Barthel

Yes. 

Peggy Barthel

Alright. Last week's question of the week, I asked you if you would please share a regional food favorite that you've discovered in your travels. A couple of weeks ago, we gave you all of our answers. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. There was all of the soda about stuff 

Peggy Barthel

that we And so we did get a few responses, and I I just have to say, Karen, I'm sorry, but pasties didn't make our list. And I understand that you enjoy them by smothering them in gravy, and maybe that would have been 

Tony Barthel

Well, we got gravy when we got them. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. We just didn't know. Maybe No. 

Tony Barthel

We did and it was still it's like 

Peggy Barthel

It's just brown gravy. So, anyway, I'm glad that you enjoy them and, um, you just keep on doing that. 

Tony Barthel

Ouch. But There 

Peggy Barthel

are a few other favorites. Tony actually sent a picture of a Scottish breakfast, Tony Gibboni, and who I love those guys eat breakfast. 

Tony Barthel

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Proper breakfast. 

Speaker 3

Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

Although you kinda lose me on the black pudding, but still, yeah, all of that looks good to me. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. This week, we were wondering if you have some thoughts you'd like to share about the non resident state park camp fees. Yeah. I know that it's kind of frustrating sometimes when you have to pay more than your friends did because you went to visit them in another state. But I think the one point I wanna make, and we can still discuss this, is that residents pay taxes and they subsidize those parks. 

Peggy Barthel

Yeah. And so I think that, you know, as much as it might frustrate me, I don't have a problem paying extra fees when I'm at a state park in a different state. Wow. So there 

Tony Barthel

And you can weigh in on that in our fun and friendly Stressless Campers Facebook group. 

Peggy Barthel

Yes. 

Tony Barthel

And any question you have or whatever, we've had some great posts this week there, and it's just a fun way to share the RV lifestyle. And everybody there is really polite, which is pretty cool. 

Peggy Barthel

Mhmm. You also can sign up on our website for the weekly newsletter. It is fun and friendly. Oh, wait. That's the group. 

Peggy Barthel

Well, I'm listening 

Tony Barthel

to this too. 

Peggy Barthel

But it's also free and it has links to stories and videos and podcasts and things that we think will help you get the most out of your RV experience. 

Tony Barthel

Yep. All you gotta do is visit our website, and if it's one of your first times, welcome. There'll be a pop up where you could sign up. But at the bottom of every page, there's a sign up form. Know that we never share your information with anybody. 

Tony Barthel

We only send one email a week, and we also have coming up kind of soon ish, some pretty great things were given away to people who are subscribers. So Right. No cost, no tricks. We have some cool stuff. 

Peggy Barthel

You can also find on our website the show notes for this episode, which is number 276 on the podcast page at stressescamping.com. 

Tony Barthel

Well, there are also discounts and deals for the best deals and the things you'll need for your stresses camping adventure. And if you've got a great deal for our audience, let us know. 

Peggy Barthel

Please. Of course, we are on all the social places. So when you've done all those other things on stressless camping.com, you can jump off to all the places I don't list anymore because I always mess them up. Continue to hang out with us in those places. 

Tony Barthel

Wow. There you go. And of course, if you don't wanna miss future episode of the Stressless Camping podcast, it's free, and we'd love to have you around our virtual campfire. You can find us at any podcast app or again at our home on the web. And 

Peggy Barthel

And a review will help others find this podcast, And more listeners means we can continue to get great guests which we haven't had in a couple weeks because we've had a lot to say. Sorry. Yeah. We'll get you some guests coming up soon. So please, if you haven't already done so, leave a review. 

Peggy Barthel

And if you have already done so, you know, you can still help. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah. If you see something you like on the stresses camping website or you have let's say you have a question you've seen on social media, you wanna provide a verified answer. A lot of times we have those answers on the website, so if you share those pages with people in your social media circle, boy does that ever help us. So thank you, and it's free. Yeah. 

Tony Barthel

Isn't that cool? Share what you find on our website in your social world, and thank you so much for that. It really really helps us. So with that, we really appreciate your being here with us once again as we come to you from Amana Colonies. 

Peggy Barthel

Go out and have a rally. 

Tony Barthel

Yeah, we are. So thank you and 

Peggy Barthel

stress less camping. 

Speaker 5

We hope you learned a lot and had some fun and got some tips for your next stress less camping adventure. We're honored by your reviews on Apple Podcasts, which helps others find us too. Don't forget to subscribe so you won't miss out on the adventure, and we look forward to your joining us next week. Until then, happy camping. 

Peggy Barthel

Play newsletter. It is fun and friendly. Oh, wait. That's the group. Well, it's fun and friendly, but it's also free.