Reviews with generalized comments

Hi folks,

I suspect, like many of you here, I read reviews for locations from all over the continent. Places I've visited, places I've never heard of or places I'd like to visit. Having read a great many of these, I have increasingly started noticing that some of the reviews make reference to GPS. These tend to fall in to two groups. One being, "our GPS took us straight there" and the other being, "don't trust your GPS."

While I appreciate the intent is to be helpful, it really isn't. There are many variables to GPS. I may have a different brand to you. You may have recently updated your system and I haven't. I may set mine on the shortest route while you have yours set on the quickest or most economical route.

Sweeping statements like do or don't trust your GPS have little value unless they are qualified with some information about the system you are using.

Equally, generalized comments about the location of site utilities don't have much meaning unless you are quantifying that against the equipment you have. Simply stating that utilities were poorly located may be correct for your rig but by the same token, they may work perfectly for mine.

Cellphone signal strength is another common complaint that people often submit in a review and appear to lay the blame on the CG owner. This isn't something in the control of the CG/Park owner. That issue belongs to the cell network provider.

I'm sure there are lots of other 'generalized' comments but these are just some that I have noticed creeping in to reviews.

 

On our recent trip we stayed at several parks where the park's own website stated "don't use your GPS to get here." In all those cases, Google Maps had no problem getting us there because it was navigating to the park, rather than to a street address. In rural areas street addresses can be flaky; I suspect that's where most of the problems have arisen.

I agree that complaining about cell phone service is wrong, but noting which carriers work and which don't is definitely helpful. We spent ~10 days at a park where we barely had cell service of any kind and that's not something I'd like to do again very often. I'd sure like to know about that before I went there.

 

Hi Joel, I don't disagree the cell phone issue is worth noting in reviews but when the blame is laid at the owner of the CG it is a little unfair.

 

Agreed

 

Another comment that has no use in the review, but you can find with alarming frequency is "looks like an old KOA". What's the point? The place could now be much improved since it is not a KOA, or it could have fallen into disrepair.

Chris g.

 

I agree that it's an irrelevant comment, but one that strikes you when you drive into a park and you see the classic A-frame KOA structure.

 

I agree.

I try to qualify my "old KOA" comments by making it clear that I think this is a good or bad thing. You're right - it can be either.

I'm one of those who just doesn't get the appeal of KOAs and I'm not surprised some of them get sold off or taken over or fall into disrepair. We generally stop at an "old KOA" in Fort Stockton, Texas and I think it's fairly charming all in all. But there was one we stayed in recently that was attempting to capitalize on all the kid-oriented activities and it felt old and dated and was overpriced.

 

I know that Google maps are not exactly the same as GPS units, and I don't want to be off topic, but this story sort of relates to the OP. We were using Google maps to get to an RV park recently. If we had followed the map, it would have had us pass up the turn into the RV park driveway which was well marked and turn into the driveway of a business about two lots down. From there it had us go around to the back of the building (where there was no road), go over a curb in order to go behind the next business winding up by putting us into a dirt/gravel storage lot before going over another curb into the park's driveway. Fortunately we ignored this and turned in the driveway where the sign was. When I went in to register, I told the office worker about the weird route and she said, "We get that a lot. All the GPS units show the same route and we don't know why."

The bottom line of this story is I don't totally trust any one source. I use Google maps and paper maps and my own observations of street signs to decide the right way to get to a destination.

 

Your experience illustrates a problem that, I think, is unique to using Google Maps as a GPS. For larger businesses, national parks, historic landmarks, etc, Google places its map pin in what I think is something like the geometric center of the area defined for the "thing" being navigated to. It's navigation software then takes you to the point closest to the "pin" regardless of whether or not that is the front or the back of the building or the entrance to the park.

The first time we really noticed this behavior was when we were near Macon GA trying to navigate to a nearby national historic site. We were driving our car and were following Google's instructions when it took us down the interstate, had us exit and immediately took us back on the highway going the opposite direction! As we drove back up the interstate Google proudly announced "you have arrived at your destination!"

I then realized that what it had done was attempt to navigate to a map pin that was in the middle of a large plot of land and which wasn't directly accessible by a road. It had calculated that by taking me on the interstate it was bringing me as close to the pin as possible!

We use Google Maps a lot for local navigation, and, since then, have encountered several situations in which we were taken to the back of a store, instead of the front, etc, just because that was closest to the pin placement. In a couple of cases I have been successful in contacting Google and telling it that its pin placement was erroneous and could cause confusion. To my knowledge they have moved their pin twice in response to my efforts.

 

As to GPS--"Trust, but verify" Currently on long trip thru NE US--3 couples and 3 vehicle nav units + 3 cell phone mapping apps. Mostly, every one has a different idea of how to get to a given point--to just blindly follow the blue line can be disastrous. Having a state map (I'm the only one in group that uses one) available can many times point out a GPS mistake or a route that it thinks is best but actually takes odd turns. Also, parameter input to the GPS previously may be forgotten--"always avoid freeways"; always avoid toll roads; shortest vs fastest, will all cause differing routes to show up.
It is a tool, no more than that.

 

A rather large percentage of our sites this summer were at KOA's because they were well-rated parks in places we wanted to stay. One was a destination park in Durango where we spent 2 weeks, the others were all one or two night stays. The nightly prices varied from ~$70 (incl tax) to ~~$35.

With the KOA discount card I don't think KOA's are any pricier than any other equivalently appointed parks. Furthermore, if you join the loyalty club you get another 5% back by collecting points. We received $50 in loyalty club credits this summer. Also, because of our loyalty club "status" we were no longer subject to the $10 reservation cancellation fee.

Quite honestly, I get quite tired of the the incessant "bash KOA" threads that are found on almost all RV forums. Our experience with KOA's has been like the old days of going to Howard Johnson's restaurants while on the highways--they aren't necessarily the best, but they're almost always acceptable.If you don't want to stay at a KOA, then don't, but don't make unsubstantiated accusations of price or other reasons for not staying at one.