Settled back in and loving it!

Not a lot has been going these last few days, and right now that's a good thing.  We have just been chilling and enjoying ourselves.  We've been meeting friends and visiting here and there.  Been out to lunch a bit here and there.  Been doing a lot of walking.  Had my computer replaced.  Seen a few doctors.  Sat around the fire a few evenings.  All good things.

Now we have a few small projects to take care of, replace a chattering water solenoid in our washer/dryer, install a new 120 volt AC outlet, try to clean a sight gage in the engine coolant tank, and actually it's all good as it is keeping me busy.

In the meantime one of the things we really enjoy is going over the jetty and watching the sunset, many times we'll have a glass of wine and sometimes we'll pack up a picnic and eat while the sun goes down.  Here on the west coast, the event is the sunset which would make a lot of you late risers very happy.  Up in New England we are the odd ones that creep out at 5am or so to watch the sunrise over the ocean.  

A little eye candy.

South jetty

You can see the actual jetty in this one

Looking back at the Venice coast

Almost

Just a peek

Good evening

WE ARE BACK!!

After our bit of disappointment with no sewer hookup and another navy shower this morning, in 37 degree weather while unhooking our electric I looked up at the rear corner of the coach at the spot I kind of noticed last evening as the sun was going down, and oh my!  It looks like a scratch, damn!  I called Jan out to take a look and she agreed that it even looked like it had penetrated the paint.  Man, they must have accidentally bumped it with a ladder and we missed it.  So as we started moving I called to tell Lester we found a scratch in the paint, I didn't want them to think we had done it so we wanted to let them know as soon as possible.  Now one thing I neglected to mention yesterday was we had one little issue with the newly recovered seats, they used a bright white zipper in the armrests, that really stood out.  Robin the owner agreed with Jan that it needed to be redone with black or even brown zippers so they would disappear.  After we left, we realized we had taken the extra material and needed to stop back at Creative Coach today to drop off the fabric, and that would give Dan and Lester a chance to take a look at the scratch.

So off to M&M Electronics for our 9am appointment to have our multiplex system backed up.  Mark and Chris were waiting for us, and jumped right in and started up the computers and began backing up.  Then we asked if we could change around a few of the switches, and they said sure, so they changed a few minor annoyances.  But now I need to add a little background info.  All the awnings on our coach are electric, a few use a remote and the window awnings all are operated from a switch panel over the driver's seat.  When we bought the coach we noticed that there were several spare switches on a panel right near the bed.  We had asked Lazy Days, where we bought it if they could make the two bedroom window awning work from that switch panel, it would be so cool to be able to raise and lower those awnings from the bed instead of going all the way to the front of the coach, but they said no it couldn't be done, something about the awnings on one loop and those switches on another.  Then later one time we were getting service done at Alliance Coach, we asked them if they could make it happen, and they said no and started talking about the different loops etc and so on.  So today, since M&M are considered the absolute gurus of this system, we asked if they could make the bedroom window awnings work from the switch panel near the bed and they said...........YES!  And they made it happen, so now we can operate those awnings right from the bed!  We are ecstatic.  

So after lunch we headed back down to Creative Coach, pulled in and Dan met us and asked where was the problem.  I pointed up at the scratch and he said he would get a ladder and see if it could be buffed out or what would need to be done.  Well, while I was getting the truck unhooked, and now Lester, Dan, and Jan are all around the ladder, I come over and Dan says do you want to go up the ladder and take a look, so I do, and what do I see, NOTHING!  It wasn't scratch at all, must have been dust or dirt or who knows what.  Well don't they all get a big laugh, I feel awful accusing them of scratching the coach, but in the end we were ALL happy.  So now we are back in Venice, the coach is looking awesome, we have water and sewer, all the work is done, the awnings work from the bed, the bourbon is great, and we are happy, happy.

Day 13, so much for being unlucky

We have chairs, baby, and completion!!!  The chairs did finally show up about 11am.  We wondered when nothing was happening and no one was telling us anything, especially after yesterday when we thought they were coming and didn't.  

It was worth the wait, we are very pleased, and they are beautiful!

Just arrived!

Dan figuring out what was removed and what had to go back on

A bit challenging

Dan getting "help" from yours truly

Oh yeah!

Almost in

So after a long and trying time made so much better by the excellent treatment we received from Dan, and actually everyone, we are finally done.  The wheel well, the front cap, new wiper system, repaired headlight bezel, new step motor, fixed cracks in the front cap, and shiny clean, we left Creative Coach for a campground in Umatilla, FL to be ready for our 9am appointment with M&M in Deland, FL.  We've been boondocking, living off the our own water with no sewer connection for almost 3 weeks, so we were really looking forward to a real long shower and not worrying about conserving dish water etc.  Yehaw, well we pull into the campground and they direct us into a spot near the entrance to this humongous campground and show us our 30amp service, say what no 50 amp, no sir 30 amp is all we have for overnighters, oh, and there's your water, ok thanks where's our sewer connection, oh no sir there is no sewer for our overnighters, aaaccckkkkkkk!  So here we are with one more night of unexpected boondocking, another navy shower in the morning, but if all goes well we will be back in Venice tomorrow and yes we will be taking long showers!!

Day 12, and more disappointment

Just a quick post.  We were brought into detail as promised, so our coach is shiny clean and glistening with it's new paint and bodywork, BUT no chairs.  Evidently the person doing the work is still having health issues, and like Sandy said, what do we do if they can't finish or how long do we wait?  Pretty hard to drive without seats!  We are hopeful tomorrow is the day, because if it's not, new plans will have to be made.  So wish us luck.

Day 9, 10, 11, finally some news!

We got back yesterday afternoon after a nice few days away.  Bert was waiting anxiously for us.  Funny, how in starting the 3rd week our enthusiasm has waned to say the least.  We settled in for the night.

Lots of activity began a busy Monday for Creative Coach.  We pulled in 2 of our slides to make a little more room for the numerous coaches coming and going around us.  After looking at each other for the morning, Jan finally had enough and headed into the office for an update, talked to Keith the owner who said he would have some information a little later.  Sure enough in about 30 minutes Keith reported that the only thing left on our chairs was one headrest and 2 arms, and we could expect them here and installed tomorrow!!!!!  Yeeeeppppeeee, hooray, and hallelujah!  Also tomorrow they are taking us into detail to clean up and wash the coach.  It needs it.  It is really dirty from the body work done to ours and the dust created by the shop as it operates.  

Now on another note, we have a computer controlled multiplex wiring system on our coach.  It enables switches to be programed and control different functions all around the coach, turn on and off lights, water pump, heat, fans, etc., kind of like a "smart house".  The potential danger is since our coach manufacturer, Monaco, is out of business, if something happens to a component or computer, a backup software program is not available.  So last year we found a company, M&M Electronics that has taken over the multiplex systems and can provide a backup system to hold just in case of, and can reprogram any of the switches and functions we would like.  We had planned to rendezvous with them in their shop in Ohio last year, but were unable to get there.  We just found out that for a few months this winter they have set up operations not too far from us in Deland, FL, so we have plans to go see them and have this preventative work done, and a couple switches that have driven us crazy reprogramed.  So hopefully all will go as planned this week, and after M&M on Thursday morning, we will finally be back in our winter hideout in Venice Thursday night!

Day 8, nothing new, different plan

Very quiet day for us, not for Creative Coach.  Man, busy, busy, coaches coming and going.  We just sat and watched for the most part.  We got a stupendous offer from our good friends Ray and April who offered their house to us for a few days.  We are going to take them up on their offer which will give us a chance to catch up with our mail, our tomato plants, check in on the happenings at the campground, and get away from here for awhile, and don't forget not fill up our tanks:-)

So Lester and Dan will watch our coach, Lester will visit Bert, and we will enjoy a long weekend away.  Keep your fingers crossed for us, that our chairs will show up first thing next week, and most importantly be beautiful!

Day 7, delay, delay

Today was much slower, didn't move around until noon or so.  There was a small glitch when the headlight bezel was installed so off it came again to be made perfect.  Our awning and the fake rail were both installed, our step motor after finding out the one I bought was not the right one, and running back to Lazy Days to exchange it is all installed and working beautifully, everything was buffed and looks good, but.....

No chairs yet.  Found out the person that does the recovering had a gall bladder attack and spent a day at the hospital, so we are delayed.  Hard to get too mad when someone's health is involved, but it looks like we may be here through another weekend:-(

In anticipation of hanging out we dumped our tanks again and filled up with water so we are pretty set for awhile.  It's not Creative Coach's fault, it's beyond their control as well. Karma, I guess.

Day 6, short post

Started off with a bang, right in at 8am, and Rick started in on the front cap, and wheel well.  We left to take a walk around a lake and had another fantastic lunch at Saigon Bistro.  We've pretty much run out of things to do, so when it started to rain we headed back.  Quite a bit was accomplished, the paint is done, all buffed out, the headlight bezel is back in place, all the trim that was removed is back on and everything is caulked.  We don't have any pictures because it is pouring rain right now.  About 2pm, we were told that the recovering of the captain chairs was going slower than expected for some reason.  Lester hedged a bit, but said he didn't think they would be done by Wednesday as expected, but didn't give us another estimate.  One of the problems as we see it is the recovering is done elsewhere.  So although happy with the progress, we are a bit down on the delay.  They should finish up everything tomorrow, so we will be hanging around waiting for our seats.

Day 5, a very good day!

Dan showed up as promised at 7:30am, and since we were ready and raring to go, moved us into position to dump our gray tank.  They have a policy here that Dan moves all the coaches around and he is very good at it.  There is not a lot of room and it is packed in with motorhomes of all sizes and shapes, mostly big, and the other thing to remember is there is no driver's seat so it is a bit more challenging.  After we dumped he moved us over to their good water supply and we filled our fresh water tank, so now we are set for the duration.  While we were filling he went around and shuffled several coaches around, moved one out of the paint booth making it ready for our arrival.  So by 8:30am, we were parked in the booth, and Rick was already blowing it dry getting it ready for paint.  It was necessary for us to be gone for the day, so off we went.

First stop was Lazy Days who happened to have our step motor in stock, and the CB antenna bracket we needed.  Now that our important goals were met we decided to go to Fort De Soto for the day.  We called Jason to see if he could recommend a place for lunch since he had lived in St Pete for awhile.  He reminded us of Lucky Dill, a cool little deli in downtown St Pete where we had eaten many moons ago.  We stopped in and got a couple awesome sandwiches to go and headed over the the Fort.  Had to pay 2 tolls on the way, but it was worth it, a beautiful day, a bit windy, but nice for our picnic.  We got out on the island and stumbled across a very popular kite surfing spot, and it was easy to see why it was so popular.  The wind was blowing parallel to the beach, and the area was perhaps a 1/2 mile or so wide, and went out about 500 yards to deeper water, and this whole area was maybe 2 feet deep!  And did I say popular, at least 15 were flying around!  We decided we had found a perfect spot for lunch.

A bunch in the background as a kite is being readied for flight
That's the Skyway bridge in the background

We sat and munched our delicious sandwiches marveling at this really cool sport.

Getting some air!

Flying, with a kite being readied in the foreground

The next 10 photos are in order, yeah I know Sandy, we should have taken video, but Jan wasn't thinking about it.

As the PGA commercial says, Yeah, these guys are good!  There were two girls who were sharing a kite and board next to us and Jan went over to get some info about how hard it was, etc?  Turns out they were European and they travel all over the world kitesurfing.  She said it is a bit costly, about $2200 for the kite and board, and that doesn't include additional kites or boards needed in different wind conditions, or the wet/dry suits, harnesses, etc.  And she said it was imperative to get some lessons as it has the potential to be very dangerous when you don't know what you are doing, if you get tangled in the lines with the incredible forces it is possible to even lose a limb!  And lessons are about $100/hr.  Pretty cool, and there were several, shall I say seasoned folks out there right along with the younger people.  Very neat.

We found a 1 1/2 mile hike up on the north side of the park, nice and quiet, with the temps perfect we had a good time.

Pretty day

Pleasant hike through the trees

Jan hard at work

Hard to see, but that is a frog's snout poking out of this bat box

He says, "What's going on up here?"

Horseshoe crab on the beach

So after we left we drove up along St Pete and Clearwater beach for awhile, got caught in incredible traffic, but managed to get back before 5pm, just as Dan brought our rig out, turned us around so we have a "view" for the weekend, put out our slides, leveled it and welcomed us back.  A great place.  And all the paint was done, still has to be buffed out, but I'll tell you it looks good so far.

So then as we were driving around, we got a text invitation to spend the weekend with our friends Ray and April, so we'll be off to see them in a little while!  I didn't have time to update this last night as Jan and I did something out of character and went to a nice little Italian restaurant for a delicious dinner, recommended by Dan the man!

Have a good weekend, we'll catch up with Monday's progress next.

Day 4, more progress and murphy makes himself known

Same start, 8am, and we are ready.  Dan rolls us back in the bay.  We had a ton of rain overnight, more than 2 inches, so we tipped the motorhome way, way back to keep the water towards the rear.  Rick spent the first hour blowing us dry.  

I may not have mentioned it previously, but our entry steps have been a little reluctant going in and out.  They retract when we drive down the road, but when we open the door they extend and retract when the door is closed.  They have rebelled a couple times in the last month or so, so we went under, should I say Jan went under the motorhome and cleaned them up.  We figured they had picked up so much dirt and grime from our Alaska trip that maybe that was the only problem.  Now normally when we are parked for awhile like here in Florida, we set the steps to just stay out, but here working on the coach, we have them set to retract each time the door closes so Rick can slide his platform up to the side of the coach to work on the front cap.  Well, today Murphy raised his head and the steps quit again, then they worked awhile later, then they quit, you get the idea.  So by the time we figured out the motor was bad it was 5pm, so I missed ordering a replacement by 5 mins!  A project for tomorrow.

Anyway I digress, midmorning Jan and I took off to go find some lunch, do a little grocery shopping and get away for a bit.  We had a good lunch, drove to a very disappointing Camping World to look around, picked up some groceries and headed back.  

In the meantime Rick had sanded down all the filled spots again, sanded and primed the entire front cap, and we found out we are going into the paint booth tomorrow!

Rick hard at work

Rick has removed our clearance lights

CB antenna removed and entire front cap prepped

Ready for paint!

So we will have a busy morning tomorrow.  Dan is going to come in a little early so we can dump our gray tank in anticipation of being here for several more days, fill our fresh water tank, and put us in the paint booth, so we need to get lost for the day.  We do have a couple goals though, one to get a replacement motor for our steps and find a new CB antenna mount to replace our corroded one Rick removed.  So hopefully we will return in the afternoon, find our newly painted coach looking good, with a new step motor that Dan can install, and be ready to settle in for the weekend.

Day 3, all good

Same start, promptly at 8am, Dan knocked, came in and moved us into the bay.  Right away, Rick jumped up and started working on the front cap.  First grinding the new fiberglass smooth, then spreading on the two part filler.  It must be incredible stuff because in only an hour or so he was already sanding the filler smooth!

Spreading on the filler

Mostly sanded

Sure looks better than it did yesterday!  We decided the best thing for us to do was head out, so we flipped a coin and drove east.  We ended up at Dixie Crossroads, a destination restaurant that we went to many years ago with Vern and Viv.  Two things stood out in our memories, dim as they are, a complimentary pile of hushpuppies, and the rock shrimp.  We hoped that after all these years it would still be as good as we remembered.  It was, first thing out came the hushpuppies covered in confectioner's sugar, warm from the fryer, mmmmm good!  We shared 2 dozen broiled rock shrimp, and wow, they were just as good as we remembered, a superb lunch!

The hushpuppies, whoops partly gone:-)

The sensational rock shrimp!

After that we took a ride up to Daytona Beach, and cut back to the shop.  We got back just as they were calling it a day.  It all looked great, lots of progress, and no more bad news.  Most of the front cap was all filled, sanded and primed, so was the headlight bezel, and the wheel well.  

First coat of primer

Sanded and primed

Looking better and better

We were very pleased with the progress.  We are supposed to get some rain tonight into tomorrow mid day, we are hopeful it won't interfere with the work.

Day 2, progress and a little more bad news

The doors opened promptly at 8am, and we were ready.  Dan said Good Morning, and moved us into the shop.  They jumped right on us and Rick started grinding away on the new wheel well fiberglass, got that done and climbed up to work on our front cap.  We are losing some of our clear coat which is one of the reasons that we wanted to get this paint work done.  Also we have experienced small cracks right where the front cap meets the roof.  This is a common occurrence unfortunately, it is caused by the manufacturer doing a crappy job rushing the build of these coaches.  I personally think they get a little lazy up near the top where it gets a little harder to reach and deal with.

This is the spot with the crack on both sides

The bad news was when Rick started getting in there grinding away the coating to get down to the fiberglass so he could repair it, he found out Monaco had applied more than an inch of filler in this joint, so our quick and easy repair went down the drain.  You see the filler has to be ground away all the way down to the fiberglass so the repair will stick.

The offending area

You can see in this photo how thick the filler is on the top

Well now the repair would necessitate removal of our rails so Rick would be able to get in there to remove the filler and do the necessary glass repair.  In the top photo you can see the rail behind the repair point. On the drivers side it encloses a large patio awning that weighs 450#, a bit of a challenge, but the one you can see in these photos on the passenger side is a look-alike rail with no awning, fairly light.  So this little surprise added another day, and of course more cost, but it needs to be done right.  

Jan and I decided to take off and took a nice 3 mile walk around a pretty lake, then had a sensational Vietnamese lunch at Saigon Bistro.  We tried to stay away for awhile so took a nice ride killing time.  When we got back both rails had been removed, the bad driver's side had been prepped and fiberglassed, and the passenger side had been constructed correctly so it was a easy job to prep and glass it.

The driver's side as it should be

The "bad" side all glassed in

So all in all, just a bit more money and time to get a permanent repair that will last the life of the motorhome.  So about 4:30 Dan backed us out 10 feet to our overnight campsite which tonight is definitely in the high rent district, we have a Newell on one side and a Prevost on the other, hopefully they will accept us:-)

Our Newell neighbor