Our RV Adventures

I was up about 6:30 to finish our travel preparations for today’s move over to the Colorado River Thousand Trails. I stowed away all the satellite stuff and then got the laptop set up on the dashboard. The laptop runs our Delorme Street Atlas GPS software and our Silverleaf digital engine monitoring program.

But that wasn’t going to happen today. At least the Delorme GPS part of it. 

My #$%$#@& cat sometime in the last two weeks chewed off the USB connector of my GPS module, as well as the mini-phone plug from the external speaker I also use.

#$%$#@& cat !

I know I’ll be able to replace the phone plug, but I’ll have to see if I can solder a new USB plug on the GPS cable. It might even be easier to just solder a new cable onto the GPS module.

I can buy a new one from Delorme for about $40, or a used one on eBay for about $20. But I’ll try the cheaper way first.

By 8am we were ready to roll, with only bringing up the levelers, unplugging shore power, and bringing in the slide left to do, so we headed into Conroe to have our normal travel day breakfast at the local Cracker Barrel. We were a little worried if the CB would be crowded since this was Easter Sunday, but it was no busier than usual for 8am.

We were hooked up and leaving the park by about 10:45, and after a smooth, but somewhat windy trip, we got into the Colorado River park about 1pm. As we were checking, the ranger said a prime site, A10, had just opened up and to grab it quick.

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He also asks if I could work on RV refrigerators and that Barbara Spade, the head ranger here, had a problem. So I told him to tell her to give me a call.

Then after we parked and got set up, our friend Jim Dean called and invited us to dinner down at their rig about 5pm. By this time Jan was already napping on the couch, so deciding this was a great idea, I adjourned to the bedroom for my nap. Later, after we were both up and getting ready to head down to the Jim and Peri’s, I got a call from Barbara Spade about her refrigerator.

She said it was a Dometic Royale, about 15 years old, and was working fine up until this morning, when she noticed it was warming up. Later she tried switching over to gas, but it didn’t seem to help, so she switched it back to electric. So I told her I would come over after dinner and take a look at it.

Peri fixed us a great meal, complete with dessert. Our contribution was six pack of Redd’s Green Apple Ale and a box of Girl Scout Thin Mints.

We all talked for a good while, especially about Alaska, since Jim and Peri are heading that way this summer. And when I mentioned to Jim that I was going up to look at Barbara’s fridge, he offered to come along.

When we got there we found all the lights and controls seemed to be working, but the inside was at room temp. When I pulled the outside access cover off, we found that the vent stack was hot, almost too hot to touch, but there was no temp difference in the ammonia coils up at the top of the unit. They were also at room temp. Then we switched the fridge over to gas, and we could see the blue flame, and again had heat in the vent.

Later we went back on electric and checked AC voltage coming into the board and the voltage feeding out to the heating coil. All were correct, though we did not check the continuity of the coil, but since we had heat from it we assumed it was OK.

Now normally when you’ve got heat, you should have cooling . . . unless you have no ammonia, or maybe a blockage. And if your ammonia leaks out, you definitely know it. Plus you have a yellow residue at the leak point. But no sign of that here.

As far as blockages, they don’t usually occur in operating units, but ones that are used on and off, or turned off part of the year. But you never know. And of course, one of the recommended fixes for a blockage is to take the refrigerator out and turn it upside down for a while.

So for right now, we left it running on gas, and we’ll check back tomorrow and see what we have.

It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession.

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We didn’t walk today, our last day here at Lake Conroe for the next two weeks, since we’ll be doing another Wal-Mart walkabout this afternoon, and that’s always good for at least a mile, or even more.

So after coffee and breakfast, I went outside to do my normal Saturday prep to travel  tomorrow morning. Normally I would have closed our gray valve a couple of days ago, but with all our recent coming and goiing, I forgot.

So today I just closed the valves and put away the water and sewer hoses without dumping the tanks. Back inside I squirted a large dose of Dawn into the toilet, along with a cup of Calgon Water Softener and a cup of powdered laundry detergent. The black tank is about 90% full, so all this will get to slosh around in the tank until we get to Colorado River, for just a general cleaning.

This is not really to clean the tank level sensors since we don’t use them. We can go 14 days on our black tank with no problem, so I normally just dump it right before we move. And we can go longer – our record is actually 19 days, but the tank was filled to the tippy-top by then. Not a good thing.

Tomorrow morning I’ll be up about 6:30, and then finish up everything else outside, except for power, i.e., satellite, awnings, folding step, etc. Then around 8 Jan and I will head down to the Cracker Barrel for our traditional Sunday Travel Day Breakfast.

Back at the rig, I’ll crank up the diesel, raise the levelers and stow the pads, bring in the slide, and disconnect shore power. By this time the coach will be up on the airbags, and we’ll be ready to roll. And it looks to be cool enough so we can be comfortable with just the fans.

This afternoon, about 3pm, we drove into Conroe to see My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2. We saw the first one years ago, and really liked it, and this one was just as good or better. All of the original cast are back, including some you probably thought were dead since the original film in 2002.

Both this movie and the original one were produced by Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, and Rita and John Stamos have cameo roles in this one.

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And a couple of things I was surprised to learn, is that the original movie, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, is listed as the highest grossing romantic comedy of all time. And based on percentage of return – it cost $6 million and made $369 million, it is the second most profitable movie of all time, bettered only by Paranormal Activity.

Who Knew!

Thought for the Day:

First Rule of Government Policy:  – “If It Ain’t Broke, Break It!”

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