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Have fun! I've always said I'd like to RV; I can't find anybody that agrees with me.

I vote you get a baby kitty and train it to harness/RVing right away. Bam! RV Kitteh!
As much as our cat loves his Boy, he HATES other people, places, things that are not his house MORE.
 
No - that ship has sailed. Onyx is about 9 and the kittens are almost 2.5 years old. We don't need more kittehs.

Had brunch with Munchkin and Jeff, and left too much $$ at the casino. Charles is still feeling under the weather so we're chillin' in the rig watching Sunday night football.
 
(Thought I posted this hours ago ...)
Safely arrived at storage area, figured out how to unhitch and stow everything (had a problem with one side of the hitch - I had to go to the back of the Jeep and lean in and lift the rear), disconnect the auto brake, and oops forgot to put the parking brake on the Jeep first! - and put the Jeep back in driving configuration. I'm sure it will eventually become second nature, but it seems very challenging at first!

And yup, it is going to be a while before we "recoup" the sunk costs, but part of the pleasure we're getting out of this is the planning and setting up. And perhaps perversely, I LIKE camp cooking and even washing the dishes - something I don't do at home.

And tell Mr. Sue it's too late - my GoogleFu skills (together with some insider info) located your home address already, and the only thing that's keeping me from telling Kirmy - so she can retaliate in the war of the housewarming gifts - is my promise I wouldn't do it (though I am really regretting it right now!). Thought that DOES look like a nice KOA: http://koa.com/campgrounds/fillmore/

We aren't going to take the kitties on this next trip, as it is going to be ~ 10 days. We'll start out with just an overnight or two the first time we take them out. We still need to get them used to the playpen (it's sitting in the guest room, open for them to walk in and out), and to using a cat box in it (we bought a smaller secondary one, as the "poop canoe" is too big). Then we'll close them up inside the playpen in the house. Then we'll try putting them in the playpen OUTSIDE in the courtyard.

In the meantime, I'm trying to train them to accept a harness and leash. I'm putting them in their harnesses several hours a day. At first, two of them (Fat Boy Onyx and voluptuous Mimi) acted like they were paralyzed by the tightness - and both of them managed to get out of the harness when I wasn't looking. Loki didn't seem to mind - so I tried taking him outside in the courtyard with the leash. Now keep in mind, he's the escape artist - he's ALWAYS wanting to get out if the door isn't carefully attended. He usually goes to ground when I yell at him to stop, so I can pick him up and bring him back inside. But outside with ME, he acts like he knows he's not supposed to be out there, and runs for the door to go back IN! It will be a process.


You're all *******...all of you...*******....beeeeetcheees!
 
So, we had three nights in Los Wages - did not have our usual luck, sadly. But we saw Spiky and Mr. Bugger, and Munchkin and Jeff,

The morning we left Vegas was a bit more eventful than I had planned. First, some work came up for which I needed to do research, and contact people at work, all while trying to get ready to decamp, shower, and then wash dishes, before Charles dumped the grey and black wastewater tanks.

When I finished the dishes, all of a sudden I smelled something terrible - apparently, our gauges for how full the wastewater tanks are, are not working - it backed up into the shower stall, fouling all the stuff we had stored in there - the hamper full of dirty clothes, bags of extra "just in case" stuff, including medicines that I store in a canvas bag because I don't want to leave them in the rig between trips, the broom, Swiffer mop and extra mop head, and some empty canvas and cloth bags. OMG the smell! Had to carry it out of the rig without dripping on the floor, rinse everything out in the park's bathroom sink and shower stall (thank goodness for that!),repack all the wet stuff and figure out how to stow it until we reach our next stop with washing machines (we had a vinyl mat that we laid in the trunk area of the Jeep and put the hamper full of wet, still fragrant stuff on top of it, and left the windows in the Jeep cracked to let the smell escape. Washed out the shower stall, called the front desk that we would be a little late leaving the campground (it was OK), and then re-emptied the tanks after we washed all the mess out. UGH!

While I was doing the dishes, Charles had hooked up the Jeep by himself - and then the **** almost literally hit the fan. When it was cleaned up, we checked the lights on the Jeep to make sure they were working with the RV lights, and then discovered that the automatic door lock on the Jeep wasn't working (turned out to be user error though). More distraction. We finally hit the road, driving about 4 miles down a main street to the freeway, and about 3 more miles on the freeway when Charles suddenly asked if I had noticed whether he had released the emergency brake on the Jeep - I had not. He pulled over to the side of the freeway, I hopped out and discovered the brake was still engaged (and the Jeep now smells of spoiled food, poop and roasted brake). Released it and we were back on our way.

The drive to the campground just off I-40 south of AZ 64 (45 miles south of the Grand Canyon) should have taken 4 hours. It took 6 - for 14 miles, we were in stop and stop traffic - FOR NO REASON WE EVER SAW! So we got to the campground as the sun was setting, set up, and thank goodness they had a coin op laundry facility - washed all the yuk out of our clothes, canvas bags and Swiffer mop-heads. Made dinner in the rig and watched Game 1 of the World Series (Go Giants!).

In the morning, we unhoo ked the Jeep and drove up to the Grand Canyon (the campground said we could leave the RV in the site, since they weren't very busy). We only had a couple of hours to re-visit the places we already had seen and have lunch, but it was beautiful - the Grand Canyon is one of the most spectacular things I have ever seen, and the photo doesn't even begin to do it justice:
10354603_10152466451196173_5284896343194663026_n.jpg


We got back to the campground at about 3:30, hooked up and headed for Sedona.

It is 62 miles to Sedona - except both the campground we were headed to and the RV-specific GPS we have indicated an 89 mile route instead - saying on I-17 and going past Sedona and then back up a different road, rather than the shortcut through the mountains. All I can say is, if the interstate was the BETTER route, I would HATE to see what the switchbacks on the state road were like - 6% grade down for miles and miles. This was followed by 14 miles of roundabouts until we got into Sedona.

The campground here is lovely - but by the time we got here at sunset, it was too late for my BFF from high school who had been expecting us earlier - so we just hunkered down and ate leftovers from the night before. I haven't seen her in too many years, and I know she is a very earlier riser and early-to-bedder, so that was fine.

This morning I had an 8 AM conference call with Slovakia (!!) and a bit of other work. My friend, who has become an Episcopalian vicar since we last saw each other (!?!) had to write a sermon in the AM, so when she arrived at the campgound at 11:45, I was just getting ready for a visit. Charles, unfortunately, has NOT been feeling better - the stress of the drive down I-17 on top of the rest of what he's done has exhausted him, so we left him to rest at the RV, while we went out to lunch and caught up on (goodness, 7 years since we last saw each other??), and then after bringing Charles some lunch, spent the rest of the afternoon at her FABULOUS home that used to be a Tibetan monastery overlooking the spectacular scenery of Sedona (this place is ******* beautiful, in a deserty sort of way!).

We are now relaxing for the evening - Charles decided we should stay an extra night so he can recuperate a bit more.

Here we are - sorry it's so big - I wish there was a way of shrinking it a bit!
GC - D&C.jpg
 
sorry to hear about the plumbing issues but you took care of it and life goes on. overall, sounds like a great trip.

I so want to see Sedona - have driven through the area just to get out of Phoenix but really would love to spend some time there. never gotten to the Grand Canyon, either.

I find mountain driving very stressful. it's hard to enjoy the beautiful scenery when you are so tense. :frown:
 
Got all the way to Quartzsite AZ, near the CA border on I-10. It will be a long but do-able day tomorrow to get to Long Beach in LA (not far from my brothers' shop).

It is 900 degrees F (maybe C) here in the desert at 5 PM in late October. I have the A/C on all the way, and I'm still sweating - but maybe that's in part because I've already downed a small margarita :th beach: and drinking alcohol makes me sweat. Watching Game 4 of the World Series - GO GIANTS!

I STILL haven't driven the RV - it was really really windy on I-10 and Charles didn't suggest that I try, and I didn't offer.
 
I don't blame you - that wind was hell yesterday, couple times I was eating dirt !

how are your brothers doing, anyway?
 
I've learned to never underestimate the wind. Some severe gusts while driving on the 101 down the coast almost took us out, several times. I had some ptsd over it driving the motor home after that. Your rig is larger and certainly heavier than ours, but we are essentially a big tall wall on open road when the wind hits from the side. Takes a lot our of you physically and mentally driving through much of that.

It sounds like you both are able to roll with changing some plans while traveling. It took me years to learn I didn't have to stick to my rigid itineraries and to adopt a **** happens attitude, so now I can enjoy pretty much anywhere we end up, even when it was at a repair shop for two days. The shop allowed us to still stay in the rig while we waited for an ordered part, an it was adjacent to a huge park and near a nice spa. I didn't mind that change of plans too much.

Reading about the shower back up made me cringe. Washington has a fair amount of tax on booze, so I often stock up on half gallons of the some of the fancier stuff in other states to save a few bucks, and the shower is where I store it for the trip home. It takes me years to go through the large bottles, and I'd think of the poop-tastrophe every time I mixed a drink out of one those bottles.

As we are not enjoying our wind and torrents of rain up here, it's nice to read about your fun stops and see the beautiful pics of you at the grand canyon.
 
Here we are this evening, in Long Beach, after a very windy and stressful drive from Quartzsite AZ:

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We put up our colorful globe lights, but they just look like white lights in the pic. We had hors d'oeuvres (Rondole cheese and quinoa chips) and I had a LEETLE too much Bloody Mary), and then I "cooked" dinner (Barefoot Contessa beef stew with Costco mashed potatoes with creme fraiche) and watched our SF Giants win Game 5 of the World Series.

Tomorrow, we go see my brothers and allow them to pay us back for our help with their situation by "letting" them fix some annoying but minor issues with our new-to-us but not in the best condition Jeep (the driver's seat reclining back adjustment is sheared off, leaving the driver in the upright and locked position; the driver's side passenger window won't go down; the rear window wiper doesn't work). We may end up with just diagnoses, give them money for buying the parts we need, and then get them to fix the Jeep when they come up for Thanksgiving.

We will spend two nights here in Long Beach, then one night about half-way home at the beach on 101 (maybe Pismo again?), and then home. Then we get Charles to the PS to drain the seroma, and let him relax.

What we learned from this trip - we don't like this kind of pressured travel (though we were flexible enough that we twice extended stays in places that were comfortable and Charles wasn't feeling well). We'd like to go one place and stay a few days, not just drive 250 miles, stop for the night and drive again. And 250 miles when you can only go 55 (towing the car) is a LONG drive, though in our big comfy SUV, 500 isn't bad. But good to know - the trip was useful to learn this, ahead of a longer trip we want to take to National Parks in the spring.

And we have power envy after seeing diesel-engine powered RVs pass us looking easy-peasy on windy, uphill mountain roads that were buffeting us around as we strained to stay above 35 mph. I'm glad we bought an older, low-end, stripped-down rig for our first RV experience, because what if we had hated it? But, we kinda like the RV travel experience, and now we are lusting after a more upscale version for our next rig. But first, we have to get our money's worth out of this one, which we adore for her simplicity and value (shhh, don't tell Sallie we are already thinking of replacing her!).

But look at this one ... which we saw in Sedona:
http://www.dynamaxcorp.com/products/DynaQuestXL/ - $400K new ... yeah, right.

I can't see spending 1/4 that price on a motorhome. We spent about 1/15th of that on Sallie.
 
Dh went with the dh's of my long time friends on Friday and spent several hours just looking, while WE went to the apple orchard.

Then on Sunday we went back to just look at the ones WE could tow with our truck...a trailer but not a fifth wheel. Our limit is 7200 GVW. W did find some ultra lights that give us a fair amount of space.
 
The end of the trip:
My brothers fixed all the issues on the Jeep on Monday, and we headed for Pismo Beach on Tuesday. Charles was still not feeling well, and I had called his PS's office to see if we could get him in on Thursday or Friday, but he was not available. Charles decided he wanted to stay two night in Pismo, and I agreed - it is a 200 mile drive from Long Beach, and he needed the rest. So we spent a nice day in Pismo on Wednesday, and drove home Thursday.

Today, he finally had his appointment with the PS - and lo and behold, in the last few days, the swelling/seroma went down significantly - no aspiration needed after all. Sallie is still outside (we might have some service done on her before we put her away for a few weeks), and I just want to jump back in her and run away again, now that he's feeling better.
 
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