The Journey Membership

Original Article released on Learn to RV on November 1, 2024 by Doug Setzer

Thousand Trails is at it again with switching up their memberships. They’ve just released a new Journey membership level that is designed to replace their Elite Basic membership. It’s a unique new subscription model where you pick a term of 2 or 4 years but everything is included in that one fee- there’s no extra fees for yearly dues, Trails Collection, or RPI. The price is locked in for the duration of your term.

If you don’t already know, Thousand Trails is a set of member parks that you pay an up-front fee in order to be able to camp at them for free. In general, you can stay two or three weeks at a time and then have to move on. It’s not the best option for someone who wants to stay for months at a time, but for those who want to keep rolling or occasionally stay somewhere up to about a month, it can be a great fit.

Thousand Trails Contact

I have worked with a Thousand Trails sales rep to secure a discount for Learn To RV readers. If you’re interested in a Thousand Trails membership or have questions about it, please reach out to Craig Rouse at 336-488-0644, via Craig_Rouse@equitylifestyle.com. If you reach out to him directly, tell him you got his contact info from Learn To RV.

Benefits of the Journey Membership

This is useful for people who plan on fulltiming for just a few years. You’re not stuck to a long-term contract. Your pricing won’t change for the duration of the term, you’re locked in.

You get all of the benefits of the Elite membership with its longer booking window, up to 3 week stays, and you can go park-to-park directly.

Thousand Trails has 82 base parks spread across the country. Trails Collection adds 122 Encore parks to your membership and runs about $400/year for the other Thousand Trails memberships (it’s included with this Journey membership). Most of the add-on parks are $0/night, but there is a small set of them that are $20/night.

The reservation window for Trails Collection parks is different at 60 days vs. 120 days. There are also differences in the park-to-park feature in that you can go from a Thousand Trails to or from a Trails Collection park, but you cannot go from a Trails Collection park directly to another (for that, you’d need to explore the Adventure package and Trails Collection+).

Cons

The biggest downside is the fixed Term. If you’re not sure how long you’ll be fulltiming for, but expect it to be the long haul, then you will want to check out the lifetime memberships (Elite Connections or Adventure memberships). A lot of people sell their memberships after they’re done with them to try and recoup some of their cost, obviously with a subscription membership model, you can’t do that.