Mythbusters: Camping in a Walmart Parking Lot

As much as we bag on corporate America and box stores, we had a little Mythbusters inspired investigation to complete at the beginning of this trip. For a while know we had been hearing urban legends about someone's friend's brother's uncle's cousin who set up shop and successfully lived out of a Walmart parking lot. For various reason unknown to the public, supposedly there is an unspoken rule coming straight from Sam Walton himself that allows weary travelers of the road to take rest in his sprawling, vast parking areas. Perhaps this was to encourage business and build customer loyalty for the RV set, or perhaps a throwback from Sam's hippie traveling days of the past. While we didn't know the exact reason, as we pulled into Savannah, Georgia just past midnight with no where to sleep we decided the timing was perfect to bust this myth.

We scoped the scene of the parking lot looking for obvious long termers around the perimeter and even went inside to use their restroom and grab some drinks. Believe it or not, Walmart was packed at midnight on a Saturday, and we had to wait in line to buy our Gatorade. We backed the Eurovan into the corner of the lot, put our curtains up, and retired to the back.

The night went smoothly and we got a good night's rest. Whatever nervousness we had about the tolerance and/or safety of the situation was soon quelled as we saw the flashing orange lights of the 24-hour parking lot security patrol pass us by every 15 minutes like clockwork. By the morning when we woke up we were just another car in the lot as Sunday AM patrons flocked to the store, and we were waving to our friend the security man as we made our coffee and at our granola before taking off. To Sam Walton's credit, we even spent some 6 dollars at his establishment before leaving, getting some cheese, lunchmeat, and ice. Is Walmart camping an act of marketing brilliance, or simply a humanitarian gesture to those in need of a safe place to sleep? We still don't know, however we do know that if you need a place to sleep in South Savannah, there's a big box store just off of I-95 that will leave its light on just for you.

UPDATE: We continued to test our theory with much success through the rest of our trip, with the most crowded Walmart parking lot being in Florida City, the last supercenter north of the Florida Keys. It was practially an RV campground at this locale, with a huge section of the parking lot taken over by the camping crew. We were able to get a good night's sleep, hassle free, and woke up in a great position to head down south to the beaches.