Better Late, than Never

Happy New Year and may 2024 bring everyone good health, and  be a year of peace.

Usually we start our trek south in late October, but due to us deciding to move, and a few medical tests, our departure was delayed.  And what a year to have this happen – the weather co-operated and stayed unseasonally warm and we spent Christmas at home with the kids.

Of course, no trip is without the odd hitch.  It started when we went to pick up the motorhome – it wouldn’t start.  The strange thing is that it had been running just 10 days prior so after much coaxing, and threatening, and two new batteries – away it went.  We parked it on the street in front of.   our place, woke the neighbourhood at 6:30 a.m. with the rumble of the motor, packed (poorly I must add) and we were off.  Driving conditions were ideal – sunny skies, clear roads and little to no wind.

We found a fairgrounds which was off the highway, and not right next door to a train track and called it a night.  Travel on day two was much the same although in the mountains, there had been a bit of snow so there was some moisture on the highways so enough to make a huge mess of everything.  But when we stopped for fuel we realized that our step did not retract when we left so, another repair.  With some spray and a bit of shoving, it is now working again.  I guess in time, a lot of crap gets into the moving parts.   We found a large, flat parking lot and called it a night.

As with any big city, Las Vegas traffic was rather slow at times.  Due to constant construction, here is a sample of the slow moving traffic with extends for miles.

There are some huge solar installations in Nevada.  What you see is not a lake or body of water - this is all solar.

As we were coming out of Las Vegas on day three,  oops, hot engine.  So we limped into Searchlight, NV, stopped at a service station where a nice gentleman let us clean the road crap off our radiator, and as we had hoped, we were good to go.  It was great to be able to call it a day before nightfall,

and not have to leave before dawn.  We made it down to Yuma on day four and it was time to relax – well almost.  At home we will often see large bales of hay.  Here in Yuma, it is large bales of cotton.

 We found that the tailpipe broke off from the muffler so once the repair shops are up and running after the holidays, we will be looking for a repair shop.  In the meantime, we are going to enjoy the sun, enjoy our visits, and bring in 2024 quietly.

Despite the little challenges, it was marvelous to have three plus days of great driving, good roads, decent temperatures.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and the new year will be filled with health and happiness.

 

We Have Arrived

The time has come to make the journey northward.  The weather hasn't been spectacular and there seemed to be an endless stream of storms further north, we decided to go to Mesquite for a few days and do a little touring. 

Not wanting to stay in a casino parking lot (with everyone else who is travelling through) we found a spot just a few miles out of town on a much less travelled highway which parallels the interstate. 

The spot was overlooking the Virgin River and valley and was a pretty spot. 

 It was nice and quiet at night so it was perfect.  Of course there was the regular weather checks and sure enough, rain was predicted in a couple of days.  Although we quite liked our spot, there was a fair bit of clay and we really didn't want to be here in the rain.  Oh, but just ten or so miles up the road, there is the Virgin River Campground where we have stayed a number of times and the view is incredible.  We decided to go and spend a few days there while looking for a three day window to hit the road for home.  On the interstate, however, there seemed to be a continual long lineup  which seemed to be due to some construction work which resulted in a traffic restriction. 

According to the highway department this restriction was every day from 6 am to 6 pm.  No problem - we weren't going far so we would wait until after 6 pm and go there for a few days.  This is where it starts.

We get to the on ramp to the interstate and it is blocked by an ambulance and police car.  We stop and talk to the police and the comment was "there is an ambulance parked there".  Well, he was right as it was just parked and we would have to go around to the west onto a secondary highway.  That's no problem except it does not go to the campground.  They were not going to open the ramp until after nightfall and we did not want to travel the interstate as it goes through the Virgin River Gorge at night.  So off we go and now we have to find somewhere to park for the night and it is now becoming dusk.  We see some campers parked on the right and on the left is a nice clearing - we will just stop here for the night so in we turned.  As we go to turn around we discover that an error in judgement meant that it wasn't quite big enough so it was tight but we were able to get the Jeep unhooked, got turned around, went across the road and spent the night.

Now this road does come out at St. George, Utah but it is now too far to go back to our campground so we said - let's go.  It isn't very far before we were in the snow

and of course, a snow squall had gone through so the roads had been icy

(fortunately not for us) and there was about 20 miles of wet, sloppy roads.  Everything was covered in a wet, dirty, salty muck.  From there it was smooth sailing......until we got to just past Salt Lake City.  There was a bad accident so the interstate was blocked.  Once again, a traffic jam as you have three lanes of traffic merge into one to go off onto a secondary highway along with traffic from two other roads.  That was stop and go for a couple of hours.  Our stop was Idaho Falls for the night for a very cool and crisp night.

The next day proved to be a day to drive.  The skies were overcast to start but did mostly clear, no wind, dry roads and cool temps which the motorhome seems to like.  So drive we did - 1432 km and got home.  Only almost bump was when three deer ran out in front of us - but they scattered soon enough to avoid venison stew! We simply parked the motorhome in the RV dealers parking lot, turned the furnace on, and went home.  The temps dropped to -23C that night.

The next morning is the task to winterize, and unload.  No problem, except the water line froze so can't winterize.  We should have run the furnace during the day as it was quite cold out, and we should have had it higher at night.  It was should have, could have.  We spent some time by running the furnace at a higher temp, put in a small hair dryer, and after and hour or hour and a half, winterizing was done!!  But we're not done - under the motorhome there appears to be an antifreeze leak.  That will be dealt with at a later date with some warmer temps.  The fellows at the dealership washed all the grime off and things are looking good again.

But we did make it safe and sound, laundry is all done, we are all rested, and can now reflect on a great winter.  We can now all look forward to spring and the joy of seeing the birds come back, the trees leaf, and grass grow.  Until our next trip, this will be it for a while.  I hope everyone has a wonderful summer.