“Ain’t I Cute”

We went for our early walk this morning which was over an hour.  We just walked inside and around the park never being on the same road nor an inside zig zag road.  This park is big and is an under statement.  Probably bigger than the TTN in park in Orlando if you been there you know what I’m talking about.   One of their storage areas, did you pick up on “one of”, is so big, “how big is it” that they have a map for it.  That’s big.  Get this.  They have an ice rink, yeper….They have 2 snack bars and one restaurant.  Plus a tram for transportation.  Now this ain’t no real fancy uppity place and it has some age which we call character.  Just the basics and a lot of them.  A couple of pools, etc…..very clean.  You could actually hide in this park.  Some sections are away from everything and most people don’t go there.

No blue tarps either. Can you tell we like this park. 

While walking around we saw this baby tow hauler.

I knew a company bought Shasta years ago and were going to bring those trailers back.  Well, here’s the first one I’ve seen.

Carol went line dancing which is everyday. She’s in heaven.  They had about 20 people.

After lunch we decided to go 4 wheeling in the nearby national forest and did we.  Here’s the track that we went on according to  our GPS.

 

See the black clouds?  My phone gave an alert for flash floods.  Now we are on a sandy twisty with switchbacks sandy trail down at the bottom of a big hill.  Well, it didn’t rain or it would have been a different adventure.  We got back to the top and came upon this tower.

That tower is on the very top of this mountain.  We got up there!

Back on the road the rain hit us.  You know how you always see the signs that say watch for falling rocks.  Well, there was no sign.  We came around a curve in the rain and here was this 100 lb rock in the middle of my lane.  Of course I missed it.  I decided to move it out of the road.  That thing was made out of lead and it was hard to move and it was raining.  I finally moved it and a train of cars were coming down the hill.  They were tailgating each other which meant at least one of them would have hit it and you can guess what the rest of the story would have been.  I did my good deed.  Down the road further was a sign  that said watch for falling rock.

UPDATE -The Roadmaster Tow Defender #4750.  It was fully operational for our trip here.  It worked good.  Must be the installer.  Time will tell how it really works.  I have concerns about it tearing because the struts seem to be very strong.  I think I will lube them up really good.  We we got here there was some small pebbles on top of the screen.

I got more of our adventures today but will post another day.  It’s one of those full timer dilemma stories that is happening to us right now.

See ya……..

Moving On……

We had about 280 miles to go today.  We were on the road by 7:30 AM.  No special reason it just worked out that way.  Along the way…..

The Indian is watching over his land…

A new round about in the middle of the desert.  Your tax dollars at work…

At the Ehrenburg AZ/CA state line.  The cheapest fuel we will find until November.  We got fuel about 50 miles before here.  Diesel was $3.98 and gas was $3.41.

Looking at Indio/Palm Springs area.

 

Looking at the hill we will be staying at near Idyllwild.

 

We’re about half way up looking down and was in 3rd gear all the way.  The engine temp stayed very low which was a little surprising.  I kept my RPM’s about 2100.  Coming back down I think I will be going weeeeeeeeeeeeee……

 

We’re now at AOR Silent Valley.  They have about 800 and some sights.  For $9 a night we got 50 AMP FHU and we will be here for 13 nights.  They didn’t have our reservations when we arrived but it was all straighten out by AOR.  The staff is really fun.  Notice the power station, gray box,  just behind our rig.  We got real good electricity.  They gave us a paper saying they were in a draught and not to water the grass.  BUT it was OK to wash your rig!  That was different…..and I’m not complaining at all.

Sights here are arranged differently.  You drive into a little area and they have fingers which are sights.  Pretty neat I think.

The temps are in the 80’s and it is real nice.  We slept very well.

Get “ER” Done

We started with an early walk..Early like at 6 AM.  During our walk we saw this neat bike

Never heard of this manufacture.

The campground is basically empty…duh…

almost empty

Well I decided to put the Roadmaster Tow Defender on today.  It was over cast and only in the 90s.  Damn that sounds so wrong.  Anyhow…

It took two trips to a welder to get a part modified the way I needed it to be.  Almost done – kinda.

I had to get a 12’ receiver extension to get the material away from my exhaust.  I also had a bracket raised up higher (welder).  I also had to drill some extra holes on two bar extensions that go on the Jeep.

 

Here it is all tucked away.  I still have to check it out when the RV is turning.  It is centered but the photo shot isn’t.  I still have to get two 12” extensions made up for the safety chains.  That will be at Lowe’s tomorrow probably.  Everything else is alright

Well, if the “guys” were here it might have taken longer but I would have had a lot more fun.  I was determined to make this thing work.  The sun stayed behind the clouds most of the day and I really appreciated that and took advantage of it.  I probably had about 5 hours into it with the modifications that had to be done.

With the 12” extension I still can tow 6,000 lbs (vice 10,000) which is more than enough.  I use  what I call hitch tighters so I don’t have any movement what so ever in the hitch and receivers.  Not even a little – none!

Sometimes full timers have to work on their “stuff”  and have to do it by themselves for what ever the reason.  This was my case today.  I never worked with this kind of shield much less making modifications. Bottom line I wanted it done and done a certain way so I had to do it.  Welcome to the life of a full timer.  Some things are harder than others.  You don’t know until you try.  If you can’t do it yourself or your screw it up, find a friend or throw money at it.  I don’t like the latter.

Overall – job well done if I say so myself.

I will let you know how it works as time goes on.

See ya………

Mickey Ds and Toad Shield

People have been asking about Mickey D’s restaurant here in Wickenburg.  Here it is…

I ordered a Roadmaster tow shield (Tow Defender) Friday.  It came today…yea.  I sat in the shade (107 degrees) putting this thing together.  I want it ready to use Thursday.

I thought I was doing alright then………my tow bar needs to be extended.  The shield needs to miss the body of the rig and tail pipe.

I went to three places to get an extension – no good.  The fourth place was a winner.  They had a 12’ extension and it happened to be by Roadmaster even.  Got back and it wouldn’t work.  The piece that slides on won’t slide over the extension. The big piece should slide down towards the end but won’t.  Thus no help. 

I tried to take it back to the store but they were closed.  Guess where I will be early tomorrow morning.  I will call Roadmaster and ask, “What’s up?”  I think they’re answer will be I should get the 7 1/2 “ extension.  I think the 12 inch has extra outside thickness on it for support.  There is no 7 1/2” extension in the area.  Looks like I will have to finish this job later down the road.

Tomorrow could be a real hectic day being it’s the last day here.  I got a call from a Polaris dealer in Prescott Valley who wants to help me resolve the leaky fuel tank on the Polaris.  Strange….. He said he would call Polaris and give me a call tomorrow.  He also needs the Razor of course if Polaris will repair – FREE only.  That means I will have to get it out of the shed.  I nailed it in and will have to take the wall down again. Get it out. Put the wall back up and then take it about 40-50 miles away.  I’m waiting for two contractors that I should be talking to tomorrow about getting main service on the lot.  They both know we are leaving Thursday.  I also have to finish up drawing a Plan for the Park and deliver it here at North Ranch for the electrical work.  Other than all that and getting the rig ready to travel – not much going on.

See ya….

Zooming & Full Timing

A lot of RVers when they start full timing they go thru a zoom stage.  That is where they have to see everything real quick because they want to make sure they see everything.  This usually lasts about 1 to 3 years.  Then they start to slow down and to use the old adage, “slow down and smell the roses.”  Well after 12+ years of being in that zooming stage we are smelling the roses a little more.  We (I) are slow learners.  In years past we usually put on about 20+K miles a year.    Yep, 20 thousand miles a year.  That’s zooming to the fullest.  We will be getting down around the 6-7K miles now. This year we have been setting three to four weeks in an area more often.  That’s a long time for us (me).  Of course our 2 1/2 month old Jeep has almost 3K miles (non towing) on it.  Later this week we will start a month in the Banning, CA area.  We feel like we are a little more organized in that we have time to do things and take care of things.  Of course the heat is putting a hurting on that.  Now we do set in Livingston, Tx for most of November and December for several years but the weather chases out of there.  At least that’s the excuse we (I) use.  A couple of times even longer due to medical reasons (me).

So anyhow……..life on the road after 12+ years is still great even though it’s friggin hot!

See ya……..

Snakes

At 6 AM I was wiping down the Jeep with a damp cloth.  Orange looks good because it doesn’t show dirt like most other colors.  This is our 3rd orange vehicle over the years.  A Honda and a Dodge van were the others.  We also had an orange 21 foot boat.  Yep it was orange.  I wipe the Jeep down every few days and it only takes 10-15 minutes. I also finished up cleaning the front end of the Beast.  I still have to get above the windshield up high.  Once it gets around 10 AM that sun comes beating down on me…no thanks.  Anything metal really gets scorching hot during the day in the sun and even in the shade some.

Carol & I went for about a 1/2 hour walk while it was still in the 80’s and overcast.  We saw a 2 1/2 foot rattlesnake crossing the road.  The one of few times I didn’t have me camera.  We watched him and us him for about 5 minutes while he crossed the road.  Later I found out it was a Mojave Rattlesnake.

By 8:30 AM is was 95 degrees and sunny.  By 10 AM it hit 100 degrees

NASCAR this morning at 10 AM local.  It was a good race especially at the end.

I vegetated the rest of the day.

At 5 PM we went to the ice cream social and met a few more people that were here.  I couldn’t tell if they were weathered from age or hot weather.  The big topic was, “Oh, you’re the ones with the orange Jeep.”

See ya……

Keep Looking – They Will Come

Walt……getting a little lonely?

The sun came up about 5:30 AM and I headed for the shed.  I dropped off some “stuff” so we won’t have to carry it to Texas and then back to here.  Plus I left some more Razor parts that I found while straitening out the Beast’s belly.  After that Carol & I went for a walk.  It was starting to get warm so it wasn’t a real big walk (40 minutes). 

I  then changed the water filters – all four.  I haven't done that since April.

I’ve been trying to get an  estimate or two to have someone install the main electric pedestal on our new lot.  So far it’s been dead ends.  If anybody can recommend someone here at North Ranch/Congress area let me know.

I ordered a tow shield.  It’s the cloth one that goes from the rear of the RV to the front of the Jeep.  A Roadmaster 4750 from www.makariosrv.com . I think I will have to make some parts to make it work the way I want.  I will probably will need to confer with Ed Kruty on how to make it fancy.

I took that picture of Walt several months ago here at North Ranch.  Now that this place is pretty quiet, it fits.

Oh we got a pair of owls here that roam the park at night.  They are pretty vocal and move all over the park. 

It’s 4:30 AM right now and it’s 85 degrees outside.  I went out to watch for the meteor shower.  I saw one shooting star.  It was nice outside.

See ya…..