What's Your Tolerance For High Gas Prices?

Above, the RV at Grand Teton National Park in 2019. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

As gasoline prices rose over the past few months, I had to adjust my summer vacation plans from going to eastern Wyoming and the Black Hills of South Dakota to somewhere much closer to home.

My motorhome's gas tank has a 55 gallon capacity. The current price for unleaded regular at the local Flying J is $4.359/gallon. If my gas tank were completely empty, it would cost me $239.74 to fill it. Anything over $4.00/gallon would not be within my tolerance level for a road trip.

National Parks Traveler has posed the question to their readers in a new article posted today.

They start their article with:

What's your breaking point for fuel costs this summer? Will you stay out of the National Park System if you have to pay more than $4.50 per gallon, or $5 per gallon?

During my recent road trip through Wyoming, Nebraska, and Kansas, gas prices certainly caught my attention. I found a relative bargain in McPherson, Kansas, where I paid $4.249/gallon for "Super 93" unleaded, while in Rawlins, Wyoming, the price was $4.799 for regular unleaded. Even though my 2012 Subaru Outback averaged about 26 miles per gallon, fuel was a major expense for the trip. 

But there were many travelers out on the highways, where I saw more than a few three-quarter-ton pickups hauling fifth-wheel campers, and you know they're lucky if they can average 15 miles per gallon. While I never paid $70 or more to fill up my 16-gallon tank, filling a 36-gallon pickup tank with diesel can run $200 or more, a breath-catching cost. It might cost four or five times that to fill one of those bus conversion RVs.

To read the full article, go here.