living simply - Page 4 of 204

Posted September 22, 2025 – Narrated by Jim

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First, you should know that we’re okay!

Second, the beauty of our campground hosting adventure is that we got out of it alive – but it was a close one.

camphosting — Campsite at our first camp hosting gig

After fourteen months of pain, denial, healing and stewing over what could have been, we are finally able to share our sorry work-camping story without having to post a red FOUL LANGUAGE warning at the top of the page.

We’d hoped to just keep it quiet, move on, nurse our wounds, wash our mouths out with soap and pretend it never happened. But trauma doesn’t work that way. If you don’t “go there” it will come and get you.

This is our third month in Vienna, for our 50th wedding anniversary trip. From here – 6,000 miles away from the campground – we’re finally ready to face our Waterloo.

If what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, then we hope our story helps others.

To protect the innocent, we will avoid names and places. Our purpose here is not catharsis, or to blacklist or defame, but to share a cautionary tale about campground work and hope it helps our fellow RVers.

First, let’s clear the air.

One. Even though campground work didn’t pan out for us, Carmen and I value volunteer host and camp work more than ever.

Many Forever Campers (people who dwell permanently in RV households) rotate annually between two or more campgrounds.

Imagine living in The Florida Keys through winter…

Malibu in Spring…

Lake Superior in Summer…

The Blue Ridge Mountains in Autumn…

blue ridge parkway — The beautiful Blue Ridge Parkway

… residing in the most iconic vacation destinations during peak season in exchange for skilled part-time labor.

For many RVers, that is The Dream. But these days many campground hosts are working as a strategy to be near family members who need help or renting their house to supplement income.

Whatever their reasons, our Living in Beauty lifestyle depends on work-campers volunteering behind the scenes to help senior retirees, essential workers and digital nomads navigate unaffordable housing in America. We owe campground hosts a debt of gratitude. Many federal, state, county, city and private parks cannot operate without these unsung heroes.

Two. We never set out to campground host or work camp. We are retired and financially solid. Why tinker with a purring engine? But over the years, with campground crowding, closures and resort price inflation, sloooowly we turned and the idea seemed attractive. Then, one fateful day, “Never” evolved into “Sure, why not?”

Three: We had every expectation for a fabulous first experience – and we can assure you that it was a hot job …

But extreme heat was the easy part. In the course of two work days, three weeks apart, Carmen suffered a broken hand, loosened teeth, a hematoma on her ankle, and two head injury accidents requiring two emergency room visits, many appointments with specialists, emergency dental work, physical hand therapy for 3 months and prescription pain meds.

Holy Cow! What Happened?!

Understandably, due to the severe trauma Carmen is still working through, she is not keen to discuss it. She’s healing though she still suffers head and hand pain.

But time heals and in the good moments, like now, we look back and think through the accumulation of events that led to such a life-threatening error in judgment. We are survivors. It’s a blessing that we can look back. ☺️🙏🏼😊

Now, we’d like to pass along what we learned to our fellow RVers. We heal and we rise by helping others.

We should have done our homework before accepting the T-shirt.

Looking back, our gut instincts screamed, “NoO0Ooo!, while our flawed logic hissed, “YesSsss!” 🙉 We were in too deep before we realized how badly we’d messed up.

STOP!!! is a good word. We missed several opportunities to employ the brakes and acknowledge those little red flags you feel rising in your gut. (🚩)

For example, the moment we were offered a peachy gatehouse job and a secluded semi-developed site with full-hookups in an award-winning urban campground, we should have paused to consider why this awesome job was being offered to two seniors without any camp work experience. (🚩)

Had we acknowledged our gut feelings we would have STOPPED and taken a moment to inspect ourselves in a mirror and ask, “Do we look like ‘ambassadors’ and ‘the faces of the campground?’ Would we hire us for that job?” Maybe then, we’d have remembered that we haven’t worked real jobs in a decade. (🚩) But no, we high-fived and congratulated our old asses.

And again, when we were persuaded to sign off on our right to Worker’s Compensation Insurance, ( 🚩) we should have said, “STOP!!! (🚩) But we signed off on the park’s promise to cover any losses our insurance rejected.

Worker’s Compensation Insurance,incentivizes parks to implement safe work conditions for low-wage workers and volunteers. Without that motivation, parks may forego: troubleshooting dangerous work conditions; upgrading outdated infrastructure; training sessions for safety procedures and heavy equipment use; and issuing safety apparel and equipment.

We failed to interview our predecessors. We heard they are a nice, quiet old couple who retired to Texas. But, with only a few days to settle in, we spent the time completing our background checks, submitting our finger-prints, and taking pee-tests to prove that we are not criminally-degenerate drug-addicted senior citizens. (🚩) Observing the gatehouse during peak business hours would have been a better use of that time.

Our friendly supervisor met with us, described the job, assured us there would be no manual labor. He frankly expressed that it could be “very busy at times during the summer.” (🚩) He also said, “It can be hot out there (🚩) but the booth is air-conditioned,” before offering us an opportunity to back out before signing the contract. (🚩)

Here is the Gatehouse Job Description as documented by the park advertisement:

Gatehouse: Provide positive customer service relations to the general public utilizing our park; Collect fees, provide general information, and assist with communication support for staff. Schedule varies from mornings/afternoons to early evenings

Here is a more accurate description gleaned from our midsummer experience.

Gatehouse: “You’ll be standing outside in the hot sun for up to four hours at a time in well over 110 degree temps breathing noxious fumes as you conduct hundreds of cash and credit card transactions per hour for dozens of products which you must account for in detail at day’s end. If you don’t work fast and efficiently, cars will pile up (sometimes 50 at a time) Don’t feel rushed, but check-in campers for one of the 300 campsites, and don’t let fishermen pass without purchasing permits for extra poles. You’ll know. Extra poles are hard to hide in a Subaru. First, check for passes. Check to make sure the passes are up to date. Check to confirm the people with the passes are the people issued the passes. Be sure to collect the $25 fee to use the RV dump, remember the price difference between the Weekend and Weekday Splash-pad wristbands, and make sure you have enough bags of duck food. Everyone pays to park. Decades ago parking was free so you must explain to old people that parking isn’t free anymore. You may have to explain several times. They might get mad, maybe real mad. Watch those toes, there’s no curb! And keep an eye on the pedestrian path because you don’t want to be the one who lifts the traffic-barrier-arm for a distracted driver who, while stowing away their credit card, hits a toddler. Oh, and watch out for shady characters who may be armed, dangerous or drunk. But, no worries, if they hurt you we’ll catch them because everything’s on camera. Now, you two kids go out there and have fun!”

Never has a campsite cost us more

Why didn’t we see the red flags 🚩?

The campground operates under the umbrella of a government entity, perhaps we deluded ourselves with an outdated sense of civic protection.

The questions: “How many work related injuries have volunteers suffered here?; How were they compensated for their injuries?; Were they satisfied with the compensation?” should have been addressed early in the interview process.

We wanted to interact more with our fellow volunteers, but most were busy working other jobs outside the campground or focused on training us in the gatehouse details, which we quickly mastered. Most of the volunteers were cordial, some were very kind – even sharing fresh overstock from a produce stand job – and other volunteers were all about business.

Due Diligence

Even if you are already pulling that uniform t-shirt over your head, it isn’t too late. THINK it through. There is no minutia. Leave no stone unturned. If you are required to reject Worker’s Comp to volunteer in exchange for a free site that costs your employer pennies per day, in our opinion and experience, that is a 10-red-flag deal-breaker! (🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩)

As the popularity of RVing expands and the housing crisis and government cutbacks continue, we predict there will be an even greater need for this kind of information exchange for first-time camp workers.

In Conclusion

With our limited experience, we can only share only what we know.

Things to remember:

You are important.
Life is fragile.
And lastly, When you contract to live on an employer’s property to work their grounds, you are provided a site for your RV. That site is not charity. The employer needs workers to live on the grounds. The site should reflect that your being there is to the employer’s advantage. The site should be clean, modern, updated and properly maintained – an incentive worthy of your labor.

Again, we don’t want to discourage, only to inform. Most camp hosts and camp-workers we meet are happy with their situation. We’re just two campers who tried it and got burned.

Maybe we’ll give it another go someday, sometime, somewhere …

CARMEN: NoO0Oooo!!!

Do you have any campground host stories you can share? Either as a camp host or your experience with camp hosts at campgrounds?

Questions to ask

From our experience and lessons learned, below we list a long stack of questions. Every one of them should be answered and documented to your satisfaction, preferably in writing. If you are not satisfied or are refused an answer, that is a red flag. (🚩)

Job Description

What exactly is the job description and duties? (do not accept general vague descriptions like “Help when needed”) Insist on specifics!
Will I work by myself or with others?
Will I need to be computer literate?
Will I be talking to folks over the phone?
Will I be interfacing directly with the public?
Are there maintenance skills required that I will need to learn?
If the job involves cleaning, what exactly will need to be cleaned? Public restrooms? employee restrooms? If camp sites or common areas, what aspect of them… sweeping, leaf blowing, raking, trash pickup, fire pit cleaning, hosing down?
Is there any heavy lifting or intense manual labor?
Will I work inside or outside or both?
Will I be required to supply anything for the job? computer? cell phone? tools?
Who will be my direct supervisor?
Will I be asked to perform duties outside of my job description?
Will my job require the handling of cash?
- If yes, will I be in charge of my own cash register drawer?
If we are a couple, can we perform the same duties, or if we choose, have different duties?

Days and Hours

How many hours a week?
Are the hours a week “per person” or “per couple”? This is very important!
- This concept is called “man-hours.”
- Do not accept that a couple working together for one hour is only counted as one hour. It should be counted as two hours toward that week’s requirement.
Can couples work together at the same time to double their hours?
Are there early morning hours and/or late evening hours?
Are the hours contiguous or are there split shifts?
How many days a week?
Are the hours weekdays and/or weekends?
Is the schedule the same every week or does it change?
- If it changes, how often and what advanced notice is given on the upcoming schedule?
Are those hours per week definitive and no overtime is expected?
How many days off in a row each week?
How flexible is the schedule?
If needed, can I find another volunteer to switch hours.
Is there the concept of “On Call” or when I am off duty, I am “Off Duty”?
- If there is the concept of “On Call,” do those hours count toward the required work hours?

Work Environment

Is the work environment calm or crazy?
Does the work environment change during different times of year?
How many camp sites are in the campground?
How many visitors (guests) per day?
How many other work campers are there?
Can I leave the campground when not on duty?
What is the procedure if I have a medical or family emergency and have to be gone a few hours, days or weeks?
Is there transportation supplied to get around the campground?
Is a uniform required? If yes, who pays for it?
How many hosts have stayed longer after the initial contract?
Can I talk to or email current or previous camp hosts to ask about their experience?
Have camp hosts ever been threatened by visitors or campers?
What accidents or injuries have happened to your camp hosts in the past?
- How were they compensated?

Camp Site

What amenities does the campground provide at my camp site.
What amenities does the campground provide for the whole facility?
If there is no sewer in the campsite, is a ‘honey wagon’ service provided or will I need to move my rig to a dump station to empty gray and black tanks?
In exchange for my hours, are all my camp site costs (water, electricity and sewer) totally included?
- If not, what costs I will incur?
What is my campsite at the campground valued at?
- What is the daily, weekly, and monthly rate? I need this to determine the ‘pay rate’ you are offering me for camp hosting.
Describe the camp host site you are offering me. Is it paved, dirt, grass, small, large, cramped, shaded, sunny, any privacy screens, patios, enclosures, hookups?
- More details the better! It would be nice to know is it way in the back, near amenities, near noise, near stinky trash bins, near a playground, is there any views.
Are pets allowed in the campground?
- If yes, any breed restrictions and/or pet policies or costs?

Job Perks

As a camp host, am I free to use all of the campground amenities at no charge?
Is there cell internet and phone connectivity in the area? If not, do you provide free ‘high-speed’ WiFi?
- If no cell service and no free WiFi, what is the monthly cost, if offered, for WiFi?
Do you sell stuff on site? Propane, food, supplies? If yes, do I get a discount?

The Contract

Is there a solid start and end date?
Is there a written contract with all the details required and offered to me?
Can I see and spend some time reviewing the camp host contract?
What if I want to camp host longer than the initial contract? What is the process?
If I or my supervisor feel it is not working out, can the contract be easily terminated by either one of us?
- How many days notice?
If I decide to quit hosting, can I stay in the campground and pay the regular fees?
- If yes, in the same site or would I have to move?
What if I have to leave early, or any reason?
If I have a previous commitment scheduled during my contracted time, can I have that time off?
Am I signing as an employee or a volunteer?
Am I covered by worker’s compensation insurance?
- If not covered, what happens if I get hurt on the job?
- What if I am hurt on the job and it is because of the campground’s negligence?
What happens if you ask me to change job descriptions and I refuse?
If this is a government campground, is it managed by the government or contracted out to a separate management company?
- If a separate management company, who?

Camp hosting resources

If you are looking for camp hosting opportunities, here is a listing of some of the resources we have used.

You can see our exact route on this map.

*photos in this post (unless otherwise noted) were taken and copyrighted by Living In Beauty.

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Tag: living simply

Campground Hosting Almost Killed Us