Best RV parks to stay?? - from Central Florida to the Keys

[mugsytrpt]

I am beginning to plan a trip to the Keys this summer.  I would like some advice about the best places to stay with a 40ft bus.  We will be pulling a trailer with a car on it.  We are planning on staying in some campgrounds from Orlando on down to the Keys.  We are wanting to let our kids see some different places in Fl.  Some of the parks I have tried to get in will not let an older motorhome in if it is over 10 years old on other trips we have taken.  We are Ok with state parks too.  Any advice would be a big help.

Thanks for your input.

james

[white-eagle]

There are some really nice city or county parks.  Hannah Park in Jacksonville is on the ocean, plenty of sites usually, $25 a nite.  You can walk the 2 blocks to the beach from your site.
South of Lake Okeechobee, South Bay county(?) park, nice place, fishing, hiking, also $25.
Practice your hand signals for backing.  The keys have terrible sites, low branches, small sites.  Check prices.  We stayed in one of the oldest parks in Key West.  Tight, $100/nite, But in Key Largo, we found quite a few sites at $50, still tight, but more scenic in my opinion.
Check Google for campsites.  I have Delorme, Trailer Life, and Streets and Trips.  None of them have a great list of campgrounds because they only seem to list those that pay them.  i've taken to stopping in an area, using "places" on my cell to find local campgrounds, then book a currently open site.  There's always one available and you can get better prices.
The state park in Key Largo got an upgrade, but it was closed when we went thru, so no idea what it's like.

If resorts want to know the age of my bus, then they don't need my dollars.  i don't like snobs.

[stevet903]

Check out www.rvparkreviews.com.  It's a great resource to find campgrounds along the way.  Since you are pulling a trailer, a book that you might find useful is Big Rig Best Bets, which lists campgrounds that the authors have visited that are suitable for larger and longer RVs.  Unfortunately, most of them are also $$.


We've stayed at Knights Key in Marathon, at Mile Marker 47.  Kind of in the middle of the keys, about 55 miles to Key Largo and 47 miles to Key West.  I know they have a place to store trailers on site, and it's large enough to easily maneuver the bus inside the park to put it in the storage area.  (Not many in the Keys are)  Prices are about average for the keys.

http://www.keysdirectory.com/knightskeycampground/

We also stayed at Larry and Penny Thompson Park which is right next to the Miami Zoo.    Nice park, but I don't remember if there were sites big enough for the bus, trailer, and car.  It's also close enough to Everglades National Park for a day trip or you could camp in the NP at two areas.

Steve

[Mike in GA]

Ditto on Larry and Penny Thompson Park in West Miami/Kendall. Very nice place, and large sites.
      For the Keys, forget Key West (and Boyd's) - too tight and too expensive. A better bet is  the KOA on Sugarloaf Key - 18 miles north of KW and still pricy, but worth the cost.
Good luck!
    Mike
PS:  Some interesting things to do in KW  -  the Truman Little White House, the Hemingway estate, and Sloppy Joe's Bar where they have the annual Hemingway look-alike contest.
Mike in GA

[Joe Camper]

We have been camping the Keys for better than a decade.

What used to be Fiesta Key resort at the 70mm between Islamirada and Marathon.

It is now a Morgan resort google it. Do not go by the advertized prices they will book you at full rate and when you show up they have a 50% off not advertised rate.

You will pay about 50 a night or so probably less by the week or longer.

Do not try to extract this info over the phone it ain't happening and if you do pay full price there is not a reimbursement at the gate.

I know you will for sure not wanting to be going that far on a maybe but i assure you there will be spots available The place was about 30% occupied in Jan last we were there.

You will not be disappointed.

[loosenut]

I second the Larry&Penny T park.  It was nice.  There are only a few pull thru spaces but most of the spots should accommodate your bus and tow.  During our stay there were a few buses in the park besides us.

Yacht Haven in Ft. Lauderdale is okay but not nice.  Although the yachts parked around were impressive.

I stayed at Boyd's and enjoyed it.  The staff was friendly and accommodating, perhaps because it was at the beginning of the season.  The spots were not overly large but they had a number of 40 foot rigs there during our stay.  

I felt Boyd's was worth the money differential to be 5 miles from Key West; because, traffic is s-l-o-w in the Keys.  The road is not always smooth getting there.  Hopefully the construction will be over before you go.

Mike