Category Archives: WC-RV-Resort

Posts related to our extended stay at Williston Crossings RV Resort in Williston, Florida.

2014/02/28 (F) A New Air Compressor

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I was up early.  I called the Grainger store in Ocala, Florida but got connected to a person in Orlando.  I gave her the model number of my old unit and what I thought was the replacement model number.  She confirmed that my exact model number was no longer available.  They had a Dayton compressor in Orlando I could pick up today or have shipped to Ocala for pickup on Monday.  They also had the Gast compressor at their warehouse in Jacksonville, but I could not pick it up there; it would have to be shipped to Ocala where I could get it on Monday.

I called Braas Corp. in Oldsmar, Florida, the sole Florida-based distributor for Gast products.  Yes, they had the model I needed in stock, and yes, they would sell it directly to be.  I gave them my credit card number, got in my car, and headed for Oldsmar 2.5 hours away.

It was a very nice day for a drive.  I took FL-121 south to US-98/19 south, and picked up the Fl-589 leg of the Florida turnpike which got me fairly close to Oldsmar.  I got to Braas Corp. around 12:45 PM.  The compressor was waiting for me at the loading dock and I was back on the road at 1:00 PM.  I stopped for fuel, took a brief detour to check out the Pyper Kub restaurant location at the Williston airport, stopped at Williston Peanuts for a can of their Honey Roasted Peanuts, and was back at the coach by 4:00 PM.; too late to start on the compressor project, but in plenty of time for the Friday evening fire circle.

 

2014/02/27 (R) No Air

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Not to worry; there is no hole in the atmosphere letting all of the lovely, moderate temperature air leak out of north central Florida.  Quite the opposite, the past week has been pleasant enough here with some rain.

I was draining the auxiliary air tank/system today as I have been every day or so since I first drained it some weeks ago and got a lot of water out of it.  The procedure I’ve been using is to drain the tank until the auxiliary air compressor turns on (~80 PSI), shut the drain valve, wait for the air compressor to turn off (~104 PSI), and repeat until I get dry air from the drain.  This procedure cycles the air compressor more quickly than during “normal” use, but does not exceed a 50% duty cycle.  As I was finishing up, the air compressor tried to turn on but could not turn and pump air.  I could hear the motor trying to run until the thermal protection device opened.  Something mechanical in the unit had seized.  (Once a week or so I’ve been starting the main engine and using the very dry air from the main engine system to dry out the auxiliary tank, but that is not good for the big Detroit Diesel engine.)

Great (not).  Our coach has a really nice air flush toilet that only uses a half gallon of water per flush as long as it has 50 – 60 PSI of air pressure with adequate volume.  No air?  No flush.  (And no dump valves or other air powered accessories.)  Not the end of the world —one of the RV Resort bathrooms is not far from where we are parked—but not convenient either, especially in the middle of the night.

I pulled out the binder with the documentation (such as it is) for our conversion / house systems and found the data sheets for the auxiliary air compressor.  The documentation was for a Dayton Speedaire.  I took my flashlight and inspection mirror to check the actual air compressor.  It was a Gast 34BB-32-W300X.  I wrote down the model number and noticed that it had a five-character code under it that matched one of the model numbers on the Dayton Speedaire sheet, 2Z868.  Hummm.

I got on the WWW and searched for Dayton Speedaire, but all of the hits led me back to Grainger Industrial Supply.  I searched for Gast and found the manufacturer’s website.  The exact model number of my unit was not listed, but they had a similar model number (3HBB-10-M300AX) with nearly identical specifications ( 13″ L, 10″ W, 6″ H, twin horizontally opposed oil-less compressor pistons with Teflon rings, 2.4 CFM @ 0 PSI, 100 PSI maximum pressure, 1/3 HP, 120 VAC single phase electric motor, ~70 dB ).

I called Butch (because that’s what I do in these situations) and we talked it through (because that’s what we do in these situations).  I learned that Dayton is now a “house brand” for Grainger and that Grainger also carries Gast air compressors.  He looked up air compressors in his Grainger catalog, verified that the exact model number I was looking for was not listed, and gave me model numbers of units that were very similar.  He also gave me the phone number for the Grainger location in Ocala, Florida.

I also sent an e-mail off to our mobile mechanic, Joe Cannarozzi.  He sent me a link to a compressor made by California Air tools.  It was available through Home Depot but had to be ordered online and shipped or picked up at a store.  It was designed for running small air tolls and came assembled to an aluminum air tank.  It was less expensive than the Gast replacement and would have been a nice compressor if I had room for the whole thing, but it was not a drop in replacement for the one that failed.  That meant installing it would be a big project; not something I was prepared to take on while parked at the RV Resort.  I also did not want to wait for it to be shipped.

I went back to the Gast website to see where else I might be able to get one if Grainger did have what I needed.  They had one distributor in Florida, Braas Corp., in Oldsmar, Florida just north of St. Petersburg, Florida.

John Hagan had offered to drive up from Dunnellon to help me with bus projects.  I had phoned him every night to push our plans back another day as we waited for warmer, dryer weather conditions.  I called him again to let him know about the air compressor, see if he wanted to help with that project, and set it up for Saturday assuming I could get a new compressor on Friday.

 

2014/02/25 (T) Bus Project

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Photos for today’s post follow the text in a photo gallery.  Maximum dimension is ~300 pixels.

I don’t think I’m obsessive or compulsive, but I can only sit and relax so much before I have to do something.  Linda likes to walk, and I like to walk with her, but I am less inclined to do that on my own just for the doing of it.  Still, I walked to the local ACE Hardware store today for some parts for a “project” and stopped at the Grocery Depot for some supplies on the way back.  It was probably a mile round trip; not enough to really promote cardiovascular fitness, but better than taking the car.

Yesterday I put some water in the garbage disposal opening.  (Yes, our bus has a residential garbage disposal.)  The disposal has never worked since we bought the bus and it occurred to me that the trap in the drain might not have any water in it, which would permit orders from the gray tank to come up into the house portion of the coach.  Not to worry as it turns out; the water did not drain from the In-Sink-Erator.  I left it for a few hours and it eventually drained out.  Examination with a flashlight revealed that the inside was complete rusted, so badly that I could not even see the two pieces that are free to rotate when the disposal is spinning.  I tried scraping the inside, but to free it up, but it was beyond hope.

I also finally understood why the switch which we assumed was for the disposal did not do anything.  At some point in the past someone turned it “on” and the breaker on the bottom of the unit immediately tripped and never got reset.  There would not have been any purpose in resetting it anyway.The only reasonably solution (from my point of view) was to replace the disposer, even though we did not intend to use it very much.  I am not aware of a product that is sold for sealing up the hole where the disposer goes.  (I could have plumbed it into the drain for the main sink basin, but given how small that section of the sink is, that would also serve no practical purpose.)  I did not remove the old unit, but I had a good look at it as I needed to find one of similar size and shape given the space where it had to fit.

Late morning I was getting ready to head to Lowe’s in Gainesville when John (next door neighbor) invited me to join he and Ali and group of folks from the fire pit to go out to the Blue Highway Pizzeria for dinner, so I deferred my shopping trip until later.  (Linda and I had a pizza at the Blue Highway in Micanopy a week or so ago and it was OK.  The staff was great and was very helpful in getting us a vegan pizza, but most pizzas just don’t veganize very well.  They did say that they would put our non-dairy cheese on a pizza for us if we brought it in a sealed package as it comes from the store.  That may be worth a try).

I left early enough to do my shopping at meet up with the group at 3:30 PM.  Luck was on my side.  Lowe’s had a garbage disposer that looked exactly like the one installed in our coach.  It was a Badger Model 1, 1/3 HP.  Badger is In-Sink-Erator’s budget grinder line.

Today I opened the unit, read the instructions (yeah, I’m one of those guys), gathered my tools, and went to work.  As shown by some of the photos that follow, the discharge port of the old disposer was completely clogged with—well, I’m not sure what—some combination of rust and food scraps.  Kind of nasty, although that stuff doesn’t bother me.  I removed the unit and discovered that it was a … In-Sink-Erator Badger Model 1.  Sometimes you just get lucky.  At least it was guaranteed to fit!  Everything went back together fairly easily.  I added water to check for leaks.  Water tight.  Plugged it in and voila, we have a functioning garbage disposer.  And yes, the switch we thought was for the disposer is in fact for the disposer.

The other project I have been contemplating had to do with toilet paper.  Our female cat, Juniper, likes to unroll it, shred it, and eat it.  As shown in the pictures the doors on the bathroom sink cabinet are easily reached when “seated.”  The right door opens into your right knee, but the left door swings clear.  Oh look, I could mount a toilet paper roll holder right there.  Open the door to use, close to hide it from the cat.

So, off to the ACE Hardware store in search of an appropriately sized TP holder.  They had just what I needed; end mounts in (fake) polished brass, and inexpensive too.  I like it when that happens.  I assembled the tools I needed for this project but was not able to find my drill bits.  Back to ACE Hardware for a drill bit.  The project was done quickly as projects go and it works great!  We’ve talked about mounting a paper towel holder somewhere in the kitchen.  That may be tomorrow’s project.

Here are the photos:

2014/02/14 (F) Valentine’s Day

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“Hallmark Holidays” have never been a big deal for us, and Valentine’s Day is no exception.  However, we had no plans to visit state parks today, had been looking for a day to visit the Florida Museum of Natural History at the University of Florida in Gainesville, needed to make a visit to Walmart, and wanted to try one of the vegan-friendly restaurants in Gainesville, so Valentine’s Day provided the needed excuse to do all of that in the same trip.  Before I go on, I am including a picture of us taken by Marian Hagan on our outing with her and John to the two Crystal River state parks last Sunday.

Us at Crystal River Buffer Preserve State Park. (Photo by Marian Hagan.)

Us at Crystal River Buffer Preserve State Park. (Photo by Marian Hagan.)

We selected The Jones Eastside which was open all day serving breakfast and lunch, and was staying open for dinner.  We can usually find acceptable food for lunch and dinner if we are thoughtful about our choice of restaurant, but breakfast is often limited to dry toast with jam and/or fresh fruit.  Nothing wrong with that, of course, but also nothing special about it.  At The Jones Eastside, however, we were able to order a tofu scramble with sides of potatoes and fruit and a stack of vegan flax seed pancakes with fresh blueberries and real maple syrup.  We split each dish in half and had a really nice breakfast.  The Jones Eastside was highly recommended on both HappyCow.com and Yelp.com, and deservedly so.  It’s a quaint little place using organic ingredients and providing attentive service; you go for the food, not for an upscale setting.

From The Jones Eastside we drove through the heart of downtown Gainesville to where we thought the Florida Museum of Natural History was located.  We enjoyed seeing the non-university part of town, and parts of the UF central campus, but the museum was not where I thought it was.  Our Garmin 465T GPS did, however, and we followed its directions into a major traffic jam.  We had been to Gainesville several times, but had not seen traffic like this before.

We found the museum, paid $4 to park, and went in.  Admission was free except for the Butterfly Rainforest and special exhibits.  We spent a couple of hours exploring the free exhibits and plan to return for the Butterflies and a special exhibit titled “Wolf to Woof” on the evolution of the domestic dog.  Like most serious museums, you could spend days here depending on the level of detail you wanted to absorb.

By the time we were done at the museum it was 4 PM.  Our Valentine’s Day still needed something “sweet” so we headed to Karma Cream for vegan ice cream.  We fought our way (slowly) through more terrible traffic, but it was worth it.  🙂

“GPS, find us a Walmart, please.”  It showed two in Gainesville so I picked the closer one just up the street.  It was closed, the building vacant.  🙁  So I selected the other one on SW Archer (US-24).  We routed ourselves over to FL-121 southbound which intersects Archer close to the Walmart.  YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE ON THIS ROAD DURING AFTERNOON RUSH HOUR, which is actually “hope you’re not in a rush” hour.  Truthfully, you do not want to be in Gainesville during the evening rush hour.  Period.  End of story.  Total gridlock.  Fortunately we were not in a rush to be anywhere in particular by any certain time so we only had to deal with our self-imposed frustration at being stuck in traffic.  It won’t happen again, at least not in Gainesville.

We eventually got to the Walmart (thank goodness they are open 24/7).  We do not go out of way to shop there, but it’s the only place locally where we can find Calgon Bath Beads which we mix with water and Pine Sol and add to our holding tanks.  It is also where we bought our microwave popcorn popper and have to get the disposable cardboard heating discs that go in the bottom.

Shopping done, we had no choice but to venture back out into traffic.  OK, we had a choice; we could have sat there for a couple of hours until traffic thinned.  If we had been the least bit hungry we could have gotten something to eat while we waited, but having just had ice cream our appetites were satisfied.  Fortunately we were close to the SW corner of Gainesville by now where FL-121 turns SSW and heads through the country to Williston.  We arrived back at the RV resort after 6 PM, but there was no fire going in the fire pit.

WCRVR was having a Valentine’s Day dinner/dance starting at 5 PM so the Friday night fire had not been built by Kevin at its usual time as he and his wife had gone to the dinner/dance.  But a short time later I noticed a flickering flame and went to investigate.  Next door neighbors John and Ali had not gone to the dinner/dance either and John, being the backup fire guy, was getting one going.  We opened our bottle of sparkling pink moscato, bundled up a bit against the cool evening air, and went over.  Ali brought John’s guitar, the rocking chairs slowly filled up (~16 people), and we sang along when we knew the words.  It was a lovely capstone to a very nice Valentine’s Day (traffic notwithstanding).

 

2014/02/10 (M) A Day Of Firsts

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It was a near perfect day weather-wise, and a pretty decent day in all other respects.   We woke to clear skies with temperatures in the upper 40’s but by late morning it was 70 and gained a few more degrees by late afternoon.  Winds were very light from no particular direction and there were very few flying bugs.  We had a leisurely morning with our usual coffee and granola.  We took showers.  Linda vacuumed.  I opened the awnings on the coach to let them air out and dry, with assistance from Linda for the patio awning.  This was only the second time we have deployed the awnings since we left home, and the first time we planned to leave them open as rain is predicted for only one day in the next 7 to 10 days.

Linda continued with her cross-stitch project and I dealt with e-mail, website, and technology issues.  Bill was unable to clear the error codes on Pat & Vickie’s DDEC I engine computer so I e-mailed Butch, who also has a DDEC I, and provided some additional guidance.  Bill indicated that they needed wiring diagrams, which Pat did not have.  Bill had them, but they were back home in Ontario.  Doh!  I have the diagrams with us on the Network Attached Storage device.  They are all PDFs I got from Bill on a CD.  I located the lists of drawing numbers, picked a half dozen that I thought might be what Pat needed, put them in a folder in our Dropbox, and e-mailed everyone back.  Dropbox has turned out to be one of the better little pieces of technology in our cyber arsenal.

Around noon we walked to the Grocery Depot to pick up a few ingredients for dinner; a one mile round trip and the closest place to the RV resort to buy groceries.  Linda prepared lunch and we ate outside; the first time the weather has been nice enough to do that since we got back to Williston Crossings on January 1st.  We then sat outside to work; again, one of the rare days we have been able to do that.  Mid-afternoon we went for a longer walk around the RV resort that included our first hike down into the quarry.

We noticed that WCRVR had installed a new sign just inside the new entrance to the resort off of FL-121.  This is where the new section of park is being developed with ownership sites that will be available for purchase.  The sign said “The Reserve at Williston Crossings” so apparently that is how they plan to market these sites.  The sign is framed on either side with a new wood rail fence and plants, all of which looks very nice.  The first two sites have had paver blocks added to the concrete pads to dress them up a bit; presumably as demo sites to show prospective owners what can be done if they so choose.  It will be interesting to see what else they do in this area before of the park before leave.

When we returned to our coach we continued to sit outside to work and just enjoy the day.  Although the park is quiet and peaceful, it is not silent during the day.  We rarely hear other residents (talk or music) but there are always folks walking or riding bikes, and maintenance work being done by resort staff and residents.  We are near the south/old entrance so when we are here we see all of the rigs coming and going that way.  We saw more people out tending their sites or cleaning their vehicles than on past walks.  And there are birds—lots of birds—and with the sunnier, warmer weather they have had a lot to say.

Eventually, inevitably, as afternoon faded into evening it cooled off and we lost our light.  We retreated inside, had dinner, and watched Antiques Road Show on Gainesville PBS while working on projects (cross-stitch and BCM) before retiring for the night.  Linda made a delicious acorn squash stuffed with white rice and mushrooms, and onions and we opened our bottle of Blueberry Rhubarb Wine from Forestedge Winery (LaPorte, MN).  We have been spending time at the resort on less than ideal weather days so we could use good weather days to go exploring.  We enjoyed finally spending a nice day at home.

 

2014/02/08 (S) Uptime

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We had heavy rain off and on overnight and woke this morning to steady showers so I decided to delay doing the laundry until later in the day.  After making the morning coffee, which serves as Linda’s alarm clock, I finished my blog post for yesterday and updated the BCM page of our website while Linda concentrated on her counted cross-stitch project.  The amount of time that goes into a handcraft project like this is considerable, but she enjoys it and actually finds it relaxing.  The recipient of this effort will be our 14 month old grand-daughter (and her parents) who took her first unassisted steps yesterday.  Her parents captured it on a cell phone camera and sent it to us.  Although Linda is not looking forward to returning to S. E. Michigan weather, she is eager to see Madeline and wants to have her cross-stitch project finished, or close enough to done that she can finish it while she is home.

Our BCM website page has a reverse chronological listing of all the issues of Bus Conversions Magazine that contain articles I have written.  Today I added the listings for the January and February 2014 issues, including the Special Edition of the January issue that BCM produced for distribution via the Great Lakes Area Motorcoach Association (GLAMA) newsletter.  The January issue cover story was my article on the GLAMARAMA 2013 rally back in September 2013 at the Elkhart County 4-H Fairgrounds in Goshen, Indiana.  The February issue cover story was my article on the Arcadia Bus Rally 2014 that was held at the Turner Agri-Civic Center in Arcadia, Florida December 29 – 31, 2013.  I posted extensively about these two rallies and those posts are still available in the blog archive.

Bus Conversions Magazine is continuing to evolve under the ownership of publisher Gary Hall and editor Mike Sullivan.  Starting with the January 2014 issue the digital edition now contains additional content and features not found in the print edition.  Although Gary hopes/plans to expand the print edition, he needs more subscribers and advertisers to justify the added printing and mailing costs.  The digital edition, however, now features additional photographs and clickable advertisements with plans to add links to videos and other content as it becomes available.  Starting with the February issue, the digital edition is now available in Standard Definition (SD) and High Definition (HD) versions as PDF files.  The difference between the SD and HD versions is the resolution of the photographs, which the reader can click to enlarge.  Both versions are available to online subscribers for download but only the SD version is available as an e-mail attachment; the HD version must be downloaded from the BCM website.

In the afternoon I updated the accounting records and roster for our FMCA Freethinkers chapter and did a small load of laundry.  I heard some additional complaints about the park Wi-Fi.  We can connect and log in with our individual devices and we can connect our WiFiRanger, but not log in.  The technician told me a few weeks ago he had not done anything to specifically block a device like a WiFiRanger (booster/repeater) but I suspect he has.  An e-mail to WiFiRanger is in order to see if they are aware of any way a Wi-Fi system could detect that their device is something other than just another Wi-Fi client.

We had an Asian soba noodle dish with tofu and scallions dish for dinner that we bought at the Earth Origins market in Gainesville earlier in the week.  We finished dinner at 6:30 PM, poured a couple glasses of moscato, and headed over to the fire pit.  As seems to be the pattern there were more people than last night, maybe 30 at any given time with a little bit of turnover.  Kevin had a good fire going and John brought his guitar.  John is recovering from something respiratory and still doesn’t have his singing voice back, so tonight became a sing-along.  We met another first-timer WCRVR couple from South Bend, Indiana who owned the KOA there until 2005 and I had a nice chat with the husband about the business of running a campground.  A couple from London, Ontario sat down next to Linda and she had a nice chat with the wife.  By 9:00 PM the declining heat of the fire wasn’t keeping up with advancing cool of the evening and we retired to our coach for the evening.

 

2014/02/07 (F) Downtime

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Earlier in the week we were making plans to go to Crystal River today with John and Marian Hagan but by Wednesday evening realized that being out three days in a row would be too much and put us too far behind on various tasks.  Besides, the weather forecast for Friday was for cold, overcast, rainy conditions; not ideal for exploring and hiking, especially when we had the option of going some other time.  The forecast for Saturday was even worse, but the forecast for Sunday looked much better and turned out to be a better day for them anyway.  We would have had to be back early today anyway as tonight was pizza night and our pickup time was 6:30 PM, so we stayed home today and planned to stay home tomorrow as well.  I did not take any photos today.

Linda concentrated on her cross-stitch, went for a walk, and took a call from Butch, who had another potential buyer for their business (Linda helps them with accounting and tax returns).  I worked on e-mails and blog posts and had a couple of phone calls and e-mails with Pat, who had a relay replaced in their bus and needed someone to clear the fault codes in the DDEC I engine computer.  Unfortunately the only cartridge I had for our Pro-Link was for a DDEC II / III.  Pat had already called Prevost’s Nashville service facility and they did not have a code reader for a DDEC I.  I suggested that he contact Bill in Orange City.  As I blogged in late December, Bill has a newer diagnostic instrument with cartridges for every DDEC version, as well as Allison transmissions, and was camped relatively close to Walt Disney World.  I also suggested Prevost’s Jacksonville service center and Florida Detroit Diesel Allison in Jacksonville, both of which are only an hour from Fort Wilderness.

With the January 2014 issue Bus Conversions Magazine started adding additional content to the digital edition which they send out as a PDF or allow online (registered) users to download.  With the February 2014 issue they began offering the digital edition in two versions; Standard Definition (SD) and High Definition (HD).  The SD/HD editions has expanded content compared to the print edition, most of which is additional photographs with the photos in the HD version being much higher resolution than the in the SD version.  They have also made the advertisements live links to the advertisers’ websites and plan to add video and other expanded content in the future.  I had an old login for Bus Conversions Magazine that no longer worked so BCM set up an online subscription for me so I could access the online only HD version.  My old login did not work for the BBS/Forum either so I also registered for that.

Volunteers at Williston Crossings RV Resort (WCRVR) make pizzas to order every Friday using the clubhouse kitchen, which has a small conveyor type pizza oven.  Orders have to be placed by 4:00 PM on Thursday and are for a specific pickup time.  We decided to give this a try after our neighbors described how it works and told us the pizzas were pretty good.  We ordered one with mushrooms and onions, hold the cheese, and asked for thin crust.

Friday and Saturday evenings are campfire nights at WCRVR so we had a salad at 6:00 PM, picked up our pizza at 6:30 PM, and headed to the fire pit.  The pizza was big enough for two people to split, only cost $6.00, and was partly a social thing.  Kevin, John, and Ali were there along with a few other folks.  Kevin had a nice fire going and John had his guitar.  We ate our pizza and then Linda got us a couple of glasses of Moscato.  WCRVR is not over programmed, but there are plenty of things to do here if you want to join in.  Of all the nice things at Williston Crossings RV Resort, the Friday and Saturday evening campfires have been the nicest, with John, Jeff, and others providing musical entertainment.  And they have been best when they were more lightly attended, which has been the case on these cool, damp evenings, allowing for more and better conversation.

After we returned to our coach for the evening we turned on the TV and watched a couple of interesting shows on PBS while I finished creating the blog posts for the two preceding days.  Such are our days at WCRVR in Florida.

 

2014/02/03-04 (M&T) Happy Birthday

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After our fairly active weekend we wanted to be home bodies for a couple of days.  It’s not that we couldn’t go all day every day; it’s that we don’t have to and choose not to.  We are not on vacation and we do not have to fill every waking minute with new and exciting adventures to the point of mental and physical exhaustion.  Linda needs quiet days to work on her cross-stitch project and I need quiet days to process photos and write.  Besides, Tuesday was my birthday and Linda wanted to bake a cake.  Oh, and we had to tend to bus issues.

Our male tabby cat Jasper, in his Sphinx position.

Our male tabby cat Jasper, in his Sphinx position.

A bus issue that had been developing for a while involved our auxiliary air compressor.  It was sounding worse by the day when it ran, vibrating excessively and making loud, unpleasant sounds.  I checked the mounting of the air compressor and the vibration dampening rubber mounts appeared to still be OK.  I noticed that the sight gauge on the side of the air accessories filter housing was showing water at the 80% full level so I decided to try draining the auxiliary air tank.

 

A hard copper line runs from the auxiliary air tank to a drain valve on the front outside corner of the floor in the bay under the driver’s seat.  I had to open it carefully using a pliers, but once it was open it let out what I estimated to be at least a quart of water, including a considerable quantity of milky white liquid similar in appearance to skim milk.

There is a petcock style drain on the bottom of the auxiliary air filter housing so I also opened that.  I got some water out, but not much, and the water level in the sight gauge did not drop.  I needed to start the main engine to roll the bus forward so a different section of the tires was in contact with the pad to avoid flat spots from being parked for three months.  I let the engine fast idle for over 10 minutes and used the higher pressure, very dry air from the main engine air compressor to purge the auxiliary air tank, air lines, and other air accessories.  When I was finally getting nothing but dry air from the drain I closed both drains tight and shut the engine off.

I was checking the bay and heard a distinct hiss indicating an air leak.  I sprayed soapy water on various fittings and finally got bubbles on the air compressor side of the check valve in the main air line from the auxiliary air compressor to the auxiliary air filter.  With the auxiliary air compressor not running this indicated that the check valve itself was leaking, not just the fitting.

I texted and then talked to our mobile mechanic, Joe Cannarozzi, about all of this.  Although he is staying at an RV park an hour from here He was tied up with a major bus project and unable to come work on this for us.  He was confident, however, that I could replace the check valve myself and that Prevost Jacksonville had them in stock.  (He had just spent four days there with the bus he is working on.)  He wanted to know when I had last drained the auxiliary tank.  I couldn’t recall the last time, but it was probably several years ago.   He suggested that I drain it daily.

Since I would have to depressurize the entire air system to replace the check valve I figured I would replace the filter element in the auxiliary air filter at the same time.  I looked up the part in the Prevost CatBase system and found the part numbers for the filter element and the O-ring/gasket kit.  I called Prevost Parts in Elgin, Illinois to order them.  As sometimes happens on an older bus our filter housing, and the service parts for it, were no longer available and had been superseded by a different assembly.  The check valve, however, was available and in stock at the Jacksonville service center.  I wanted to see the part before I purchased it to make sure it was what I needed, so I decided not to order it and instead drive to Jacksonville on Wednesday to get it.  That would be a two hour trip one way, so started looking at what else we could do over there.

Sunset light on thunderstorm cloud to the east. Our car and coach visible lower right.

Sunset light on thunderstorm cloud to the east. Our car and coach visible lower right.

Linda found a recipe for a vegan vanilla cake and made it for my birthday.  We went for a walk while it cooled.  Thunderstorms were building in the area as the sun set and we got some nice light on the clouds.  It turned out quiet well.  She made a sauce from fresh red raspberries to put on top and it was also very good.  Life is good.

 

2014/02/01 (S) San Felasco Hammock Preserve SP (FL)

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Having spent a long day Thursday visiting Pat and Vickie at Fort Wilderness, and with the weather still wet and cool, we stayed around our coach on Friday and relaxed.  Linda worked on her cross stitch for much of the day.  I did a load of laundry.  We went for a walk around the RV resort.  We met another group of campers from Michigan and stopped to chat briefly.  Linda made her wonderful vegan pancakes for dinner and then we went to the fire pit at 6:30 PM.  We visited briefly with Kevin, who is in charge of the fire pit, before he took off to play Texas Hold’em.  John and Ali, our next door neighbors to the east, were there as they are every Friday and Saturday night.  A few other folks showed up, but not as many as we have seen in past weeks, and they did not stay.  By 8:30 PM it was just the four of us and we had a nice, long visit.  Kevin came back after Texas Hold’em and visited for a little while before turning in.  I’ve included a photo gallery at the end of this post rather than insert the photos inline.

This morning we awoke to temperatures in the upper 40’s with dense fog, but the forecast was for a high near 80 degrees with only a 30% chance of rain.  We waited until noon for the temperatures to rise into the mid-60’s and then headed for Gainesville.  We had two State Parks to check out plus some shopping to do.

Our first stop was the Devil’s Millhopper State Geological Park.  A small park on the NW side of Gainesville, Florida the Devil’s Millhopper is a sinkhole to drains water back into the Florida aquifer.  It is 500 feet across at the top and 120 feet deep.  Water flows in from streams that become waterfalls, and seeps out of the steep side walls.  A wooden staircase gets you from the top to the bottom and back up while keeping hikers from destroying the vegetation which leads to serious erosion.

About 6 miles farther west on the same road is the trailhead for the hiking trails in the southern section of the San Felasco Hammock Preserve State Park.  The southern 2/3rds of the park is restricted to hiking only with over 12 miles of trail.  The area is pine flatwoods, with sinkholes and ponds and was the site of a Spanish mission a long, long time ago.  We went for a very pleasant three mile hike and rarely saw anyone else on the trail in spite of a very crowed parking lot at the trailhead.

My birthday is on Tuesday, and rather than make a special trip into Gainesville for dinner, we decided to dine out while we were there today.  Our hike completed, we drove to Karma Cream, a vegan friendly ice cream / pastry / sandwich shop on the north edge of the University of Florida campus.  We ordered a Tofurkey Rueben sandwich and a vegan “bacon” and Tofurkey club sandwich.  We each had a half of each sandwich.  Karma Cream has a good selection of non-dairy and dairy ice cream.  Linda had chocolate peanut butter and I had a Sunday with Lunaberry ice cream, dark chocolate hot fudge, whip cream, and crushed peanuts; all vegan.  Karma Cream is a hole-in-the-wall kind of place, staffed and patronized by college students many of whom had tattoos, but we enjoyed it.  It has a four and half cow rating on Happy Cow, and we felt that was an accurate assessment.

Just around the corner from Karma Cream is the Gainesville Earth Origins organic market, so we did our weekly grocery shopping there rather than at the Publix supermarket.  By the time we got back to our coach and put the groceries away it was time to go to the Saturday night campfire.  Even though the humidity was high, the milder temperatures brought out the crowd.  Jeff and John brought their guitars and played/sang some of their favorite country songs.  While country I not our preferred genre, we appreciated their musicianship and willingness to entertain their fellow RVers.  We can only sit for so long on hard chairs and made our exit from the campfire around 8:30 PM.

2014/01/23-24 (R,F) A Gathering

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On Thursday morning we followed our usual home routine; breakfast, computer work (for me), cross-stitch (for Linda), a walk around the park, and a light lunch.  We walked by the clubhouse / pool / pond / pavilion area to check on the progress of the deck being built along the north edge of the pond.  The deck construction was finished and the landscaping was being installed. We continued on to the rear entrance to check on the new landscaping that was being installed the day before.

The new deck by the pool at WCRVresort.

The new deck by the pool at WCRVresort.

The new landscaping by the rear entrance.

The new landscaping by the rear entrance.

Mid-afternoon John and Marian Hagan drove up in their car from their home in Dunnellon for a visit.  It was the first time they had been to Williston Crossings RV Resort and the first time they had seen our converted bus.  Shortly after John and Marian’s arrival David and Marie Ross walked over from their motorhome, which was parked just around the corner from ours.  Linda had set up all six of our folding chairs and our one folding table, but it was just too chilly to sit outside and talk.  Our coach will accommodate six adults for seated conversation, but just barely.  We had met the Hagan’s last week for the first time and the Ross’s just yesterday for the first time and this was the first time the Hagan’s and Ross’s had met but we quickly settled into a long comfortable chat.  This has been our experience to date with every member of our FMCA Freethinkers Chapter that we have had the pleasure of meeting.

Around 6 PM we took the conversation down the street to Angelina Mia, the only Italian restaurant in Williston.  Once again Linda and I had a pizza and side salads.  This time, however, we had a Manhattan Supreme “white” pizza with olive oil, garlic (lots of garlic), spinach, sweet basil, tomatoes, and mushrooms, hold the cheese.  It had a thin, crispy crust the way we like it, and was a very acceptable vegan pizza.  Everyone else had regular Italian dishes, and like the last time we were here, they all indicated that the food was pretty good.  We stayed at the restaurant two and a half hours eating and talking.  John and Marian headed home directly from there and we dropped David and Marie back at their rig.  A little more chat in the brisk evening air and we decided to call it a night, but not before agreeing to go out to breakfast the next morning.

L-to-R Me, John, Marian, Marie, David, and Linda at Angelina Mia’s in Williston.

L-to-R Me, John, Marian, Marie, David, and Linda at Angelina Mia’s in Williston.

Friday morning the Ross’s picked us up a 9 AM and went to Melanie’s.  The parking lot was so full we had to park across the street by a vacant building.  Linda had rye toast, dry, and I had a plain bagel, dry; a pretty typical breakfast out for us.  David and Marie had regular breakfast fair, and seemed pleased with their choices.  We lingered and drank coffee, but eventually had to go back to the resort as they were expected at Fort Wilderness in Orlando, Florida that afternoon.  We said our “until next time”s and left them to concentrate on t heir departure routine.  A final wave as they drove out and they were gone.

Living in an RV, even part-time as we are doing, can be an isolated, even lonely experience if that’s what you want it to be or if you fail to take some action to make it otherwise.  Cherie Ve Ard and Chris Dunphy of Technomadia and been full-timing for at least seven years now and have put a lot of thought and energy into the issue of “nomadic community.”  They have run into people all over the country, both randomly and intentionally, and then used their knowledge of communications and social networking technology to stay in touch and forge enduring relationships.  Cherie’s most recent post discusses the difference between what they call a “convergence”, which is what is occurring in Cedar Key, Florida at the moment, and an RV rally or other such organized event.

We have some busy days coming up, so I took the opportunity to do a load of laundry mid-afternoon while Linda went for a walk.  I think she planned to go for a long stroll, but cut it short because it was just too chilly to enjoy even with sunshine.  We planned to eat dinner early and go over to the Friday night bonfire at the fire pit but Linda did feel like going, so I went by myself for a while.  Part of living in a RV is that it has to be OK to not always do everything together.

 

2014/01/22 (W) Old & New

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I spent most of the day catching up on our blog postings for the previous two days.  Our trip to Cedar Key on Monday was a full day of interesting sights and people and I took quite a few photographs.  The weather and light were very nice and most of the photos were usable but required the usual post-processing which would take several hours.  Our trip to Paynes Prairie State Preserve on Tuesday preempted image processing work and resulted in even more photos to review, select, and process.

David and Marie Ross from our FMCA Freethinkers chapter were scheduled to arrive at Williston Crossings RV Resort today so we did not plan any activities away from the resort.  That gave me the time to work on the blog posts and Linda to work on her cross stitch project.  We took a break around noon to go for a walk and bundled up against the chill, which seemed sharper than usual.  It was below freezing again last night and only made it up to about 50 by mid-afternoon.  We had some Amy’s Thai Coconut Soup when we got back which helped warm us up.  Amy’s products are all vegan and we try to keep some on hand for a quick, easy, delicious meal.  A selection of Amy’s products is often available at regular supermarkets including Publix here in Florida, the best selection is usually found at Whole Foods or specialty markets.

While we were walking I got a call from Pat Lintner letting me know that he and Vickie were back at Fort Wilderness and we arranged to drive over to visit them late next week.  We made plans yesterday to visit Al Hesselbart on Saturday at Breezy Oaks RV Park near Bushnell, Florida.  We will probably drive through “The Villages” enroute to Breezy Oaks and stop for a visit with Joe Cannarozzi (our bus mechanic) who is staying at The Villager RV Park in Wildwood just south of The Villages.  While we are down that way we will also check out the Escapees Park in Bushnell which is only a few miles from Breezy Oaks.

David and Marie came in the back entrance of Williston Crossings so we did not see them arrive.  A knock on our door around 4 PM announced that they were here.  We visited with David briefly and discussed dinner options.  They invited us over to their motorhome, a very nice 2000 Safari Sahara, for drinks and we enjoyed a glass of white wine and good conversation.  By 7:00 PM we were all hungry and headed over to the Driftwood.

The Driftwood is a small diner that is walking distance from the front entrance of the resort and the closest place to dine out.  David drove us over as it was dark and cold and would be darker and colder by the end of our meal.  The place looked like it was closed, but the illuminated “open” sign in the window suggested otherwise so we went there for dinner as planned.  This was our first trip to the Driftwood since we arrived in Williston.  Linda and I had salads and potatoes, hers baked and mine French fried (with lots of ketchup and Tabasco sauce).  The food was OK but our waitress was friendly and efficient.  We were all drinking coffee or tea and she was very attentive to keeping our cups refilled, which I appreciate and use as a marker of good waitservice.

By the time we finished dinner and returned to the resort clear skies revealed bright stars and radiational cooling had already lowered the temperature in to the upper 30’s.  With yet another sub-freezing night ahead we set the thermostats on the toe-kick heaters and settled in to watch the final episode of Shackleton on PBS, a documentary on the recreation of Ernest Shackleton’s epic journey in 1916 from Antarctica to South Georgia Island to reach the whaling station at Stromness and arrange the rescue of the 22 men left behind.  It was somehow fitting given the weather this January.

 

2014/01/19 (N) Things That Go Bump

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We slept in this morning and had a light breakfast.  I called Cherie (of Technomadia) to see if she and Chris were up for a visit today.  They are camped at Sunset Isle RV Park just a mile north of Cedar Key, Florida.  It is 45 miles from Williston Crossings RV Resort to Sunset Isle and the drive is estimated to take about one hour.  Chris answered the phone and indicated that a front was just pushing in off of the Gulf and that it was raining, and was expected to continue for much for much of the day.  We agreed that it wasn’t the best day for a visit and decided to stay home and try again tomorrow or the next day.  A quick check of the sky showed heavy cloud cover and the weather radar confirmed that the storm front was also going to bring rain to our RV resort, so we decided to get a walk in before it started.  It was a short walk as it started raining lightly while we were out!

Living in an RV is obviously different in many ways from living in a fixed dwelling, but in equally many ways it is not different at all.  One of the ways they are different is that RVs get moved around and so the environment around them changes.  That, in turn, means the pattern of sights, sounds, and smells is always shifting.  Even if you stay in one place for a while, as we are currently doing, other RVs still come and go and the external pattern of daily activity changes.  I suspect most full- and extended-time RVers enjoying the change in their external environment, but it also means you are constantly exposed to “unexpected” stimuli that draw your attention.

One of the ways fixed and mobile living are the same is that our dwellings each have a unique “personality”, which is to say, they are structures full of systems that have characteristic sights, sounds, and even smells that occur in routine and predictable ways.  It’s almost as if they are alive, but we become so accustomed to the personality of our dwelling that we hardly notice it.  Indeed, this is essential to being able to live there.  If we paid close attention to every little detail of a dwelling we would not be able to do anything else.

As long as it is behaving the way it normally does, we are only dimly aware of our home’s personality or the environment surrounding it.  But when there are deviations from the norm we are acutely aware of them and none more so than things that go “bump” in the night.  This evening while watching TV we had such a noise.  It appeared to come from the cockpit area, possibly from the bay under the driver’s seat, and sounded more mechanical, like our A/C shutters, than like a motor or moving air.  That bay is where most of the auxiliary air system components and chassis leveling valves are located, but even when it happened while I was standing right there I could not identify what was causing the sound.  I went outside and checked the bay with a flashlight, but nothing looked out of place.

Mid afternoon I had been working in the front TV cabinet and the media cabinet behind the driver’s seat hooking up the cable TV from the resort.   The media cabinet has an electric toe-kick heater in the base and I thought perhaps a cable was coming in contact with the fan.  I turned the heater off while the noise was happening and it did not go away immediately.  It stopped a short time later, but the sound never lasts very long anyway.  When trying to figure out what is wrong, it often useful to know what is not wrong.

BTW:  I did get the cable hooked up and working and even used the old video switcher to select between OTA TV antenna and cable.  We get more channels on the cable but they are marginal quality analog signals and we only get the primary PBS station.  We get a much better digital signal over the air and get both of the PBS  sub-channels in addition to the main channel.  As it was Sunday evening Linda watched Downton Abbey and then we both watch the first episode of Sherlock Holmes.  It was a double-episode.

We are probably more sensitive to noises in our coach than we are to noises in our house.  For one thing, the coach is a smaller, more intimate space where no noise goes unheard.  For another, it’s capable of being stranded right where it sits if the wrong components fail.  This is part of RV life, and we are much more comfortable with it than when we started, but not completely at ease yet, especially when something goes bump in the night.

 

2014/01/18 (S) On Top Of The World

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Sure, there are days when we feel like we are “sitting” there—we are retired after all, have our health, and are in Florida for the winter at a nice RV resort—but today we were not sitting on top of the world.  Rather, we were at On Top Of The World for a one hour talk on “humanism and problem-solving” by Jennifer Hancock.

OTOTW is a large, upscale, planned retirement community just southwest of Ocala, Florida off FL-200.  We were at a retail/community plaza that included the sales office, a sizeable theater, coffee and ice cream shops, and a few other businesses including one named Master The Possibilities.  MTP is the education center for the complex and offers a wide menu of self-development experiences.

We were made aware of this presentation by John and Marian Hagan from our FMCA Freethinkers chapter and they also attended.  The presentation was sponsored by the newly formed Humanists of North Central Florida (HNCFL), which is affiliated with the American Humanist Association.

After the talk I had to take a phone call from our son.  He was checking the house and called to let us know that the battery on our backup sump pump was indicating that it needed to have water added.  I talked him through that and then the four of us headed to a nearby Panera to talk over food and coffee.  I think it was the first Panera we have been to since we left Michigan on December 19.

We stopped at the Publix supermarket on US-27 just west of Ocala to do our weekly food shopping and got back to the RV resort around 8:15 PM.  We had left at 11:00 AM to do some shopping before the lecture, so it had been a long day.  We were surprised that there wasn’t anyone at the fire pit, when Linda remembered that tonight was a dinner/dance at the resort.

I walked over to the fire pit and found the remnants of a fire still smoldering so I pushed the pieces back into a pile and the fire came back to life.  I spent over an hour tending the fire and enjoying the warmth against the chill of the night air.  A few people wandered by and stopped to chat briefly.  John (from Vermont) mentioned that his son, Matt, who uses a wheelchair, was a ham radio operator, but didn’t have any of his equipment with him.  I offered to lend him one of our Kenwood HT’s and have a QSO with him sometime if he wanted to do that.

I forgot to mention in yesterday’s post that we met Golda The Adventure Dog at the campfire on Friday night.  A very sweet and gentle animal, she is part Anatolian Sheppard and has her own Facebook page.

 

2014/01/17 (F) Campfire Music

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Today was a day for chores and relaxation.  I did the laundry while Linda tidied up the inside of the coach.  Various RV authors have said that the best way to learn about the area where you are camping, or intend to go to next, is from the people in RV parks and campgrounds where you stay.  And the best place to meet those people is often in the laundry room.  Today I had a long conversation with a fellow Williston Crossings resident with Alaska license plates on his truck while we were both doing our laundry.  He had traveled extensively and was a wealth of knowledge.

For lunch we had the vegan version of one of my favorite sandwiches: crunchy peanut butter and “mayo” with lettuce and pickle slices.  I used to make this sandwich with Miracle Whip.  (I was raised with Miracle Whip and have never cared for the taste of real mayonnaise.)  The vegan version of the sandwich uses “vegan mayo”, of course, and it is an acceptable substitute although it lacks the characteristic tanginess of MW.

It dropped below freezing again last night under clear skies, but rebounded quickly with the sunrise and topped out in the mid 60’s.  Linda sat outside in the sun and worked on her needlepoint.  She needs the light to see what she’s doing, and she likes sitting in the sun.

We ate dinner around 6:00 PM–left over angel hair pasta– and then went to the fire pit for the Friday evening campfire.  Kevin already had the fire going but we were early enough to get two of the rocking chairs.  By 6:45 PM all the chairs and benches were occupied and there were a few folks standing.  There were four guitarists playing and singing in various combinations.  Their selections tended to be country and folk, but they all played and sang well, and the rest of us listened, talked quietly, or sang along as we sat in the glow of the campfire.  It was too dark to photograph and we did not record it on our smartphones so you will just have to take my word for it; it was a warm and thoroughly delightful experience.

 

2014/01/16 (R) Wi-Fi Woes

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The Wi-Fi at Williston Crossings RV Resort has been very good since we got here.  There are professional grade access points with decent antennas positioned on towers all through the park.  The signals have been strong and steady, and the bandwidth generally very good.  Wi-Fi is always going to slow down when lots of people are using it, but the resort seems to have enough access points feeding into a robust enough router and gateway to handle the demands placed on the system by the residents.

A couple of weeks ago the resort announced that they were going to reconfigure the Wi-Fi system slightly and that starting on January 10 we would need a username and password.  We generally prefer “open” Wi-Fi signals since we connect to them with our roof-mounted Wi-Fi Ranger Mobile, which repeats the signal as a secure hot spot around out coach.  Our current configuration goes one step farther.  We have an Amped Wireless SR20000G Wi-Fi router/repeater configured as a bridge to the Wi-Fi Ranger.  The SR20000G creates a local area network to which we connect wirelessly along with a RAID 1 Network Attached Storage device connected via Ethernet.  The SR20000G then connects to the private/secure hotspot side of the Wi-Fi Ranger Mobile, which is connected to the wide area network on the public side and from there to the Internet.  It’s a great setup when everything works correctly.

In the past we have used our Wi-Fi Ranger Mobile successfully with both secure and filtered Wi-Fi networks, and both types are handled through the Wi-Fi Ranger web-browser interface.  Secure Wi-Fi systems require an encryption key, which is entered through the Wi-Fi Ranger control panel and stored for future use.  Filtered Wi-Fi networks are not secure.  After the radio and logical connection is established, you are taken to a web page where you enter a username and password and accept the terms and conditions of use.  Indeed, places like Panera don’t even bother with the username and password, they just want you to acknowledge the terms and conditions of use before allowing you access to the Internet through their system.  Fair enough, the Wi-Fi Ranger is designed to handle that as well right from the control panel.

We have had our system configured and working flawlessly right through yesterday morning.  When we returned from a day of hiking and visiting it was obvious that something had changed.  It still wasn’t working properly this morning so I inquired in the office and they confirmed that the guy who takes care of their Wi-Fi network had made changes yesterday and was working on the system today.  I reconfigured some of our equipment to use our Verizon Mi-Fi to get online and take care of e-mail and some BCM article tasks.  I called the Wi-Fi guy and chatted with him briefly, just to explain our setup and make sure there wasn’t any reason for it to now work.  I spent part of the rest of the day working with and reconfiguring our equipment and by late afternoon everything seemed to be back to normal.  I even found a better spot in the coach for the Verizon Mi-Fi device.

The day ended well, however, as Linda made whole-grain angel hair pasta with garlic, onion, mushrooms, and sun-dried tomatoes, perfectly dressed in olive oil.  It’s one of my favorite dishes.

 

2014/01/12 (N) More Visitors

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Steve and Karen were headed to Deltona to visit relatives of Karen’s and were expected there around noon.  With a two hour drive ahead of them they needed to be on the road by10 AM.  We were all up before 8 AM, had a leisurely breakfast and set up a tripod to get a few photographs of the four of us before the left.

Linda, Bruce, Karen, and Steve at site 439, Williston Crossing RV Resort (FL).

Linda, Bruce, Karen, and Steve at site 439, Williston Crossing RV Resort (FL).

The more time we spend living in the bus the more normal it seems, but we are still very much aware of the fact that for most of our friends it is an object of considerable curiosity.  I think many of them are also fascinated, perhaps even a bit perplexed, by the idea that we live in even part time, and seeing it in person helps them understand just what it is that we are doing.

Last March (2013), while on our second Holistic Holiday at a Sea cruise, we became friends with a retired special education teacher from New York City named Norma. We exchanged e-mail addresses and phone numbers and have stated in touch with her since then.  Norma has a daughter who lives in Winter Park, Florida north of Orlando and not that far from where we are staying.  Norma has been down visiting, and e-mailed us yesterday indicating that family was headed to a state park for the day and would be close enough to stop in Williston for a visit.  A quick phone call this morning confirmed the arrangements; they would come to the RV resort on the way home so everyone could see the motorhome.  🙂

Linda, Norma, Anna (Norma’s daughter) and Anna’s children in our coach.

Linda, Norma, Anna (Norma’s daughter) and Anna’s children in our coach.

As of this morning our Dropbox client software was still unable to connect to the Dropbox cloud servers.  I was able to log in to our Dropbox account through various web browsers and upload a file, so that was some sort of progress.  I was not, however, able to access my settings page, so the Dropbox servers/accounts were not yet fully restored and functional.

Linda made pan-fried firm tofu with grilled onions and Bar-B-Q sauce served on a whole wheat hamburger bun.  The tofu has something of the texture of a fried egg, and the sandwich, while simple, is simply delicious.  A side of Brussels sprouts and broccoli provided our greens.

I worked on getting the blog up-to-date while we watched Downton Abbey.  I then transferred all of the photos for the Arcadia Bus Rally BCM article to a flash drive.  I need to put it in the mail to the editor tomorrow.

 

2014/01/10 (F) Visitors

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Steve and Karen Limkemann e-mailed yesterday that they were in Macon, Georgia and thought they would arrive at Williston Crossings today between 2 and 3 PM. They left S. E. Michigan Wednesday around noon and got as far as northern Kentucky before stopping for the night.  We had planned to do weekly chores this morning anyway, but that became necessary once we knew their ETA.  My chores included doing the laundry so we would all have clean linens, and dumping the waste tanks and refilling the fresh water tank.  Linda’s chores involved interior cleaning (vacuum, mop, dust, glass and mirrors, sinks and toilet, etc.) and de-cluttering.

Steve and Karen arrived on schedule and came in the new/rear entrance off of FL-121.  They phoned me and I drove over to lead them to our site which is near the original/front entrance on N. E. 5th St.  I had not finished filling the fresh water tank, so I gave Steve a tour of the bays while the tank filled.  Eventually the chores were done and we gathered inside to visit.

Being a Friday it was fire pit night at the RV resort, but first we went out to dinner.  We decided to try Angelina Mia’s, the Italian restaurant and pizzeria we stopped at the other day on our walk to town.  We ended up ordering a thin crust northern Italian veggie pizza, no cheese, and it was OK.  Steve had lasagna and Karen had seafood linguine, and they both said it was OK as well.  By the time we got back to the RV resort a large group had gathered around the fire pit and the fire was blazing.  There were no vacant chairs, and we did want to stand, so we retired to the coach and settled in.

We have had overnight guests in the bus prior to this, but only one person at a time.  Steve and Karen were the first couple to stay overnight, and the first guests to use the sleeper sofa pulled out into its two-person configuration.  In spite of the noise and vibration from the auxiliary air compressor, the refrigerator, the vent fans, and the water pump, they said they were comfortable and slept well.

 

2014/01/09 (R) Rainy Days And Writing

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I finished the first draft of my article for BCM on the Iron Horse converted bus and e-mailed it to the owners.  I also completed a draft of a shorter article on the Cool Cruiser bus conversion.  Both of these coaches were at the Arcadia Bus Rally where I was able to photograph them and interview the owners.

Rainy days are good days for this kind of work.  We’ve had a few recently, and we have taken advantage of them.  Linda has worked on her needlepoint, reading, and some accounting work in addition to putting our meals on the table, playing an occasional game on her iPad, and going for walks.  She is less inclined to sit and work for as long as I am, and rain does not deter her from walking.

Eventually, however, I also need to stretch my legs and get dome fresh air.  Around mid-afternoon we went for a long walk through the heart of downtown Williston and out to the west edge of town.  We stopped at an Italian restaurant to check out the menu and it had some options that would work for us.  We have friends arriving tomorrow mid-afternoon to spend a couple of nights, so we may try the restaurant for dinner.

We found the Win-Dixie supermarket and will check it out the next time we need groceries as it’s a lot closer than the Publix stores in Gainesville or Ocala.  We stopped at a roadside fruit and vegetable stand, sampled several different oranges, and bought a small container of one that was particularly juicy and flavorful.  We also stopped at the ACE Hardware store, checked out the store, and bought an outlet expander (2-to-6).

We were just about back to the entrance of the RV resort when a pickup truck passed us, slowed down, stopped, and backed up.  It was none other than Jimmy and Sadie Clay, the owners and converters of the Iron Horse.  They had driven over from Apopka, where they are volunteers in the state park, to check out Williston Crossings RV Resort.  They have a friend who had stayed there and told them how nice it was.  They were as surprised to see us as we were to see them.  We climbed in the back of their truck and gave them a guided tour of the resort.

Linda microwaved a couple of baking potatoes for dinner and sautéed onions, mushrooms, and broccoli with spices as a topping.  She added some shredded vegan cheese and we had a hearty, delicious meal.

We are both getting anxious to start exploring Florida, but it’s been good to be parked for the last week in our quiet little corner of our quiet little resort with cold, wet weather that gave me the opportunity to make significant progress on several critical projects.

 

2014/01/08 (W) Florida In Winter

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It dropped below freezing again last night here in Williston, Florida, but not by much.  This weather is not unusual for this time of year, and therefore not unexpected.  We normally use our three electric toe-kick heaters and our Broan ceramic cube heater to ward off the chill but when the outside temperatures get down towards freezing we use the Aqua Hot (diesel fueled hydronic heating system).

The unit has been running fine, but this morning I noticed that the coach had cooled off a bit. I checked the blowers on the bedroom and bathroom heat exchangers and the air coming out of them was not warm.  I checked the main unit (in one of the bays) and while the burner appeared to be running the feed lines were cool to the touch.  Normally they would be quite warm.  I turned off all three thermostats (bedroom, bathroom, and living room) and shut off the main switch that controls the burner.  The coolant in the overflow reservoir was at the add mark, so added some.  I turned the unit back on, turned on all three thermostats, and set them high enough to call for heat.  A short time later we had heat again.  The fans for the living room heat exchanger even came on (they haven’t been working the last couple of days).  Ahhh, the mysteries of the motorhome.  I added to much coolant, so of course it overflowed when it came up to temperature.

The weather was cloudy all day and the high temperature barely broke 50 degrees so we stuck around the RV resort.  Linda continued working on the needlepoint she is doing for Madeline and I started working on a featured bus article for Bus Conversions Magazine.  At the Arcadia Bus Rally I had the opportunity to interview Jimmy and Sadie Clay and photograph their 1984 Eagle Model 10 conversion “Iron Horse.”  The interior is done to resemble a railroad car from the Old Wild West.  I did not have a finished draft by bedtime, but I made excellent progress.

We took our usual walks and Linda made stuffed acorn squash for dinner using some leftover rice and other ingredients she had on hand.  She served it with a side of Brussels sprouts that she browned and then steamed.  Simple but delicious, and very satisfying on a cool evening.

2014/01/07 (T) Ocala Florida

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It dropped into the mid-20s last night so we used the Aqua Hot hydronic heating system to keep the coach comfortable and the water bay above freezing.  Although the high temperature only rose to 43 degrees the sun was shining and we needed a break from the confines of the coach.  We had compiled a shopping list over the last few days so we decided to head to Ocala.

Our first stop was the Radio Shack store at the Paddock Mall where I got a small wireless keyboard, a wireless mouse, and some 75 ohm coax cable.  Although we have a few OTA TV channels, most importantly the PBS trio, we have a cable TV hookup as part of our site and a cable TV connection in our utility bay, so we are going to see if we can get it to work.

The dining table in our coach is not ideal for working at our computers and I was developing a sore neck.  The wireless keyboard will allow me to move the monitor a little farther away and position the keyboard more comfortably.

We went to Gander Mountain in search of waterproof camp shoes for outdoor use that we can slip on and off easily, but did not find what we were looking for.  We looked around online later and it appeared that L. L. Bean has what we want.

We doubled back to an outdoor mall where Linda went to Joann a Fabrics and I went to Staples to get a cooling pad for my laptop.  Staples also had and outlet expander (3 from 2) with two USB charging ports and a night light that solved a specific problem for use very nicely.

Our final stop was the Publix grocery store on US-27 just west of I-75.  This store is 22 miles from Williston, seven miles farther than the one in Gainesville, but there is a lot of other shopping in that area.  We did not do a general tour of Ocala, so we will do that another day.

Having uploaded my article and photographs on the Arcadia Bus Rally last evening I decided to do a shortened version of the article for the February issue of our GLCC newsletter.  I selected 17 photographs, most of which included at least one of our GLCC members and/or their coaches.  I finished the article, uploaded everything, and e-mailed newsletter editors Scott and Tami Bruner before I went to bed.  It felt good to get that done while the event was still fresh in my mind and have it off my plate as I have a backlog of articles to work on and keep falling behind on posting to this blog.

 

2014/01/05 (N) Views of WCRVR

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I’ve been hunkered down writing an article for Bus Conversions Magazine on the recent Arcadia Bus Rally and Linda has been working on her counted stitch needlepoint, but both of those are activities from which we need to take breaks and go for walks.  When we do, I usually take my camera along.  Here are eight more photos of Williston Crossings RV Resort that capture some of the features of the park and the ways that residents make their sites uniquely their own.

A cactus garden.

A cactus garden.

The fire pit.

The fire pit.

Grass and palm trees.

Grass and palm trees.

The old quarry from the back of one of the sites.

The old quarry from the back of one of the sites.

This belongs to one of our next door neighbors.

This belongs to one of our next door neighbors.

Tiki huts and rock gardens.

Tiki huts and rock gardens.

Donna & Michael’s Motorhome.

Donna & Michael’s Motorhome.

Donna, Michael, and Linda.

Donna, Michael, and Linda.

2014/01/04 (S) Rally Articles

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Our site at WCRVR with our sign!

Our site at WCRVR with our sign!

Our sign. (Normally reserved for 4 month or longer stays.)

Our sign. (Normally reserved for 4 month or longer stays.)

In addition to writing blog posts I have written three articles in the last five months on RV rallies.  One was on the GLCC/CCO rally last August in Clio, Michigan and was the cover story for the October issue of Bus Conversion Magazine.  I wrote an article on the September 2013 GLAMARAMA rally for the November issue of our GLCC newsletter.  I rewrote that article from a different perspective and BCM ran it as the cover story for the January 2014 issue.  Although different from writing a personal blog, these articles still retained the perspective of personal experience.

Our patio and picnic table.

Our patio and picnic table.

Gary Hall, the owner/publisher of BCM, knew we planned to attend the Arcadia Bus Rally in Arcadia, Florida between Christmas and New Year’s and asked if I would cover the event for the magazine, which I agreed to do.  That made for a different experience, putting me in the role of a reporter with a publisher and editor expecting an article by a certain deadline.  We returned to Williston Crossings RV Resort on the 1st, got settled in on the 2nd, I got to work on the article on the 3rd, and had a complete draft by bedtime today, although I still needed to have Linda proof-read it in morning and then send it off to the rally organizers to fact check.  I will spend the next two days selecting and processing photographs.  I also heard from Gary and Mike Sullivan, the BCM editor, that the article was back on as the Feb 2014 cover story, putting me on a short timeline to get it to them.

The fire pit at WCRVR.

The fire pit at WCRVR.

I can work at this kind of task for long periods of time, but eventually I have to get off my butt, move around, and clear my head.  Williston Crossings RV Resort is an excellent place for walking and I went twice today with Linda.  (She does her first/power walk in the morning without me.)  Resort volunteers build a big fire in the covered fire pit on Friday and Saturday evenings unless there are high winds.  The fire pit is surrounded by rocking chairs and benches and is a social event for some of the resort residents, especially those, like us, that hail from more northerly places.  We went over after dinner, sat by the fire for 90 minutes, and made some new acquaintances.  While most of the residents were hunkered down avoiding the temperatures in the upper 40’s we felt like we were on a fall camp out back in Michigan, complete with a smoky campfire. 

New friends around the campfire at WCRVR.

New friends around the campfire at WCRVR.

 

2014/01/03 (F) Power Dinner

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Linda went to the Publix grocery store in Gainesville yesterday, so we are well stocked for the next week or so.  We also learned last night from Donna and Michael Bartolomeo that there are several vegan restaurants in Gainesville as well as a vegan ice cream parlor / bakery / brewery and a vegan pizzeria.  While we don’t plan to eat out very often, having vegan dining options less than 20 miles away is a nice plus.  The Happy Cow website confirmed their addresses and menu selections.

The overnight low hit 35 degrees F, but that is not unexpected in this part of Florida in January.  We had closed up the rig before we went to bed and did not turn on any of the heaters (other than the refrigerator) so the temperature inside dropped to just under 60 degrees F; a bit nippy, but not uncomfortable.  The refrigerator is a compressor driven residential unit that exhausts heat out the bottom front into the kitchen/dining area.  In warmer weather (no rain) we usually have the ceiling vent open and the exhaust fan running to pull that warm air out of the coach.  But in colder weather the vents are closed and the heat from the fridge helps keep the coach from getting too cold.

We lost power to the coach around 11:15 AM, but only for a few minutes.  The inverter kicked in immediately and did what it is supposed to do.  The microwave clock did not lose its time and the UPS that powers the NAS kept it double protected.  The power was restored before I could go investigate what had happened.  When I checked later there was no code set in our Progressive Industries EMS, indicating that we had simply lost power and then had it restored, which clears any previous error codes.

The View From Our Coach on Site 439 at WCRVR.

The View From Our Coach on Site 439 at Williston Crossings RV Resort.

After her morning walk Linda worked on her needlepoint while the light was good and I took care of e-mail, finished up the blog post for yesterday, and started working on the Arcadia Rally article for BCM.  I had an e-mail from BCM publisher Gary Hall indicating that they planned to bump the rally article to the March 2014 issue, so that gave me a little breathing room in terms of getting it done.  Gary also sent me the January 2014 special edition they produced for the FMCA Great Lakes Area Motor Coach Association (GLAMA).  This issue has an extensive article that I wrote on the September 2013 GLAMARAMA rally.  GLAMA is going to include the entire issue in their next newsletter, which will go out to somewhere between 10,000 and 15,000 members.

Tonight was one of the scheduled fire pit nights at the resort.  The fire pit is only 100 feet from our site so we checked it out.  It‘s under cover and surrounded by large rocking chairs and a couple of benches.  We often enjoyed campfires when tent camping, but have not made very many since we started RVing in 2005.  We were planning on going when I got a call from Michael Bartolomeo inviting us to their motorhome for dinner.

Michael indicated that it had been a strange night and that’s when we found out that the whole north section of the park had lost power overnight.  Apparently the short power outage we experienced this morning was connected with the restoration of power to the north section.  We stopped by the office later and inquired as to what had happened.  Sometime the night before someone ran into a utility pole (outside the park) and took out power to half the city of Williston including the north section of the RV resort.  When utility crews finally repaired the damage and restored power, the transformer that feeds the southern half of the northern section failed.  A replacement had to be brought in from some distance away, and residents in that part of the resort were without power for about 18 hours.

Donna and Michael had been without power overnight and when they got it back their furnace decided not to work.  Michael was able to locate a loose connection and tighten it this morning which brought the furnace back to life, but they had a chilly night in their rig.  They had us over for dinner nonetheless and it was wonderful.  We had pistachios (in the shell) for an appetizer, butternut squash soup with fresh apple slices and croutons, and whole bean burritos with guacamole, spicy salsa, and steamed kale.  They served dark chocolate covered almonds for dessert and we drank Pinot Grigio to wash it all down as we continued our conversation from the night before.  No pictures yet, however, as we have not crossed paths with them during the day when I also had my camera with me.