Back in the East, and a little rant.

I left you saying good bye to the West our last night in Santa Fe, and have now made our way back to Atlanta.  I 'd like to say it was an uneventful trip but....

First of all we stopped for our normal oil change and service at Speedco in Amarillo.  I would link it up but it appears that their website is down due to the fact Love's bought them effective Nov 1st.  We arrived on Nov 5th.  We didn't know what to expect, but it all looked normal when we arrived.  Speedco is like a big Jiffy Lube for trucks and motorhomes, at least it had been.  We have been using Speedco and very satisfied for quite a few years, in fact this was the 4th time we had been to this exact one.  They all let you watch and monitor everything that they do, and we have always had a good experience.  The trucks all drive in from one side and since we have our engine in the back we have to arrange to come in the opposite way.  I went into the office, and was told to pull into Bay 3 as soon as the truck there moved out.  Well, he moved out and another truck came in behind??  I went back in and was told sorry you'll be next into Bay 1.  Okay until the truck in Bay 1 pulled out and stopped blocking that bay for over 30 minutes!  As we waited 3 more trucks came in.  I went in again and saw the commotion and confusion in the office was being caused by the Loves representative trying to show everyone the new to them computer system.  We finally pulled in and it was apparent things were a mess.  The Loves person comes over, while I am standing there, and announced as to how he hates to work on motorhomes, they are the most ridiculous and hard to get at vehicles and he hated working on them when he was turning wrenches, in fact he says, that's why he quit doing it.  I am appalled and asked him if he'd rather I just left?  And was he describing Loves attitude towards motorhomes in the future?  He backed off some and said at this time Loves intention was for Speedco to continue servicing motorhomes.  I guess time will tell.  I'd love to hear from some of you with your recent experiences.  So our normal 1 hour service took up 2 1/2 hours of our time.

We spent the night in Amarillo, and then made our way to the Dallas area to visit with our daughter.  We enjoyed seeing her and then headed out to Poverty Point SP in Louisiana.  We had stopped for fuel just west of Shreveport, and about 5 miles down the interstate I hear a warning beep from the dash, and after looking around realize there is also a message that a bay door is open!  This is right in the middle of town, in traffic.  I think I must not have closed the fuel door properly, but Jan announces she can see the open and swinging door!  I look for a place to stop, and decide to run down an exit and luckily catch a red light, Jan flies out to close the door and yells that the locking pin is broken.  So duct tape to the rescue, and off we go again.

We get to Poverty Point, a place we have stayed several times, it is off the highway, has large pull-throughs, and is quiet and dark.  We get to our site, plug in the 50 amp electric and I get all sorts of messages saying it is bad power and won't connect.  Okay, we try the 30 amp instead and get it hooked up.  I call the office after checking the pedestal with my meter and they send out their maintenance guys.  After cycling, and cleaning it up they get it to work.  So now I go to see if I can repair the broken latch on the bay door.  It looks like I can make it work with some JB Weld and a new bolt, so I decide to run in the slide to give me more room, and..........it doesn't work!  Ok, must be a fuse, check all the multiplex fuses in the bedroom closet, check all the fuses in the Front Run Bay, and finally check all the fuses in the Rear Run Bay, and find nothing, still doesn't work, and neither do any of the other slides.  We think maybe it has something to do with the interlock system that won't allow the slides to move if a bay door is open, maybe something broke when the door flew open, or maybe something happened with the initial bad power, but I can't find anything.  We could be in a world of hurt in the morning if we can't get our slides in.  So I figure one thing at a time, fix the broken bracket first.  And the sun is setting.  

The temporarily repaired bracket

So Jan decides to try the slide again, and voila, it works!  But will it work in the morning?

Turns out they do, one after 3 tries, but we are on our way:-)  We are now enroute to another one of our regular stops in Anniston, AL.  

BUT!!  One of our absolute pet peeves with campgrounds is their not trimming trees along the roads and sites.  We go to pull out of our pull-through site and in order to miss a huge tree directly in front that HAS NOT been trimmed, I have to cut the corner a bit, and the left side main tires drop down into the soft grass and we hear BAM!  We both look at each other and we already know what has happened.  After a few, okay maybe more than a few bad words, Jan goes out to confirm, and we have broken our wheel well out for the FOURTH time!

Woe is us

It's probably a design fault, but we discovered when we are in a very tight left turn, and the motorhome is tipping left, like on a 90 degree turn out a driveway, over a crown, and the left side comes down with the tire all the way to the left it can catch the top of the wheel well.  We did it the first time in Kentucky, then did it again in Kentucky, and then did it again in Alaska, and now.  We are so gun shy, whenever I think there is any chance of it happening, I will raise the entire coach up with the air and have avoided it many times since, but this was a complete surprise.  We are angry about trees that caused me to turn so early, I am angry that I didn't somehow anticipate the situation.  Then to make it even worse we had to hit branches of at least 5 more trees on the way out that hadn't been trimmed either, but at least we had no apparent damage from those.  The office was still closed when we left so that was probably a good thing.

So on we go, and when we get to Anniston I go to put out the slides and all but one go out.  I try it a couple times, but decide to just wait and try later.  I get a few other things done, and go back and out it comes too.  We are parked right next to a big Camping World, a store we try not to ever frequent, but we now think our problem is a relay on our hydraulic slide system that went bad about 5 years previously.  Now that we have had time to think about it the symptoms are the same.  I look on the website and CW lists having the relay.  So we decide to go see if we can get one in the morning, but before we go over we decide to try to get the slides in first, and they do!  The last one takes 3 tries, but it comes in, thankfully.  We walk over to CW and they tell us, they don't have it.

The relay in question, it switches power to the pump motor

So we know we can now get to Atlanta, hopefully the slides will extend, they did, we are here for a week or so, plenty of time to get the part, repair it on nice pavement, and not be rushed, so that is the plan.  We'll order the part Monday.  And we will have to get the wheel well fixed on our way out of Florida in the spring as there is no way we could get in to the body shop when we arrive in a week or so.

See you in Florida!