What is the worst that has happened?/Does this sound safe?

[gingerK]

Ok, well this wasn't while I was camping but on one vacation my best friend and I had gone to a museum where we bought some souvenir baseball bats. While walking back to our car, I noticed a man "hanging around" and he started following us. I mentioned it to my friend who promptly raised her bat up high. The guy turned around when he saw what we were carrying. We got back to our car safely. I forgot about this til now, reading your stories reminded me. Other than that, I've only ever felt uneasy a time or two.

[FinallyTime]

I've only been scared once. A few days after I picked up my trailer in Topeka I was working my way back to California in early May and high gusty winds drove me off the highway. I found a nearby State Park and discovered I was one of only two trailers in the entire park. The whole day and evening, I never saw anyone near the other trailer. To quote an opening line "it was a dark and stormy night" and around 3 am I woke to what sounded like a bunch of barefoot leprechauns bowling on my roof. I looked over at the dog and she had her hair up and was staring at the roof. I peeked out the window but all I could see was rain and lightening flashes. I went back to bed staring at the ceiling and wondering about that "deserted" trailer up the hill. The noises stopped after about a half hour. I was too timid to go out and take a look until daylight. I looked around my site and couldn't see anything in the wet dirt, but there was mud on the rungs of my ladder. I climbed the ladder and looked over the roof...muddy raccoon prints all over the place.

[JudyJB]

Love the raccoon story! I can imagine they can climb ladders, too, because they are so clever. I have had birds walk on my roof early in the morning, and it is amazing how noisy their little feet can be, so I can imagine how noisy raccoons would be!

[MandysMom]

In summer of 08 hubby and I were returning to Ca after having the veg oil system in our bus installed. We took a route up into high desert to lessen the grade we had to deal with (old bus does not like steep grade ESP in summer heat). It was barely daylight early in the morning. We had been asleep in a quiet nearly empty truck stop, when we heard loud voices. Hubby peeked out the curtain and turned and said quickly and more command than request ( he is a retired Navy Chief after all GET DRESSED NOW). I grumbled and said what's wrong and he pulling on pants repeated the command and added police, lots of them. We both dressed as we peeked out watching as guns drawn they pulled first a woman then a man out of a rv. We were not sure but since we were like one parking space away we decided not to crank up the bus possibly causing police to turn attention to us. We waited as it all went down fully expecting police (highway patrol and Sherrif ) knock at our door guns drawn too. However eventually they uncuffed and released the man and he left in his rv and the woman was put into a patrol car and they all left. No way were we going back to sleep so we ate breakfast and drove on south towards home. Never did know for sure what it was all about as we could only hear part of their conversation but it was apparent she was wanted and we think the guy had picked her up cuz he did not hesitate to leave without saying goodbye! Was a little unnerving seeing cops a few feet from our bus guns drawn and we were so grateful the two did not start a gunfight with the cops. Other than that I can only recall one other strange incident. Middle of night and hubby, a diabetic had a severe low blood sugar. I am in the middle of treating it when over and over the back door of our new van had its lock suddenly beeped as it unlocked as if an unknown person had a similar key and was messing with us. I would relock it with my key fob and it would unlock. I got scared because husband was temporarily out of commission putting me handling two things at once. I kept looking carefully out windows one by one and saw nothing. Reached the bed over the back of the bed and found husbands keys had gotten wedged between the mattress and door and every time he shifted it clicked the lock. Had a laugh but boy was I scared for a few minutes. We are now 9 years with that van and nothing surprises me anymore!
Velda

[asirimarco]

We haven't really had any scary experiences in the states in our RV - but when we were driving our RV to South American with our whole family in 1978 we had a really scary experience in Columbia. It was the middle of the night and the rig stalled right in front of a bridge, blocking the bridge. An army convoy was coming from the other direction. They threatened to push us into the ravine if we didn't get the rig moved so they could continue on.. They were carrying ammunition and there was a lot of guerilla activity around that area. I wrote the whole story here:
http://www.movingon1.com/colombianight.html

[snowball]

Before we went full time actually think it was the same year in the spring just as we were moving out of our house had the opportunity to met Jenny (SeeyaGal) and Dan as they were having their motor home repaired up in UT so we took the time out of moving and met them for supper...after we left my husband shook his head and said well they weren't axe murders! it was a time when there was a lot of worry over who you might meet on the internet which is were I met Jenny on RvAmerica...and he would say the same thing after each person we met from the forum...and I had to chuckle each time I also think that was when the movie "I Married a Axe Murder" came out not sure about that though...when we were hosting report came of a sow bear and her cubs killing a couple of campers they had done nothing wrong just in the wrong place at the wrong time...later that summer we had a camper with a tent...and as we always did went to each site and gave them the "bear talk" told them no food in the tents no smelly stuff be it food or make up bears go by scent and perhaps we went over board but we wanted our campers to be safe and if scaring them helped them be more alert more toeing the line as to what they should do then so be it...this poor guy turned out to be a friend of one of the campers that the sow had killed...he left early it had rained and rained and reports of bears in the vicinity ...when we saw him packing up we asked why and he told us but told us he was going to get 'one of those' pointing at a hard sided trailer and 'then I'll be back' wonder if he ever did...point is I guess all you can do is the best you can do ...be alert be aware but if we go through life being afraid what will that do??? saw that Jenny posted on FB that there was some murders in Algodones MX the area that a lot of us go to in the winter ...and she sorta wondered if people would be going to the party that is scheduled this Sunday because of it...it was drug related and unfortunately murders happen too often in places that we would consider safe...and we don't stop going to say Vegas or LA
I do remember one time we took our 24 ft tt and all our kids and went to Iowa we hadn't be out there for awhile Larry's parents hadn't seen the babies and so we took the trip caravaning we had gone to MO went into a campground conversed with each other and drove out why we couldn't put a finger on it but didn't feel good about it so ended up in a rest stop till the next day were we could find another campground...
sheila

[BarbaraRose]

Wow Carol! That was a really close call! You were really lucky to get out of that situation alive! My heart was racing just reading about it! (Very good writing tho! Just like a thriller story!).

My only scary situation was a guy breaking into my apartment one night but I chased him out before calling the police. Things can happen anywhere, even at home.

[cnq50b]

Fantastic story, Carol. Must have been scary beyond belief!
I've had your trip blog bookmarked for quite a while - guess I'm going to have to read the whole thing now.

No such scary stories on my part. Just driving mountains roads with grades > 5 or 6. (that's why I have my Mountain Book so I can choose my routes based on mountain grades _ )

[SoCalGalcas]

The worst thing that happened to me during my 16 years "living on the road" was my motor home burning up. It caught on fire while I was driving on a two lane mountain road and I never knew of trouble until I lost the power steering. I was able to pull over in a pull out and stop. When I got out and looked, black smoke was pouring out from the bottom of the engine. Several persons stopped to help. One called the fire dept on a call box. As the rig went up in hugh flames, traffic was stopped in both directions. (I used one fire extinguisher and another person used another. As the fire was up in the engine, nothing worked) I had enough calmness to get the car unhooked and backed away. End result, I lost everything including two cats. People were very nice and helpfull toward me. One woman offering me her phone to call my daughter. The firemen would have stayed with me till my daughter got there, however, I wanted to go look for the cats before I left. Never found the cats. Went back the next day and looked again. Losing the cats was the worst thing I lost. lyn

[BarbaraRose]

Lyn, how sad about your RV and losing your cats too! I remember the day I left California and was just heading up the 15 out of Escondido, the freeway was backed up for miles. Finally drove past what was left of a burned up Class A motorhome. Nothing left but the wheels and frame. Felt awful about whomever owned it.

[TABaker]

I've camped all my life, but I don't full-time. I'm still a part of the working sector. A couple of summers ago my daughter and I were kind of freaked out at a campground about an hour from home. I stay there a handful of times all year because it's near one of the locations where I can be sent to work. It was the off season, and we were the only campers in the waterfront loop. We'd gone into town to meet a friend, and came back around 9 p.m. The site beside us had a campfire going. No cars. No rig or tent. No chairs. No people. Nothing but a fire.

We assumed some locals had come by and enjoyed a campfire while not intending to camp. No flames, really, just coals at that point. It was just a weird feeling so we went inside instead of starting our own fire.

At the same campground a little later in the season I was in almost the same spot. There was a camper beside me, and some others farther away. I was away for a bit, and when I returned a man in a van had arrived and parked about 3 sites away on the other side of my neighbor. It was mid afternoon, and he mentioned he was staying only one night on his way to another state. We chatted for a bit, which wasn't odd. However, about dark I began to feel a little uneasy. He'd gone into his van and appeared all was dark over there. I went inside to read, and then eventually turned out the lights to sleep. I had my windows open instead of running the AC. My shih tzu began to growl about 30 minutes later. He continued to do so, while looking around the windows and door. I was scared to move, but I did...yanked the windows shut and locked them, and grabbed my pepper spray and Jeep key fob. I also had the ranger's number in my phone. After I closed the windows my dog settled down. I assumed it was only raccoons, anyway, but you never know.

[Acadianmom]

Other than blowouts I haven't had too many problems. I did drive into and out of one campground without registering because I just didn't like the looks of it.

We had some one go into our motel room in Baton Rouge years ago while we were at dinner. I think all they took was my DH's knife and electric shaver. Motels make me way more nervous than campgrounds.

About 20 years ago I was traveling with my son and we stopped at the Galleria Mall in Birmingham, AL. It was about noon on a Sunday and I parked out from one of the entrances. There weren't many cars in the parking lot. When we came out there was a pickup truck parked on the other side of my motorhome. As we walked toward the RV the truck left. When we got to the RV the side door frame was bent like someone had tried to pry it open. This was a Class C with van doors so don't know why they didn't just break the window. They hadn't gotten the door open.

I seldom go to the Acadiana Mall in Lafayette, LA alone and never at night. Almost every year there is trouble there around Christmas. A woman was raped in the Dillard's parking lot just a couple of months ago. I try to get myself home before dark.

Martha

[JudyJB]

I agree about motels and mall parking lots after dark being more dangerous than campgrounds. I used to travel for business and always stayed at very nice places, such as Marriott's and Hiltons, but I was still careful not to go out into the hall late unless I really had to.

One place I once stayed at in Washington, DC, had a special floor for women traveling alone. I really liked that. No males were even allowed to visit or be in the halls. That was a long time ago, so I wonder if it is still there.