After the 2021 big 109-day road trip in our diesel pusher motorhome, and other travels, we needed a way to fund future trips. We opted to try workamping—working while camping in exchange for a site, utilities, and wages. We chose one of the highest-paying: guarding oil rig gates in Texas, which paid between $175 and $200 a day in 2023.
The Texas Department of Public Safety requires private security guards to be licensed. We completed training for Level II non-armed licenses while parking our motorhome in our security company’s backyard. They scheduled us to be fingerprinted, and we waited just one night for our first assignment.
The next day, our supervisor led us down dusty, GPS-unlisted ranch roads in Carrizo Springs where cell service vanished entirely. The security company provided a big generator to power our coach, an outdoor security light, a full water tank, and an empty holding tank. Because 24/7 coverage is mandatory, my husband took the day shift and I took the night shift, meeting our natural roles as a morning person and a night owl.
Living remotely logistics were a challenge. Groceries were 20 miles away and gas was 19 miles, turning supply runs into four-hour trips. To avoid being the one in our truck if it broke down on an isolated road with zero reception, I stayed and worked longer shifts while my husband handled town runs. He switched our cell carrier to the only one that worked out there.
Between logging 5 to 59 trucks a night on an iPad, the ranch offered a surprising glimpses of wildlife. My husband woke me in the early hours one morning to catch a glimpse of a lightning-fast roadrunner. I watched nightly as a coyote slipped under the fence like a cartoon character, hunting back and forth across the road. We dealt with a family of mice that required setting traps. Thankfully, despite warnings from truck drivers about snakes, I never encountered one.
Writing was impossible. On busy nights when trucks rolled in back-to-back, I had just enough time to bite into my peanut butter sandwich “dinner” which took an hour and a half to finish. One night, a 60-mph storm blew through, sending our outdoor chairs tumbling like tumbleweeds. With a tornado warning, I woke my husband and we pulled in our slides to ride it out in eerie quiet. Not one truck came through until morning.
After our first gate we spent a quieter 5-days at a gate in Three Rivers, with green grass and songbirds. We completed 21 days instead of the 30 we’d planned, ready to call it quits turning down a third assignment. It was time to move on.
Guard gate workamping demands absolute dedication: couples sleep separately so someone is always alert in a safety vest, and bathroom breaks require your partner to step in instantly. It’s an intense adventure that requires grit, and a sense of adventure. We headed to Corpus Christi next, to clean up the motorhome and catch up on sleep, with plenty of stories to tell.
About Debra Parmley
Debra enjoys writing military romantic suspense and making sure her veteran heroes have a happy ever after that will last.
She also writes western historical, women’s historical fiction, and urban fantasy. In her Tales from the Trailer articles for Fresh Fiction, she shares the RV lifestyle and travel adventures in the U.S. from the point of view of a working author. On her website you can also sign up for her newsletter. As Debra Bishop, she writes fairytale retellings and children’s picture books.
For more pics from her gate guarding days and a video, visit https://beautifuldaytraveler.wordpress.com/2026/10/14/workamping-adventures-texas-oil-rig-gate-guards
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