With RVs, the road's less traveled

Soaring gas prices temper spontaneity in the adventurous set

As their long receipt shows, Gladdie and Raymond Coultas limit the number of shopping runs in Maine to save fuel. (Fred Field for The Boston Globe)

ORR'S ISLAND, Maine - Bill and Barbara Wright sold their house in Georgia two years ago and drove off in their RV with plans to visit 50 states in five years. But record fuel prices have forced them to cut their annual mileage in half, add at least a year to the schedule, and give up their dream of driving to Alaska.

The Wrights, who have parked their RV at a campground on this rustic island, show how soaring energy costs are cooling the wanderlust of recreational vehicle owners and their romance with the open road. The unexpected pain at the pump is causing many to rethink or even relinquish the spontaneously scenic retirement lifestyles they have carefully budgeted for.

"A lot of people travel the West," said Daniel King, a 50-year-old administrator at North Yarmouth Academy in Maine. "My goal was when I got a little bit older to do that, but I don't know with the way prices are if I'll do that or not."

RVers today are rambling less often. Some are leaving motor homes in the driveway, others are traveling shorter distances. Still others are staying longer at campgrounds and RV parks - even to the point of putting down roots.

It's all diminishing a nomadic lifestyle nearly as old as the nation. Since Colonial days, a certain breed of American has always been on the move, seeking new sights and new adventures and calling "home" wherever they happened to stop.

"Americans are vagabonds," said RV historian Al Hesselbart. "Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett - had they had cars and trailers, those guys would have been RVers."

But even Boone might have thought twice about crossing the Allegheny Mountains into Kentucky had he faced gasoline and diesel at $4- to $5 a gallon. Those prices made the Wrights rethink their plans to motor to Alaska in their 38-foot RV trailer pulled by a diesel pickup truck. Fueling the 10-miles-per-gallon guzzler would cost more than flying and taking a cruise ship to admire the glaciers.

They've made other adjustments, too. In past years, the Wrights wouldn't have spent more than a few days in any one place before driving off to discover what's around the next curve. But this year the retired couple - she is 57 and he is 58 - plan to spend all summer at Orr's Island Campground with beautiful but unchanging views of lobster boats, rocky beaches, and about 60 other RVs.

As a result, the couple has planted a garden, growing jalapeño peppers, cherry tomatoes, cilantro, radishes, and four kinds of lettuce. They've become friendly enough with local lobstermen to buy the daily catch at wholesale prices. And once a week, in Casco Bay's fading twilight, they host a campfire in front of their trailer for other long-term campers.

The frequent topic of conversation: fuel prices.

Modern RVers trace their roots to the early 20th century, when the automobile gave Americans mobility, and hundreds of thousands hit the road, towing bedding and cookware in backyard-built trailers. In 1910, Pierce-Arrow Motor Car Co. manufactured the first RV, a chauffeur-driven limousine called the Touring Landau. It contained a portable toilet, stove, and other amenities, but limited production and luxury prices kept it out of reach for all but the wealthiest.

Eventually, cheap gas and better roads turned the RV into an enticing way for families to vacation, said Hesselbart. As the nation grew affluent, RVs became more elaborate, adding flushing toilets, electric fireplaces, and high-tech beds with 100 firmness settings to suit every body type. The ability to experience the great outdoors with all the comforts of home have helped make RVs the preferred means of travel today for an estimated 8 million US households.

RVs now come in a wide range of prices and styles, from towable trailers that cost a few thousand dollars to self-propelled motorhomes carrying million-dollar price tags.

King has towed his RV trailer for 30 years. He loved logging 3,000 miles a month hopscotching among racetracks as far away as Nova Scotia's Cape Breton. No matter where he wandered, he could enjoy surround-sound stereo, flat-screen television, and a refrigerator and freezer stocked with Cokes and Black Angus burgers.

Today, however, he won't even drive his trailer to Bar Harbor, about 170 miles away. Hauling it with a pickup truck ekes out just 8 miles per gallon. His car, a Presidential Lincoln, gets 24. So it's cheaper to just jump in the car and stay in a hotel. "It's not the same," King said. "In a hotel, you don't have all your stuff with you."

RVs turning into New England campgrounds these days rarely carry license plates from the West Coast or Deep South. More often than not, they've come from communities within a two-hour drive.

That means less diversity among campers. Part of the allure of RVing has been waking up each day to find new neighbors; listening to the wide assortment of twangs and accents peppering good-morning greetings; and making friends with people from the farthest-flung places. A little of this roving romance is lost every time a gas tank goes unfilled.

At New England campgrounds, Floridians like Raymond and Gladdie Coultas, of Vero Beach, have become a rarity. They've tried to hold down expenses by limiting grocery runs from Orr's Island to Brunswick, 11 miles away, and turning off their propane hot water heater after morning showers.

"There's no question the price of gas is having an impact on everything you do," said Raymond Coultas, 75. "It means now you drive up in the spring and back in the fall."

In the meantime, if something comes up in Florida that requires quick attention, the couple returns home by the most frugal means possible, he said. "You fly."

Nicole C. Wong can be reached at nwong@globe.com.