Heating Up in San Angelo

San Angelo & Colorado City, TX 4-18 to 5-10-2018

We arrived back in San Angelo after a peaceful week at Ft. Davis. It was really special seeing all the wildlife and the observatory.

Dad was waiting for us when we got back and this time there was no one blocking the power pole where we park. We used our combiner and plugged into 2-30 amp receptacles and then hooked our 50 amp cord to that. It’s just an electric hookup (No water or sewer) but we can last close to 2 weeks here without having to dump the tanks. We use the facilities in Dad’s apartment to minimize the usage of our tanks.

Dad had a few more projects he wanted help with. For instance he was not happy with the screen on his desktop computer, so we found a 32 inch LCD tv with an HDMI connection that allowed us to directly connect to his PC. This worked perfect. Larger screen means larger print which makes it easier for him to read.

Dad has always been ahead of us technologically speaking. He had a smart phone before we did, he has an Amazon Echo and we don’t, and now he has hearing aids that answer when his phone rings. Hopefully it will be a while before we catch up to that last one.

But the point is, that he was having trouble with the volume when using the smart phone. Well we drug out the manual and went through step by step with no success. We finally gave up and went to the hearing specialist shop and within 10 minutes it was fixed, but we don’t klnow how. Well, at least he knows where to go now to get it fixed.

It was also time for Sunny (the Explorer) to get an oil change. Well the local San Angelo Ford is close by, but in his commercials he drones on and on about how great he is. Since he was the only dealer within 30 miles we thought this was curious since you are the only  Ford dealer in the area why do you have to tell everyone you’re the best Ford dealer?

So we decided to go to that dealer that was 30 miles away in Robert Lee, Tx. It was a small dealer and we figured he had to work harder to keep his customers happy. After all, the “BIG” Ford dealer was only 30 miles away.

While Ivey Motors changed the oil in Sunny, we took a walk around town. Pretty deserted wouldn’t you say?

EJ loves flowers and we found this patch in a small city park in Robert Lee.

Back to Ivey Motors, we found Sunny almost ready to go, but first we had to receive the bad news. One of the rear shocks was leaking oil and should be replaced. I asked for a price to replace both rear shocks and got shocked (pun intended). We negotiated back a forth a bit and agreed on a lower price. Of course this meant another trip back to Robert Lee as the parts were not in stock.

This time Dad returned to Ivy Motors with me and we made a morning outing of it. Both shocks were replaced and the price ended up being lower than the agreed price. And Dad and I ended up back at Rio Concho in time for lunch.

Pretty soon another week had gone by and EJ and I decided it was time to take off for another short trip. This time we had Colorado City, TX in our sights. It’s an out of the way place and it gave us another chance to use our Texas State Park Pass.

Best of all, it wasn’t very crowded and because it was slowly getting warmer day by day which meant the 50 amp connection at the state park was greatly appreciated.

And we always like having a water front site, so we reserved a “Premium Site”. We keep forgetting that west Texas lakes are in pretty sad shape.

Yep, lots of vegetation and real estate between us and the waters edge.

We ended up going to Snyder, TX to stock up at Walmart. In downtown Snyder we stopped at a Pub that had just opened up for dinner.

Back at the Phaeton we discovered a worn out Gabby.

Abilene had a brewery that had been recommended to us by the Casual Pint in San Angelo. Naturally, since we were now only 70 miles away this just shouted “Road Trip!”.

So we hopped in the Explorer and headed to Abilene. We don’t normally like going to big cities on the weekend, but the brewery we were visiting is only open on Saturadays. First our journey takes us on a side track through Sweetwater, TX which on this particular day is pretty dead.

Our first stop in Abilene was the “Frontier Museum” where we saw buffalo dancing in the sky and a giant skull.

Next stop was Pappy Slokum’s Brwerey. We had been told that this was one of the better breweries in this part of Texas so we were eager to try their offerings.

Unfortunately, their beers were just so-so. Nothing really outstanding as they were rather bland. But using our phones we discovered there was another brewery mere blocks away.

It wasn’t nearly as crowded as Pappy Slockum’s and the brews were much better. I enjoyed a stout and a porter while EJ had the blonde ale.

Plus there was lot’s of room to sit outside and there was even a food truck for the hungry drinkers.

We don’t care to drive in the dark anymore so before long it was time to head back to the rig. The kitties were very glad to see us even though they were complaining that they were treated cruely and were near starving. But a few spoonfuls of canned food took care of that.

While we were at Colorado City Lake State Park there were some chores that needed down. EJ created created this delicate piece of art that whirled freely in the wind.

For the readers that are going “Whaaat?” at the artwork, those are the filters in the return air vents for the Phaeton’s air conditioning.

And wildlife was limited, but these little fellows entertained us frequently.

And this one even took a liking to our covered patio. Chilling during the heat of the day.

A week has gone by already and its time to head back to San Angelo to see how Dad is doing.

Second Highest Place in Texas

Ft. Davis State Park, TX and other places April 4 to 19, 2018

The Pogo Stick effect had been bugging me ever since we departed Red Bay, AL. I had talked to the manufacturer and to the designer and both agreed that even though our Super Steer MCU’s for the front air bags were correctly sized for the weight of our Phaeton, maybe switching to the lighter weight version would be better. But since we could never coordinate with Chris at Bay Diesel to swap us for the lighter pair we decided the best thing was to just remove them. In fairness, we had a hard time getting ahold of Chris. We tried phone calls, messages and even emails. Eventually we communicated and he did not have in stock what we needed.

San Angelo, fortunately, has a Freightliner shop. We made an appointment with them which determined our departure date from Dad’s.

So bright and early on April 4th we rolled the Phaeton over to their lot not knowing exactly what the fix would be. Luckily, they were able to simply remove the MCU’s from the airlines and replace them with a splice designed for just that purpose.

By noon we were done and drove over to the San Angelo State Park, about 5 miles away. And the best part? The Pogo Stick Effect was gone!! Woohoo!!

We picked a water front site, well sort of. The lake (reservoir) is at about 15 % capacity, so waterfront entails a whole lot of dry land and scrub brush between you and the actual water.

Gabby adapted right away, becoming a prowler in the high grass.

Miss Maggie, her regal highness, was content to bask in the sunshine.

Including getting the Pogo Stick Effect fixed, we needed a few days to resupply and take care of some chores.

Our ultimate goal was to check out Ft. Davis State Park and enjoy some more cool weather. We got lucky and scored a week long reservation.

We had a couple of days to to make a one day trip so we opted once again to avoid the interstates as much as possible and come into Ft. Davis from the south. This meant we got to spend a night at Walmart in Ft. Stockton. We had to drive a few miles on on I-10 but our reward was to see this.

The next night we decided to try our luck at seeing the Marfa Lights for the third time.

Yep, that’s pretty much all we saw. At the Marfa Lights park there was quite a crowd of people, probably about 40 in all. After a couple of hours we cursed our luck and went back to the Phaeton to go to bed. About 10 RVs and half a dozen car campers spent the night in the parking lot.

The last time we were in Ft. Davis we still had Roadie, a 19 foot Roadtrek. I was such a newbie then when we made reservations I asked if you could see the mountains from the campground.

Here is Roadie 12 years ago.

And yep, you can definitely see the mountains from the campground.

One of the benefits of camping in remote state parks is the abundance of wildlife. Not only did we have rabbits and deer wandering by our campsite, there were lots of opportunities to bird watch.

We had an anniversary while we were here too. We celebrated the 1 year mark of Frank’s hip replacement.

Couldn’t do that a year ago!

Last time we were here we didn’t have time to make the MacDocnald Observatory trip. But this time we did it.

The road to the Observatory.

A few of structures at MacDonald’s.

EJ and  one of the observatories.

The telescope inside the observatory.

Our guide. A millenial if we ever saw one. He definitely had the look, but as a young man he developed a love of astronomy. While he goes to college he guides up here in the summer. We threw all kids of questions at him, but never managed to stump him. Sorry for the bright picture but the sun was intense.

We purposely chose the hottest day during our stay at Ft. Davis State Park to do a day trip to Balmorhea, TX. Now Balmorhea is just a dried up little Texas town with not much to show except for a filling station and a couple of bars. But what makes it unique is that just outside of town is the San Soloman Spring.

In the 1930’s the Civilian Conservation Corp built this enclosure to confine a natural lake fed by the springs. The water temperature runs between 72 and 76 degrees. And with the surrounding humidty at about 15 to 20 percent it’s mighty cold when you get out of the pool as all the moisture immediately evaporates off your skin.

The pool is home to thoushands of Rio Grande Tetras

which like to nibble on the dead skin on you feet and hands. At first it’s rather startling but you get used to it after a while.

The spring boils up in the deep part of the pool supplying about 28,000,000 gallons of water to the pool everyday.

This seemed so incongrous to us, all this water in the middle of the Texas desert. But it was certainly refreshing.

Again, as happens in so many wonderous places we visit, we feel a little sad as our time here draws to an end. EJ prepares a fantastic dinner in the Phaeton prior to our departure tomorrow.

We’ll see you next back in San Angelo.

San Angelo Part I

Rio Concho Manor Parking Lot, San Angelo, TX;  3-19 to 4-6-18

Dad made sure our spot was to available when we arrived, but best laid plans went awry. As we neared our designated parking spot we could see a big old Lincoln Town Car was occupying it.

We went through the routine of unhooking the car and stowing the tow parts while mulling over what to do. Soon, out of the office, came a person who informed us the offender had been contacted and would arrive shortly to move his vehicle.

And about 15 minutes later a cowboy arrived grumbling about wasted time spent dealing with local bureaucrats today. We thanked him as he pulled off continuing to grumble.

It was good to see Dad was doing well and within a few days of arrival we even made a trip over to see brother Terry and his wife Joy. Here is a picture of the Putnam men in front of Dad’s car.

Dad had decided that he wanted EJ to work her magic so he wouldn’t have any financial worries in the future. Several days were spent analyzing and setting this up. But now all of the financial stuff has been taken care of and Dad has one less thing to worry about. He gets frustrated, as we all do, when things are more complicated than they need to be.

First thing we knew, 2 weeks had gone by and we decided it was time to do a little exploring. But more about that next time.

Pogo Stick Express To Texas

Rio Concho Towers, San Angelo, TX – March 19, 2018

Our last post left off with us bouncing down the road on our way to Texas. It was so bad with the new Motion Control Units (MCUs) that we were begining to doubt if the Phaeton was the motorhome we wanted to continue traveling in. EJ was emphatic when she said “No way I’m going to Alaska in this motorhome”.

We were so disappointed because when we installed MCUs on our previous motorhome the improvement in ride was amazing. On the Phaeton I was convinced I had made a huge mistake.

What are MCUs you ask? They are air flow restrictors that are placed in the air line between the air tank and the air bag suspension on all 4 corners of the motorhome. Their purpose is to reduce side to side rocking motion caused by things like semi trucks passing you and going over driveway dips at an angle. This is sometimes called the “Walmart Wobble”.

When you cross over a driveway dip at an angle the motorhome leans to one side then violently leans in the opposite direction. This has been know to cause cabinet doors to fly open spewing contents all over the floor. This generally results in a very unhappy co-pilot/navigator.

When we had the MCUs installed on the Itasca, it totally eliminated the side to side rocking motion. In no way did it affect any other aspect of suspension reaction.

On the Phaeton,while it did suppress the “Walmart Wobble” it also violently accentuated every dip in the road. Riding in the Phaeton was now like bouncing on a Pogo Stick!

However, Dad was expecting us in San Angelo, so we pressed on.

Due to lot’s of rain in the area quite a few of the low lying areas were flooded.

As faithful readers know, we really try to avoid interstates and enjoy cruising the back roads of America. This leg was no different. We overnighted at the Walmart in Tupelo, MS; Harlow’s Casino in Greenville, MS; the RV corral in Queen City, TX; Walmart in Mexia, TX; Faunt Le Roy in Gatesville, TX and finally the Rio Conch Manor parking lot in San Angelo, TX.

We had intended to stay at a Corp of Engineer’s Park near Queen City, but it was closed due to flooding. And in Mexia we raced to the Walmart barely outrunning a severe thunderstorm. So along with the bouncing the trip was not without it’s excitement.

And in Gatesville at Faunt Le Roy Park our campsite had neighbors right across the fence. But at $20 a night for full hook ups who’s to complain?

The next day, before we begin to make preparations to leave for San Angelo, Gabby greets the early morning.

See you in San Angelo, where we continue the MCU story.

First Time to Red Bay

Bunkhouse RV, Red Bay, AL         March 2 – 13, 2018

And we’re off! On March 2nd, we had finally pulled the plug and said enough is enough. We’ve prepared the best we can and it’s time to just wrap it up and go. We know we’ll forget some things, but we’ll just deal with it when we figure out what they are.

We said goodbye to our good friends Jeanne and John Stratton, turned the keys over to them, hooked up Sunny and hit the road.

We got as far as Waycross, GA, a whole 70 miles from our starting point, when we were notified that our Visa cards had been compromised. They would need to be replaced. And they would only send new replacement cards to our home address. Well that wasn’t going to work! We had made appointmens in Red Bay, AL that could not be broken without causing substantial delays to our trip. We just couldn’t turn around and go back to Orange Park to wait for new cards to show up.

EJ got down to business on the phone and convinced them to send the replacement cards to Dad’s apartment in San Angelo. The new cards should arrive in 2-3 weeks. In the meantime, we would just have to limp by on our remaining cards. Whew! Crisis averted!

True to our word, we stopped by Paradise Lake RV Park in Enigma, GA again. If you remember, we were amazed at the hospitality we received here when we were fleeing Hurricane Irma last year. Our second night was spent at the Super Walmart in Prattville, AL.

On Sunday, March 4, we arrived at Chris Berry’s shop, Making Sawdust. Monday morning we were scheduled to have doors made for our shoe cabinet.

It had been raining for several days and had made quite a mess, but Chris had several loads of gravel put down in the driveway to make it all better.

Chris showed up on Monday and he and EJ discussed several options (projects) but in the end decided to just go with new doors for the shoe cabinet. He got those on order, and that afternoon we skedaddled over to Bay Diesel to have the M3 maintenance done on the Phaeton.

We figured we would boondock for the night but Chris McKinney said that at 5 o’clock we were to move over by the rollop doors and they would hook us up to a 30 amp connection for the night. He even had a water hookup if we needed it.

The next day, Tuesday 3-5-18, they did the service and even had time to install a SuperSteer steering damper for us.

Once again, we spent the night, figuring tomorrow we would go hunting for a place to camp while we waited on Tiffin Service to do some warranty work for us. Wednesday morning we took a tour and found that Bunkhouse RV was one of the few places that had space available. So we signed up and they didn’t want any money until we were done with Tiffin.

That same day we went to the Tiffin Service Campground to register for the service work. We knew there was no space in their campground, but we asked if we had to move to their campground to register for service. Thankfully the answer was no. Those folks in the Tiffin Campground were squeezed in like sardines. We were quite pleased with our site over at Bunkhouse. And it was all of 5 minutes away from the service center.

For the next several days we played tourist. Every one that goes to Red Bay has to check out the Coon Dog cemetary.

And of course, one must see the Rattle Snake Saloon.

It is a Saloon/Restaurant built into a cave. But the one thing folks don’t tell you is they don’t serve beer or wine until after 5pm. You see the restaurant is on an equisterian ranch. And they don’t want the riders getting drunk and falling off their horses. The trails close at 5pm and then the bar opens.

While reseaching about Red Bay we had heard how it was an absolute must that you eat at The Mason Jar restaurant. After hearing so many people rave about it, we figured it wad be hard to get a seat.

I guess we got lucky and hit the lull between breakfast and lunch.

Back to the main reason we went to Red Bay. Most folks have these huge lists of items they want fixed by the service center. We try and fix a lot of things ourselves because we are reasonably capable folks. Also because we are generally disappointed in the quality of work performed by so called RV experts. As a rule, we try to go to the “source” ,ie RV manufacturer, chassis manufacturer, etc. Since our motorhome was made in Red Bay, we had a nagging issue we wanted them to take a look at. Actually there were four.

The step recall I could have done myself, but the manufacturer wouldn’t sell the parts to me. Something about a liability issue.

I wanted to learn more about the slides, so I figured why not let the experts show me?

And the night stand fix, we probably could have done ourselves, but we were here so why not?

The ceiling issue was way beyond our comfort level. But the service center handled all of them for us in one day. Wow! is all we could say.

We stuck around a few more days because I wanted Bay Diesel to install a set of Super Steer Motion Control Units(MCUs) on the Phaeton for us. That turned out to be a mistake.

Finally on March 13 the MCUs came in, they had to ordered, and were installed. We spent one last night in Bay Diesels parking lot and headed of to Tupelo, MS the next day. We drove on the Natchez Trace Parkway which is very smooth, and didn’t notice anything was amiss.

The next day was a long one and a good portion of it was spent on very rough roads. It was perhaps the roughest ride we had every encountered in all our years of RVing and it turned out it wasn’t all the roads fault. The MCUs installed on the front air bags had turned our Phaeton into a pogo stick.

But that is a story for another time.