Saturday, December 21, 2013

I'll never make any money at blogging. I'm just not committed enough. Another six weeks without a post. So, we took our second trip in the bus.
Traveled to Haseville NC. 1400 miles round trip. Everything is pretty much operational at this point. The mini-splits are working great. They've kept the bus at 62 degrees, even on zero degree nights. Got the water heater hooked up - hot showers now! We went down to visit our great friends Jim and Diane (see episode one). We took two days to drive down.


Ran into some Jawas at our first 
campground exit. It wasn't exactly a sand
crawler, but I've never seen anything like this before.  It was at night and I was trying to make a left behind this gigantic machine.  Wound up driving through the intersection, making a left into a Flying-J, another left through the Flying-J parking lot and then a right back onto the road blocked by the sand crawler.  The next morning it was gone. And I never noticed those figures in the lower right when I took the photo. You can't take pictures of your own hallucinations, can you?

No mechanical issues the whole trip. Once we got off I-40, we ran into some pretty long, steep climbs on the last 50 miles of two lane. Remember the bus weighs over 10 tons, and has a 238 hp. six cylinder engine.  One grade was 5% for five miles. I drove it in second gear at 25 mph for fifteen minutes. Seemed like two hours. We finally got there and Jim had arranged for us to park in the neighbor's driveway.  


They live in the mountains south of Great Smoky Mountains National Park; on a road about five miles long - Jarrett Rd. Almost everybody is related on Jarrett Rd.  The land has been passed down from generation to generation. So, Martha, Fanny, Tilly, Bobby -  all of them are descendants of John Pierce, who owned all the land there. And, they keep an eye out for each other. The next morning at about 9:00 am the Sheriff pulls in. Sheriff: "Hi, y'all.  Whucha'll doin up in these parts?" (We've got Yankee plates) Me: "We're visiting Jim and Diane - next door. Norma gave us permission to park our bus here. She's gone to Florida for the winter." Sheriff: "Yeah, I know Norma's left. One of the neighbors saw this big 'ol bus parked up'ere and called it in. Wherd'ya say you was from?"  Just then Jim arrived from next door and explained how he had made arrangements with Norma for us to park the bus there. Sheriff: "Well, I gotta keep a check on these things, ya know." Jim: "Yes officer, and we appreciate your keeping an eye on the neighborhood." 

We spent the next week just hang'n out and enjoying the 70 degree, sunny days and the beautiful Fall colors. 





Friday night Jim and I went down to the river where "the boys" have a campfire, drink beer, and tell stories. We did the same on Saturday night, but we added shoot'n tin cans off a stump to the activities. By the end of the night, Bobby wanted me to buy one of the river lots (it's an open field with a stake in the ground every 300 ft. to mark off the lots) and move down for the winter. The trip home was trouble free. Two great iPhone apps that make travel much easier are RVparking and iExit. RVparking finds RV campgrounds, gives you a full description, directions, phone number, website link and much, much more. iExit lists every facility at every exit on every Interstate in the country - period!  Next trip, Dec. 21st we head for San Mateo, CA. 

So, what's been done since we got back, you ask?  I installed bubble insulation behind the side windows that have been closed off.  I got weatherstrip installed in the front passenger side window. Rewired the turn signals with a unit that has a hazard switch built in. I could not figure out how to wire flashers with a separate switch and wasted, probably three days, making an attempt, before giving up and just buying an all-in-one unit. With the warm weather holding out, I installed an air dam below the front bumper and hung a heat lamp in the utility bay to prevent water freezing.  I also added a 3" computer fan to blow warm air from the living quarters down into the utility bay as a backup measure.  Last week - THE END of warm weather. Zero degree nights and 20 degree days, and now 8" of snow. Can't wait to head for California.

I finished filling and sanding the walls in the bedroom. They're ready for priming and wall paper. Added some aluminum trim pieces, Art Deco Mirror, installed the bathroom light, outlet, and vanity shelf.  That's about all we can get done before heading west.  This is how it looks so far.




No comments:

Post a Comment