Back in Town

Back in Benson

Our journey to the northeast is completed.  This will be the last input until next summer when we plan to make a trip to the Pacific coast.  Among other things, we'll be buying tires for the bus in Oregon (to save on tax).

It's been expensive this year, but it all goes with living aboard a moving expanse.  Like, how well would your stix and brix hold up at 65 MPH on highways that should be condemned?   

In preparation for our trip, I had to visit the Cummins dealer who fixed an oil leak, installed a serpentine belt and tensioner, and replaced the exhaust manifold because of warping.  

The Generator quit in Texas, the inverter not long after in Kansas.  Our air bags went out in Virginia, our slide out motor gears were stripped in Alabama.  Total bills:   $6508.

 The total number of miles traveled was 6008 miles, and we used  991 gallons of diesel at prices from $2.79 to $3.75.  (The generator and the Aqua Hot system also used some of those total gallons. We don't track them separately).

I've just discovered hooking up here on Sunday that my water regulator is kaput, and we're heading to Lowe's this afternoon for a replacement.   

On top of all that, now we've  discovered that thieves have stolen the pecans off of our two trees in the front yard of our place here in Benson!  Yep, took all the just-about-ready pecans.

Hmm.  After all this recapping I'm depressed!  

The up side is that we got to see our terrific grandson Sam married to a beautiful twin, in beautiful New Hampshire!  Was that worth the trip hassles?  Yep!  But I am resolved to never drive east past the Mississippi River ever again!!!! 

According to the statistics there weren't very many followers of the blog.  But to those few we say a huge thanks for following our adventures!

Please join us again next year.  We hope you stay well and prosper.

Gary & Eloise

    

The Owl Cafe

Owl Cafe, San Antonio, NM

Our odyssey is close to the finish now.  We left Kirtland AFB, NM last night, and approached the city of San Antonio, NM (Not the Alamo city!).  It was lunch time, so we were happy to stop at the world famous Owl Bar and Cafe.  We've been here several times before and we know how terrific their burgers are!  Their most popular one is made with mild green chiles, 'crusty' patty of beef, onions, lettuce, tomato and pickle chips covered with bright orange cheese that melts down to blanket everything.  $5.95.

The walls of the cafe are plastered with dollar bills, a section has foreign bills, and another section has military and other patches.  They were interesting to peruse.  

The cafe started out as a bar.  The bar was originally from  the Conrad Hilton's first rooming house that operated right there in town! 

It became the hangout for scientists who would later activate the famous Trinity Site explosion, the first test of the atom bomb said to end the war with its devastation of two Japanese cities.  If you're ever within range of this place, make a point to stop.  Closed Sundays.

Across the street is a place that roasts green peppers and has raw peppers and vegetables for sale.  Eloise found some green chilies and a bag of pinto beans to her liking.

 

      






We are staying tonight at Deming, NM.,  at an Escapees park that we have stayed at many times.  It is the last leg before arriving back at Benson, AZ.  Eloise spent the evening playing "hand & foot", a card game similar to canasta.  There were a total of 10 players in the hall tonight.  I had a quiet evening at home.  We have had 4 consecutive travel days.  Tomorrow will be our shortest day but I'm looking forward to a few days in one spot, even though they will be work days at the rental house.  It won't be long until we will be taking off again, heading further west to the Palm Springs area.  We will have 2 weeks there before we move from the Thousand Trails park to the fairgrounds for the annual Square Dance Festival in Indio, CA. 

 

Little Rock AFB, Arkansas

LRAFB, AR Gym

Decided to spend a few days at Little Rock AFB in Arkansas.  Hoping that we could just let the rains pass by.  We stayed 4 days, and the rain let up enough that we decided to press onward.  While we were here, we were able to do a few geocaches between the showers on day one but after that it just kept raining.  Eloise decided we should go over to the gym and do a couple miles of walking in the dry.  When we got there we were simply amazed at the facility.  The best one I'd ever seen!

The walk/run area is suspended around the outside.  Walkers to the left, runners right.  As you see in the top picture, a well used work-out area is very well furnished.  The locker rooms were full service, even had lockers with combination locks.  You just enter a 4 digit code twice and it locks, when you return you enter the 4 digit code and it opens.  No need to carry a lock like some places. 

walkers left, run right below was a coffee/drink bar

Basketball courts

This appeared to be a spin class

                         Racketball courts

another area which happened to be across from the locker rooms

We were able to stock up on groceries at the nearby commissary.  Only one night did the airstrip bother us much with night exercises.  Aside from a little mud from the relentless rains, the sites were nice with full-hook ups.  Always a treat to stay at military installations.

Red Bay, Alabama

Well, so I don't have any pictures at Red Bay, Alabama, so this'll have to do!

We called the factory to see about having them repair our slide out, which I thought was probably the motor gears.  We were told that this summer (July) they changed their policy, and won't work on any Tiffin product that is 10 years old or older.  (Ours was built in 2005).  We were given the name of someone that had worked at Tiffin for 17 years, and now owns his own shop in a nearby town in Mississippi, he is actually co-owner with another former Tiffin employee that worked for them for 14 years.   We called him.  He told me that he was very busy, but if the slide out was our only problem, that he could see us at 8 A.M. the next day.  We pulled into a Mississippi State Park that was only 2 miles down the road from his shop and spent the night there, MS is pretty reasonable, only $17.50 for a senior for 1 night.

When we arrived at the shop, the guy we had talked to wasn't going to be in for a couple hours, but the other fellas in the shop said they would have a look.  Sure enough, the motor was stripped out.  They didn't have a new one on hand, but they had a used one on the shelf.  They assured me it was working when they removed it from another rig, so I said to put it in.  They did.  It works fine.  Once the "real" guy showed up Eloise asked if he could look at our shower surround that had come loose from the wall.  My earlier attempts to attach it had failed.  He did lots of measurements and decided that there was nothing behind where the screws were except the thin wall, and suggested a couple screws at the very top where he knew there was a beam.  Eloise agreed to that, he did it, and it worked great.  

When he totaled up the bill, he only charged us $100 for the used motor, and $112 labor (@$75 hr).  Total bill with tax was $227.38.  I had previously priced new motors on-line and they ranged all the way to $950.  

Right now we're happy with the result and the savings!!  

A sad note; about a half hour before we got to Little Rock we hit rain again, it rained most of the next 3 days.  The slide on the opposite side leaked during the torrential downpours and soaked the carpet inside about a third of the way across the living room.  I don't know how to attempt a repair, so for now we are keeping it retracted.  I've quit saying "well, that's everything, nothing else will go wrong".

Oh, Nuts! Another Maintenance Challenge

 We were trying to leave Stoney Creek campground, near Greenville, VA, on the 4th of October (my birthday, hoo ra) when we noticed that our air bag on the front of the motorhome was not filling properly.  Our air gauges wouldn't come up, the front of the motorhome wasn't raising up. 

Blown out Air Bag

 We had some "Gorilla Duct Tape" and used it around the base where the leak was.  It must have slowed the leak enough to form a little bit of a seal, because the bag filled, but was still leaking.  The engine compressor was keeping up with it though.  We limped into Roanoke, VA to a Freightliner sales and service company.  They ordered in two new bags, because since the leaking one was dry rotted, then the other one would be bad also.  Trouble was, the new bags wouldn't be delivered until the next Monday.  This was Thursday.  They graciously let us stay on their repair lot with an electric hook-up.  

But however, we couldn't stay after 3 PM on Saturday because they were locking the gates from then until 7AM on Monday!  So...on Saturday we went looking for a place for a couple days that wasn't far from the repair facility.  We went to Camping World lot, less than 2 miles.  We had water on board, and there was a dump at Camping World.  So by running our generator a lot, we got by pretty well.
 

New Air Bag

It took two half-days to install the bags because the technician had lots of trouble getting to the bags, and then getting the bolts loose.  The tech said he broke 3 ratchets, and finally with a snatch pipe broke the 3/4 bolt instead of the nut coming off. 

Truck Maintenance Pit

 When it was all over on Tuesday afternoon, we had racked up:  
Labor: $759  (truck rate instead of MH rate, and reduced the number of hours because they quoted less hours)
New Bags:   $715.76
Shop Supplies: $15.00
Tax: $38.73
Total:  $1528.49 

The new bags seem to be working well now.  Thing is, our living room slide went Skagway (as my good buddy Rusty would say) as we were trying to leave Freightliner.  We got it retracted, but I believe the motor gear got stripped.  I've priced them on-line anywhere between $450 to over $900.  So we're going to head to Red Bay Alabama where the Tiffin Motor Home factory is for repair.  We are also heading west in order to stay out of the way of hurricane Michael. 
  
Ahhh, life on the road. So challenging.

Gettysburg, PA

Pennsylvania Memorial (It is possible to walk around the top near the dome)

While camped at Gettysburg Battlefield Resort, we visited the battleground.

After three weeks marching through the Shenandoah Valley, the Union Army reached Gettysburg June 26, 1863.  Union Gen Meade led the Army of the Potomac up from the south.
 
Gen Robert E. Lee had earlier stunning victories at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, VA and carried the war north and concentrated his scattered forces near Gettysburg.   

On July 1, they collided and started a battle neither side had intended to fight here.  Gettysburg was the bloodiest battle of the Civil War, with more than 51,000 casualties, including 7,863 dead. Wounded and dead were crowded into nearly every building.  Most of the dead lay in hastily dug graves, some not buried at all.  The Pennsylvania Governor had land bought for a proper burial ground for the Union dead.  On November 19, 1863 the Soldiers' National Cemetery was dedicated.  President Lincoln was asked to make a few appropriate remarks.  His speech lasted 2 minutes.  (Some of us had to memorize the speech in school, do you still remember it?  Eloise does!)
Contrary to popular belief, Lincoln didn't write it on the back of an envelope, but took great pains with it.  Within a few years over 3500 Union soldiers killed in the battle were re-interred here.  After the war, remains of 3320 Confederate soldiers were removed from the battlefield to cemeteries in the South.

Soldiers National Cemetery

 

Soldiers National Cemetery

 If you want to know more about the battles, I have capsulized it here.  Of course you can skip it!

July 1:
Elements of the two armies collide west of Gettysburg during the early morning hours.  The fighting escalates throughout the day as more Union and Confederate troops reach the field.  By 4 PM the defending Federal troops are defeated and retreat through Gettysburg, where many are captured.  The remnants of the Union force rally on Cemetery and Culps hills.

July 2:
The main strength of both armies has arrived on the field by the morning hours.  General Lee launches attacks against the Union left and right in an attempt to dislodge Meade's army from its strong position.  Longstreet's assault on the Union left,  makes good progress but is eventually checked by Federal reinforcements from the center and right.  On the Union right, Ewell's Confederate troops are able to seize part of Culps Hill; elsewhere they are repulsed.

July 3:
While Ewell renews his efforts to seize Culps Hill, Lee turns his main attention to the Union center.  Following a two-hour artillery bombardment, he sends some 12,000 Confederate infantry to try to break the Federal lines on Cemetery Ridge.  Despite a courageous effort, the attack (subsequently called "Pickett's Charge") is repulsed with heavy losses.  East of Gettysburg, Lee's cavalry is also checked in a large cavalry battle.  Crippled by extremely heavy casualties, Lee can no longer continue the battle, and withdraws to Virginia.

The battlefield site has a self-guiding auto tour, and includes many memorials scattered throughout the fields.

 Eloise is still trying to keep her finger out of the pictures she takes, and is mostly successful.  This was at the battlefield. 

This visit was an adventure and a sad period in our history.  The madness of that war comes clear when you walk around the monuments.  Hope you've enjoyed your history lesson!

Cyrus McCormick Farm

McCormick Mill and Farm

 We were chasing down geocaches, and when we got here we were really surprised to find the farm!!  This is where Cyrus grew up, working for his father in the mill, and on the farm.  Never, ever would have found this if it hadn't been for the caches placed here.

The grist mill was in use before Cyrus was born.  The structure has been carefully and authentically repaired in the last generation by the McCormick family.  It was again restored in the mid-1990s.  As it stands today it is as accurate as the best research and craft can make it.

 This sewing machine was in the museum area.  James Edward Allen Gibbs saw a picture of a sewing machine in a newspaper.  He started thinking about it and since they were very expensive, he decided to try to make one.  He even manufactured his own needles, from wood.  There was a three page article about how he went about the process.  He later was waiting for his father in the tailor shop where he saw a Singer sewing machine and thought it was much too big and heavy which pushed him on to develop this one.  

He sold a 1/2 partnership to a local saw mill owner, in order to have money for a patent application. He went to the patent office in Washington DC and observed patent models as well as some of the machines then on the market.  Gibbs realized he couldn't market this alone so, with his letters of patent in his pocket he went to Philadelphia.  

He patented 2 features, one was the revolving looper which pulled up a definite quantity of needle thread proportionate to the length of stitch and a feeding mechanism which fed the work positively between two corrugated surfaces. 

I was fascinated by the shape and size, would have liked to try it out.  They were having an open house the following weekend, don't know if they would have had it running or not.

Reaper Copy

   This reaper is a very old working reproduction of the machine that was invented on this farm.  Cyrus improved his father's machine including the reciprocating knife, guards, reel, platform, main wheel, side moving cutter and divider at the outer end of the cutter bar.  His invention took much of the drudgery out of a necessary chore, opened the door for a new era in agriculture by finding a way to replace muscle power with mechanical power on a job that had to be done.

These miniatures of farm implements on display were just incredible.  Such detail went into each one:

 

Grist Mill Water Wheel

 The farm had an interpretive trail around the mill pond, where the caches were.  

Mushrooms

Gary is pointing at a huge mushroom we found near the trail.  You can see 2 more in the background.  Wow, they were almost a foot across, looked like a soccer ball.  

Stream to the mill pond

 We were very happy to have accidentally come upon the McCormick farm.  Geocaching is so educational!  There have been so many caches in places that taught us much about the area and we would never have seen if it weren't for geocaching.