Monday, January 30, 2012

Arizona

Arizona.  Finally.

We are both frazzled by the long trip so far.  The driving is okay, but every day something breaks on the trailer.  Never a deal-breaker, so we keep moving.  It's usually something that wasn't built well enough.  Today a pair of drawers broke loose inside their cabinet.   The way they engineered the mounting for the drawer slides is simply ridiculous.  I have a drill, screws, and epoxy, so I'll be trying to fix it right.

In my opinion, most of these trailers are just not made to haul across country.  They are made to be pulled a couple hundred miles to the lake or woods. Our old 93 Jayco held up better than this.  This trailer has a lot of good design and workmanship, but at the same time it has things that make you say "what in the world we they thinking?!"  And it just doesn't take the bumps well, it seems.

We are both ready to just sit somewhere.  Starting Wednesday we have 5 days reservations at McDowell Mountain Park outside of Scottsdale.   Really looking forward to that.

Tonight we are in Picacho Peak State Park between Tucson and Phoenix.  It's a beautful clear night, with a sky full of stars.  Here is our campsite.

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Brrr!

It was 29º this morning in Las Cruces.  But the sun is up and it will get better quickly.  This trailer is not the best for these kinds of temps.  I have a lot of tinkering to do when I get home, to plug holes and fix drafts.

We have to make a Wal-Mart run and do some town things before doing our visiting today.  Looks like one more night here, then westward ho.

Saturday, January 28, 2012

The Land of Enchantment

We decided to finally get up on time and put on some Texas-size miles today.  We didn't think we'd make El Paso, about 420 miles, but we'd see how far we could go.  We made it and then some, all the way to Las Cruces, New Mexico.   Close to 500 miles.  One thing for sure, the dog had enough traveling for one day.



On the way out of the state park this morning, we saw some of the endangered Rio Grande turkeys.  They were beating a retreat but Terry got a shot of them.

Tonight we are in the Hacienda RV Resort in Las Cruces.  And I mean IN Las Cruces.

It has very fine facilities, but we are going to have to get used to western campgrounds.  Basically pavement and gravel, with a few shrubs planted for color.  But we are right across the interstate from the Wal-Mart (center rear of photo), so we've got that going for us!  Well, off to do some laundry.  Tomorrow we hope to visit Terry's relatives here.

Friday, January 27, 2012

South Llano River SP

Central Texas

The scenery changed a lot yesterday from east Texas to the beginning of west Texas.  Between Corsicana and Waco, every dwelling had their own personal junk yard.  We were dumbfounded.  It's as if no one throws anything away, or sells it for scrap.

West of Waco, we entered "the West".  It's virtually all scrub land ranches.

As we were motoring along TX 29, a few miles east of the town of Llano, there was a sign warning of pedestrians.  Bear in mind, this is the middle of nowhere.  Then there was a little turnout with people with spotting scopes and cameras.   They were observing a bald eagle nest.  Very neat.

The first photo is just with my camera.  The second is my camera shooting through a guy's spotting scope.


Headin' down the highway, from Mason to Junction.  I love driving these kind of roads.

Speed limits are usually 70 on roads like this.  75 on the interstates.  We go 60-65.   We bucked a strong Texas wind all day, and dipped just under 10 MPG.

70º and Sunshine

We made it to Junction, TX yesterday afternoon.  South Llano River State Park.  It's a nice little place in the barren hills of central Texas.  Its claim to fame is a flock of Rio Grande Turkeys.  Haven't seen one yet but have seen footprints.

(Should I put captions after photos, or before?  Comments please.  For now I'll stick with before. Click on photos to enlarge.)

Nights and mornings have been cold.  This is from the first night, in Sikeston:

Here's the dog, all tucked in for the night.  The travel is tiring her out, and she sleeps well.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Texas!

Tonight we are in Corsicana, Texas.  We took some nice state routes to go south of Dallas.  It rained all day, but we skirted around the big red monster on radar that eventually spawned tornadoes in Louisiana today.   Tomorrow we are going to head over to Waco.  Then somewhere between Waco and Austin we will turn west and head for a state park to be determined.   We need to stop for a day in a nice place to put our feet up and decompress.  We haven't really unpacked and organized the trailer yet because we have been on the move.

Hopefully this blog will get more interesting soon.
:)

Arkedelphia

We made it as far as Arkadelphia, Arkansas before dusk last night.  We unhooked from the trailer and made a run to Fat Boys Fine Dining for fried catfish (Terry), and BBQ ribs St. Louis style (me).  And then Wal-Mart, of course.   If you really wanted to shut down the country, shutting down all the Wal-Marts would do it.

We had 3 or 4 new glitches to deal with with the rig, so we haven't shaken Murphy yet.  At least they are all minor.

It's raining this morning, and we are getting on the road soon, headed north of, south of, or through, the Dallas area.  Supposedly it's a white-knuckle drive across the DFW metro area in an RV.  I'm kinda leaning towards heading down towards Waco, bypassing the white-knuckle zone.  I will say, the truck and trailer are handling great, so the driving is not bad at all.  Let's hope Murphy stays away from that.

Yesterday our first fill up showed 10.5 MPG at 65 MPH with a slight helping breeze.  The next one, at 60 MPH, showed 12.5 MPG.  So, four tanks, 7.7, 8.9, 10.5, 12.5... I like the trend!  Pretty soon we will be stopping to dump out fuel, lol!

OK, on to Texas.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Sikeston, and some headaches


We rolled into Hinton RV Park in Sikeston, Missouri a few minutes before sundown.  It is a few hundred yards from I-55, and on a state highway.  Our site is pretty close to the road, so we will be lulled to sleep by the traffic noise.  :)

We are seeing a pattern develop when we use a trailer for the first time.  No matter how much thought, toil, and trouble we put into the advance preparation, good old Murphy has to get involved.  So, what went wrong today?

Last night, I noticed that our brand new license plate, picked up at the dealer this month, expired last month. Great.  It was issued 12/14/11, expiring 12/31/11.  We had a temporary tag since October. Turns out the plate expiration was correct, but because it was issued so late, it didn't get on the list for mailing out renewal notices.  And I had just assumed it was good for 2012.  We had to stop and drop off something in Springfield today, so we paid a visit to the HQ of the Secy of State (DMV) Vehicle Services department.  I have to say, they got me in and out in record time, no waiting, no fuss.  So take that, Murphy!

We got to the campground, opened up the trailer, and stuff was all over the floor in the kitchen and the bedroom.  It's a common trailering problem, but our last one didn't do it.  Because of that we took our packing for granted.  It's funny, because from the truck it seemed to be pulling nicely.  Then, while vacuuming up the spilled salt, the vacuum cleaner stopped working.  Damn you Murphy!  Later, Terry opened an overhead cabinet while the dog was lounging below, and the glass door insert fell out and hit the dog.   It didn't seem to hurt her, though, luckily.

By that time I had discovered that we have a badly leaking water fitting.  Making it impossible to use either a city water hose hookup, or our self-contained water tank and pump.  Anyone going potty tonight is going to flush with a bucket.  I tried to disassemble the fitting but it beat me.  I will be searching online and going after it again in the morning.

We had a stiff head wind today in Illinois.  The fuel gauge was dropping like a rock, and we were only going about 62 MPH.  First tank, 7.7 MPG.  Ouch!!!   I slowed down to about 57, and the next tank was 8.9.  We have a small tank, so with those kind of numbers we don't even get 200 miles between stops.  Dumb.  Once we got into Missouri, the weather changed completely. It was sunny, much less windy, and in the mid-50s.  The fuel needle behaved a lot better, even going 65 or so.  For sure this tank's mileage is going to be double digits.

Diesel was 3.799 at home, 3.749 in McLean, IL, and 3.519 south of St. Louis.  That last price was cheaper than their premium gas, which was a small victory.

Well, tomorrow we have a lot of reorganizing to do, and I've got to get this water thing fixed, even if we have to stop by the local RV place.  We had hoped to hit the road and be in north Texas tomorrow night, but I think we have too much work to do first.  We shall see.

Sunday, January 22, 2012

What, and leave all this?


We are headed out tomorrow to Phoenix.   The weather forecast for camping will probably cause us to head more southerly to get there, going through Arkansas and central/south Texas rather than Oklahoma/Amarillo/Albuquerque.  It will be a game time decision.