Category Archives: WFPB

Posts related to our Whole-Foods Plant-Based approach to healthy eating. We became vegetarians in 2000 and transitioned to being vegans in 2011. We discovered the WFPB concept in 2012.

2013_10_18 (F) Not Our Best Day Ever

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Today was a travel day for us. We were not in any particular hurry to leave this morning and yet seemed pressed to get on the road as we had about 300 miles to travel. We also figure an average travel speed of 50 MPH even when traveling routes that are mostly Interstate Highways. We don’t usually travel more than 62 MPH and often slower due to traffic. The 50 MPH average also seems to make an adequate allowance for surface roads, stop lights/signs, rest areas, and truck stops for re-fueling. We try to avoid major cities whenever possible, and to go through them at off-peak times when we cannot. We also like to be where we are going before it gets dark.

We had a wonderful time this week participating in the SKP Photographers BOF workshop/rally at the Tremont Outdoor Resort in Townsend, TN. The resort itself was OK, although marginal for our motorhome. I was able to get us in, parked, and leveled last Sunday but not without adding some scratches to the upper body paint. I got us out of our site this morning and onto the entrance road where we hooked up the toad. All was well until I made a right turn onto TN-73 and cut it a little too tight to avoid a car in the oncoming lane, and clipped the body on the passenger side.

We did not know the extent of the damage until we pulled into a rest stop on I-81 northbound (still in Tennessee) to switch drivers. I clipped the lower panel of the last bay on the passenger side just in front of the drive tires, damaging the panel, a smaller body panel just behind it, and part of the wheel well trim. Ugh. Getting paint scratches buffed out just became the least of our problems. The rest of the day went fine, but this sort of thing tends to put you on edge and take some of the joy out of the lifestyle, at least temporarily.

Linda took the driver’s position and continued on I-81 N towards our destination in Virginia. She test drove the bus when we first looked at it, and did just fine, but had not been behind the wheel in the four years since then. She drove for about 150 miles, getting us to a rest area at MM109 in Virginia, and she did great. We still had 70 miles to go to get to Natural Bridge, VA and needed to stop for fuel, so I moved back into the driver’s seat to finish the trip. We stopped at the Pilot Truck Stop at exit 150 on the northwest corner of Roanoke, VA. This particular location was smaller with more congested access than we usually encounter, but we got in and out just fine.

We pulled in to the Natural Bridge / Lexington KOA around 4 PM, so we averaged just about 50 MPH for the six hours between “wheels up” and “wheels down” (aviation lingo for takeoff and landing). We do not generally seek out KOA facilities for a variety of reasons, cost being number one, but this particular KOA had a nice look and feel to it. It is built on hilly, wooded terrain, but the roads were wide enough for us to get through and the trees were trimmed up high enough that we didn’t scrape. The sites are cut into the sides of hills, but are close enough to level that we had no problem leveling the coach. Part of the reason KOAs are pricier than other RV parks are the facilities, which are designed to make them attractive to families with children. That often means congestion and noise. The campground is near full, but so far has been very quiet. There are campfires burning, as there were at Tremont Outdoor Resort, which reminds of our tent camping days many, many years ago.

The reason we are here is that KOAs accommodate everything from large motorhomes to tent campers, and we are meeting up with family here for a weekend of camping. They are camping in an A-liner in a site close to ours.

For dinner Linda improvised a quinoa-based dish with potato, squash, bell pepper, tomato, mixed dark greens, and Cranberry Thokku, a spicy/hot Indian relish/sauce. Earlier in the week we installed the WP Ultimate Recipe plug-in on our website/blog and started playing with it. Linda plans to add the recipe for this dish as her first entry. She is preparing a Farro dish on Sunday and will add that as well.

Linda’s sister (Marilyn) and brother (Ron) and his wife (Mary) arrived at 7:30 PM, got their camper parked and set up, and then came over to visit for a couple of hours. We discussed options for tomorrow and decided to make those decisions after breakfast. Ron and Mary returned to their trailer for the evening and Marilyn stayed behind as she is sleeping in the coach on the pull-out couch.

2013_10_16 (W) GSMNP

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I was up late last night post-processing images for the yesterday’s blog and downloading/installing 32-bit versions of the some of the free 64-bit software Lou had provided via flashdrive for SKP Photographers Workshop. As a result we slept in a bit and, not having anything we had to do today, Linda made her yummy vegan pancakes and served them with real Maple syrup.

The Great Smoky Mountain National Park (GSMNP) re-opened this morning, and is supposed to remain open through at least Sunday. We are camped about a mile outside the Cades Cove (Townsend, TN) entrance, so we decided to go for a drive in that direction. We left around 10 AM, and in spite of the RV parks (and motels) around here not being full, due to the government shutdown forced park closure, lots of other people had apparently stuck around in the hopes the park would re-open and had the same idea about where to head. Most of GSMNP is not accessible by motor vehicle, and Cades Cove has always been the major tourist draw for those who are sight-seeing in a car.

Giant fungus (18” diameter) along the Cades Cove Loop Road, GSMNP.

Traffic on the 11 mile long road to/from Cades Cove was bumper to bumper and moving slowly-to-not-at-all; but we were not in any hurry and it was fine with us. We eventually reached the Visitor Center at the end of the Cades Cove Loop Road, found a parking spot (not a guaranteed thing), and walked around the area looking at and photographing the old buildings. We stopped in a few pull-outs along the way and I shot a few landscapes and a babbling brook, but the day was heavily clouded with low light levels and color vibrancy and I wasn’t feeling particularly inspired photographically speaking. We were also a little tired and did not do any of the waterfall hikes. Besides, there were no open parking spots at many of the trailheads and vantage points.

We eventually made our way back to our starting point in the park and then continued on through the park on Scenic TN-73 towards US-441 to the northeast. This was a very nice drive, but not really suitable for a large motorhome and we did not see any on this leg of the journey. I mention that only because part of what we were doing today was scouting our exit route. We eventually got to US-441 and headed north towards Gatlinburg. Gatlinburg is an attractive tourist town with bumper-to-bumper traffic that moves slowly, but persistently, allowing me to gawk as I drove. (Linda usually does the tourist toad driving, but her hip was bothering her, so I took over after Cades Cove.) It’s also small enough that we were out the other side in a reasonable amount of time.

One of the two Baptist Churches we passed in Cades Cove, ca. 1839, GSMNP.

We continued north on US-441/US-321 to Pigeon Forge, home of Dolly World, to the point where US-321 South split off and headed back to Townsend. We went this way partly for the scenery, which was nice, and partly to check out the road, which semi’s were advised on either end not to use. While most of the road was fine for a larger, longer wheelbase vehicle, there was a stretch where the bus would not have gotten through easily due to narrow lanes and hairpin turns. Also, for much of its length there was little-to-no shoulder and places where the branches overhanging the road had not been trimmed up and would have damaged the coach.

Our Trucker’s Atlas indicated that this stretch of US-321 is a truck route, and we had hoped it would be passable by a large motorhome as it in the direct/short route from where we are to where we need to go on Friday. Linda found some online reviews that corroborated the warning signs; this was not a road for semi’s and motorhomes. As a result, our confidence in being able to rely on our Trucker’s Atlas is somewhat reduced, and we are inclined to believe posted signs.

The water powered mill at the Cade Coves Visitor Center area, GSMNP. The mill was operating, demonstrating the grinding of corn into corn meal.

Although I am not thrilled at the prospect, our route out of here on Friday morning will be to backtrack on US-321/TN73 S/W to US-66 N to Maryville and pick up US-129 N to Knoxville where we merge onto I-40 E which takes us to the southern terminus of I-81 N and on to Lexington, Virginia. I have really studied the satellite images of the highway system in Knoxville and the US-129 N to I-40 E transition should be a no-brainer unless the highway signs are completely screwed up or they have a road closed with a poorly marked detour.

Linda made a whole wheat penne pasta dish with homemade marinara sauce, pan-fried eggplant, and garlic. She made the marinara sauce a couple of weeks ago and froze some of it. I raved about it when she made it, and it was just as good thawed out and re-heated.

The Little River along Little River Road en route to US-441, GSMNP.

The photo workshop participants reconvened at 8 PM in the resort classroom building to go over the agenda for Thursday. With rain forecast to move in for the afternoon, the plan was to drive about 15 minutes in the morning to a nearby waterfall, capture some images there as interest and weather permitted, and then return to camp for lunch, followed by another 3 – 4 hours of classroom demonstration and discussion. Lou showed some photographs he took on his cell phone and demonstrated several cell phone camera apps that he uses. We agreed to meet for breakfast at 8 AM at Riverstone Family Restaurant, just up the road from our resort, and leave for the falls from there.

2013_10_13 (N) A Fork In The Road

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We spent a quiet night with only an occasional car passing by. Someone nearby must have a pack of dogs and fed them around 6 AM as I heard them howling in the distance. At first I thought they were coyotes, but it wasn’t the right kind of howl. We finally got up around 8 AM to cool temperatures and light fog. I checked the house batteries state of charge (I really need to get the Magnum ME-ARC remote panel installed up in the house) and it was 71%, not bad for having powered the coach for 8 hours.

Sunrise at Acres of Land near Richmond, KY

A nice sunrise lit up the bedroom and by 9 AM the fog had burned off as we ate our breakfast of Linda’s homemade granola with fresh bananas, orange juice, and a cup of coffee. This morning’s coffee was the Breakfast Blend from World Markets that Kathy brought to our open house. It was delicious and already ground. We generally grind our coffee beans, but it’s always nice to have ground coffee on hand, especially when we only want to make a couple of cups.

We had 186 miles to travel today, and check-in time at Tremont Outdoor Resort was 1 PM, so we targeted 10 AM as our departure time. We left a little after 10 and took KY-876 east back to I-75 and continued south towards Tennessee. Just after crossing the border we started down a long, steep grade but had to come to a complete stop before reaching the bottom. We sat still, or moved along very slowly, while police cars, ambulances, fire trucks, and emergency management vehicles sped past us on the right shoulder. We eventually had to move to left as the accident was in the right lane, and got the ire of an SUV who apparently felt we had cut them off. Sorry. It was an accident scene everyone in the right lane had to move to the left. Here’s a tip for folks driving cars: when a semi or large RV puts on its turn signal, you might want to consider letting them move over. These are large, slow vehicles and they need your cooperation to operate safely.

When we reached the accident scene there were two motorhomes on the side of the road, one with a towed vehicle that had the driver’s side smashed in, and a small white car that had been rear-ended and squashed pretty bad. We tried to move through the accident zone as quickly as traffic allowed, but were not able in that short span of time to surmise just what had happened, other than something bad.

The rest of the trip to Knoxville was uneventful although traffic was heavier as cars and trucks cleared the accident scene and tried to make up for lost time. We finally left I-75, picking up I-275 through the city to where it was supposed to join up with I-40, which we thought we would take west and shortly thereafter pick up US-129 headed south towards Maryville. That was the plan. Remember plans from a recent post? The Knoxville highway system is complex, and we were following the directions on our Rand-McNally RVND 7710 GPS while Linda double checked what we were doing on her Samsung Galaxy III smartphone. Everything was fine until we came to a literal fork in the road and the GPS failed to tell us which way to go. Intuitively we needed to go to the right, but that exit sign said “Downtown” and that didn’t seem right so we took the exit to the left and ended up…downtown. Not just downtown, but on a very steep hill going up where we had to stop at a red light. I don’t know what the grade of this hill was, but the bus was barely able to get moving from a dead stop.

On the plus side, while we were stopped there, a man crossed the street wearing a nice suit and bow tie and smiled and waved to us. Also on the plus side, Sunday afternoon traffic was very light, so we didn’t have any further difficulties driving the 1.8 miles through the University of Tennessee campus back over to US-129 southbound.

At that point we were back on plan. Just north of Maryville we picked up TN-35 which links up with the E Lamar Alexander Parkway, US-321 / TN-73 eastbound, which continued on as TN-73 and took us to Townsend. Although the road got narrow and twisty in places, it was a pleasant and pretty drive. All told, the accident scene and the Knoxville sight-seeing delayed our arrival at the Tremont Outdoor Resort by about 45 minutes from what the GPS originally predicted and we pulled in around 2:30 PM.

We turned off of TN-73 and crossed a bridge over a small river to enter the resort, at which point the GPS alerted us that we exceeded the weight limit of the bridge. There were no weight limits posted on this bridge, so we are not sure what that was all about. We pulled up to the check-in area, scraping the top of the coach with the low over hanging branches that they assured us on the phone they did not have, and Linda went in to take care of the paperwork. I could see from the driver’s seat that the roads in this RV park were not generous and might be problem. When she returned with the map we unhooked the car and drove the route they wanted us to take to our site. Right. There were trucks parked where they shouldn’t be, and a maintenance golf cart by the restrooms that block part of the road. I backed up and took the left fork in the entrance road, pulled up the tag axle, and made the hard left in sections B & C of the park. From there I made a hard right, scratching the passenger side of the coach on some low pine/fir branches, finally got lined up, and back down into our section and into site B3.

The reason I mention all of this is that when we call to make a reservation we are very, very specific with people about the size and weight of our coach and specifically ask about overhead obstructions such as tree limbs. (We always call, never book online, because of this.) People consistently tell us that “you won’t have any problem” and it is, quite frankly either an ignorant response (they have no idea if we will have a problem or not) or they just plain lie about it. I am also convinced that when we tell them we are 8.5 feet wide, 40 feet long (closer to 60 feet with the car in tow), 13 ft 2 inches tall, and weigh about 41,000 pounds those are just numbers that don’t mean anything to them.

But we got parked, leveled the coach, shut down the engine, and “made camp.” I pulled out our Kenwood TH-F6 HTs (small hand held ham radios known as handi-talkies) and gave Lou, K9LU, a call on the previously agreed frequency of 146.550 MHz. He was monitoring the frequency and came right back to my call. Lou is the founder of the SKP Photographers BOF, and the organizer of the photography workshop we are here to participate in. We went for a stroll around the RV park, as we usually do when we first arrive, and eventually made our way to Lou and Val’s 5^th wheel where we had a nice chat.

We skipped lunch today, so Linda started dinner preparations when we got back to the coach. She improvised a dish of diced potatoes, tomatoes, mushrooms, onion, and garlic, seasoned with basil and pan fried in a little bit of olive oil. She served it with a side of broccoli and glass of red wine. A couple of hours later we had some more of the wonderful blackberry pie we bought on the Fulton Farm Market on Friday. I will be sorry to see the end of that pie, it really has been that good.

Since we are here for a digital photography workshop, I presume we will have more photographs to post over the next few days, but not today.

2013_10_12 (S) Acres of “Land”

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We had an issue last night that I didn’t mention in yesterday’s blog post. With the generator running the microwave/convection oven would not operate correctly. It would run for a few second and then start to pulse. We are not sure what the problem is, but presume it is the microwave and not the generator/inverter, which seem to be working fine otherwise. We won’t be able to diagnose this any further until we get to Tremont RV Park and can hook up to shore power.

We knew last night that the Fulton Farm Market was expecting a busy day today with lots of folks showing up to buy pumpkins and other seasonal items, so this morning around 8:30 AM we fired up the engine and repositioned the coach where there would not be any cars blocking our exit. I also started up the generator to recharge the batteries, and all of the engines running spooked the cats a bit, so they went under the front passenger seat.

The Market was scheduled to open at 10 AM and we were originally thinking of sticking around until 11 AM. By 9 AM it was obvious we had made the right decision to move, based on the activity of the employees, and decided to move our departure time up to 10 AM. They pull wagons with tractors out to the pumpkin patch where folks can pick their own pumpkin, and they were blocking off parts of the parking lot with cones to create pickup and drop-off stations for the wagons that we originally thought we would be able to use as exit paths.

Around 9:15 Linda noticed that the OPEN sign on the store building (barn) was already turned on, so we wandered over to get some coffee. The gal who runs the coffee shop showed up right behind us and put on some decaf to brew. We had a nice chat while we waited, and 5 minutes later we were headed back to the coach with our coffee. We chatted briefly with one of the cashiers on the way out. We made the coach ready for travel and at 10 AM, with cars showing up, we started up and pulled out. No fixed plan.

We turned out onto OH-202 headed south and eventually came to I-70 where we headed west back to I-75 and continued out southbound journey. We had 184 miles to travel today and figured it would take 4 hours with a lunch stop. There was a lot of construction in the Dayton area and again in Cincinnati, but we made it through without any difficulty. Southern Ohio is hilly and northern Kentucky even more so, with a good climb up away from the Ohio River right after you cross at Cincinnati.

I-75 in Kentucky is a very good road with smooth surface. It goes up and down and back and forth as it twists through the rolling terrain, and it was a fun drive with no stress. We pulled in to a rest stop north of Lexington to have a bite of lunch and stretch our legs. Another hour and we were at exit #87 just south of Richmond. We headed west on KY-876 (Barnes Mill Rd) and 6 miles later pulled into the gravel parking lot on the south side of the road across from the Acres of Land Winery. It was 2 PM.

Our parking spot across from Acres of Land Winery, a Harvest Hosts location.

We had looked at satellite images of the site last night, so we knew what to expect when we got there. The driveway in from the road was steep, but we did not bottom out. The gravel parking lot was a long two long parallel rows with a loop around at the end. What we did not expect was the extent to which it was overgrown. It was mostly tall grasses, but it was obvious that this lot had not seen any use in quite some time. We also noticed a large concrete pad at the near end. We found out later that they had a serious fire in 2009, and we suspect that the pad is where the winery was and the gravel lot was where customers parked. All of that activity now takes place on the north side of the road.

We pulled all the way around and back near the entrance. The site was not quite level enough, so I leveled the coach before shutting down the engine. I checked the battery state of charge (SOC) before shutting the generator down. I figured it would be 100% since the generator had run the refrigerator all the way down allowing the Magnum 4024 to just charge the batteries, but it was only at 94%.

Restaurant and Tasting Room, Acres of Land Winery, Richmond, KY.

We opened windows and turned on ceiling fans and headed over to the winery. Acres of Land is owned and operated by Lowell and Katherine Land. Lowell grew up in the white farm house not far from where we are parked, and is the 3^rd generation of his family to farm this property. Originally a tobacco farm, tobacco growing started moving overseas to take advantage of cheaper labor and the Land’s started looking for an alternative crop. The property turned out to be suitable for growing grapes and they converted the farm into a vineyard and winery.

Our coach viewed from a front window of the tasting room.

They charge $2.50 to taste three wines and $4.50 to taste six. We decided to only taste three and to split the tasting. The way they do the tastings is quite different from what we are used to in Michigan and other places. We circled the three wines we wanted to try on order slip and then found a table where we could sit. The wines are served in small wine glasses (brandy snifters?) placed in hanging holders that hold three or six glasses, depending which tasting you ordered. There is a white laminated disk around the base of the holder on which they write the number of the wine from the order form so it is under the corresponding glass. In our case, Katherine brought the wine sampler to our table and chatted with us for a little while. What we liked about this approach is that you could actually go back and forth between wines if you wanted to.

In our case we had their Red Robin, Vignoles, and Late Harvest Vignoles, and sampled them in that order. The Red Robin was sweet but very full and had a lovely mouth feel. The Vignoles was equally nice, refreshing but not thin. Both were well done in our opinion. The Late Harvest Vignoles, however, was a more complex and unusual wine, and was my favorite of the three. As much as I would have liked to take home several bottles of each, we decided to buy just one of the Late Harvest Vignoles for $18.

One of the 10-yr-old Bourbon barrels being used to age a special red wine.

About the time we finished our tasting Lowell was assembling a group for a tour of the winery. We have toured a fair number of wineries, so we did not see anything here that we hadn’t seen before, except for one thing; Acres of Land has a wine that they age in used bourbon barrels. The particular barrels they use come from a Kentucky distillery that used them to age their 10-year-old bourbon. We did not get a chance to taste this wine as it wasn’t on their tasting menu. We might not have liked it anyway as neither Linda nor I care for bourbon or whiskey, but Katherine thought it was a uniquely divine product.

This was our 4^th Harvest Hosts location, and we are big fans of the program, but the challenge for us is to make sure our “free camping” doesn’t turn out to consistently be the most expensive stops we make. We don’t buy things we don’t like, and need is a pretty relative concept, but you can drop a lot of coin on wine very easily. We like the idea, however, of trying wines and other local agricultural products as we travel, and it fits our lifestyle to buy things we can consume rather than “collect” things we then have to find a place for in the house.

Dinner was a nice salad (Swiss chard, kale, and spinach) with carrots, celery, cucumbers, broccoli, tomatoes, peppers, and fresh strawberries with a balsamic vinaigrette dressing. Dessert was another serving of the blackberry pie we bought at the Fulton Farm Market yesterday. Being in the refrigerator for 24 hours had helped it set up so it wasn’t so juicy.

I left the generator off until 8 PM by which time it was down the house batteries were down to 67% SOC. I checked that the Magnum 4024 AC Input was set to 50 Amps and reset the maximum charge rate from 80% to 90%. Ideally the batteries should be brought back up to 100% SOC every time. But the last few percent is done at a low current float charge rate which can take quite a while and is not a particularly efficient use of the generator.

Linda scanned for other-the-air TV channels and found one that was carrying game one of the ALCS between the Detroit Tigers and the Boston Red Sox. We are in very pleasant country, but we are not wandering the in wilderness, at least not yet.

2013_10_06 (N) The House Is Open

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The weather was not what we had hoped for, but it was not as bad as forecast with the really heavy rain slipping just off to our east. We tried to finish our preparations the night before, but inevitably ended up working most of the morning to finish getting ready. But by noon we were relaxing, catching our breath, and waiting for visitors.

Our son, daughter-in-law, and grand-daughter were the first to arrive, so we got to spend a little quality time with “schmoo.” With the comfort of her parents nearby she decided I was not as scary as previously thought. She also discovered that she could crawl quite well on the carpet in the basement. Our daughter, her husband, and his daughter (our 16 year old step-grand-daughter) showed up next, so we had just the locally-based family for a while.

Other visitors eventually came and went throughout the afternoon, and we had a quite a crowd between 2 and 5 PM. A few people called to say they couldn’t make it due to illness, a few others who said they were coming didn’t show up, and a few who didn’t RSVP showed up anyway, so it all balanced out in the end. Everyone seemed to like the new house and many of them also enjoyed finally seeing the bus for the first time. One person noted that the bus was “a big commitment.” I hadn’t thought about it in those terms, but it is an appropriate description on so many levels.

The conversation was brisk, and folks who had never met seemed to make quick friends. The one downside to the open house was that Linda and I did not get to visit very long with anyone as we were continuously busy greeting new arrivals, giving “tours” of the house and the bus, and saying “farewell” as folks left. Keeping up with the food and beverages would have been an added challenge, but our daughter was gracious enough to help with all of that.

The food seemed to be a big hit. Everyone who knows us knows by now that we are following a whole-food, plant-based (vegan) way of eating. I think some of them are unsure (concerned?) about what they will be fed if they come to our house. The fact is that if they didn’t know how we eat, and we hadn’t said anything about the food, no one would have known that it did not involve the use of any animal products. Linda has gotten that good at cooking this way.

The last guests were gone by 6 PM and we spent a couple of hours putting food away and cleaning up dishes. A lot of folks brought a card and/or housing warming gift, which was very thoughtful and quite unexpected, so we spent a quiet hour opening them and making careful note of who brought what. Most of the gifts were consumable, so we will enjoy them without having to find a permanent place for them. The few gifts that were objects were equally appreciated and will find their place somewhere in the house and/or bus.

We were glad to see those who could come, and sorry not to see those who couldn’t, and apologize to those we didn’t invite. There was certainly no slight intended. We will have folks back individually, but the open house allowed a lot of people to form a clear image of where we now live and that should make it easier for them to find their way back here at some point in the future. The open house also provided a hard deadline for us to get sufficiently moved in, without which we would very likely still have had boxes piled in rooms and artwork stacked in the library a year from now.

2013_10_05 (S) Power Wa(r)shing

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The thunderstorms developed overnight as forecast. I woke up around 3:30 AM to the strong smell of coffee, the sight of lightning, and the sound of thunder and rain. Although the two bags of coffee beans we had roasted yesterday were closed, they were not sealed air-tight and the lovely smell had spread through the house. We had the house closed up and the air-conditioning on because of the humidity, which probably helped circulate the smell.

It never sounded like it rained very hard, so we were surprised to find our road flooded in the usual places on our way out to our ham radio club (SLAARC) breakfast in South Lyon. I had my usual dry English muffin with strawberry jam and Linda had her usual dry rye toast with orange marmalade.; and coffee, of course. (We go for conversation, not the food.) The day remained overcast and humid, but there wasn’t any appreciable additional rain.

Since we have now been in S. E. Michigan for 37 years I may have picked up some sort of local speech inflection, but if so I am unaware of it. For most of my life people who did not know me we generally unable to guess where I was from. The reason is that I hail from the St. Louis, Missouri area. That may seem strange given that the Mason-Dixon Line goes right through the middle of Missouri, dividing it in half north and south, with the Ozarks in the southern portion. That’s “hillbilly” country, and southern speech inflections are common there. And while they are heard in the St. Louis area, more now than when I was child, St. Louis speech is distinguished primarily by being indistinguishable, that is to say, very neutral. Add to that the fact that I was raised by an English teacher whose father was an English teacher and whose mother taught Latin (for a while), and you get a very neutral speech. Except for one word…”wash”. For some reason I learned to pronounce it “warsh.” The “r” in that word was my only real speech tell-tale, and it was usually too subtle and too specific for folks to pick up. This brings me to my major task of the day.

While Linda was occupied with cleaning the inside of the bus and the house and making food for tomorrow, I got to use the power washer to clean the lower deck. The basement would not have a walkout feature had the builder piled dirt completely around the basement walls, but they left an area unburied and formed a kind of valley leading out into the back yard. There is a 12’ x 15’ deck set into the ground outside the doorwall, and based on the labeling of the electrical panel, it apparently once supported a hot tub. This lower deck is under part of the upper/main deck and had gotten very dirty over the years. In fact, it was coated with a green growth (mold/mildew I suspect) that was quite slippery, especially when wet, and a bit of hazard. Another piece of neglected maintenance, I either had to clean it or close it off with yellow caution tape.

We have an electric power washer and it was the right tool for the job; powerful enough without being too powerful, and without the hassle of a gasoline engine. I was also pleased to find that the well/pump did not have any trouble supplying the needed raw water. (The outside faucets are plumbed so that well water can be supplied directly to them without going through any of the filters or conditioning equipment.)

The hardest part of this work was being slightly bent over for three (3) hours. The trigger wand requires two hands to control, and is just short enough that I have to bend over slightly to get the adjustable nozzle the right distance from the wood to work effectively. Getting the green stuff off of the wood was really a stripping job not a cleaning job, and I needed the nozzle about 2” – 3” from the surface to get the job done. I found it easiest to clean about a 2’ section of each 6” wide board before moving on.

Linda worked off and on all day making the food for tomorrow since the open house starts at lunch time and runs through the dinner hour. We have an assortment of fresh fruit and vegetables, as well as chips and pretzels, but no tree nuts as one of our guests as a serious air-born tree-nut allergy. We have hummus and she made a vegan “ranch dressing” for dipping.

For “main course” selections she made a vegan chili that she will keep warm in the crock pot and serve on slider buns from the bakery “as needed.” She also made one of my favorite dishes, a chilled garbanzo bean (chickpea) salad that tastes just like egg salad (as best I recall). That will also be served on the slider buns as needed.

For dessert choices she baked eight dozen chocolate mini-cupcakes and frosted them with vanilla icing, all vegan of course. She also made two large dishes of apple crisp using apples from our own apple tree.

Beverage choices include water, sparkling water, sparkling fruit flavored water, a variety of beers, red and white wine, and coffee. If someone wants it, we can also make tea.

We finished up with our days work around 8 PM, a much more satisfying day than yesterday. We had a simple dinner of Linda’s homemade granola with fresh fruit. We went to bed excited about the open house and satisfied with the preparations.

2013_10_04 (F) Craftsmen & Gamesmen

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I read a book years ago titled “The Gamesman.” It was one of those pop social/psychology works that probably isn’t particularly scientific but none-the-less provides an interesting and even useful framework for looking at and possibly understanding the world, especially the world of work. My take away from that book, which still rings true 30+ years later, was that I am a craftsman at heart who kept finding myself drawn into the gamesmanship of the workplace for which, in spite of not liking it, I seemed to have some aptitude. Today was one of those days were a lot actually got done but I didn’t seem to be the one doing it, i.e., not a craftsman kind of day. At least I made a partial recovery when we got home from Lowe’s and I had things I could install: light bulbs, a curtain rod, and salt for the water softener. Such days leave me tired but not in a satisfied way. Some days are like that, but so far I haven’t had very many of them in retirement.

I fixed two of our toilets on Thursday, but one of them apparently isn’t completely fixed yet. I awoke this morning to sound of water running. The flap had not sealed, causing the tank to not fill and the water to continue to run. I have no idea how much water ran into the septic tank, but it was more than should have. To make matters worse, I wanted to start a load of laundry early this morning only to discover that we had zero (0) gallons of water softener capacity remaining. The softener indicated that it was going to recharge today, which meant around midnight based on how it is programmed, so I decided to start the regeneration cycle manually. That was at 7:45 AM. The cycle finished around 12:45 PM. Yup, 5 hours during which I could not do the laundry, or dishes, or much else other than flush the toilets. That’s why it’s set to run at night. More thumb twiddling.

I checked my e-mail to see what the latest chatter was regarding the RV rally / photo workshop we are scheduled to attend. With the federal government shut down we won’t have access to Smoky Mountain National Park (or any other federal facilities) and there was some thought of cancelling the workshop. The problem is that the RV park where all of us are staying doesn’t give refunds and our deposit is 50% of the total camping fee for the week. Since SMNP is closed the RV park was willing to let us re-book for any time during the next 12 months (that they had openings) for only an additional $25. I wish I had to way to make money for doing nothing.

Our specific interest in this workshop is to learn to more fully use our digital camera (Sony Alpha 100) and to learn something about digital image post-processing software. From that point of view, being in the Smoky Mountains in the fall was simply a bonus. While we like nature, and I have always liked doing nature photography, our objectives for the workshop don’t require any specific subject matter in front of the lens.

We also made plans (and reservations) to meet up with Linda’s sister, brother, and his wife after the rally/workshop for a few days of camping, so we were committed to going whether there was a workshop or not. It turned out that some of the other participants had done the same thing, and the final consensus was that the rally/workshop would go on as scheduled, national park or no national park. That was a relief, but everything was up in the air for about 48 hours while this got sorted out.

Keith came by today to cut/trim the lawn. He usually comes every other Tuesday, and normally would have come next week, but we asked him to pull ahead to the end of this week so the yard would look nice for the open house /warming. He saves Fridays for “make up” work in case he gets rained out during the week. That’s happened to him a lot this summer, but he was here as promised and in spite of the threat of rain. It spritzed a little right after he arrived around 11 AM and then stopped, allowing him to get the whole yard done. He always does a good job, and took the extra time today to get his blower out and blow off the driveways and the deck; a nice touch, and much appreciated. But this was work Keith did, not me, so it was his craftsmanship, not mine.

Keith was done about the same time the water softener finished regenerating, so I finally got my load of laundry in the machine and we headed for Lowe’s and Meijer’s for last minute household items and food. We are trying to prep this event so that the only thing we have to get on Sunday morning is ice for beverages. We stopped at Teeko’s coffee shop before heading home. (At Latson Road and Grand River Avenue, between Brighton and Howell, we have a Lowe’s, Walmart, Staples, Meijer’s, O’Reilly’s Auto, Teeko’s, and lots of other small stores.) Teeko’s has become one of our favorite places to get coffee. They stock “green” (dried but unroasted) beans and roast them at time of purchase. They have a very nifty air-roaster that can produce anything from a very light to a very dark roast, but never burns the beans. They have a nice variety of beans from Africa, Central/South America, and islands like Sumatra and Hawaii. They even keep some 100% Kona on hand (we have some at home). This time we picked up a pound each of a Costa Rica Decaf and Organic Guatemalan Nueva.

Linda made a really nice dish for dinner: Fresh beets roasted with balsamic vinegar, grape seed oil, and a touch of sugar and served over fresh kale, wilted and mixed with couscous. I’m sure there were some other seasonings in there, but those were the main ingredients. Roasted beets are a real treat.

Linda has been monitoring the weather forecast leading up to/through Sunday. The rain never materialized today, but it was very cloudy and humid and the high hit 81. Not Michigan’s October best, but nothing to be done about it other than turn on the air conditioning. Thunderstorms are forecast for overnight, and based on the radar it looks like we will finally get the promised rain. Tomorrow will be a big day, with final house cleaning and lots of food preparation. She has some tasty things planned for Sunday.

2013_10_01 (T) Nets, Decks, & Weeds

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Today was deck day 1 of 2. Jim Pipoly has done a lot of painting for us over the last few years. He painted our old house, inside and out, including the garage and the addition over it. He painted the main floor of our new house a couple of weeks after we closed, and six weeks before we moved in. He repainted some walls in the old house after we moved out to make it look better when we listed it for sale. He was here on the 21^st and 22^nd of September cleaning and stripping the deck along the back side of our new house and now he’s back staining and painting it. Today he stained the deck boards using Benjamin Moore TWP116 transparent stain in a “rustic” color. It gave the boards a reddish-brown patina while allowing all of the grain to show through, preserving the look of the wood. Tomorrow he will do the railings using Benjamin Moore ArborCoat, a solid stain (more like a paint) in Marine White, which is very close to the color of the paint used on the Hardy Board house siding.

Meghan (our daughter) came over mid-morning to help Linda weed the planting beds around the house and spread around the remaining bags of red rubber mulch that the previous owners left us. The house didn’t look bad, but it looks better now.

In the ham shack/office I relocated a computer and printer. I also relocated the Netgear 8-port Network Switch (8pNS) and the Linksys Wireless Access Point (WAP). I then brought another printer and Network Attached Storage (NAS) device down from Linda’s desk. I how had everything in the office along one wall except the WAP, and I had the new 100’ Cat 6 network cable running to same wall. This allowed me to reconnect all of the hardwired equipment without any network cables running across the floor, eliminating a potential trip hazard or major equipment catastrophe. I put the WAP on top of a cabinet and used the old 50’ Cat 6 network cable to connect it back to the AT&T Gateway by Linda’s desk. Everything checked out, and the only things left on Linda’s desk are her laptop computer and adding machine (it’s an accounting thing). That will give her more room to work at her desk.

Linda made an ad hoc dish for dinner with beans, rice, and tomatoes and the usual assortment of seasonings. She used the Italian Seasoning she bought some time ago from Milford Spices at the Howell Farmers Market. This blend includes just the right amount of red pepper flakes to add slight bit of “heat” to a dish. She used this seasoning last week when she made the marinara sauce that I liked so much.

Jim finished up as it was getting dark. We took Linda’s laptop to the basement and connected it to the TV/monitor using an HDMI cable. We selected that port as the input and voila, her computer screen was now on the TV. She navigated to her photo directory, started a slide show, and we sat and watched pictures of our summer trip at the rate of 20 per minute (3 seconds each). It sounds fast, but it’s actually a pretty good speed. We are going to set this up for the open house. Linda may try to edit the pictures down to 200 – 300 as that would allow visitors to see all of them in 10 – 15 minutes.

2013_09_28-30 (S,N,M) Gone Fish’in

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No, I have not given up my WFPB way of eating, but one of the things I did on Sunday was to run a new network cable from our main Internet gateway (in the kitchen) to my office (in the basement). I had to pull the cable above a suspended ceiling and then “fish” it up through the floor boards into a wall cavity. There is a special tool called a “fish tape” that is made for this purpose. It’s a thin but stiff piece of metal that is coiled up inside a housing with a small hook on the free end. Because it is relatively stiff, you can push through holes and into wall cavities and other such places until it emerges somewhere, hopefully where you need it to emerge. I have a fish tape (of course) but I can’t find it (naturally) because the garage/workshop will be the last part of our move to get organized. So I improvised, and after several false starts ended using a scrap piece of 3-conductor sheathed electrical cable that was long enough, small enough, and stiff enough to get the job done. But I have gotten way ahead of myself.

As usual, Linda and I went to our South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club (SLAARC) breakfast on Saturday morning. Well, almost as usual; we took two cars this time as Linda was headed to Ann Arbor to babysit munchkin Madeline after breakfast, and I was headed in the opposite direction to do ham radio stuff.

Madeline’s domestic servants (our son and his wife) wanted to attend a wedding on Sunday in Madison, Wisconsin and thought the three days required to drive there, celebrate, and drive back might work out better for all involved if their daughter did not make the trip. They also figured that Madeline would do better in their absence if she was in her own home. Madeline approved of these plans and gave them the requested 3-day pass. Although Madeline’s aunt (our daughter) provides child care one day a week, a 3-day stint, over the weekend, in a house without television would mean no college or professional football, and would have been heroic beyond necessity. This was clearly a job for GRANDMA, who doesn’t have functioning television in her new house anyway, so she wouldn’t miss it. Besides, when sitting the baby, there’s no time to watch TV (or do much of anything else).

Mike (W8XH) and I had plans to work on the new SLAARC website, but first he had to help Bruce (W8RA) set up his new LP-PAN and integrate it into his ham radio station. Working on Bruce’s ham shack is no small undertaking. I’ve never been in the Space Shuttle simulator, but I’ve seen pictures, and sitting at Bruce’s ham station is a pretty good facsimile. It took Mike a couple of hours, but he got it all working. We then headed to his QTH to do the website stuff.

Mike and I are building the new SLAARC website using WordPress with the help of fellow SLAARC member Larry (K8UT), who is a bonafide expert in such matters. A couple of weeks ago we decided to create the new website as a subdomain of the existing website, which is hosted by GoDaddy, and that was an experience in itself. This would make it very easy, however, to later change some DNS entries and have the original domain name point to the new website. Larry did the WordPress installation manually rather than using the automatic WordPress installer that most web-hosting companies have available (including GoDaddy). As a result it has taken longer to get the new site functional, but Mike and I now have a much better understanding of subdomains and an appreciation for some of the complexity that is “under the hood” when using WordPress. One more call to Larry resulted in some magic on his end, and we were finally up and running. We then spent several hours installing, activating, and exploring themes. We haven’t made any final decisions, but we are starting to figure out what questions to ask. While Mike and I are anxious to move this along, we are not under any external pressure to have it ready by a certain date and want to take our time on the front end. While it is relatively easy to change WordPress themes even after a website is populated with content, there is a point beyond which that is still going to involve a lot of work. I like projects, but I don’t like doing projects over (and over, and over …).

I was still in WordPress mode when I got home, so I did some work on our personal website. I created a tab (main menu item) for “Ham Radio” and created a sub-menu item for “SLAARC”. These are just placeholders for now, but will eventually have content. I have also fleshed out the WFPB tab as I start to build out the main menu structure.

Mike lent me an AmpedWireless dual-band WiFi repeater that he wasn’t using and I spent some time Saturday evening and Sunday morning playing with it. It is a very cool device. In WiFi repeater mode it will pick up a 2.4GHz and/or a 5.0GHz WiFi network and rebroadcast it. What’s really cool, however, is that it will pick up a 2.4GHz WiFi network and rebroadcast it as 5.0GHz WiFi network. I have been looking for a device that will do this for quite some time. Our iPads and smartphones are all 5.0GHz capable, so using them with a 5.0GHz WiFi signal offloads that traffic from the 2.4GHz network, leaving it for 2.4GHz only devices. The 5.0GHz band also has a lot more bandwidth than the 2.4GHz band with very few devices using it, so there is less interference and more reliable network connections. Unfortunately, the device did not work well at our house as it appeared to be in conflict with our WiFi thermostat.

Wireless repeaters, access points, bridges, etc. are all designed so that they can be setup and configured wirelessly through a web-browser. In order to accomplish this they map a specific URL to a specific IP address in the 192.168.xxx.yyy range. In this case, 192.168.1.240. Unfortunately, I think the WiFi thermostat also uses that IP address. There may be a way to work around this, but I did not have time to pursue that today. The AmpedWireless device is actually configurable in five different modes. WiFi repeater is the default, but it can be a Wireless Access Point or a Wireless Bridge, or two other things.

As a result of playing with this device, I think I finally understand the difference between various networking technologies. A Network Switch (NS) is a device that allows multiple devices to be connected together using network cables, with one cable going back to the router (where the IP addresses are controlled through DHCP). A Wireless Repeater (WR) is just that; it picks up a WiFi signal and rebroadcasts it (repeats it), usually on the same frequency and channel, but with a different SSID; no cables required. (The Amped Wireless WiFi Repeater can rebroadcast it on a different frequency and/or channel, very nice.) A Wireless Access Point (WAP) generates a WiFi network and is connected to the main router through a network cable. We have a Linksys WAP running now. A Wireless Bridge (WB) is the mirror image of a WAP. It allows multiple devices to be connected to it using cables (sounds like it’s a NS) and then communicates using WiFi with a wireless router or WAP. This allows lots of equipment to be located remotely from the main Internet gateway/router without running a cable between the two locations.

While Linda continued her marathon munchkin duty on Sunday, I worked around the house trying to check things off my “to-do” list faster than they got added. I didn’t succeed, but I did get a lot done. My main focus was my office, which had become the place where stuff was getting piled so we could feel like we had put other parts of the house in reasonably good order. I either needed to get it organized or close it off for the open house. Some of our fellow hams are coming to the open house and will want to see the ham shack (which is also my office), so closing it off from public view wasn’t really an option.

Monday was odds-n-ends day. I continued to try to clean up and organize my office and the basement, installed two new door closers on the front screen/storm door, and installed new hardware (tracks) for the pair of bi-fold doors on the kitchen pantry. It doesn’t sound like much, but it takes all day. I snagged some replacement toilet flappers from Lowe’s, a nice shelving unit for the bedroom from Staples, and a large quantity of ICE Sparkling Water from Walmart. (It’s not my favorite place to shop, but Meijer’s doesn’t carry this product.)

Mid-afternoon there was a knock at the door. It was a representative from a company that is subcontracting with Consumer’s Energy to possibly run a natural gas main down our street. I walked our property with the guy and explained the rather complicated situation that has led to us having two propane tanks and what they implications of that were for us switching to natural gas. I went ahead and signed up after making sure we could back out if we decided this really wasn’t what we wanted to do. As of now, however, we are definitely interested in switching to natural gas. Consumer’s Energy estimates the equivalent cost for a gallon of propane, which is currently $2.00 + or – $0.40, at $0.77. At that ratio, our infrastructure payback would be about 3 years. There is also the added benefit of having a constant supply of fuel without a truck having to come and fill a tank. Value? Priceless.

In the late afternoon I had a nice chat with Joe from EZ*Connector. EZ*Connector is a small company in California that has designed, and manufactures, a keyed, magnetically retained, sealed electrical connector. It comes in 7 and 14 pin configurations for non-military use and is an ideal solution to the problem of connecting a tow vehicle (bus) to a towed vehicle (car). Our current setup requires two separate electrical cables with mechanical or friction latches. The EZ*Connector will provide a much easier and yet superior connection. They are just now bringing a new 14 conductor cable to market and suggested I wait until early November to order.

Linda called to say she would be home around 7 PM. I put water on to boil to make angel hair pasta with red sauce, and she picked up a salad on the way home. She made the sauce last week, and it was fabulous. (I am not normally a fan of marinara sauce, but this sauce has me rethinking that position.) A glass of 2009 Egri Merlot to wash it down, and fresh plums for dessert made a fine conclusion to a long day.

2013_09_23-27 (M-F) Getting Ready

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There is always lots to do around the house when we return from an RV rally, more so since we are still getting moved in to our new (to us) house and trying to get it ready for an open house / house warming. We decided about a month ago to have the house warming as a way to “force” us to accelerate the moving-in process and so far that seems to be working.

Arriving home yesterday we were able to pull in to our pull-through driveway with the car attached, which was very nice. With the added “fines” (sandy silt) material mixed in with the 21aa road gravel, the driveway is now packing together very tightly and easily supporting the weight of the bus. The planned driveway geometry has worked out well allowing us to pull in and out with the car attached. That means we cook hook/unhook the car in the driveway rather than in the street.

Linda babysat for Madeline on Monday while I worked around the house, unloaded the clothes and bedding from the bus, and started doing laundry; not very interesting, perhaps, but satisfying work in its own way. We both spent a fair amount of time on our computers this week, Linda with household accounting chores and RV park research and me with some CEPI work, our website/blog, and websites for several other organizations. Using WordPress to create/manage websites and blogs has really grabbed my interest. I’m not very proficient yet, but I’m leaning.

We hung the last few pieces of artwork for now and spent part of the week opening and moving boxes. Linda was looking for papers we could take to a shredding company and managed to accumulate quite a few boxes of them. At this point we’ve run out of time to open boxes and sort through the contents, so we turned our attention to finding places to “hide” them until after the open house. We’re not there yet, but we are comfortable that the house will be presentable enough by the time it needs to be.

We decided to harvest some of the apples from our apple tree and discovered that a large branch (3-4” diameter) had peeled loose in three places, probably due to the copious amount of fruit on it, the age of the tree, and the fact that it had not been pruned properly (or at all) for years. We don’t know much about fruit trees, but we know that this is not the time of year to prune them. With the tree obviously damaged, however, we decided to cut the branch off and let nature take its course. We took it off in three pieces to make sure we could handle them. The branches of an apple tree tend to get intertwined, especially if it isn’t pruned, so we really had to pull to get the pieces down. That brought lots of apples to the ground besides the ones on the damaged branch. We left the branches and their apples on the ground for the deer and other animals that frequent our backyard.

We collected a large bag of apples and Linda spent time during the rest of the week peeling them, dipping them in lemon, and freezing them. She also made apple sauce and apple bread (both of which were outstanding). She commented at one point that “I am starting to understand why farm wives never got out of the kitchen.” Cooking real food with real ingredients (whole-food, plant-based) is a lot of work. Linda finds the work satisfying, however, now that she has the time to do it, and I certainly find the results satisfying as well. Yummy.

Ed and Betty Burns arrived on Thursday afternoon in their Tiffin Phaeton motorhome and stayed until late Friday morning. This was their second visit in about a month and we really enjoyed having them here again. They have been working at the Middleton Berry Farm and finished their tour of duty on Thursday. I moved our motorhome out of the pull-through driveway so they could pull in and park in a level spot with power.

They got here in time for dinner and Linda put out a nice meal. She served a nice Waldorf style green salad using some of our fresh-picked apples with homemade apple bread. The main course was a lentil loaf with a baked potato and homemade applesauce on the side. I chose the Blueberry Wine from Forestedge Winery in LaPorte, Minnesota to go with the meal. (It only occurred to us later than we had an apple wine from the same winery, which would have really completed our apple-themed meal.) Forestedge Winery is owned by Paul and Sharon Shuster, who are members of our FMCA Freethinkers associate chapter as are Ed and Betty.

Linda made apple crisp for dessert, but none of us had room, so we saved it for breakfast the next day. In addition to the apple crisp, breakfast included Linda’s homemade granola cereal with fresh blueberries, fresh banana slices, and raspberries that we had personally picked at the Middleton Berry Farm a few weeks ago and frozen. A little orange juice and a 50/50 blend of Ethiopian Yirga Cheffe and Kona coffee rounded out the meal.

We decided earlier in the week that we would try Florida for our first snowbird experience. (Snowbird is a term used to describe folks who live in northern climates where it snows and head south for the winter to get away from same. If there is a corresponding term for folks who live in the south and travel north in the summer to avoid heat and humidity, I don’t know what it is, other than perhaps Bridwons. Think about it.) Our decision was motivated by the desire to attend a large converted bus rally in Arcadia, Florida that is held each year from December 26 to January 1st. (The actual rally is Dec 29, 30, 31, but you can arrive as early as the 26^th and departure is the 1^st.) The rally was started by Jack and Paula Conrad, who ran it for the first ten years.

Ed and Betty used to live in Florida so we were eager to draw on their knowledge and experience before trying to book a place or places to stay. Earlier in the week we called the Low-Key Hideaway RV Park and Motel in Cedar Key, but they were not able to accommodate us. We knew about Low-Key Hideaway Cherie Ve Ard’s Technomadia blog postings, and it appears that the place has developed quite a clientele, perhaps in part as a result of Technomadia’s publicity.

At the last two GLCC rallies we had talked at length with Pat and Vicky, who winter in Florida. I also had an in-depth conversation this week with two other fellow RVers (Ed and Al) who winter in Florida and got their thoughts, suggestions, and recommendations. Our friends and fellow H3-40 owners, Chuck and Barbara, have spent the last seven winters in Florida and the last several at Pelican Lake Motorcoach Resort in Naples, Florida. We delayed our return home following the Holistic Holiday At Sea cruise in March so we could drive over from Ft. Lauderdale to see the resort and have dinner with them. It was very nice, as you would expect.

We learned a number of things as a result of this quick “research”. Some of it was stuff we knew, or assumed as a form of common sense, but some of it we did not:

The cost per day generally goes down the longer you stay in one place. The usual breakpoints are week, month, 2-month, 3-month, 4-month, 6-month, and year. (You can also purchase lots, but probably don’t want to calculate the per day cost for that.)
The farther south you go, the more expensive it gets.
The reason for the previous point is the average daily temperate range. In northern Florida it is not unusual for temperatures to drop into the upper 30’s at night, and record lows have been recorded in the teens. That doesn’t happen in Key West, and money tends to follow the pleasant climate.
The closer you are to one of the coasts, the more expensive it gets. You pay a price for beaches and sunrises/sunsets.
No-See-Ums, however, can be a real problem near the coasts, and some folks have very bad reactions to their bites.
If the RV park has “resort” in the name, it will be more expensive, with “motorcoach resort” costing even more, and “luxury motorcoach resort” costing even more than that.
Most of Florida is swampy; being inland or staying at a “luxury” resort does not guarantee that you are not camped in or next to a swamp. Think bugs, snakes, and alligators.
You can almost always rent a deeded site at a higher-end park directly from the owners much cheaper than you can rent it through the park management office. Check the classifieds in the back of FMC Magazine.
Moving every week is expensive and tiring, but gets you access to more of the state.
Staying more than one month at the same place can get a bit boring, but that’s a personal thing.
Some parks are in dense urban areas, others are near small towns, and some are in the middle of nowhere. It’s a shopping convenience versus solitude thing. You can end up having to drive 20 miles or more for groceries if you are not paying attention when you choose an RV park.
Not all parks are “big rig friendly” (even though they will claim they are).
Most parks have punitive refunds polices, so be sure before you know what they are before you book.
Make sure your park of choice is located near things you want to do (hike, bike, kayak, fish, watch sunrises and/or sunsets, or have access to highways so you can visit natural and historic sites in your car, etc.) Tallahassee is not a good base camp for visiting Key West.
Many RV parks are adjacent to a major freeway, railroad track, or airport; sometimes all three. If you don’t think the noise will bother you, you’re wrong.
Some RV parks are gated (if you care).
Whether the residents in a park or nice or not seems to have little to due with the physical appearance and amenities of the place.
There are a lot of older parks with mixed use, i.e., year-round “Park Models” in addition to sites for vacationers and snowbirds.
Check the type/quality of the interior roads and parking pads (concrete, gravel, grass, hard dirt, or sand), it might matter with a big, heavy coach.
The spacing of the sites varies greatly; some parks have sites that are small and close together (but they will tell you they are very spacious).
Find out whether there is any landscaping, especially shade trees around the sites.
Find out whether the roads and sites have trees trimmed up and back sufficiently to not scratch your RV.
Check to see if “lakes” on the property actually have water in them (seriously).
Check on the availability and cleanliness of onsite bath/shower facilities and Laundromats.
Check the availability of onsite activities (which could be a plus or a minus) and facilities such as swimming pools, tennis courts, etc. If you don’t want them, why pay for them?
Find out if the park has pet restrictions, and if so, what they are.
Some parks are 55+ operations, others allow/encourage/cater to families with children. Know which type you are signing up for and make sure it’s what you want.
The photos on the website always look beautiful, but somehow manage to avoid showing you views of the parking sites from a vantage point that allows you to assess all of the factors mentioned above.
Google Earth and other satellite image websites/apps are your best friend and ultimate research tool.

Our goal was to book a park or parks for January and February by the end of the day Friday, but we didn’t make it; too much to ponder and no time to make phone calls. We will get back to it early next week as Tuesday is October 1^st, and January 1^st will only be three months away.

Tom and Tom from TOMTEK HVAC were back on Friday afternoon to finish up repairs on our hydronic heating system. They did not have one of the parts they were going to replace but it didn’t matter as they discovered some additional issues that will require a return visit.

The first thing they discovered was that the propane shut off valve didn’t shut off the propane. We had to turn off the supply at the tank so they could replace the valve before doing anything else. When they removed the propane diffuser cone to clean it and replace the gasket they discovered that the end of the cone had large holes in it. These holes were preventing the propane from burning as efficiently as it should, and if they got bigger could prevent the furnace from working at all. Parts like this for a Weil-McLain GV Gold Series hydronic heating system are not common, i.e., they don’t carry them on their truck or even stock them at their office, so they had to special order it.

As long as they had the combustion chamber open, they went ahead and vacuumed it out. They had me look at it, and it had what appeared to be a couple of inches of rusty debris lying in the bottom, the result of a lack of proper (professional) service over a very long period of time (or perhaps any service at all). They put it all back together and will replace the diffuser cone, gasket, and igniter (along with the part they forgot to bring) when they return next week.

I don’t know if this qualifies as serendipity in the usual sense, but we are lucky that we decided to have the system “serviced” in advance of the start of the heating season. If not, we would not have discovered defects that could have led to a wintertime failure of the furnace with serious consequences for the house.

As I was working at my computer Friday evening an e-mail showed up with the PDF version of the October 2013 issue of Bus Conversions Magazine. The article I wrote on the mid-August Back-To-The-Bricks rally in Clio, Michigan was the cover/centerfold article, the fifth one I have had published in BCM. (See the BCM page of the website for the complete list and information about Bus Conversions Magazine.) That was a nice end to nice week.

2013_09_18 (Wed) Under A Harvest Moon

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I was up early this morning to check e-mail and work on my backlog of blog posts. The WiFi at the Elkhart County 4-H Fairgrounds is excellent; our WiFi Ranger is picking up nine open fairground signals, with five of them quite strong. Even so, WiFi always works better when fewer devices are trying to use it.

A 1948 Spartan and aour1990 Prevost.

Linda was up in time to go to the registration building at 8:00 AM with the intent of reserving one of the pavilions adjacent to where the GLCC chapter is parked. Alas, they were both taken. She and Vicky scouted out the ones that were still available, selected one, and reserved it for our Thursday evening pizza social and business meeting. We will be meeting at the Elkhart Noon Optimists building, 603 Locust St, by the big blue Fish Fry sign. While they were taking care of this I brewed a pot of coffee using two parts Ethiopian Yirga Cheffe to one part Columbian decaf, a very nice blend that cuts down a little on the amount of caffeine. When Linda returned we had a light breakfast of her very yummy homemade granola and fresh orange slices.

Don and Sandy Moyer’s restored 1948 Spartan bus conversion.

Mid-morning Linda, Fonda, and Vicky drove to the Shipshewana flea market, which is only open on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. I took that as an opportunity to wander the fairgrounds and photograph the arrival and parking activities. Today was the official beginning of the 2013 GLAMARAMA and motorhomes arrived all through the day. The arrival and parking process appeared to go quite smoothly, which makes for a good start to a large RV rally. The all-volunteer parking crew put in long hours, but were patient and cheerful throughout.

Elkhart County 4-H Fairgrounds.

While I was wandering around I found Ron and Meredith Walker’s Prevost XL-45. They just joined our GLCC chapter this past summer, but are not camped with us at this rally. Ron is the conductor of the Frustrated Maestros, who are doing several scheduled performances during the rally, so the FM chapter is their primary focus while they are here.

A motorhome approaching the fairgrounds entrance from the east on IN-34 / Monroe St.

They were home but rather busy. A muralist was air-brushing a mural on their rear cap and their front entrance door was partially disassembled. Meredith had me check out the mural and then Ron filled me in on the door situation. The main door handle had failed that morning while he was outside talking to someone, as a result of which he was locked out and she was locked in. They managed to find a technician who was able/willing to climb in a bedroom window and disassemble the door enough to get it open. I looked at the mechanism to see if there was anything I could do to fix it. There wasn’t, of course, but I told them I knew someone who might be willing/able to help.

Welcome to GLAMARAMA at the Gate 5 entrance.

I returned to the GLCC camp to see if Butch would be willing to lend some assistance to fellow GLCC members. He was, of course; RVers tend to be helpful to other RVers when they can, but converted bus owners really tend to look out for one another. We went back over to the Walker’s coach and Butch determined that a weld had failed. While he couldn’t fix the latch on the spot we realized that the whole mechanism could be unbolted and moved out of the way so it couldn’t engage the latch pin on the door frame. Ron did the work, and that temporarily removed the lockout problem until they could get a new latch assembly from Prevost. In the meantime they could lock/unlock the door from inside or outside using only the deadbolt.

The staging area where towed vehicles get unhooked.

When the ladies got back from Shipshewana we pulled our camp chairs into a circle by Butch and Fonda’s MC-9 and spent a relaxing afternoon visiting with our fellow GLCCers. While we were sitting there, Frank and Sandy Griswold arrived in their Prevost H3-45 Vantare conversion along with Dean and Cindy Chipman in their Holiday Rambler Endeavor motorhome. A bit later Scott and Tammy Bruner arrived in their MCI MC-12 conversion. This completed our set of nine GLCC rigs that would be camping together for the duration of the rally. Our chapter had originally requested 8 spots, but the parking crew did a great job of getting nine coaches parked.

The holding area where RVs are queued for entry and escorted to their sites.

During the afternoon conversation someone asked how long we had owned our coach. That’s when we realized it was our 4th anniversary; we purchased our Prevost H3-40 on September 18, 2009. We met the owner at a restaurant in western Pennsylvania, gave him a certified check and got the title. The coach was at Creative Mobile Interiors (CMI) just south of Columbus, Ohio where it had been sitting for about two years. The owner had taken it there for service and then decided to sell it instead of fix it. CMI allowed him to leave it there while they advertised it on their website and tried to find a buyer. I described some of this story in the cover/centerfold article of the February 2013 issue of Bus Conversions Magazine.

A caravan being assembled for entry. They will be parked together.

We eventually broke for dinner and a little quiet time before heading over to the opening ceremonies. Linda made a simple green salad and a bow-tie pasta dish with olive oil, garlic, onions, mushrooms, and sun-dried tomatoes. The Arcturos Late Harvest Riesling from Black Star Farms in Michigan’s Leelanau peninsula was the perfect accompaniment. Their late harvest Riesling and pear wines are two of our all-time favorites.

A different kind of motorhome, called a Class D, with a fancy paint job.

A group of us from GLCC walked over to the evening activities building around 7:00 PM and were greeted with handshakes and hugs by Jon and Sondra Walker, Charlie Addcock, and Jane Roush. That may not sound like a big deal, but it was. Hugs are an Escapees RV Club tradition, not something we had ever seen before at an FMCA rally. When Charlie and Jon were elected to national office they promised a new tone and new direction for FMCA, and it appears they are putting themselves behind that in a very personal way.

The Frustrated Maestros performed from 6:45 to 7:30 PM. The opening ceremonies began at 7:30 PM with Dane Bailey, The Singing Auctioneer, as the master of ceremonies, a role he will be performing for the duration of the rally. We had the usual opening consisting of an invocation, Canadian national Anthem, and U.S. national anthem, the posting of the colors by the local VFW color guard, and the chapter parade. There were 12 chapters officially in attendance. Notably by their absence were the Michigan Knights of the Highway, who formerly ran the GLASS rally. Dane then introduced Jon Walker, the FMCA Senior National Vice-President, who welcomed everyone. Jon was the GLAMA president and FMCA area vice-president until this past July when he was elected to the senior national vice-president office. He and Sondra are well-liked and well-respected within the Great Lakes area, and remained as the co-rally hosts for this event along with Jane Roush. (Jon and Sondra are also members of our GLCC chapter and Jon was our National Director for a while.) Jon announced that we had 469 coaches in attendance, although Vicky told us that one more had arrived. (Pat and Vicky were the official coach counters.)

FMCA National President Charlie Adcock was introduced next and said a few words. Charlie is a very enthusiastic, upbeat guy, as is Jon. Charlie administered the oath of office to Jane Roush, who was elected as the GLAMA president when Jon resigned to take his new national office. Charlie acknowledged the long list of VIP attendees, which certainly helped the rally coach count. The rally was budgeted for a break-even point of 400 coaches, so everyone involved in the planning and execution was very pleased with the turnout. I suspect that many of the VIPs were here as a show of support for this first ever attempt by GLAMA to organize its own rally.

With the opening ceremonies concluded Sgt. Daniel Clark, The Singing Trooper, was introduced. Dan is a former U. S. Marine and retired Massachusetts State Trooper, but has been singing since he was a child. He was clearly a trained opera singer and mentioned that he spent time at Tanglewood. He did a very tightly constructed and energetic show of patriotic and sentimental American favorites, ending with a medley of U. S. armed services theme songs, including the one for the U. S. Merchant Marines. The evening’s activities concluded, we had a leisurely walk back to our coach under a harvest moon.

And that is part of why we go RVing.

2013_09_17 (Tue) To Goshen We Go

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We awoke this morning to temperatures in the mid 40’s. As we had no reason to rush we stayed under the covers a bit longer than usual. Lazy mornings are always a source of consternation for our cats who, in spite of the obvious presence of food in their bowls, expect us to get up at the first sign we are awake and attend to their perceived need for fresh(er) food.

I turned on the electric toe-kick heater in the bathroom to take the chill out of the air, but then decided to fire up the Aqua-Hot instead to warm up the entire coach and preheat the main engine. At a seminar in Gillette, Wyoming this past summer we learned that the Aqua-Hot needs to run with some regularity in order to run well, so this was an opportunity to do that and to check my work from yesterday for leaks. The Aqua-Hot ran quite well, but as I feared there was a small leak at the gasket between the two halves of the check valve. I will try one more time to get a couple of wrenches on this part and tighten it, but if that is not successful I will have to install the new check valve, which would take another entire day. Ugh. I like doing projects, but I don’t care so much for doing them more than once.

We had oatmeal for breakfast, which is always nice on a chilly morning and has a certain staying power for days when lunch is uncertain. After breakfast we got our coach ready for travel while Butch and Fonda did the same with theirs’. We departed Twelve Mile, Indiana a little before noon with Butch and Fonda in the lead and headed for Goshen, Indiana to attend the Great Lakes Area Motorcoach Association (GLAMA) 2013 area rally (GLAMARAMA13).

Our route was IN-16 (Co Rd 700 N) westbound to N Co Rd 600 E northbound to IN-25 northbound to US-31 northbound to US-6 eastbound to IN-15 where we stopped for a stretch break. We moved into the lead and continued northbound on IN-15 to Goshen with Linda navigating based on directions provided by the rally organizers. We had been advised by FMCA to follow the directions they provided in order to avoid a bridge that was out on the main road to the fairgrounds from the west.

We tend to travel on Intestate and US highways, but have also found State highways to generally be good for travel. Even county roads are OK if we know in advance we will not encounter weight, height, or width restrictions. This is where it is helpful to have local information from folks familiar with the roads. It also helps that our Rand-McNally RVND7710 GPS is configured to know the parameters of our rig, so we are able to travel with some confidence that we will not encounter unexpected obstructions. As an added feature it also provides real-time traffic information, especially near larger metropolitan areas.

The trip up IN-15 brought us quickly into the outskirts of Goshen with heavy, slow traffic. This presented a challenge for us as the buses do not accelerate that quickly and the lights do not stay green for that long. It was important that I not lose Butch at a light as Linda had the detailed directions for getting to the fairgrounds. As we came to downtown Goshen there was construction with lanes closed and traffic rerouted through barrel lined jiggy-jogs. We pressed ahead none-the-less as we needed to go east on IN-4, just three short blocks beyond the construction. We made it through but it was the kind of situation that adds a bit of stress to the usual pleasure of driving the coach.

We continued east on IN-4 looking for Co Rd 29 southbound. Along the way we spotted an official looking sign that said “RV Rally and Fairgrounds” with an arrow pointing down a nicely paved road to the south. I slowed down and considered taking this road—even though the turn looked a bit tight—until I noticed the “NO TRUCKS” sign on the adjacent pole. We are never sure whether or not we are a “truck” so we generally decide one way of the other depending on what is to our advantage. In this case I took a “pass” and continued on down IN-4 to CR-29. We headed south on CR-29 until it ended at CR-34 where we turned westbound back towards the fairgrounds. Our directions said to enter at Gate 3, but as we approached the northeast corner of the fairgrounds an orange-vested parking crew member motioned us to turn in. I hesitated again, but decided to follow his directions. The parking procedures are usually well thought out and the crews usually know what they are doing. The whole arrival/parking experience generally goes much more smoothly if you simply follow their directions.

(It is worth noting, however, that as with a boat or airplane the driver of an RV bears the ultimate responsibility for it’s operation and is the ultimate decision authority with respect to that operation. If the driver is unclear or uncomfortable with what parking crew are asking them to do, the correct response is to STOP, ask for clarification, and not move until they are certain they understand where they supposed to go and are comfortable (willing and able) going there. Arguing with parking crew, however, is counterproductive, and ignoring them and moving the RV is potentially dangerous. Parking crew are there to move large numbers of RVs efficiently and safely to planned parking areas and drivers should always give them their full cooperation but never surrender their ultimate decision authority.)

We arrived at the rally venue a little before 2 PM. The usual procedure is to unhook a towed vehicle and drive it, separate from the motorhome, to the site or a designated parking area. And so it was today. They had changed the entrance gate to channel us into an area where there was more room to unhook our towed vehicles. With the cars unhooked, we proceeded to the holding area where we queued up and waited to be escorted to our site. For this rally parking areas had been reserved for chapters so they could park together without having to arrive together (caravaan style). We were part of the reservation for the Great Lakes Converted Coaches chapter (GLCC). The parking crew was friendly and efficient and we “wheels down” (an aviation term) in our site by 2:30 PM with the coach set up and ready to use by 3:00 PM.

The reserved parking was an unusual feature of this rally, and an attempt by GLAMA to be as accommodating as possible in spite of the added complexity of this arrangement. If you have not been to an RV rally, you won’t fully appreciate how nice it was to be able to park with “our group” without having to coordinate our arrival with everyone else. Generally if RVs want to park together at a rally they have to arrive together in a caravaan. The only aspect of their parking that is usually pre-arranged is the area of the facility they will be in based on the hookups (electricity, water, sewer, generator use) they have paid for as part of their pre-registration. Even with a small number of RVs caravaning can be a challenge. Wile some rallies provide an arrival area where RVers can meet up and form their caravan, many rallies do not have the space for this. In that case, the RVers first have to find a place to rendezvous. (Walmart is a popular choice, especially if folks are staying overnight there anyway.) They then have to make their way to the rally site while trying to keep the group together at stop lights (which isn’t possible with more than two rigs). GLAMA is to be applauded for trying this new approach.

Goshen is the county seat for Elkhart County, Indiana and the home of the Elkhart County 4-H Fairgrounds. We had been to this facility once before for The Escapees RV Club Escapade in September 2010 and it is a nice facility for an RV rally. Access to the fairgrounds is good, and the interior roads are more than adequate for large motorhomes (and converted buses). The campgrounds can provide 30 Amp power and water for a large number of rigs (800+), and there are also some full hookup, 50 A sites. There are many buildings and covered outdoor areas available for entertainment, vendors, seminars, and meetings. And yet all of this is neatly contained in a surprisingly compact space that makes the venue very walkable while the paved roads make for good driving of toads and courtesy transportation golf carts.

This is the first Great Lakes Area Motorcoach Association (GLAMA) rally being organized by the officers and volunteers of GLAMA. For many, many years the Great Lakes Area Spring Spree (GLASS) rally had served this purpose. Held at the Berrien Springs, Michigan youth fairgrounds, GLASS was a nice rally at a nice venue held over Memorial Day weekend and consistently drew 800+ motorhomes until the last few years. Unlike most FMCA area rallies, however, the GLASS rally was organized by the Michigan Knights of the Highway, the 4th FMCA chapter ever formed, and the oldest FMCA chapter still in existence. MKH handled the registration process, and any financial benefit (or loss) went to them, not GLAMA.

GLAMA takes in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Ontario Canada, so obviously it does not include all of the states that border on the Great Lakes. Even so, it covers a large geographic area with lots of FMCA members. GLAMARAMA 2014 is also slated for the Elkhart County 4-H Fairgrounds in Goshen, but the intent is to then rotate it to each state and Ontario for two years each. That will entail more work for GLAMA organizers, but will open up the chance for more people to attend and build a stronger sense of ownership across the association.

Today was early entry day, so there were no official activities beyond arrival and registration/check-in. Pat and Vicky Lintner were already parked at the GLCC area as Pat is the GLAMA VP for Indiana and part of the rally organizing committee responsible for all of the rally specific signage. We pulled in next to Pat and Vicky, followed by Butch and Fonda. Mike and Laurie Minnick pulled in shortly thereafter in their 1968 MCI MC-7 bus conversion. Don and Sandy Moyer then arrived in their 1948 Spartan bus conversion.

[Note: The Spartan bus was built for three years, post World War II, in Sturgis, Michigan. The owner/president of the company was the chief test pilot for the B-25 bomber. All of the engineers and craftsmen came from the aircraft industry and the bus was designed/built much more like an airplane than a motor vehicle. Only 57 Spartan buses were built and most of them ended up being used outside the U. S., including some used to make a 12 hour daily run from Damascus, Syria to Baghdad, Iraq and a 12 hour run back, making it the fastest bus line in the world at the time. The Moyer’s bus was the last one built, a 28 foot model. It was destined for a bus company in Wisconsin but they never took delivery. It left the factory as a seated coach, was driven out of the factory, and the front tires came off the ground because it was too heavy in the rear end. Within two years someone had purchased it, taken out the seats, and had it converted to a motorhome. Many of the details suggest that it was “professionally” done, but the Moyer’s have not been able to track down who did the conversion. It was eventually parked and left to rot for 35 years until Don and Sandy rescued it. Based on their research there are no more than 12 of the original 57 buses still in existence and theirs’ is almost certainly the only motorhome. Don worked 8 hours a day, 7 days a week, for 18 months to put it back in usable condition. It is a truly unique RV.]

GLCC reserved space for eight motorhomes and the other three planned to arrive tomorrow. The chapter will have more members/rigs in attendance than that, but they will be parked elsewhere. George and Sue Myers are parked within close sight of our group, but are located for their convenience in running the golf cart courtesy transportation service. Don and Kathy Crawford from Ontario are in the VIP row as Don is a past president of GLAMA, which also entailed being the national vice-president representing the Great Lakes Area. Ditto for Jon and Sondra Walker, who was the GLASS National Director until he moved on to become GLAMA President. Jon was elected the FMCA Senior National Vice-President this past summer at the FMCA national convention in Gillette, Wyoming, so the number two national FMCA officer is a GLCC guy. Ron and Meredith Walker, who just joined our chapter, are also here but are parked with the Frustrated Maestros. Ron is a retired K-12 music teacher and is the conductor of the FMs.

Linda made something new for dinner: firm tofu slices pan fried with onions and Bar-B-Que sauce. She served it on a sesame seed bun with a side of sweet corn on the cob and some Sam Adams Cherry Wheat beer to wash it down. Sometimes simple is best.

2013_09_01-04 Driveway Success, Raspberries, And Old Friends

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Sunday September 1^st found us at our son and daughter-in-law’s house for a Labor Day family pot luck along with our daughter, son-in-law, and step-grand-daughter. Grand-daughter Madeline handled the crowd pretty well, but still was still wary of Grandpa Bruce, so I had to be content with mutual admiration from a distance. She is starting to crawl and pull herself up to a standing position, and is fascinated by books, especially ones she can try to eat.

We awoke Monday morning (Labor Day) to overcast skies and the threat of rain. We had planned to drive to Middleton Berry Farm near Ortonville to pick raspberries and decided to go in spite of the weather. Ed and Betty, our RV friends, were working/staying there and we had said we would try to stop by. The rain never materialized and the overcast skies made the picking experience more pleasant.

Neither of us had ever picked raspberries, or anything else other than apples, pumpkins, and Christmas trees. We enjoyed the experience, collecting 12 pints of fruit between us. At $4.00/pint it seemed expensive until we checked raspberry prices at the grocery store and Door-to-Door Organics and saw them ranging from $5 – $6 for 6 ounces. We didn’t weigh our pints, but Linda estimated that it would take three of the 6 ounce contains to match one of our pints.

It seemed appropriate that we were laboring on Labor Day, even though this is the one day of the year that labor typically doesn’t labor, but rather relaxes and celebrates importance those who labor and the work they do. Although we have been sourcing fresh fruits and vegetables from local farmers markets when we can, it was very satisfying to personally harvest even a small portion of our own food from a living plant. It also gave us an appreciation for those who do this kind of work for a living. As we were checking out we also bought a fresh pepper and tomato.

When we got back to the house Linda washed, dried, and froze all put three of the pints of raspberries. With that task initiated, we turned our attention to the pull-through driveway. It had not rained for the past several days, and it was time for the BIG TEST. We unplugged the electrical power from the bus, pulled the chocks, fired it up, and backed it out of the driveway and down the street, positioning it to drive in to the pull-through driveway. Linda watched the tires as I drove in, and seeing nothing more than tread marks I brought in, across the pad, and out the other side, back on to the concrete driveway. Success!!!

We inspected the pull-through driveway. In some places there was no evidence that the bus had just been there, in others only tread marks, and in a few spots a slight channel of not more than 0.5 inches. Phil had told me previously that compaction of up to 1 inch might be possible but would indicate that the driveway was finally locking together, so we were very pleased with the result. I pulled the bus out and around again, but this time I tried to go back and forth over slightly different paths on the approach and then again on the parking pad area. I did not pull the bus all the way this time, but got it lined up on the pad with Linda’s help and parked it with the entrance door opposite the front door of the house.

I e-mailed Phil Jarrell (Precision Grading) to give him the good news. Phil has been an absolutely outstanding guy to work with, standing behind his work, and doing what was needed to fix what turned out to be a problem with the load of 21AA road gravel used in the project. Besides building this pull-through driveway for us, he dug up and repaired our septic tanks and regarded an area in the back yard to help move water away from the area outside out basement doorwall. We plan to eventually put up a bus barn to house the motorhome, and we plan to have Phil do the site prep, driveway(s), and final grading.

Linda spent Tuesday baby-sitting Madeline while I worked around the house, trying to clean up and arrange the ham shack/office and get all of the technology hooked up and working. I made good progress, but I didn’t get it done. It’s never done. I took time out to have a long chat with my best friend from high school. J. C. has lived in Olympia, Washington for years with his wife, Julie and their three girls, but we have managed to stay in touch. He was my best man at our wedding and I was his best man at theirs. In the early years we corresponded by letter with an occasional phone call, but that was in the days before cell phones and “unlimited local and long distance” plans. Eventually it was by e-mail. We tried instant messaging, but it doesn’t work well for me. We’ve even Skyped once or twice, but it requires broadband to work well, and we don’t have that at the new house. We’ve even had an occasional but all-too-rare face-to-face visit. I drove to Ypsilanti to meet up with Linda and our good friend Kate de Fuccio for dinner. Kate is a former colleague from my educational service agency days, the graphics designer for the agency and a very talented photographer. She is also a kindred spirit traveler, excellent researcher, and perhaps the most considerate person I know. We don’t see her enough.

Kate had suggested Nirmal Indian Cuisine in Ypsilanti and Linda had checked out their menu online, which has become standard practice for us. Nirmal has several vegan dishes, and others that can be made vegan, so we agreed to give it a try. They also serve chicken, but their specialty appears to be goat. They place is a bit “preachy” about the health benefits of Indian food, but the way they do it is kind of innocently cute and we enjoyed that aspect of the place; it’s true after all, and we are sympathetic to the sentiment. Most importantly, the food was excellent, and the staff was very attentive. We had a leisurely dinner which was fine with us as it gave us lots of time to talk. We adjourned to the Starbucks just up the street and continued our conversation.

Wednesday was errand day for us. We picked out stain and paint colors for the rear deck, which Jim Pipoly is going to redo later this month. Jim did all of the painting on our old house and new house. He’s the only guy we use, and friends and family use him too. When you find a good contractor you stick with them. We dropped off old prescription and over-the-counter drugs at the Livingston County jail, where they have a special “no questions asked” collection barrel. The Howell Recycling Center is only open on Wednesdays and Saturdays, so we stopped there. We don’t have curbside recycling like we did in Farmington Hills. We’ve been recycling for so long that it doesn’t feel right to throw things in the trash that can be recycled so we gladly paid the $22 annual membership fee. We picked up some drawer cabinets for the office, a free-standing cabinet for the basement bathroom (which has no other storage), and unpacked the wine refrigerator and plugged it in. We always seem to have just enough bottles of wine that they can’t all go in the regular refrigerator so they end up in the pantry where they take up space we need for other things. They are not cooled, which is bad for storage, but even worse in terms of limiting our choices when we decide we want to open a bottle. It’s one of those things I’ve always wanted and it just wasn’t that expensive. I am now trying to figure out where the popcorn machine will go in the basement rec room. After dinner Linda continued to work on finding an RV park/campground where we can meet up with her brother and his wife in October and I worked on configuring our e-mail SpamExperts and updating this blog.

2013_08_27-28 Babysitting And Our First RV Visitors

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Linda has signed up to babysit our youngest grand-daughter, Madeline, on Mondays so our son and daughter-in-law can attend to their professorial duties at the University of Michigan. (Our step-grand-daughter, Katie, is 16 and does not need a sitter.) However, Linda sat on Saturday the 17th. This week she sat on Tuesday because of our Monday dental appointments. Next week she is going to sit on Tuesday because Monday is Labor Day. Like I said, she is babysitting on Mondays.

We both left the house early, Linda for Ann Arbor in rush hour traffic and me for Dearborn in rush hour traffic. As retired people we are not supposed to be in rush hour traffic; it tends to spoil that special, relaxed mood that is the hallmark of the happily retired. Morning rush hour traffic headed south on US-23 into Ann Arbor is always bad. Morning rush hour traffic headed into the northwest suburbs of Detroit on I-96 is always worse. I was late for my 9 AM dental appointment, but only about 10 minutes. I won’t be making any more 9 AM appointments in that part of town.

When I was done at the dentist in west Dearborn I headed for Ann Arbor, looking forward to spending some quality time with my grand-daughter. As I was nearing Ann Arbor I got a call from W. W. Williams in, where else, east Dearborn, letting me know that my special order part was in. Life really is all about timing. I continued my journey to babyland. When I walked in the front door, Madeline was sitting up in the middle of the living room playing with Grandma Linda. She turned, looked at me, and started crying. You can’t take anything an 8-month old does personally, but it wasn’t quite the reception I was hoping for. She got herself all worked up. Linda tried feeding her, but she was not to be consoled, so we took her for a walk in her very spiffy stroller.

We peeled back the sunshade so she could turn her head and look up at me, which she did frequently. She stayed calm for the whole ride, and even babbled for a while, apparently satisfied that I was at least doing something useful. Or perhaps I am less scary when viewed upside down? As soon as we got back to the house, however, she got herself all upset again. Having no other plans for the afternoon, I made my exit and drove back to Dearborn to get the special order part for our bus. Linda told me later that Madeline settled down as soon as I left and had a nice lunch. It won’t always be that way, of course, and it’s not a contest to see who wins. Eight month olds are spontaneous, irrational beings, and you just have to accept that and work with it as best you can. That’s why she has parents, aunts, and grandmothers.

By the time Phil was done working on the driveway on Monday evening he had mixed 14 tons (yes, that’s 30,800 pounds) of sandy silt into and on top of the 6 inches of 21AA road gravel that forms the top layer of the pull-through driveway. What we really needed at that point was a good, soaking rain and starting late Tuesday evening and overnight into Wednesday we got our wish. The rain helps the fine particles work their way down into the gravel and lock it together to form a dense mass that will not spread out when driven on, even by a heavy vehicle. At least that’s the theory. I drove on it again with the car Wednesday morning and it seemed to be packed pretty hard.

The first test of the pull-through driveway came when the UPS truck showed up with our Centramatic dynamic wheel balancers for the bus. He pulled the truck right up on the pull-through driveway and backed it out with no difficulty. That was a good omen. The next test came when Ed & Betty arrived around 1:30 PM in their Tiffin Phaeton motorhome. They unhooked their car just after pulling onto our street as I needed them to be able to maneuver the RV to get it parked. They were also going to have to back out when they left and you cannot do that with a car attached to the rear end of the rig. I met them at the end of the street, led them to our house, and got them positioned to turn into the pull-through driveway. Betty drove their car and parked it in our regular driveway. Ed gave me one of their walkie-talkies and I guided him in to the pull-through driveway with voice and hand signals. Their motorhome tires did not even leave visible tracks! Finally, success. Their rig has 6 tires and weights about 33,000 pounds, so the weight on each tire that is similar to our bus, except that our front tires carry a couple of extra thousand pounds each. Once they were parked and settled they came inside and we quartered a small, round watermelon and had that as a light lunch/snack.

We had the pull-through driveway built for our own use as a convenient place to park the coach while we load/unload it. We installed an electrical outlet so that we could also run the refrigerator and maintain the batteries while it was parked there. We plan to eventually have a “bus barn” to store it in, but for now the pull-through drive is where it will live when we are home. That meant that we might also want to run the air conditioners while it was parked, so we installed a full “50A” RV electrical service since that is what our coach is designed for. We also had in mind, however, that it would be nice to have RV friends be able to come for a visit and have a level place to park with some nice shade and decent electrical service. We also have water available, but we do not currently have a way for folks to dump their holding tanks. We eventually hope to be able to dump ours using a macerator pump connected by a garden hose (reserved for that use only) to a fitting on the first septic tank. We can’t use a normal gravity drain hose because we have to pump the tank contents uphill to the septic tank lid. If we get this to work, guests could do the same as long as their rig is equipped with a macerator pump.

Some of the RV clubs we belong to allow members to list their home or place of business as available for no-cost overnight stays. FMCA calls these “Stop’in Spots” and the SKPs include them in a list of free and low-cost camping. There is also a program called “Boondockers Welcome” that our friends Butch and Fonda joined. We are members of Harvest Hosts, but can’t be a host site as we are a residence not a business.

Ed and Betty originally planned to stay two nights, but they are on their way to some temporary work at the Middleton Berry Farm, a pick your own (PYO) operation east of Ortonville, Michigan. They have worked summers there for some years, usually during the strawberry season. At one time they owned a strawberry farm in upstate New York and were the secretaries of the National Strawberry Growers Association. Ed has a PhD in plant pathology and has done extensive extension service work as a plant pathologist. The owners of Middleton Berry Farm needed Ed & Betty’s assistance ASAP as the raspberries have come in very well this year.

We did our usual first time visit thing and gave them a complete tour of the house, yard, and bus. We got to see their motorhome as well, and spent some time trying to tune in over-the-air TV stations with their roof antenna. The only station we could get was FOX out of Detroit, so Ed turned the system off and put the antenna back down.

Ed and Betty are pretty avid cyclists and have a pair of very interesting tricycles. They are Spike models made by Trident Trikes and purchased from Craig and Linda Current of http://www.boomersbentsandbikes.com in Florida. It’s a two front, one rear wheel design with disc brakes all around. The two front wheels steer and the central structural member is hinged to allow the rear wheel to fold up between the two front ones for storage. They got the 24-speed gearing option. I test drove Ed’s and Linda test drove Betty’s and we both found them very comfortable. Linda can’t ride a bicycle because of occasional balance problems related to her loss of hearing in her left ear, so a tricycle or quadcycle is her only viable option. At this point in my life, I would just as soon have the stability of a 3-wheeler as well. Another alternative for us would be a side-by-side 2-seater, which might be a lot of fun, but would probably preclude either of us going for a solo ride.

We sat and talked like old friends and enjoyed a bottle of Pinot Grigio. Eventually Linda and Betty set about making dinner. Betty had prepared a “vegan cheese” out of cashew nuts and served it on Saltine crackers. It was very good, and it reminded Linda that she had purchased a vegan cheese book on our last Holistic Holiday At Sea cruise, but had not yet used any of the recipes. Linda prepared a nice green salad. The main course was quinoa with mushrooms and Swiss chard. She served it with a side of fresh corn, cut off the cob. We opened at bottle of the 2009 Egri Merlot to go with dinner. This wine is a little sweet for red wine aficionados, but it is one of the few red wines I will drink. It lacks any hint of tannin, and is full-bodied enough to stand up to the earthy grain/mushroom/greens dishes that Linda often prepares. After dinner we sat on the back deck for a while and continued to enjoy our Merlot. The mosquitoes appeared about the same time we were ready for dessert so we went back inside and enjoyed the last of vegan chocolate cake Linda had made on Monday served with fresh strawberries. It was still as moist as when she baked it and you would not know it was vegan. We washed it down with the end of the Merlot, which also goes very well with chocolate cake and strawberries.

The rest of the evening was a free- and far-ranging conversation about life, travels, kids, health, careers, and interests. We looked at maps and old copies of Wilson’s Free And Low Cost Camping directories and talked about getting large rigs into National Forest campgrounds, which Ed and Betty have done successfully on numerous occasions. Being full-timers, they are by necessity knowledgeable and skilled when it comes to finding places to park for the night.

20130819-26 E-mail Problems

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It seems there is less to blog about when we are at the house, or perhaps there’s just less time to do it. It’s not that we are less busy; it’s just that what we are doing seems potentially less interesting. Besides the usual chores that go with owning a house, I spent the last week dealing with our pull-through driveway, ham radio stuff, and a serious e-mail problem.

By Wednesday the 20^th it had become clear to me that we were not getting replies to e-mails we had sent out; not a couple of e-mails to a couple of people, but lots of e-mails to lots of people. Most of these were e-mails to people who normally reply in a timely manner, and they were e-mails seeking information or continuing a conversation, and thus replies were expected. I started making phone calls and sure enough our e-mails had been received and replied to. We never got the replies, and the senders never got bounce-backs; the e-mails just vanished into cyberspace. In one case I sent a single e-mail to two recipients, both of whom had gmail accounts. They both replied. I got one reply and not the other. We also had a couple of folks send us e-mails while we were on the phone with them, but those e-mails never arrived. Not good.

I opened a support ticket with our hosting service and spent the last week trying to communicate with their off-shore technical support people. I don’t have prejudice towards off-shore support, but in this case they turned out to be neither sufficiently technical nor supportive. Every time I updated the support ticket I got a reply from a different person. I explained repeatedly and in considerable detail the difficulties we were having and they repeatedly sent replies apologizing for the inconvenience, asking me to send them information I did not have, performing simple but irrelevant tests of our e-mail accounts, and then informing me that everything appeared to be working fine. Arrrgh. As of this post the problem persists and I have lost any hope of it being resolved. I hope to accomplish this with minimal downtime or disruption of service. Our apologies to anyone who was affected by this; we have not been ignoring you and we now know that you have not been ignoring us. We will be moving our domain to a new registrar/hosting service at the end of this month.

We have a tower that sits at the east end of the house. It was already installed when we bought the house, and I estimate its height at about 38 feet; not that tall by ham radio standards, but tall enough to treat with respect if you are going to climb it. It’s an older design and has obviously been there for a while. It has an over-the-air (OTA) TV antenna on a rotor at the top. The rotor is not connected to a controller and the coax is not connected to anything inside the house. There is also a Direct TV satellite dish (single LNB). The cables from that are also not connected to anything in the house. The previous owners left the SAT-TV receiver behind, but it is obsolete. The base of the tower is set in concrete but the tower was not secured anywhere else. On Friday we rigged up a couple of support arms and attached them to the side of the house in anticipation of climbing the tower on Saturday to remove the old antennas and install our 2m/70cm ham radio vertical antenna.

On Saturday we went to our ham radio club (SLAARC) breakfast in South Lyon. It’s always good to visit with this group. Many hams are tech savvy about a lot of things besides amateur radio so I got to bounce our e-mail problem off one of them. Thanks Larry (K8UT). After breakfast Linda and I went to Mike’s (W8XH) QTH (location) to look at his ham radio tower as we are trying to figure out what to do for base station antennas. He has a Heights Tower with a motorized fold-over base. It is a very nice all-aluminum tower and a very nice installation. Nice antennas, too, but that’s another story.

Mike then came to our house and brought his professional grade climbing harness. We got it adjusted to fit me and I climbed up as far as the roof, probably 10 feet off the ground. (Our tower is only an inch from the gutter.) As I started up the tower from the roof, the tower had more movement than I was comfortable with, so we abandoned the climb. I removed the old Direct TV antenna, which was at my shoulder level when standing on the roof, and installed our dual band VHF/UHF (2m/70cm) vertical ham radio antenna at the same height. The dual-band is lower than I wanted and very close to one of the tower verticals, but it was the best we good do at the moment. We routed the coax to the back deck, connected it to our Icom 7000 go box, and started looking for 2m and 70cm repeaters. We were able to activate the K8VJ 2m repeater in South Lyon without difficulty, as well as the Livingston County LARK 2m primary repeater. We were also able to talk to two guys on the Clarkston 2m repeater, which, according to the ARRL repeater directory that Mike installed on his smartphone, was over 22 miles away to the northeast. Not bad for 2m on 50 watts with a less than ideal antenna location. We tried a number of other repeaters but were not able to raise them.

While we were out taking care of ham radio business during the morning, Phil (our pull-through driveway contractor) brought a large load of sand (silt, technically) to the house, pulled the top 6 inches of 21AA road gravel out of the new pull-through drive, and mixed in the sand as he put it back. As I noted in a previous blog, our bus got stuck in the driveway a couple of weeks ago and had to be winched out. The problem turned out to be an inadequate amount of “crusher dust” in the 21AA road gravel. Without a sufficient amount of fine particles, the larger stones don’t bind together and pack to make a hard surface that resists blowout and further compaction.

Mike spent the rest of the day at our house helping us with some computer issues. He is a retired HP tech and now has an active business of his own working on personal and business computer systems and networks. By the time we were done it was dinner time, so we treated him to dinner at Olga’s in Brighton. Thanks Mike.

Sunday is our day to go to the Howell Farmers Market. The fruits and vegetables are now plentiful and we picked up an assortment of yummy things. We also got some pointers from Marjorie about apples and pears as we had discovered just a couple days earlier that we have an apple tree and a pear tree, both of which are laden with fruit.

On Sunday afternoon I used our Honda Element to “roll” the pull-though driveway. The car only has about 1,000 pounds on each tire, so it is in no way equivalent to driving the bus, which has 7,000 lbs on each of the front/steer tires, 5,000 lbs on each of the four drive tires, and 3,750 lbs on each of the two tag axle tires. Still, the car did a nice job of compacting the surface. Phil had suggested that I carefully pull one of the front tires of the bus onto the pull-through driveway, but even after rolling it with the car I was nervous that it wasn’t locked together quite as much as it needed to be. I had also heard from Ed & Betty Burns that they would be arriving on Wednesday in their Tiffin Phaeton, so I was anxious to make sure the driveway would support their motorhome. I discussed it with Phil Sunday evening and he said he had a plan and would check in the morning to make sure it was going to work. He was confident, however, that Ed & Betty would not encounter any driveway difficulties.

Monday saw us in west Dearborn for our summer dental checkups. One of my old fillings was starting to separate from what remained of the tooth, and I was informed that it was time to get a crown. They had a 9 AM appointment slot available the next day, so I signed up. Dental work doesn’t bother me the way it does some people. The sooner it’s fixed the better.

Jim and Kristine Gullen came over for dinner on Monday, the first time they have been to the new house. Linda made a mushroom risotto using Farro, a wonderful, ancient, high-protein Italian grain that is earthy, slightly nutty, and has great “chew”. She used mushroom “broth” instead of stock, of course, but that just added to the earthiness of the dish. She served the risotto with a side of mixed green and “long” beans lightly sautéed in olive oil. We got the long beans from an Asian vendor at the Howell Farmers Market who told us they are usually stir-fried. How long are they?; about 2 feet, on average. They taste like green beans although subtly different. Linda also made vegan chocolate cake that was excellent and served it with fresh strawberries. Jim and Kristine brought a couple bottles of wine and we had a wonderful visit over a lovely meal.

Phil came back late Monday afternoon and added some more sand to the edges of the pull-through driveway and also to where it ties in to the concrete driveway. He had borrowed a compactor device that mounts on the arm of his backhoe and used that to compact the driveway. I don’t know about Linda, Jim, or Kristine, but the sound of Phi’s equipment working was music to my ears. The song was “Our bus ain’t gonna sink no more.”

2013_08_16 (Fri) BTTB Rally – Day 2

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We had another cool night overnight that was great for sleeping. 7:30 AM found the coffee brewed and the bagels, fruit, muffins, and Danish pastries awaiting the rally participants. This isn’t a “fancy” rally in a fancy place, but it sure is a nice one.

Mike Mullen’s Flxible (on right), the only one at this rally.

Two more buses showed up today; Mike (GLCC vice-president) & Mary Ann Muller and Mark (CCO president) & Diane Reid. Linda took off with a group of the women to search out garage sales, but came back empty-handed. (She is not a garage sale person.) Over the course of the morning bay doors were opened on various buses and small groups of (mostly) men could be found peering deep inside. These sessions are sometimes for the purpose of seeing/admiring someone’s latest handiwork, and sometimes for the purpose of trying to help diagnose a problem and fix it if possible. There was some of both today. On Wednesday, for instance, someone blew a transmission hose just as they were pulling into their parking space. With the help of some of the other participants, a new hose had been custom made by a local supplier and installed, tested, and verified as operational in less than 24 hours. Today several guys worked on diagnosing a severe vibration problem someone in the rear of a GM 4104.

Bill Gerry’s Harley Davidson with Leyman trike conversion. Bill is in the center of the photo, directly behind the bike (dressed in black, of course).

Mid-late morning Bill Gerry showed up on his Harley Davidson Leyman trike conversion. He left the Toronto, Ontario area around 6:00 AM for the 4.5 hour trip plus several fuel stops. As you can see in the picture, it’s a gorgeous machine. Bill is the de facto “ring leader” of the Canadian contingent that usually attends this rally, but he and Karen could not come this year because of a 50th wedding anniversary party being held tomorrow for some of their best friends back home. (Karen stayed home to help with the preparations.) Still, I think it says a lot that Bill thought it was worth driving 9 hours round trip to hang out with all of us for a few hours. Such is the attraction of the bus conversion community, and the camaraderie of those who choose to be part of it. As mentioned yesterday, Dennis and Bernadette did make it to the rally in their Class B, so our Canadian friends were represented.

Late morning conversations in the pavilion.

Everyone was on their own for lunch today, so Linda and I had some sun-dried tomato hummus wraps with onions, lots of onions. Because we knew we would only have a 20A connection, Linda planned the meals we would have to provide for ourselves around not having to cook things. With the way we eat, however, “no heat don’t mean no eat.” It was a bit warmer by lunchtime than the last few days, and the cold dishes were particularly satisfying under such weather conditions.

Since most of the rally participants were now on site, I decided to bring out the copies of the February 2013 issue of Bus Conversion Magazine and the May-June issue of The Gypsy Journal to distribute to those who don’t already subscribe to them. We left home in early June with about 60 copies of the BCM issue and picked up about 100 copies of TGJ in Gillette, Wyoming. We have been carrying them with us every since and passing them out at campgrounds and rallies. After today’s distribution we have less than 10 of each left.

Almost everyone was present for the roundtable discussion, which lasted two hours.

At 1:00 PM (Ed time) we circled up the chairs for our roundtable discussion. This has been a regular Friday feature of the rally since it began. We had 20+ people in the circle, 30 total in the pavilion, and almost everyone participated. Someone was having a problem with a 2-year old leather chair that was peeling, and the group helped problem-solve how to deal with the vendor, who was being very reluctant to make good on the situation. We ended up on speaker phone with them, and made it clear that 30 of us were listening to the conversation. By the end there seemed to be a greater willingness on the part of the vendor to try to make the situation right.

Other topics of discussion included electrical shorepower and how to build/use a combiner box to plug a “50A” connector into two smaller capacity outlets (30A, 20/15A). Some of us indicated that we also carry long, larger gauge extension cords with 50A RV/marine twist lock connectors that have the L1 and L2 pins internally jumpered. There’s no magic to this—20A is 20A—but it does allow power to be applied to both legs of the coach’s electrical system so that everything onboard is able to receive electrical power (except for any 240VAC devices). That doesn’t mean you can run everything; 20A is still just 20A after all.

We had an extended discussion about supplemental braking systems. While everyone present indicated that they use one, there were several different types represented, and questions about each of their methods of operation, and opinions about their relative merits. Like any other vehicle, buses have brake systems designed to safely stop their GCWR (Gross Combined Weight Rating). This is the maximum amount of weight the bus is designed to move and stop, including anything it is towing. Most states and provinces require supplemental braking for anything being towed that weighs over a certain amount, with 1,500 pounds being a common specification. A major consideration is break away situations, in which the toad breaks loose from the bus. Many supplemental braking systems are designed to apply the car brakes hard and keep them applied in this situation.

Several discussants had issues with their pneumatic systems so those were put forward and discussed. At lot of things on buses operate on air, including suspensions, brakes, accessories, and even engine throttles. The universal reality about air systems seems to be that they leak, so the issue is never IF, but HOW BAD? Many air leaks are small enough that you can live with them, but not always.

The subject of Coach-Net came up. Many FMCA motorhome owners have Coach-Net emergency roadside service policies. What the policies cover is actually fairly limited, but does include towing (a huge benefit for a bus or large motorhome owner), fuel (if you run out), and telephone technical support. If you need a roadside repair they will try to get the right person to your location to do it, but the cost of the repair is not covered. Several of our GLCC members had recently had their service canceled, in spite of not having made any claims. The reason they were given was that Coach-Net had changed their policy and would no longer cover buses (specifically?) that were more than 40 years old. Pat indicated that he had talked to Jon Walker, a member of GLCC and the recently elected FMCA National Vice President, and that the contract between FMCA and Coach-Net had ended as of July 1 and not been renewed. The rally participants who were affected by this had no problem signing up for Good Sam Emergency Road Service.

There was a question about solar panels (photovoltaic). The question generated a lot of comment, but no definitive recommendations. It was a systems sizing question that was simple to ask, but not simple to answer without specific analysis and calculations. Finally, several rally goers reported on recent, successful service experiences and gave positive recommendations for the service providers.

After the roundtable ended around 3 PM Bill said his farewells and left for Toronto. Folks returned to their coaches, resumed their conversation groups, and returned to their “bay watch” patrols and repair work.

L-to-R Gordy, Marty, and Glenn cooking up the burgers and hotdogs for dinner.

Dinner this evening was classic summer fare; grilled hotdogs and hamburgers with the fixins’, potato salad, baked beans, and potato chips. Some raw veggies were left over from the other night as well. We supplied our own tofu hotdogs, which Glenn grilled up for us very nicely. We garnished them with fresh raw onions and mustard. Potato chips and raw veggies rounded out our meals, which, while not exactly whole-food, plant-based, were definitely vegan.

Prepping the buffet line. There were a few young folks at the rally, although not as many as in past years.

Not long after dinner Bill Foley stopped by. Bill is a CCO guy who lives nearby but was not able to attend the rally with his bus. Bill has a bus barn that Don has been trying to arrange for some of us to go see. I ended up at Ed’s coach and had a long chat with Ed, Bill, and Don. We discussed bus barns, but we also talked about the situation with our driveway at some length.

I eventually returned to our coach to sound of the nearby race track. We have heard these vehicles at various times most days, presumably making practice runs, but we assumed tonight were actual races. Some of the rally participants started playing bingo in the pavilion around 9 PM. They were done by 10:15 PM, after which conversation continued along with the racing. RVers, or at least the ones we hang out with, tend to be up early and turn in early. This particularly rally, however, tends to keep folks up a bit later, especially on Friday and Saturday evenings. We are gathered out in the country, not in a commercial campground or state park, so we have only our fellow rally participants to answer to, and no one objects to conversations extending into the evening. Eventually the rally site quieted down and the only thing that disturbed the nighttime silence was an occasional train. (For those who don’t know, it is a requirement that wherever two or more RVs are gathered, there must be an active rail line nearby. If there isn’t, I think there are special crews that get dispatched in the middle of the night to quickly build one.)

2013_08_13 (Tue) Computer Updates And Family Time

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I spent most of the day updating various computers. One thing you can say for Microsoft is when they issue updates for their operating systems they really issue updates. On multiple computers it can become an all day process. When combined with the time I spent updating our GPS units, I did very little else for the last couple of days.

Linda had a noon appointment to get her hair cut and then headed to Ann Arbor to babysit our grand-daughter. One of my planned chores for today was to wash the bus. It was very cool all morning and was still cool by mid-afternoon, but as warm as it was going to get. I forced a regeneration of our water softener to make sure it would be able to keep up with the washing. I mixed a 4 oz bottle of SUDS that we got as a sample from a vendor at the FMCA rally with a couple of gallons of water. I hosed off a small section of the rig, applied the SUBS solution with a soft brush, and rinsed it off. It took a couple of hours to do the whole coach, but its parking spot in front of the house is shaded. Between the softened water and the shade I did not have any issues with water spotting.

Tomorrow is our daughter-in-law’s birthday, so I drove down to their house. I got there around 6:30 PM, just in time to see our grand-daughter before she went to bed for the evening. She is almost 8 months old, and was very tired from playing with her grandmother all afternoon. Our son picked up vegan Indian food for dinner. We had a delicious meal and great conversation with the big people, a lovely evening all-in-all.

Back home we were getting ready to turn off the lights and go to sleep when were heard coyotes howling, the first time since we moved to the new house. That’s something we never experienced in the suburbs. It was a bit eerie, but it was a thrill.

2013_08_08 (Thu) Settling In

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Today was a settling in kind of day. Linda spent much of it working at her desk on accounting and tax returns, with a break for grocery shopping, cooking, and a walk on an absolutely perfect Michigan summer afternoon.

I spent most of the day at my desk as well trying to diagnose our non-functioning AT&T home phone line and filing an online repair order. I caught up on correspondence, backed up and moved computer files around, and got back to the task of writing articles for Bus Conversion Magazine. I also finally got to be present when the backup generator started up at noon for its weekly self-test.

For dinner Linda prepared a dish using quinoa, black beans, corn, onions, and garlic in a little bit of vegetable broth and seasoned with salt, pepper, cumin, and cayenne pepper. The dish had just a hint of heat but let the flavors of the ingredients come through. She served it along side baby bok choy that she quartered and roasted. Bok choy has a taste/texture suggestive of Brussels sprouts or cooked cabbage, but more subtle. I drizzled mine lightly with white vinegar for a little added zing. A small glass of Summer Sunset from Leelanau Cellars completed the meal. Latter we had fresh strawberries for dessert.

2013_08_05 (Mon) A Quiet, Easy Day

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Today was our last full day on the road for this trip. We celebrated by sleeping in, waking up slowly, and having pancakes for breakfast. Yum.

Main Street, St. Ignace, MI.

The WiFi at the Tiki RV park was surprisingly good, and I worked on various computer chores, including updating the roster for our FMCA Freethinkers chapter. Whenever a new member joins, I update the roster and send it out with a request for any corrections. I typically get corrections from a dozen folks, plus or minus, and end up having to re-issue the roster. And that’s OK; we are a small chapter and I understand that keeping me informed of these kinds of changes is not a high priority for anyone. What I hope to do someday is make the roster/directory online and interactive, i.e., allow members to log in and add, change, delete their own information, access the directory, and print a copy to take with them if needed.

Part of the waterfront boardwalk in St. Ignace.

Late morning we drove into the main part of St. Ignace, parked, and walked the town. Street parking is metered, but just behind the buildings on the west side of the street is free public parking. There is a wonderful boardwalk that runs along most of the waterfront from one end of town to the other and it is lovely place for a stroll on a 66 degree day with partly cloudy skies and very light winds, which is just what we had!

The St. Ignace public marina.

Even though this is the height of the tourist season in Michigan, Monday in St. Ignace was fairly quiet. We stopped at The Garden, one of the two additional restaurants opened by Java Joe’s. We wanted to try It as they offer various vegetarian and vegan dishes, but they were not open. Perhaps they only get enough of “us” on weekends to justify being open.

The boardwalk to the marina entrance and light.

No problem, Linda fixed some of the Farro dish that was left over from the other night. She cut up some Swiss chard, lightly steamed it in mushroom broth, added it to the leftovers with a little garlic powder, and heated it up. Dishes made with Farro seem to hold up well as left overs, and may even improve by being allowed to sit and meld the flavors. Was it good? Would I being writing about it if it wasn’t? It was great!

Linda in front of the Colonial House.

Java Joe’s 3^rd restaurant in town is Jose’s Cantina. We went there for dinner and had taco salads with “soy grillers”, hold the cheese. It was good enough for the price. We had a table with a view of Lake Huron and Mackinac Island, which was nice. The place had a steady flow of customers. Our server, Shantel, was from Manchester, Jamaica, and most of the other wait staff was also Jamaican. We remembered that on our last trip to St. Ignace we chatted with one of the workers at Java Joe’s (a cook, we think) who was from Jamaica. What we didn’t know then, but we do know now, is that when the last cruise ships stop visiting Jamaica sometime in April, the tourist dollars dry up as well. Still, it is a bit surprising, and at the same time delightful, to encounter Jamaicans in St. Ignace, Michigan in August.

A unique RV. (My picture is crooked, the trailer was fairly level.)

We have seen some unusual RVs along the way, but this was a first. It’s a pop-up pickup truck camper mounted on a flatbed trailer. It has front and rear porches, with the front one serving as storage. I chatted with the owners briefly, and they said they had reached the age where getting it on and off the pickup truck was just too difficult. I gave them a copy of The Gypsy Journal and dropped off eight more copies in the campground office.

2013_08_04 (Sun) Return to Tiki

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Today we drove US-2 from Ironwood, Michigan to St. Ignace, Michigan, a distance of approximately 317 miles. We were on the road for about 7 hours, including rest/food/fuel stops, and lost an additional hour to the time zone change from CDT to EDT. That’s more miles and more time than we prefer, but we have done 400 mile days when we needed to. 200 – 250 miles seems to be the sweet spot for us at this point, at least until we get better driver/passenger seats in the coach and seal up the wind leaks around the windshield and entrance door. (The bus is 23 years old after all.)

Most of US-2 through Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (U.P.) is good, 2-lane road with occasional 4-lane divided and 5-lane (center turn) stretches. There are also lots of passing lanes, which are needed due to the hilly nature of the western U.P. and the volume of traffic in the central and eastern U.P. There are places where the surface is rough and bouncy, but on balance it’s a good road to drive. The speed limit is 55 MPH, but you have to slow down for the small towns. Even so, we actually prefer traveling on US and state highways rather than Interstates when we can. And this route gets us home in a reasonably direct way while keeping us as far away from Chicago, Illinois as possible. My life will not be incomplete if I never drive in, through, or even near Chicago in the bus ever again.

[ A note on Michigan drivers: speed limits appear to be lower bound suggestions. One of the nice things about this, is that if you are driving a large vehicle at the posted speed limit, when you get to a passing lane the cars (and trucks) behind you don’t screw around; they step on the accelerator and get around you. By the time you get to the end of the passing lane, all (or at least most) of the traffic that was behind you is now in front of you. We did not encounter any blatant bone-headed drivers today, and that helped make for a better and more pleasant drive for us. ]

We had excellent weather for this leg of our trip. It was 45 degrees F when we woke up this morning. We pulled out of Curry Park, the city-owned RV park/campground in Ironwood, Michigan at 8:19 CDT. There were enough discrete clouds to make the sky interesting and the high temperatures only made it into the upper 60’s. There were plenty of hills and turns in the road, but the bus ran well; it really likes this type of weather and roads.

Although we are trying to learn to be more about the journey than the destination, the reality is that you have to end up someplace each night. Most of the small towns we went through yesterday and today had signs about not parking overnight on streets and the one Walmart we checked in Ashland, Wisconsin did not allow overnight parking due to a city ordinance. We took a chance last night (no reservation) and it worked out. The sites at Curry RV Park were first-come, first-served, but we were in early enough to snag a “full hookup” site even though we only needed/used the electrical connection. These sites were the only ones that would accommodate our size and turning radius. That made four nights in a row of boondocking, at least with respect to water and sewage, and three nights for electrical. We passed several casinos and more than few RV park/campgrounds. Tonight, however, we wanted to make sure we could get into a RV park/campground with legitimate full hookups as we will need to refill the fresh water and dump the waste tanks before our final leg back to the house on Tuesday. We also wanted to be positioned so that one more driving day would get us back to our house in southeast Michigan.

Our target was the Tiki RV Park on the north end of St. Ignace, Michigan. We have stayed at the Tiki before when we had our Itasca Sunrise motorhome, and we liked the park. We also like the town of St. Ignace, which sits at the north end of the Mackinac Bridge (Big Mac). St. Ignace is a nice town on the water facing Mackinac Island which lies close by in Lake Huron due east of the town. It has a marina, which is always interesting and pleasant. There are plenty of things happening during the summer tourist season. Like all of the U.P. it never feels crowded and is an unpretentious place.

The five mile long Big Mac connects Michigan’s Lower and Upper Peninsulas, bridging the Straits of Mackinac (pronounced Mack in naw), and is high enough in the center span for very large lake freighters to pass under with lots of room to spare. We like both of Michigan’s peninsulas, but they are very different. The U.P. is much more sparsely populated and has a cooler, harsher climate (especially during winter). Trees and other vegetation tend to be shorter, and in many places it has an “edge of wilderness” feeling.

In spite of previous good experiences, we had an issue with our site at the Tiki. We had walked to the site to make sure the coach would fit and not encounter any obstructions, but we did not walk the entire route to get to the site. Big mistake. The narrow gravel road took us around a sharp curve that did not leave me room to maneuver when I found myself facing low overhanging branches from a fir tree. Pressing forward, the branches dislodged the top half of our broken searchlight. Once parked, I had to get the ladder out, climb up, and redo the rescue tape that has held it together since I did this same temporary repair in Gillette, Wyoming back in June. While I was up there I discovered that the limbs also scratched the paint on the driver-side of the roof. The scratches are not visible from the ground, but that is not the point. I consider the RV park responsible for this damage as Linda very clearly explained to them the size of our rig, both when making the reservation and when checking in. We, however, should have known better than to take their word for it that our coach could make it to and into the site without any difficulties. We are learning, sometimes the hard way, that we should never discount or dismiss even a minor concern that either one of us has about a situation, and to never take someone else’s word that our coach “will be just fine.”

Once settled in our site, we walked down the hill to Java Joe’s. Java Joe’s is on the main road at the bottom of the hill leading up to the RV park, and is great place to get coffee, breakfast, etc. It’s about 1.5 miles from there into town, a flat and very walkable distance on a nice day. On our previous visits here the place was hopping, but it was mostly empty and quiet this evening. The owner is a “parrot head” and has a Jimmy Buffett concert playing in an endless loop on a TV monitor the last time we were there. It was still playing. We went for coffee as we didn’t have any this morning, but ended up getting a couple of dinner salads, sans cheese, as we had not had sufficient greens for the last few meals. Since the last time we were here the owner has opened a second location just down the street called The Garden that serves “vegetarian and vegan friendly” food. We were told they are only open Friday through Monday, 11 AM to 3 PM, so we will probably have lunch there tomorrow. BTW: I’m not sure what “vegan friendly food is.” Either it’s vegan or it’s not.

When we got back to our coach we opened the bottle of Yellowstone Howlin’ Pear wine we purchased at the store in Fishing Bridge, Yellowstone National Park and each had a small glass. It was a very acceptable wine given that we did not get to taste it before we bought it. As with accepting other people’s opinions about RV sites, purchasing wine without tasting it first is generally a risky proposition.

We will be at the Tiki RV Park for two nights and then head for home on Tuesday morning. We have nothing planned for here except to relax and enjoy the local area.

2013_08_03 (Sat) Across The Northern Tier

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Today was a travel day, and an uneventful one at that (the best kind). Linda spent some time last evening and again this morning researching places for us to stay tonight somewhere between Ashland, Wisconsin and Iron Mountain, Michigan. The choices appeared thin; the Walmart in Ashland didn’t allow RVers to overnight due to a city ordinance, and there did not appear to be a Walmart anywhere in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. (I know, I know, that doesn’t seem possible. It turns out there is one in Ironwood, and probably others we haven’t discovered yet.) As our route eventually put us on US-2 we settled on a city RV park in Ironwood, Michigan, just over the border with Wisconsin on the north side of the highway. Based on available online information, this park appeared to have a variety of sites from “full hookup pull-thru” to “no hookup tent site.” (Note: Full hookup in this case meant 20A electric power, barely sufficient to recharge our house batteries, and run the refrigerator, and run the air compressor.) The sites were first-come-first-served; no way to make a reservation. And being a city park, there was no one to call for information on a Saturday, the city offices being closed. So we did something very unusual for us, we started driving with no guarantee that we would be able to get a site, much less one that our coach would fit in, or if the park was even still open.

We left the Forestedge Winery (very reluctantly) at 9:19 AM CDT and headed south down MN-64 towards Akeley where we picked up MN-34 heading northeast to Walker. MN-34 ends at MN-200 in Walker and we headed east on MN-200 from there. MN-200 appears on the map to run straight east-west, but in actuality it bends to the left and right, and goes up and down, through lovely forests and past bodies of water, large and small. The forests eventually gave way to shorter, scruffier growth and marshy areas that reminded us a great deal of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. MN-200 ended at US-2 and we merged on headed southeast to Duluth, Minnesota 52 miles away.

The roads were generally very good, with smooth, quiet surfaces, and we rolled along at 55 MPH except for the occasional idiot who seems unconcerned about pulling out in front of a 41,000 pound vehicle traveling fast enough to turn their sub-compact into a splotch on the highway. No, we didn’t hit anyone, but one of the things I do not like is having to suddenly get on the brakes. Buses do not stop quickly (in a short distance) when traveling at highway speeds. I know that–and I generally try to drive very, very defensively–but I have no control over what other motorists do, and I find in particular that it is not always possible to anticipate what a stupid/oblivious person might do next. One or my other pet bus peeves?; drivers who wait until the passing lane is about to run out and then decide to try to get around you. One &%$*(#! did that to me today and he ended up facing oncoming traffic. I am not going on the shoulder and risking putting a 41,000 pound bus in the ditch for someone that stupid. I did not encounter the most common peeve situation today, however, as it involves entrance ramps on limited access highways; people who don’t get up to speed and pay not attention to the traffic that is already on the highway and into which they are required to merge, i.e., get up to speed and blend in.

BTW: The weather today was almost perfect; blue skies with lots of white puffy clouds (enough to create plenty of shaded areas on the highway) and afternoon temperatures in the low 70’s.

Paul had told us to just stick with US-2 east and we would soon find ourselves in Wisconsin, and so it was. As you approach the northwest corner of Duluth MN-194 splits off to the left and US-2 goes to the right. Signs make it very, very clear that trucks are to use US-2 to get into, around, or through Duluth; they are NOT to get on MN-194. One of the interesting things about driving an motorhome that’s really a commercial bus, is there are times when you are not a truck (such as highway weigh scales), and other times when you are, such as any road situation that involves height, width, length, or weight restrictions. Toll roads are a toss up; some go only by axles, thus treating you like a commercial semi, while others have special fares for RVs and the things they tow. Also, if you have a Jake Brake (we don’t) local noise ordinances prohibiting their use apply to you the same as they do to commercial vehicles. If you don’t believe it, try using yours.

US-2 takes you to I-35 south of Duluth. From I-35 you travel a couple of miles north and onto the Bong bridge which takes you into Wisconsin, or 10th state. It’s a fairly high bridge, but an easy one to drive over (sorry Nick).

The drive on US-2 across northern Wisconsin was a bit tedious. The road is rough and noisy in a lot a places, and each town you go through seems to stretch out along the highway for miles and requires you to drive 30 or even 25 MPH. It will be nice to be back in Michigan where speed limits are almost universally ignored.

We arrived at the Wisconsin/Michigan border around 3:15 PM CDT, returning to our state of origin. As advertised, we found Curry Park right where it was supposed to be, and it was open for business and mostly empty. We spotted a pull-through site with good ingress and egress and made pulled in. It appeared to be an electric only site, so Linda filled out the form and put the required $15 in the envelope. Turned out that it was full-hookup site, which is $20 per night and the camp host came around later to collect the extra $5. Even though we only needed the electrical hookup, we were not about to move.

Our neighbors on either side appeared to be off doing whatever it is RVers do in the late afternoon, so we ran our generator for a while to at least bulk charge the house batteries before switching to shore power. Linda went for a walk around the park and I put the finishing touches on the blog posting for yesterday while keeping an eye on our batteries.

We have to be very thoughtful about how we use the coach and its various (electrical) systems when we only have a 20A electrical connection. Not cooking dinner avoids having to use power, so Linda (the smartphone/Google queen) found a well-reviewed restaurant in town that was a four block walk from the park on the same side of US-2, and had pizza on the menu; Federico’s MIKES. Winner. Well, maybe. Since we don’t eat dairy products we order our pizza withOUT cheese. That is guaranteed to get some strange looks and even questions, and the outcome is always a bit of a gamble. (We had a fabulous vegan pizza in the Black Hills of South Dakota back in June but we have had others that just were not very good.) The waitress took our order—16” thin crust, no cheese, with onions, mushrooms, olives (black and green), and pineapple—and a young man in the kitchen who obviously loved making pizza threw himself into the task. He even came out part way through our meal to see if we liked it. We did, and we told him so. We saved a few pieces for lunch on the road tomorrow as it will be another travel day for us, boxed it up, and walked back to the park.

Tomorrow we have another travel day, and then plan to stay put for a couple of nights before our final leg back to the house.

2013_08_02 (Fri) To Hibbing And Back

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The west is high, dramatic, stunning, stark, “gorgeous”, awe-inspiring, etc. It is also dry, hot, and barren in many places. Northern Minnesota and the Great Lakes Region in general, are beautiful, wooded, lush, green, cooler, and wetter. Not as good for the sinuses, but every place has its tradeoffs.

We fired up the generator at 0630 CDT to recharge the house batteries after using them all night to run the refrigerator, auxiliary air-compressor, and any small miscellaneous loads that were still on. I always like to bring them back up to full charge, and I have been determining that by waiting until the remote control/display shows that the charger has gone into “float” mode. Yesterday I figured out how to find the State Of Charge (SOC) meter, so I can now monitor directly the SOC of the battery bank.

One of the outside buses…This must be the place!

Since Paul and Sharon offered to let us remain boondocked at the winery beyond the normal 1-day Harvest Host period we decided to drive the car to Hibbing, Minnesota to visit the Greyhound Bus Museum. I have wanted to visit this museum for a while but Hibbing, quite frankly, is not really on the way to anywhere. Besides the museum Hibbing is home base to the Hull Rust Mohoning iron ore mine, largest open-pit mine in the world. Up the road at Tower is an underground state park that houses an advanced physics laboratory where scientists are catching quarks.

The Greyhound Bus Museum, Hibbing, MN.

The drive to Hibbing took 2 ½ hours. We spent two hours at the museum. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but we felt like we more than got our monies worth for the $5 adult admission. The museum is housed in a nice building with seven buses inside, a nice display of Greyhound artifacts, and lots of information about the origin and development of Greyhound, specifically, and bus transportation in the U.S. more generally. They have another six buses or so in a fenced lot behind the building. Most of the buses are open so you can go inside them. Here are some photos:

They started with a Hupmobile.

The museum has lots of model buses.

An early route map. It didn’t take long for the business to expand beyond Hibbing.

Uniforms for drivers came early and changed over the years.

A 1956 PD4501 Scenic Cruiser. This is the iconic Greyhound Bus.

A DD 8V71 with numbered parts and a key.

The Detroit Diesel 8V71 series engines are pre-computer control machines and are still in operation today.

(See http://www.technomadia.com ; they have just had theirs rebuilt and have reported on the experience.)

All of the inside buses lined up in a row, oldest to newest, far to near.

The lobby features an old time ticket office diorama.

An MCI MC-12 that operated in Canada. I have never seen an MC-12 converted into an RV.

An MCI MC-5 specially made for use in Saudi Arabia. Note the double roof. Its purpose was to “shade” the main roof and dissipate heat to help keep the interior cooler.

A pair of 1947 ACF Brill buses in a terminal mockup.

Greyhound used Yellow Coach buses in the 30’s and some ACF buses, but eventually used GMC buses (many different models) until GM stopped making them in the 1970’s. Somewhere along the line Greyhound started using MCI buses (MC-5, 7, 9, 12, and later 96- and 102- series) and over the years bought and used a lot of them. The MC-5 and MC-9 were particularly popular with bus converters. Commercial converters, like Custom Coach in Ohio, also did MC-9, as well 102- series, conversions.

An Eagle Chassis and Complete Bus.

Greyhound also ran Eagle coaches. These became popular with some do-it-yourself motorhome converters because, unlike the GMC buses, the skin was non-structural and could more easily be removed and replaced. The chassis (skeleton in picture) was made of mild steel, so it was easy to cut and weld to replace rusted pieces or make modifications. The problem with mild steel, of course, is that is very prone to rust.

A Caterpillar 170 ton mine hauler with 10.5 ft diameter tires. They also make a 240 ton with 13 ft diameter tires. I don’t feel as bad now about replacing the 315/80R22.5 Michelins on our rig.

The Hull Rust Mohoning Mine Visitor Center is just a mile up the same little road that leads to the bus museum so we drove up there. To get to the visitor center we drove through a city park that had nice shaded RV electrical hookups. It was empty except for one tent. We saw the same thing Wednesday evening in Buffalo, North Dakota; a nice little city park with nine RV sites with electrical power, and it was empty. These parks seem to run $15/night, cheaper by the week or month. Not that we would want to stay that long, but the price is right for what you get, especially if there are things you want to do in the area. The challenge is finding these facilities.

The 2,200 HP 16 cylinder Cat engine that moves the mine hauler.

The wheels on the mine haulers are driven by electric motors. The Caterpillar power module consists of a 2,200 HP 16 cylinder turbo-charged diesel engine that drives an electric alternator (the large cylinder lower left in photo) and a radiator and cooling tank. The power module with radiator, as shown, weights 28,000 pounds. In operation it burns 28 gallons of diesel fuel per hour. The hauler can reach a top speed of 30 MPH while carrying 170 or 240 tons of mined material. I think the 6 MPG we get from out bus is pretty good!

A small portion of a big hole in the ground, currently about 600 feet deep.

We spent about 45 minutes at the mine looking at the equipment displays and the big hole in the ground. Our GPS says it’s a huge lake, and at one time it had water to a depth of 325 feet, but it is still an active mine and they pumped most of the water out so they could work. Part of the original town of Hibbing had to be moved because of this mine, and it was the split into two pieces that led to the formation of the business(es) that became Greyhound Bus Lines and successor companies.

Hibbing is also the home town of Bob Dylan so Linda pulled up some information about his childhood home on her smartphone. It was supposed to be at 7^th Avenue E (Bob Dylan Avenue) and 21^st St., but we could not locate the house. On the drive up and back we passed through Grand Rapids (Minnesota, of course) and discovered that it was the birthplace of Judy Garland. Everybody is from somewhere.

An interesting note about Hibbing and the mine; if you look at the Minnesota state highway map and peruse the area around Hibbing, you will see brown lines that demarcate the boundaries of the three watersheds that are found in Minnesota, namely: the Mississippi River, the Atlantic (via Great Lakes / St. Lawrence Seaway), and the Hudson (Bay). About two miles NNW of the mine visitor center and viewing area is the point, unique in North America, where these three watershed boundaries meet. Depending on exactly where a raindrop falls, it will end up in one of three very different places (assuming it doesn’t evaporate and soak into the ground).

[18 L We were parked next to this aspen grove while at Forestedge Winery, a most appropriate name for the place.]

We were parked next to this aspen grove while at Forestedge Winery, a most appropriate name for the place.

We got back to Forestedge Winery before they closed and sampled some of their Plum wine, which we had somehow missed yesterday. Sharon had left for Iowa for her mother’s 93^rd birthday so we invited Paul to dine with us and he accepted. Linda made a nice salad and a Farro dish with sun-dried tomatoes, kale, onion, garlic, and Italian seasonings. Paul brought a bottle of Headwaters Red wine, his rhubarb and chokecherry blend. The meal was yummy, the wine was just right, and the conversation went on for quite a while. This is one of the reasons we retired and decided to hit the road. It isn’t just about spectacular scenery and historically interesting places; it’s about encounters with spectacular and interesting people. Thank you, Paul and Sharon, for your hospitality.

2013_08_01 (Thu) A Short Drive And A Winery

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Jasper on the couch.

We only had 168 miles to travel today to get from Red Trail Vineyards in Buffalo, North Dakota to the Forestedge Winery in Laporte, Minnesota so we were in no particular hurry to leave. I was up by 7 AM, however, so I could turn the generator on and top up the house batteries before we hit the road. I also wanted to add air to the driver-side front tire as I noticed yesterday when I checked the Pressure Pro Tire Pressure Monitoring System that it was starting to read a little lower than I would like.

Juniper by the windshield.

Since I was up I took the opportunity to take some pictures of the property to replace the ones I inadvertently did not take yesterday and updated yesterday’s blog post with a few of them. I also took some pictures of our two cats, Jasper and Juniper, who have been with us on this whole trip, but have not received the attention they deserve in this blog.

Adding air to the tires accurately, however, requires that they are cold and all at the same temperature. It also requires the main engine to be running to get the air tanks up to 120 PSI. We were parked facing north, and by the time I got around to this task the passenger-side tires were already reading 5-6 PSI higher than the driver-side due to the heat of the morning sun.

I checked the pressure in the driver-side front tire with my tire gauge, and it was reading 110.5 PSI. This was adequate, but the lower limit of what I want to run, and at least 3 PSI lower than the passenger-side tire. I hooked up the air hose and chuck to the auxiliary air fitting in the driver-side front bay and tried to raise the pressure in the tire. In spite of the manifold gauge reading 120 PSI, all I managed to do was lose a few PSI from the tire. Although the tires have held their pressure fairly well, they have lost a little bit over the course of our trip. It has become very clear to me that we need to travel with an auxiliary air compressor that is capable of producing at least 150 PSI at the air chuck if we are to have any ability to adjust tire pressures while away from home.

We pulled out of the Red Trail Vineyard around 9:15 AM and continued east on I-94 towards Fargo, ND and Morehead, MN. Just three miles shy of the border, detoured south on I-29 for ½ miles and exited to go to the Pilot / Flying J truck stop where we topped off the tank. They have air pressure lines at each pump, and I started to get the air hose, chuck, and gauge out but decided not to. We have had our PP-TPMS longer than we have had the bus, and in general it works quite well. It has one major downside, however, namely, that the “baseline” pressure for each tire is determined by whatever pressure is in the tire at the time the tire pressure sensor is threaded onto the valve stem. Had I removed the sensor at the truck stop, added air, and reinstalled the sensor, it would have reestablished the baseline pressure at a value that was way too high due to the tire already being hot from being driven 35 miles on I-94. Later, when the coach sat overnight and the tires cooled off, it would have given us a “low tire” alarm, which would have been annoying. Newer competitive products have addressed this issue by making the baseline pressure something the user programs into the receiver. The other major downside to the PP-TPMS sensors is that the batteries are not user replaceable. At some point they will stop working and have to be replaced at a cost of $35-$50 each. At that point, we will probably just buy a different system with programmable baseline pressures and user replaceable batteries.

Minnesota, our 9th state on this journey.

We returned to I-29 north to I-94 east and crossed into Minnesota, our ninth state (including Michigan) since we left in early June. We had a very pleasant and uneventful drive through very pretty country; the best kind. Eastern Minnesota was a combination of green rolling crop lands, lovely lakes and ponds, and northern mixed forests. Our route was I-94 to MN-336 to US-10 to MN-34 to MN-64, and the roads were all very good except for a short stretch of MN-34 with seams at regular, and annoying short, intervals. The bus ran very well, and the transmission even behaved the way I think a transmission should, shifting between gears on hills as needed with the cruise control set and no intervention from me. This primarily occurred on stretches of MN-34 and MN-64 where the speed limit was 55 MPH. Apparently the transmission is willing to drop out of D into 4 (or at least out of torque converter lockup) when climbing hills, something it does not do as often when I am cruising at 62-64 MPH.

The one thing I noticed on this trip was the auxiliary air system pressure gauge I had installed in the cockpit was indicating that the system would reach 120 PSI and then fairly quickly bleed down to about 105 PSI and then re-pressurize to 120 PSI, over, and over, and over… At the same time the primary and secondary tank gauges indicated that these tanks were holding 120 PSI until I applied the brakes.

Entrance to Forestedge Winery near Laporte, MN.

We arrived at the Forestedge Winery around 1:00 PM, pulled around back per Paul Shuster’s e-mailed instructions, got the car unhooked, and got the bus parked and leveled. We went over and introduced ourselves to Paul. He was busy serving wine to potential customers, so we went back to the coach and had a bite of lunch. We then went for a stroll around the property and worked our way back to the tasting room, where we were able to sample most of his wines.

This driveway goes behind the winery, which is where we parked.

Paul and Sharon have a very nice operation in a beautiful setting at the edge of the Paul Bunyan State Forest, and across the road from Lake Benedict. It’s a tourist/vacation/recreation area, and there was a good flow of traffic through the winery. There is a nicely gardened sitting area outside and besides tasting and purchasing bottles, you can buy a glass of wine and sit outside and drink it.

Our coach and car parked by their Bluebird next to the forest.

Forestedge makes only “fruit” wines, and has 13 or 14 products. Although grapes are obviously fruit, this label is used to indicate wines made from any other fruit than grapes. (Mead, of course, is wine made from honey.) They started with only rhubarb, and their rhubarb is still grown on the property, but their offerings now include raspberry, strawberry, cranberry, blueberry, chokecherry, black currant, apple, and pear in addition to rhubarb, as well as blends of some of these. We sampled most of these, and purchased some of the white cranberry, blueberry, chokecherry, black currant, plum, and rhubarb/blueberry. We won’t be able to do this at every Harvest Host location where we stop, but Paul and Sharon are also members of the FMCA Freethinkers chapter which Linda and I belong to, so there was an additional connection here. Besides, we liked their wines! And we decided early in our trip that we were going to purchase wines as our major travel “souvenirs.” We can enjoy them while traveling, or once we return home, but eventually they are gone and we don’t have to find a long-term place for them in the house.

I finally shut the generator off around 3:30 PM. I did not let it run long enough this morning to bring the batteries back up to full charge. In generally it is not good for the batteries to only be partially recharged so I wanted to make sure I did so this afternoon.

The tasting room, art gallery, and patio.

The weather here was wonderful; blue skies with puffy white clouds and temperatures in the mid-70’s. We are parked behind a winery, alongside what appear to be a grove of white birch (paper birch) trees, in view of orchards and gardens. This is no part of this not to like. While I was resting outside in one of our folding campchairs a Bald Eagle soared overhead.

The tasting room and patio looking towards their house.

Paul invited us for dinner, so we had to explain “the vegan thing.” Sharon rose to the challenge, making a green salad with fresh picked greens from her own garden, zucchini and onions sautéed in olive oil, and black beans and rice accompanied by their own Raspberry Rhubarb wine. We had a long, great conversation over this meal, including some tips on what to see and on our visit to Hibbing, MN tomorrow. As we left their house to return to our coach his final words for the evening were to not be surprised if we heard wolves howling. We can only hope.

2013_07_30 (Tue) TRNP-NU and Medora ND

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Entrance to Red Trail Campground.

We are staying at the Red Trail Campground in Medora, Montana. The WiFi signal is strong, and the Internet connection is fast enough to work, IF nobody else is using it. We kept getting disconnected and finally turned on our Verizon MiFi device. Bingo! I love 4G/LTE when it’s available.

Entrance to TRNP South Unit in Medora MT.

We decided last night that this morning we would tour the North Unit of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park. It’s a 62 mile drive to get from the entrance of the South Unit in Medora to the entrance to the North Unit, in the middle of nowhere. Rain was forecast for today but we wanted to get there early, so we were on the road by 7:15 AM MDT.

(BTW: This MDT thing becomes important in this part of North Dakota as the dividing line between the Mountain and Central Time Zones zigzags around this part of ND basically cutting off the southwest corner of the state for Mountain Time and leaving the rest as Central Time. A careful look at the state highway map revealed that the dividing line runs right down the middle of the North Unit of TRNP on an east-west line. We actually crossed the line while in the Park and our phones changed to Central Time for a while.)

The North Unit may be in the middle of nowhere, but it is very much on the route to somewhere, namely Williston, ND some 60 miles north and bit west of the Park. Williston is the hub of the northeastern Montana / northwestern North Dakota oil boom, and the truck traffic and equipment moving up and down US-85 was something to experience. Apparently North Dakota expects this to continue for a while as much of this stretch of US-85 is being widened.

CCC shelter overlooking the Little Missouri Scenic River; TRNP North Unit.

Once we turned into the Park, however, all was very quickly quiet and peaceful. Not being adjacent to a major Interstate Highway, the North Unit is probably much less visited than the South Unit, and we encountered very few other vehicles driving the 14 mile road (28 miles out and back). The weather was thick, as is obvious in these photographs, but it was an interesting and different way to see the Park. We encountered a “back country ranger” at this overlook and had a great, long conversation with him about the Park and the area around it. He told us that the North Unit does not have the wild horses that the South Unit has, but it does have bison, moose, bighorn sheep, and mountain lions. Although he didn’t mention them, we saw wild turkeys and a pheasant in addition to a couple of bison and deer.

Thick weather in the TRNP NU.

The weather in the North Unit was very thick this morning and the mood in the park is very different in this kind of weather. The Ranger told us that The North Unit is usually very dry this time of year but has had an unusually high amount of rain this season, and has already exceeded its normal annual rainfall. The Little Missouri Scenic River has water in it, when it would normally be dry, and the Park has a lot of greenery and flowering plants.

Clouds rolling up out of the river valley to the rim; TRNP NU.

On the drive back to Medora we stopped at the Painted Canyon Rest Area and Visitor Center on I-94. This facility is located at the southeast corner of the South Unit of TRNP and affords nice views of a corner of the park where the interior roads do not go.

[04722 CN A chokecherry bush (I think).

Back in Medora, we stopped at the TRNP South Unit Visitor Center, which was closed when we went for our drive last night. On the way in from the parking lot we passed through an area of plantings that were labeled. I think this bush was a chokecherry, but I didn’t see a label for it. There are a lot of chokecherry-based products for sale in Medora, so I’m sticking with my story.

TR’s “nicer” log home, now on display in TRNP SU Visitor Center in Medora MT.

In the backyard of the center is Theodore Roosevelt’s 2^nd (and nicer) North Dakota log cabin. Our timing was good as we got there in time for the 2 PM Ranger-led tour of the house, which is otherwise locked. It was very fancy for its time (1884), with three rooms, wood floors, an attic, a cold cellar, and glass windows.

We left the South Unit Visitor Center and drove through the adjacent De Mores Meat Packing site, now a state park with the smokestack and remnants of the foundations of the buildings that once stood there. We then had a slow drive through Medora and back to our coach. Here are a few pictures of the town:

Just down the street from the entrance to TRNP SU in Medora MT.

Shouldn’t every pizza parlor have a saloon, and look like this?

Medora is a much more refined town than its “rough” exterior suggests.

Even the post office and bank are quaint.

For dinner this evening Linda prepared a Kabocha squash that she bought for $1 at the Cody Farmers Market last Saturday. Niether of us had ever heard of this squash before she bought it. She cut it in two halves and microwaved them for 8 minutes to start the cooking process and cut down on convention oven time. She sauteed a mixture of brown rice, onion, garlic, carrots, bell peppers, and kale seasoned with salt, black pepper,dried basil, and Tamari sauce and stuffed the squash halves with it, mounded over the top. She backed these for 15 minutes at 350 degrees F using convention feature of our convection microwave oven. The squash came out perfectly cooked with a light yellow to slightly green color that paired wonderfully with the slices of honeydew mellow and the Riesling wine that accompanied the dish. Savory, nutty, chewy, and a little spicy without being “hot”, it was another wonderful example of what she has learned to do with these basic WFPB ingredients.

We have been back in “vacation mode” last week and this. We would prefer not to be, but we need to be back in Michigan in early August and are trying to see what we can on this trip with the time we have. We have not taken hikes that we would like to have taken, done any geocaching, or had the luxury of waiting for the weather to change. We did not go for pre-dawn or post-dusk drives and we did not stay up late enough to view the stunning night sky at the new moon in the deep, deep darkness of the west. We did not visit the Chateau De Mores (State Historical Site) or see the Medora Musical (OK, never really planned to). And we did not bring/operate our ham radios. But we did what we could with the time that we had, and it was all good. And when we are be back this way we intend to be managing our time differently. But for now, tomorrow we must move on and cross North Dakota.

2013_07_28 (Sun) Heading East

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What could have been an easier travel day for us started a bit earlier and got stretched out by our choice to put diesel fuel in the bus (twice) and our desire to stop in Billings, MT for a while to visit with Cherie and Chris of Technomadia. We pulled out of Green Creek Inn and RV Park just after 8 AM and immediately pulled into the adjacent gas station to the east and added 25 gallons of diesel fuel to the tank as insurance for the first leg of our trip.

We took US-14/16/20 from Wapiti back to Cody where we picked up US-14 Alternate going east. Yup, that’s the same US-14A we drove across the Bighorn Mountains (in our car) from Burgess Junction to Lovell with a stop at the Bighorn Medicine Wheel. The stretch from Cody to Garland, however, was in the valley and relatively flat. In Garland we picked up WY-114 to Deaver and then took US-310 into Montana and finally connected with I-90 eastbound.

We got on I-90 at exit 434 and got off at exit 452. Those numbers, of course, are miles from where I-90 enters the western edge of the state. Montana is a big place. Exit 452 is US-87 / Main St., the truck route through the east end of Billings (known as “the heights”), and the location of Interstate PowerSystems where Chris and Cherie have been since early June getting their 8V71 rebuilt after it developed a problem while traveling in the area east of there. But they are close to being back on the road, and we just caught them on the first leg of our return trip home. Although we had a six hour drive to get from Wapiti, WY to Miles City, MT the visit in Billings broke it nicely into two pieces.

Chris and Cherie of Technomadia, “camped” at Interstate PowerSystems.

We had a nice visit with Chris and Cherie. I have been following their blog and purchasing their iPad apps and e-books for some time. We had met them once before at the mid-August GLCC/CCO Back-To-The-Bricks Rally in Clio, Michigan. We use Verizon/Android cell phones, and they recently released their “State Lines” app for that market. Besides both having bus conversions, we have in common that we are both “re-doing” previously converted buses bit-by-bit and contributing articles about it to the recently rejuvenated Bus Conversions Magazine. Beyond that, they are full-timers (we are not), they are still actively working (we are not), and they are much younger than us (smile). We chatted for a couple of hours, but did not want to overstay our welcome as they are deep into several projects that need their time and attention and we still had to stop for fuel and make another 148 miles to get to Meadows RV Park in Miles City, MT.

We returned to I-90 eastbound and exited three miles later for the Pilot / Flying J truck stop. Our PFJ card saves us a few cents per gallon, but mostly we like the truck pumps; wide lanes, no overhead obstructions, fill from either side with large nozzles, and they sell a lot of diesel, so it doesn’t sit in their underground tanks for very long.

We had been cautioned back in June (in South Dakota) that RV sites might be hard come by in eastern Montana and western North Dakota, but that did not turn out to be the case. Meadows RV Park gave us a place to rest our heads and recharge our batteries (literally, the house batteries are not currently set up to charge from the Zena engine-mounted alternator while we are in transit, as described in a previous blog post).

Linda made a wonderful salad for dinner and incorporated some of the Kholrabi she bought at the Cody Farmers Market yesterday. I believe this is the first time either of has (knowingly) had this vegetable, described as a “German cabbage.” I didn’t find it particularly cabbage like, but it was very tasty.

Practicing the bagpipes are Meadows RV Park in Miles City, MT.

We were getting ready to go for an after dinner walk when we both noticed the faint sound of bagpipes. I went outside to investigate and sure enough, one row over from us was a gentleman practicing the bagpipes. That was a first.

2013_07_27 (Sat) Where We Go From Here

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We have had an intense but wonderful week in northwest Wyoming and the Green Creek Inn and RV Park has been just the right spot for us to base camp. The RV park is away from the hustle and bustle of Cody, yet close enough to be convenient for shopping and entertainment, and is close enough to Yellowstone N. P. and Grand Teton N. P. to make them accessible as day trips. And although it’s a small RV park with only nine sites, we had excellent full hookups, laundry facilities, a WiFi connection to the Internet, and free popcorn. Our 50 Amp site allowed us to run all three house air-conditioners all day while we were away to keep our cats safe and comfortable. We needed to do this because of daytime highs in the mid-80’s with bright sunshine and constant wind that prevented us from using our awnings to shade the passenger side of the coach.

Although $45 per night is more than we generally pay to stay in an RV park, it was a fair price given the location and facilities. The WiFi/Internet bandwidth was limited, but we were glad to have what we had as there was no useable Verizon 4G/LTE signal here, and even 3G EVDO was marginal for making phone calls. The WiFi connection was generally very strong thanks in part to or WiFi Ranger Mobile Titanium, which has been working very well for us since we bought it at the FMCA rally in Gillette, WY last month. Interestingly, the only OTA television signal we could pick up was Wyoming PBS from the general direction of Cody. (Smile)

This was a quieter day for us, but by no means an idle one, as we needed to prepare for our departure tomorrow morning. We noticed this morning that it was overcast, the first time since we arrived here a week ago. We did have clouds today, and a few drops of rain, but Jeff informed us that the haze we were seeing was from the various forest fires burning in the west.

Linda drove to Cody in the morning to do our shopping. The main attraction was the local Farmers Market, located, conveniently enough, in the parking lot of the Whole Foods Trading Company. She came back with quite a few bags of stuff!

While she was gone I drained the waste tanks, stowed the hose, and added our Pine Sol / water / Calgon solution to the tanks. I also drained the little bit of fresh water that was still in the tank, flushed it with a bit more, and then refilled it. I left the fresh water shore line connected so we could use if until we depart, conserving our onboard water for use on down the road. I also worked on getting our blog postings up-to-date.

When Linda got back she did the laundry. At our house in Michigan this is usually my chore, but for some reason she seems to take care of it on the road. Although we are trying to learn not to over-plan, we are not full-timers, and we have a house and family to which we have to return from time-to-time. We knew the route we wanted to take back to S. E. Michigan, but the timing and overnight waypoints were still undecided. We want to see the Theodore Roosevelt N. P. in western North Dakota, but the campgrounds there do not have any hookups and do not appear to be big rig friendly. Medora, ND is the closest town, but it is 410 miles driving distance from Wapiti. That is more than we care to do in one day, especially given our planned stop at Interstate Power Systems in Billings, MT to visit with Cherie and Chris of Technomadia. (http://www.technomadia.com).

Using the online Good Sam campground finder we located the Meadows RV Park in Miles City, MT, 280 miles away, and made a reservation for tomorrow night. That should give us a 5.5 -6.0 hour drive, leaving plenty of time to stop and visit in Billings.

I continued to work on our blog while Linda paid our bills and continued to research overnight stops. We decided we would try to stay two nights at an RV park in Medora if we could find an opening. And we did! We made a reservation at the Red Trail RV Park just off I-94. It is walking distance to downtown Medora and convenient to the Theodore Roosevelt N. P., which we will now have a day-and-a-half to explore.

Linda took time out to make wheat berry risotto with mushroom /garlic/onion /asparagus. She used some of the Argentinean Malbec wine we had on board, and served the rest with the meal. This was a fragrant, earthy dish with great “chew” that somehow fit the wildness of this past week. When she has the time to cook we eat very well indeed.

While the risotto was cooking we pulled the tray on the passenger side of the bus that houses the chassis battery disconnect switches and the Vanner equalizers (we have two as it turns out). We located the circuit breakers, and pushed them in to (possibly) reset them. (This refers back to the BAL light that came on while traveling from Sheridan to Wapiti on the 21^st of this month.)

Beyond Medora we hope to stay at a winery in Buffalo, ND about 30 miles west of Fargo. It was personally recommended to us by Harvest Host founders Don and Kim Greene. If they can accommodate us on the 31st, it will be our first use of our Harvest Hosts membership.

Along the same lines, we hope to stay the next night at the Forest Edge Winery in Laporte, Minnesota. Forest Edge is owned/operated by members of the FMCA Freethinkers Associate Chapter. Being a kind of “virtual” chapter in FMCA’s International Area (INTO) our members are spread out all over the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Rallies are difficult to organize and most of our interactions are by e-mail. We even hold our annul business meeting electronically. Thus any opportunity to meet in person is a treat. The fact that Forest Edge is also a Harvest Host business makes it easier and that much more special.

From Laporte we plan to head to Hibbing, MN to visit the Greyhound Bus Museum. Beyond that, we will make our way across Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to St. Ignace. From there we cross the Straits of Mackinaw (Mackinac) on the Mackinaw Bridge and head straight south on I-75 where we vector off on US-23 southbound to M-59, and home. Depending on when we get there we will have been gone almost exactly two months.

2013_07_20 (Sat) The Last Day (of building)

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Today was the last day of our 2-week HFH RV CAV / SKP BOF build. It was our 6th day in a row, and was scheduled as a half day. There was a mix of feelings at circle: satisfaction in what we had personally and collectively accomplished; disappointment that we had not accomplished more; excitement that we were almost done; a touch of sadness that we would soon be going our own separate ways. It was also clear that most of us had an accumulated tiredness. But we had one last half day to work, and we had things to finish. We had one last reminder about safety; don’t rush, be careful on/under ladders and roofs where teammates are working, and watch your energy level.

Installing roof trusses over the front porch.

One crew finished installing siding. Another crew built a truss-like top for the front wall to fill in for a truss that had to be moved due to the front porch being foot longer than planned. Lynn and Jack continued sheeting the roof. Brett, an HFH homeowner, showed up to work and helped Brian lift roof decking up to me so I could hand it to Lynn and Jack. When they were far enough along, I nailed off the roof sheets with the air nailer. The Lindas finished the bedroom closet, installed the living room closet, and removed diagonal cross-bracing from the interior.

The house as far as we were able to build it.

11:00 AM came quickly and we packed up the tools, stacked unused materials, and picked up the site. The house was not closed in as the windows had not yet arrived on site, the front and rear hip roofs still needed to be sheeted, and the roof shingles had yet to be installed. But it was clearly a house, and it was structurally sound.

After lunch, which included a very nice salad, we all made a final check of the site and then returned to our rigs. Linda and several others headed to the laundry room and most of us started readying our rigs for departure the next morning.

Matt and Julie.

At 4:30 PM we started gathering for our caravan to Dave and Karen’s house in Big Horn just south of Sheridan. Dave is a founding member of the Eastern Bighorn HFH affiliate and the current treasurer. They gave us a thank you dinner and a comfortable place to sit, relax, and be together as a group one last time. The meal included several vegetable dishes, including grilled beets from their garden. Matt, the executive director of the Eastern Bighorn HFH affiliate, and his wife Julie were also there.

Wherever/whenever Escapees gather there are hugs all around, and so it was tonight. It was a nice way to cap off our first HFH build.

The view looking south from Dave and Karen’s back yard.

2013_07_17 (Wed) Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

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Mornings are lovely here this time of year with 5:00 AM temperatures typically in the mid-to-upper 50’s and clear-to-partly cloudy skies. And so it was again today. I know, because I was up at 5:00 AM working on our blog and watching the sun rise.

Linda L. holding the tape at the truss peak.

We gathered at the Works site at 7:30 AM, had our circle, and went to work. Kent and I were joined by Lynn and Linda (the other one) and worked to correct the spacing of the roof truss peaks. The spacing between the peaks had gradually increased from rear to front so that the ones by the front wall were leaning 3″ towards the front of the house.

Bruce and Lynn adjusting the truss peaks spacing.

Linda held the free end of the tape measure on a common reference point while Lynn and I worked our way along the trusses on either side of the ridge, alternately measuring, aligning, and then nailing 16 foot 2x4s to the center upright of each truss to hold the peak in place. Kent worked from below passing tools up/down and using a board as a push stick and/or lever to help push the trusses into position and hold them while we nailed. It was slow, careful work, but we got it done before lunch.

Linda L., Lynn, and Bruce, adjusting the truss peaks

Angel and her two children.

This house is being built for Angel and her two children. As part of her “sweat equity” in the house, Angel organized the preparation of our lunches and got the food to the church kitchen and arranged on the buffet table.

Ron nailing hurricane clips.

Ron nailed hurricane clips all day and most of the rest of the team painted siding panels. The Lindas installed another closet header and the worked with Lynn and Jack to cut and install extensions for the north trusses.

Front porch posts and beams (not)

Kent and I were originally going to start sheeting the roof, but that had to wait for the truss extensions to be installed. We switched off and worked on installing the front porch posts and side beams. These are massive rough milled western Douglas fir (8×8 posts and 4×10 beams) pinned at the top by rebar inserted into drilled holes. We cut the posts to length and notched the top surface of the house end of the beams using a circular saw and a Sawzall, and cut the rebar with a hack saw. We cut and installed jack studs to hold the house ends of the beams. When we finally lifted the west beam into place we discovered it was about a foot short. Sigh.

A flurry of activity followed for the next hour as Brian figured out that the porch portion of the concrete slab was a foot longer than it was supposed to be, which placed the base pads for the posts a foot farther from the house than they should be. Kent and I offered some suggestions for how to fix the problem beyond the obvious one of getting two new beams, but even that fix had the downside of a 3-week delay and another $300 in expense. Brian conferred with Matt and Sandy (the architect), both of whom came to the site. In the end they decided to go with a solution Kent and I had suggested of constructing beams out of 2×10’s sandwiched together. They decided to use 2×12’s and have us cut them down, but that would have to wait for Brian to get material on site tomorrow morning.

Linda F., Jack, and Lynn, extending and plumbing the north truss tails.

We had agreed several days ago to have a pot luck social this evening at 5:30 PM, with happy hour starting at 5:00 PM instead of our usual 4:30 PM. Brian came, as did the folks from Castle Rock CO. It was a warm evening (in more ways than one), and there were several dishes that Linda and I could eat. Linda made the garbanzo bean salad, which tastes remarkably like egg salad, and is a favorite dish of mine.

2013_07_15 (Mon) HFH Week 2

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It was 66 degrees at 7:00 AM this morning. Very pleasant, but it is usually in the upper 50’s at that hour, so we knew we were in for another hot day. The forecast high was 93 degrees F.

View of Bighorn Mountains to the SW on our drive to the Works site from Peter D’s RV Park.

Although reduced in numbers, our team reconvened at 8:00 AM to continue working on the Works house. We were only scheduled to go until noon today, but we had significant tasks to try to accomplish. First was getting the walls plumb and square followed by setting the trusses and starting to wrap the house in Tyvek.

Trusses laid out and ready to lift into place.

We learned at “circle” that 4-6 more volunteers would be joining us for the morning. They turned out to be a group of four, but were an experienced group from Castle Rock Colorado, and they worked right in to the tasks at hand.

Trusses being nailed in place.

Linda and I nailed some wall bracing in place, but we quickly had more bodies than we had tasks or room to work, so I took up my semi-official photographer duties for a while. Posey , John, Linda and I then went in Brian’s HFH truck to the Poplar Grove site to fetch the 5/8″ OSB roof sheathing. It was a big stack and if took us two trips.

We learned that being idle on an HFH build is a minor “sin” unless you are “taking a break”, so Linda and I grabbed a couple of shovels and started back-filling the small trenches along the east edge of the slab. The sun was very hot, made worse by the reflection of light and diminution of breeze from the Tyvek, so we found a shady spot at the northwest corner of the house and moved dirt around until Jack whistled for the team to quit for the day.

We did not get lunch today as it was originally scheduled as a day off and no one expected Angel to arrange food on short notice. Brian worked with the new crew after lunch to finish setting most of the trusses. Tomorrow he is supposed to move them to the Woodland house to develop a final punch list and get it wrapped up. That house has been under construction for almost a year.

It ‘s starting to look like a house.

Although not our personally most productive day, the team accomplished most of what it set out to do. Tomorrow we will finish setting trusses and wrapping the house and should start sheeting the roof. There is still a lot work to do at the Poplar Grove site, but no indication that any of us are going to work there.

When we got back to our coach we had a light lunch. We were both surprisingly tired but opted for different solutions. I took a nap while Linda went for a four mile walk to downtown Sheridan and back.

Jan stopped by around 3:00 PM to see if I was available to work on their Internet connectivity. She and Kent have a WiFi Ranger X (WFR-X) and it has the same web browser control panel as our WiFi Ranger Mobile (WFR-M), so that was a plus for me. I suspected that the SSID and Password for the WFR-X followed the same pattern as the WFR-M, but we found the instruction sheet and confirmed that. They also had a Motorola cable modem (that they had used at a fixed location). It wasn’t hooked up correctly, but it didn’t matter as cable modems are generally of no use in a mobile lifestyle. I was able to connect their iPad mini to the WFR-X and reconfigure the password. We then got Jan’s iPhone and Mac connected to the WFR-X. Finally, we got the WFR-X connected to one of the public/open/free WiFi networks in the RV park and from there to the Internet.

I suspect that their setup is fairly typical of full-time and extended-time RVers, for whom connectivity has become a significant part of the lifestyle. Smartphones, tablets, laptops, even cameras, often two of each, create a complex arsenal of devices with multiple methods of connectivity, including cellular, WiFi, and Bluetooth. Even if you have some understanding of this technology, this is a complex environment that requires active management by the user. Devices like the WiFi Ranger products (X, Go, Mobile, etc.) appear to add to this complexity initially, but properly configured and used, actually simplify the user experience.

After dinner we watched an hour-long presentation by Dr. Michael Greger, M.D. on the leading causes of death and the preventative and curative effects of a Whole-Food Plant-Based Diet. You can find it at http://nutritionfacts.org but if you are not interested in changing how you eat in order to be healthier, you probably shouldn’t watch it as it will just make you unhappy.

2013_07_08 (Mon) A Day To Get Ready

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The historic Sheridan Inn.

Our nominal HFH work schedule is Tuesday through Saturday, so we had today available to do whatever we wanted/needed to do. The Sheridan visitor center is close by so we went there early to get information and a walking tour map of downtown. Sheridan has more than 50 buildings on the National Register of Historic Places, many from the late 1800’s to early 1900’s.

Buffalo Bill Cody hung out here and interviewed acts for his Wild West show on the porch.

Just coincidently, the Sheridan WYO Rodeo is taking place this week (it’s a big deal), so there is a lot of signage and commerce related to that. Accommodations are hard come by, and a bit pricier, in the area because of the rodeo. Fortunately our spots at Peter D’s were pre-arranged far in advance and at a slight discount. We were asked to contribute $20/day towards the $32 cost of our site, and the local HFH affiliate picked up the difference.

Our walking tour done, we found the local Albertson’s grocery store using the Point Of Interest feature on our Garmin 465T GPS. (This is the GPS we use in the car. We can use it as a handheld unit, but we rarely do. We have a DeLorme handheld GPS that we use for hiking and geocaching. We use a Rand-McNally RV GPS in the motorhome.)

The Mint Bar. “Meet me at the Mint” is what the locals say. Lots of bars in town, not too many wine stores.

Besides a few grocery items, we were looking for some wine. The Albertson’s in Gillette had a separate, attached store, but the one in Sheridan did not sell beer, wine, or liquor. In this county you can only buy alcoholic beverages at a “liquor store.” There was a small one a few doors down from Albertson’s, so we went there.

Back at the rig I continued working on my blog posts until it was time to go to the 4:30 PM social at Steven Gullette’s trailer. A glass of wine and finger snacks with our new(est) friends; RVing is a good life.

For dinner, Linda made a flatbread pizza with caramelized onions, peppers, olives, kale, mushrooms, garlic, and a touch of balsamic vinegar. There were severe storms in the area that we were tracking using several weather apps on our smartphones, but none that appeared to be a concern for us. Before she got the pizza in the oven, the wind came up very suddenly and flipped up the front arm on our large driver-side awning. We scrambled outside to retrieve the ladder and poles needed to stow the awnings, and were assisted by Marvin and Leo from the motorhome just to our west. Linda hung on to the patio awning strap (barely) while we got the driver-side awning straightened out and stowed. We then ganged up on the patio awning and got it stowed. I then stowed the two small awnings. The wind in Wyoming is constant and can get very strong very suddenly. Hot, bright sunshine notwithstanding, we may just leave our awnings up for the duration of our visit.

The potential crisis averted, Linda finished assembling the pizza and baked it using the convection bake feature of the microwave oven. She bought a flexible silicone baking disk at Escapade and has been using it to great success. The pizza was fabulous; another example of how she is developing the ability to improvise dishes based on ingredients (G-BOMBS) that are the staples of our way of eating (WFPB). (Greens, Beans, Onions, Mushrooms, Berries, and Seeds. We also let G stand for Grains.)

It was still light after dinner, so we went for a ride to locate the two build sites and see a bit more of Sheridan. We found the county fairgrounds where the Sheridan Wyo Rodeo will take place and saw a magnificent sunset from there. We also found Kendrick Park, which has a wild animal section with Bison and Elk, but couldn’t find the entrance. The Kendrick family was prominent in the founding and development of Sheridan, and a number of buildings in town bear the “K” which was their mark.

The Phase Place

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Category Archives: WFPB

2013_10_18 (F) Not Our Best Day Ever

2013_10_16 (W) GSMNP

2013_10_13 (N) A Fork In The Road

2013_10_12 (S) Acres of “Land”

2013_10_06 (N) The House Is Open

2013_10_05 (S) Power Wa(r)shing

2013_10_04 (F) Craftsmen & Gamesmen

2013_10_01 (T) Nets, Decks, & Weeds

2013_09_28-30 (S,N,M) Gone Fish’in

2013_09_23-27 (M-F) Getting Ready

2013_09_18 (Wed) Under A Harvest Moon

2013_09_17 (Tue) To Goshen We Go

2013_09_01-04 Driveway Success, Raspberries, And Old Friends

2013_08_27-28 Babysitting And Our First RV Visitors

20130819-26 E-mail Problems

2013_08_16 (Fri) BTTB Rally – Day 2

2013_08_13 (Tue) Computer Updates And Family Time

2013_08_08 (Thu) Settling In

2013_08_05 (Mon) A Quiet, Easy Day

2013_08_04 (Sun) Return to Tiki

2013_08_03 (Sat) Across The Northern Tier

2013_08_02 (Fri) To Hibbing And Back

2013_08_01 (Thu) A Short Drive And A Winery

2013_07_30 (Tue) TRNP-NU and Medora ND

2013_07_28 (Sun) Heading East

2013_07_27 (Sat) Where We Go From Here

2013_07_20 (Sat) The Last Day (of building)

2013_07_17 (Wed) Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

2013_07_15 (Mon) HFH Week 2

2013_07_08 (Mon) A Day To Get Ready