One of the best things about a road trip is the sense of freedom you get from being away from the appointments and schedules of daily life. Then why inflict that same structure on a vacation? All year people are telling you where and when you have to be somewhere, but a road trip is the perfect chance to change all that. It's great to be able to just move on when you feel like it or stay an extra night if there's more you want to see. Or maybe you want to go completely random and change destinations, because someone along the way told you about a place you never heard of.

It's easy for me to talk now, but in our early years of travel, I had reservations made for every night of the entire trip. Although it did give us the security of knowing we had a place to stay, it took away from that carefree feeling that you should get on a vacation.

Being realistic though, there are certain destinations that are so popular (such as Yellowstone or Yosemite) that your only chance of visiting them is with advance reservations, available on-line from www.recreation.gov. These are a good idea to make or you will very likely be disappointed. However, you can keep some of your flexibility by building extra unscheduled days around the reservation.

Also, find out about a campground's cancellation policy. If it's not too bad, it might be worth making the reservation and then cancelling or changing it if necessary.