Whether you’re a seasoned traveler or brand new to the road, bad weather can strike fast, and your safety depends on being prepared and knowing what to do when the skies turn dark.







PLUS the Social Media Buzz, The RV Question of the Week, and Mike and Jen's Storytime -- The Black Fly Tango!







To see the Video Version of the Podcast, click below:















The audio version is available on your favorite Podcast apps or the player below:















A Terrible Weather Week















This has been one of the worst weeks weather-wise that we have ever seen in our almost 15 years of doing the RV Lifestyle.







Really, the entire year has been plagued by severe storms and dangerous weather. For us, we were dodging blizzards and snowstorms right from the first of the year when we headed down to Tampa and the Florida RV Supershow.







And who would have guessed that Florida would be so hard hit by snow and ice… yes…Florida… snow… that we were stranded in Gainesville because the US 10 east-west route from Tallahassee ot the Gulf Coast was shut down.







But it is the devastation, the loss of life, and the sheer magnitude of the wave after wave of severe weather we’ve seen this spring that has literally taken our breath away.







The tornadoes that hit Missouri, Tennessee, and Kentucky this past week were catastrophic. As we record this podcast, the death toll from just those storms stands at 38. There have been other massive storms in Kansas, Oklahoma, and, in Alabama, a hailstorm that was best described as Apocalyptic.







There was also massive flooding these past few days. In West Virginia, 15 adults, 8 dogs, and 1 cat had to be rescued from their RVs, which were surrounded by flood water, at a campground on Sleepy Creek near Berkeley Springs, W.V.







Michigan was hit hard by big storms, too. Last Thursday night, massive thunderstorms rolled off Lake Michigan and made their way across the entire lower peninsula. There were at least six confirmed tornadoes from that storm. In March, another storm had 12 tornadoes confirmed from a single storm…. in one state.







Now here’s the thing. We are lifelong residents of Michigan. Tornadoes have always happened there. But never on this scale. Never so severe. Never so many, so frequent.







In Thursday’s storm, those strong winds devastated the Schnable Lake Family Campground near the west Michigan town of Allegan, tossing campers and damaging at least 35 of them. No one was hurt, but the damage is every RVer's worst nightmare.







That same night, we were camping across the state in Oakland County, Michigan. The tornado warning sirens went off at about 11:30 and like everyone else at the Addison Oaks Campground, we took shelter in the bathhouse (as you can see below). The all clear was finally sounded about 2 AM. The campground was buffeted by high winds and heavy rain, but we were very fortunate compared to what happened elsewhere across the Midwest and Central States over the past few days.















Why We Need to Talk About Dangerous Weather When Camping







Camping is about enjoying the outdoors—sunny skies, fresh air, peaceful nights. But the reality is, storms, heavy winds, tornadoes, hurricanes, and hail are all part of camping life, and they can be dangerous for RVers. The weather can change unexpectedly, and RVs, being lighter and sometimes more fragile than traditional homes, are at risk during severe weather.







We recently saw a question in our online RV Lifestyle Social Media that really capt...