8:30 Saturday morning, 23 March 2013
Just a week late, Art pulled out of the park to fuel up while Gillian took the dogs for a walk. The Chevron station across the street was out of diesel!
A bit further back down the highway was Woody's, and they not only had diesel, but it was cheaper than the price Chevron had posted!
The computer estimated we had 66.5 gallons left. When done, we had taken on 61.3. It's a 90 gallon tank! That means there was only 28.7 gallons left. We had lost almost 39 gallons of fuel!
Art returned to just in front of the RV Park where he topped up the propane (in case we needed the furnace on the way home) and got the Jeep hooked up just as Gillian and the dogs arrived. We were northbound at 9:20.
We found the Yuma Palms Mall without difficulty and more by good luck than good memory ( we had been here last year) we parked quite close to the Pet store and a couple of electronic shops.
No luck on a GPS, but found the required dog food without difficulty, had lunch and a few minutes after 1:00 PM were California Bound.
We found our way to Desert Hot Springs OK but got lost on the way to the RV Park--missed a turn! After a nice tour of Beautiful Down Town Desert Hot Springs, we got to Sands RV and Golf Resort by 5:00.
Walk and feed the dogs, shower, change etc we set off in the Jeep to our friends Celine and Peter. We met them quite a few years ago in Zihuatanejo, they dropped in to visit us at home in their sail boat a few years ago and last year we visited them in the park. Now they have bought a house here for the winters.
We had an excellent dinner and good time visiting them and another Canadian Couple, then headed home to bed, hoping for an early start in the morning.
And early it was, for us, anyway--departing at 8:40.
Our route was I 10 to the I 5 at Los Angeles, by what ever route our temperamental GPS or the Road Atlas or the Highway signs indicated. We managed to keep the GPS functioning more or less but followed a slightly different route than last year.
Where the 210 joins the I-5 we did not follow the truck route. In hind sight we probably should have as the multiple lanes thin out to just 2 going up a very long steep hill. Note the car passing us on the right in the merge lane.
The truck route appeared to be a little longer but less steep.
At any rate, we were on the I-5 and fueling at the Flying J at El Tejon at 12.30 (exit 205) Just a quick stop here and we were on our way for about 5 minutes when we pulled of at the rest area fora quick lunch and to give the dogs a quick run and a pee.
Continuing on again at 1:35, we just kept rolling for the next 260 miles or so when we pulled off for some grocery shopping (Exit 463). 35 minutes later we were back on the road, just a short 40 minute run to the next Flying J where we fueled up again then moved to the parking area for the night. There was a bit of a line up at the pumps, it took longer for the pickup in front to finish fueling, buy a coffee and a burger, than it did to pump in another hundred bucks of diesel.
Monday, March 25th
This was the day of our original appointment at McKay Truck in Albany OR. We were going to be a little late.
Somewhere around 8:00 AM, getting ready to roll and the rear jacks wouldn't retract. You may remember that the front jacks wouldn't respond to their button--(it's on the TO DO list for Chris when we get home) so we had just used the rears. Well, this morning, it was the rear jacks' turn!
Art dug out the manual to make sure he opened the correct valves, reached in and began to turn the handle and . . . Up came the jacks and down came the rig. We were mobile by 8:30.
Again a long day, stopping at 1:00 at Weed Rest Area in Northern California for lunch, 45 minutes later we were back on the road and in another 45 minutes had crossed into Oregon. We had called McKay Truck to let them know that we would be outside their door in the morning. We were told that they had a late shift on and they would open the gates to let us set up inside.
At 5:00 we stopped yet again at a Flying J, this one at exit 148 at Rice Hill. Half an hour here for a quick stretch and fuel and we arrived at Mckay Truck in the rain at 7:00 PM.
We parked, dumped the suspension, plugged in and were done. We'd be here at least two days, probably three. We had quite a list, the biggest job being the heat pump.
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