Love’s Travel Centers (truck stops) have started adding dedicated full hook up RV spaces to many of their locations with more in plan for the future. We wanted to see what Love’s had to offer besides fuel so we make a stop and stay at one of the RV locations.

What you may not know

You have likely fueled up at a Love’s at some point but their travel centers do offer many other amenities for those of us on the road. We use Love’s often to dump our waste tanks – they charge $10 for their dump station and many don’t have potable water at their dump station but if you are lucky on occasion you will hit the “potable” jackpot. If you are reading this you likely realize that some now offer full hookup RV spaces but in addition they have DEF at the pump, propane, dump station, laundry, dog park, convenient store and often times various fast food restaurants on site.

Full Hook Up RV Sites

Lets dig into the important things (for our purpose) first – RV Hookups. This is still relatively new to Love’s and they are still expanding this program. We drove by one in Utah that was in a beautiful location with the back drop Utah’s mountains behind it. Finding our next Love’s took jumping on the app and filtering for “RV Hookups” but we quickly learned that the app wasn’t that informative about the program. Jumping on the Love’s website you can go to the “RV Locations” and look for a location near you. We found our location when passing through Texas at a new Love’s in Tyler, Texas.

We booked using the website and were charged $42.50 for a one night stay. We received an email about checking in at a kiosk once we arrived at our location however we had two challenges upon our arrival; our spot was occupied by a tractor and the kiosk was not in working order. We went to the diesel counter to adjust our stay to a new spot.

The pads at loves are large concrete pads with the typical RV hookups. The pedestal and the dump were located to the rear of the pad – for us this made our dump a bit of a stretch but not our of the norm from many RV parks. We did find that the pedestal is not “energized” until there is an active reservation on the spot reserved. Since our original spot was occupied by a piece of construction equipment we had to work the folks at the diesel counter to adjust our location and give us power to our new spot.

You will hear the constant rumblings of trucks and air brakes through the night but for our visit the running of our ACs help drown out that sound. It really didnt bother us.

We have received some feedback that staying at Love’s is taking away from a truck drivers parking space. We havent been to many Love’s locations but in the ones we have drove through or our particular stay the area where the RV spots were developed where previously a dirt field. In Bliss Idaho as of this writing they are currently developing the RV spots in an area that was a previous field just in front of the main location.

The sites may be a bit on the higher side for pricing at $42.50 where we stayed – especially for us when we have become accustomed to boondocking and not paying anything for a nights stay. At this point all that we have seen are back-in sites although we have been told by a Love’s official that they have plans for pull thrus in the future. Back ins make less appealing to those with a TOAD when you are looking for a quick stop. I do see value in these being added. There may be times when you press to hard and don’t want to pull into a park after hours or maybe you are fueling up and that’s when you decide to throw in the driving towel for the day. These dedicated full hook up spots may work out for you.

Fueling with the Love’s APP

Did you know you can authorize the Love’s pumps using the Love’s app? Now you do have to sign up for their loyalty program to enable the function in the app but this only involves picking up a Love’s card the next time you are at the diesel counter at any Love’s location.

The app can seem… well, gimmicky – but we have found uses for it and is why we continue to use it. We first used it to see how it worked but later found it useful when the “Enter” button didnt work at one of the pumps we had pulled into. I again later found a pump with a screen that flickering and almost pulled out to another pump but had waited for this pump … so I was able to use the app to authorize and activate the pump. We tied our Open Roads TSD card to the app for our fuel purchases.

Doing this also makes it so you are gaining loyalty points. At first I didnt see a real big use for the loyalty points as the stages seemed to be free soda refills to shower credits but we later learned that we could use our loyalty points to use the washer and dryers.

Hitting the Scales

Knowing your weight is critical when you are on the road – for the health of your tires and the safety of towing. Everything in your rig adds up quickly and it is easy to lose track of how quickly your weight changes as you continue to make changes or accumulate items during travel. Weighing your rig at a CAT scale will cost you $13.00 but will help you understand the details of your setup.

Using the CAT scales at a Love’s truck stop may look intimidating and honestly if I had to pull up and try to press the button that is ladder height from my window I might now want to weight the rig either. Using the “Weigh My Truck” app though changes this whole process. Pulling onto the scale you will find that it is divided into three different sections; steer axle, drive axle and trailer axle. You will place the front wheels onto the front plate, the back wheels of your truck on the next plate and the axles of your rig on the large back plate.

Using the app you will have to have had a payment method tied to it prior to getting on the scale. I would recommend getting that setup before pulling onto a scale as truck drivers have to use those scales for their everyday weighs and you don’t want to be parked in their way as you are setting up your app.

Once you are on the scales and open the app it will prompt your for a scale location. The scale number is located right next to the speaker and you enter that into the box in the app. From there it is all prompts and confirmations. Within a few clicks you will have your weight on the screen. No need to sit on the scale and analyze things you will also get an email of the ticket but if you are still one of those folks that want the paper ticket you can go to the counter and get the print out.

Now for us since we are dropping the trailer into a spot, this was a perfect opportunity to go back for a re-weigh. Using the same process a re-weigh only costs an additional $3.50 but you will want to select “re-weigh” when going through the app.

Other things we Love

During our stay at Love’s we also used their laundry and was no charge! We were able to use our loyalty points gained by fueling through the app to activate the washer and dryers.

Of course anytime we go through a Love’s, or as of the time of this writing when we drove in a rental car to Boise Idaho for the holidays… we would stop at Love’s when passing one knowing the restrooms were clean and they had dog parks so we could let the pups run and get some exercise for a bit.

We mostly use Love’s for their $10 dump stations since our preference in staying has changed to boondocking but knowing that Love’s now has RV Hookups just adds another option to the arsenal of places to stay while on the road.