Almost
ten years ago, we bought a Winnebago View and have made it our home for weeks
or months at a time. Though my partner was familiar with the RV (recreational
vehicle) life, it was all new to me. By talking with other RVers, and reading
magazines and online forums on the subject, I’ve picked up a lot of information
and learned much of the language.
The
special RV lingo mystified me for a long time. Why would anyone pull a “toad”
behind an RV? Isn’t that animal cruelty? Is a “genset” a person’s gender at
birth? And so on. I had a lot to learn.
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| Towed |
Now
at least I know some basics: a “back-in site” is a campground site that has to
be backed into. Carefully. In contrast, a “pull-through site” can be
driven into at one end, exited at another. Pull-throughs are more desirable
because of their convenience, but campground managers tend to reserve them for
the large RVs that need them more than we do. Luckily, the View is very
maneuverable.
As
on a boat, the kitchen in an RV is called a “galley.” Thank heavens, the
bathroom is called the bathroom rather than the head.
Hookups
are not what may first come to mind. They are connections for electricity and
water in campground sites. Some campgrounds also have hookups for cable TV.
RV
resorts are campgrounds with an attitude. They are likely to have a lot of
expensive extras that seem antithetical to the informal RV life.
Boondocking,
which we do often, is camping where there are no hookups. Forest Service and
Bureau of Land Management campgrounds, for instance, are usually in the
boondocks, though some of them have water available. RVers often refer to staying at Camp Walmart,
a specialized type of boondocking.
Like
a truck, an RV is often called a “rig.” It may be a “puller” (a trailer that is
pulled by a truck or other vehicle) or a “pusher” (rear-engine diesel rig that
doesn’t have to be pulled, as opposed to a front-engine rig). “Duallies” (the
spelling varies) are those pairs of tires at the rear of an RV. They have
valves that are hard to reach and cause a lot of the cussing you hear in campgrounds.
There
are tons of other terms used in manuals and conversations. Googling for RV
lingo will bring up many I have not mentioned.
And
finally, a “toad” is not an amphibian; that’s a pun on “towed,” and can refer
to a trailer, small car, or other towed object. A “genset” is a combination of
a diesel engine and an electric generator.
Language
can unite groups or divide them. In some cases those who have a common language
feel superior to others, or to feel alienated from them. That doesn’t seem true
for RVers, though. Even those who don’t know much terminology can be quickly
included in the fraternity. Some aspects of RVing will always be out of my reach,
and I don’t care to know about some others. I do feel comfortable with the lingo,
though.
