We’ve been travelling in our RV since mid-December and have had full hookups every single night! We never had the guts to park overnight in a parking lot or rest stop. We haven’t explored state parks which tend to have water & electric but no sewer connections. Anyhow, after our day at the beach in Port Aransas, we decided it was time to boondock…on the beach!
For just $12, we can now legally park on the beaches of Corpus Christi and Port Aransas for all of 2018 and camp for up to 3 consecutive nights at a time.
Boondocking, or dry camping, is camping without any hookups. No water. No electric. No sewer. Our lights are run off of the battery and the fridge/stove would still work as they run on propane, but other than that, we’d have no amenities.
We got to the beach and found out it was busy! We managed to find a great spot where we could park with our windows facing the water. It was a beautiful view. We quickly set up camp and got to the water to spend the day in the warm water and building sand structures.
We ate at a beachfront restaurant and took a long stroll on the beach after dark. It was so amazing. Nobody was out there except us. It was the perfect temperature to be walking around the beach. We slept with the windows open and heard the endless crashing waves all night! Sunrise was equally amazing.
We would have stayed our legal limit of 3 nights on the beach, but we had a few things going against us:
- Beaches aren’t the same with kids. They need naps, require constant supervision, and ruin anything you try to build in the sand.
- Dogs, sand, and no hookups means a sandy mess inside your RV. When we took them out to the beach with us, one of us had to hold the leashes – which again meant no ability to build stuff or swim in the water.
- The temperature was set to drop into the 50s overnight. Our night there had a low of 68, which was perfect. We’re not sure if our furnace works without electricity. We could have found out, but the sandiness from the dogs and worries about our kids freezing to death at night helped us choose to leave.
All-in-all, we loved our first boondocking experience. It was a perfect setting with perfect weather. We may not become frequent boondockers, but it’s not quite as scary after getting the first notch on our belts. We would definitely love to boondock in Port Aransas/Corpus Christi again. I doubt our next attempt will be in such a great setting, but you never know.
