Campground memberships

I've been looking around at different campground memberships, and I'm so not sure what we need or would use.

There are some mega-expensive nationwide plans out there-like $1000 for a previously purchased membership + $750 transfer fee + $500 annual dues. Believe it or not, that's a bargain compared to buying a new one. It does include 50 days of camping per year and some discounts beyond that, but there are a lot of rules and limited availability. It didn't take long to rule that one out. I don't think it would be worthwhile for only 2 years, and even if it were, I don't think we'd want to put out that much cash up front.

Then there are a slew of programs with annual membership fees of less than $100 that give you various discounts per night. I think that two or three of these would definitely be worthwhile, but it's so hard to figure out which ones will be where we want to stay (especially since we don't know where we want to stay!) and which ones would be available when we want them.

Some people have also had good luck just negotiating a cheaper rate with campgrounds when they plan to stay for a week or more at a time, so that might be a possibility for us too. It's a shame we can't do much workamping. It'd be nice to get the free campsite, but most places want you to stay for at least a few months and work 15-20 hours a week, which doesn't really fit with our current plans. It's a good emergency backup anyhow.