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W I R E L E S S S O C I E T Y
Wi-Fi Gets Rolling
For mobile nomads, an RV park with wireless access is a godsend. Better even than the pool
By Cathy Booth Thomas
November 3, 2003
The sun is still an orange ball low on the horizon, and the air
is cool under the oak trees at the Austin Lone Star RV Resort.
The birds are chirping merrily, but Kara Cox, 19, is oblivious
to the unfolding beauty of the day. She's inside her Gulf
Stream trailer, still in her pajamas, a week's worth of clothes
on the floor, playing in the 3-D virtual world of EverQuest via
a wireless connection to the Web. "She's on it four hours a
day," says husband Jesse, 22, with an indulgent laugh--and with
no exaggeration at all, he swears. "They call it EverCrack for
a reason."
At the other end of the park, retirees Joyce and Pat Busbee
haven't had breakfast yet, but the 70-year-old patriarch already
has his Sony Vaio revved up, ready to research a new motor home
to replace the couple's luxury 40-ft. Country Coach. "It's the
best thing since sliced bread," jokes Joyce, referring to the
wireless service, not her 12-ft. living room, full-size tub or
double-door fridge. Nice amenities, but after two years on the
road, they most cherish the spontaneous instant messages sent via
the Internet from their 10-year-old granddaughter in California.
That wasn't always possible before wi-fi. It used to be that they
would wait for cheap evening rates on their mobile phone and then
dial online through a cellular modem. Now the messages zip freely
back and forth. "She writes 'Grandpa?', and I write back, 'Hi,
Peanut.' I love that," says Pat.
In America's heartland, geeks and grandparents and good ole boys
alike are signing up for wi-fi access in the last place you would
expect: RV parks. Whether they pull up in $10,000 campers or
$300,000 McMansions on wheels, the nation's mobile nomads are
using 802.11b, the wireless Web standard, to work and play, to
bank, to check their stock portfolios or just to stay in touch
with loved ones from the road. Ditch those old stereotypes about
RV parks, says Eric Stumberg, co-founder of the start-up
TengoInternet, based in Austin, Texas, which supplies wireless
connections 30 times the speed of dial-up to RV denizens from
Florida to Arizona. "These are the real road warriors, living in
a coach, carrying cell phones and computers, connecting
wirelessly."
In fact, the RV crowd is increasingly plugged in. The Recreation
Vehicle Industry Association found that of 7 million households
with RVs, 16% access the Internet on the road. And although the
majority of the nation's 16,000 RV grounds still don't offer
wireless access, scores of parks--from the Kampground of America
in Kissimmee, Fla., near Disney World, to Yogi Bear's Jellystone
Park in Estes Park, Colo.--are installing the systems. KOA, which
launched KOA Konnect in April, plans to offer wireless Internet
access in 500 campgrounds and RV parks, charging a flat $19.95 a
month, which is about average. Virginia-based LinkSpot offers a
$5.95-a-day service in 30 East Coast parks, while TengoInternet
supplies 28 RV parks from Florida to Arizona at prices ranging
from $5 a day to $105 for three months.
The services have lured a faithful band of rolling wi-fi addicts.
Consider Barney and Carol Norton, who pull up to their Lone Star
campsite shortly before noon in a new Nissan Xterra--bought after
a week of research done (you guessed it) wirelessly online. For
the Nortons, quality Internet access was a job necessity. "We can
live anywhere. The only thing I require is high-speed access. I'd
do without a phone for it," says Barney, 45, a tech engineer who
uses his iPaq handheld to check on his clients. He and wife
Carol, 40, moved to Austin for her new job in tech support.
Sitting at the dining-room table of their camper at night, they
have been researching cars and perusing the real estate listings
on Carol's Dell notebook. After a week, they had the car and were
close to buying a house. Not a moment too soon, says Carol,
glancing around their cramped quarters.
Down the gravel road, past the fruitless pear trees and the
hedges of glossy photinia, is Sherry and Bob Baugh's "fifth
wheel," a trailer pulled by a truck so massive it inspires fear.
The Baughs keep their wi-fi connection open all day long so they
can get real-time stock quotes on a desktop Compaq. Bob, 57, a
former transport manager, reports that coal companies are paying
good dividends, while Sherry, a former medical technician in her
50s, has her eye on some Wal-Mart stock. Wi-fi sure beats the
days when they would pay up to $70 to have a phone line
installed--plus the monthly charges for Web access--vs. a flat
$30 a month for wireless. "We always look at amenities in parks,
but now we've included wireless access," says Bob, who reveals
Sherry's secret late-night vice: playing cards online after he's
gone to bed.
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