This post will be a short mish-mash of disorganization since we have not exactly settled back into our “routine”, but the main point will be about a great money-saving tip, provided to us by our RV friends Bud & Meredith Bradley. That will come at the end. But for now, since the great year of 2020 has been such a disaster and none of our plans have panned out (or so it would seem), we contemplated our future travels. We came up with plan #7,892. That would be a run back into the great state of Texas, after, of course, a short visit with the kids & grandkids. Texas has not fallen off our radar screen as a potential landing target when we decide to “retire” from the full-time RVing lifestyle, the eastern half of the state in particular. We also anticipate this year to be the first for us where we will not return to Kalifornia for family holiday times.

We hit Kalifornia, still suffering smoke filled skies albeit not as thick as before, returned Jeanne’s mom to her normal life, then made a beeline south for some children & grandchildren time, first stop Santa Rosa, with our home parked at the Petaluma Elk’s Lodge. Jenn, Gus, & grandson Max “The Gladiator” have been poised, seemingly forever, to get evacuated due to the wildfires in their area, but now the danger was diminishing, enough so that we actually drove into the danger zone to visit them. Max will be having his 9th birthday at the end of November, so we celebrated a little early. Max is into Nerf guns & Pokemon cards, and he made bank on Nerf gear and Pokemon. I was trying to figure out the Pokemon “game”, but I swear, the people who come up with this stuff must be on a continual acid trip! We then chased each other around, blasting away, Nerf darts everywhere!  We wanted to go check out a local brewery, Cooperage, but thanks to China, they were not open on the day we were there. So we ended up at 3rd St. Aleworks in downtown Santa Rosa. Unremarkable beers, not the best nachos we’ve had, but we still had fun with Jenn & Max. While at Jenn’s, I took the opportunity to make use of her kitchen and cook up a whole bunch of my father’s famous Chile Verde burritos which we promptly chowed down on. I rolled up a bunch for Gus to take in his lunches, as well as a bunch for us to freeze in the bus for easy dinner nights. Jenn & Gus had chef’s duty one night and they made some outstanding street tacos for us. It was a very nice visit, as usual, and sad to see it end.

Atascadero Elk’s Lodge (my home lodge) was our next run. As is the case with most of the Elk’s Lodges, the lodges & lounges are still closed because of the China virus bull$hit but thankfully the RV lots are open. We had fun with Chad, Crissy, Little Miss Hailey & Little Miss Ellie, even a couple of granddaughter sleep-overs in the “camping bus” as they call it. We had arts-n-crafts time, Jeanne found a new hairdresser (see photo), and mommy & daddy got a childless date night. With Jeanne’s birthday just passed, Chad & Crissy also treated us to a birthday dinner followed by some ice-cream cake. One day Chad & Crissy took us to their club winery, Rava, where they did their product pick-up and we got to sample some of the winery’s offerings. Hailey & Ellie had fun running around the small pond and playing on the swings.  During our time here Chad took Jeanne & I to check out Manrock Brewing Co., Santa Maria Brewing Co., and Liquid Gravity Brewing Co. One standout quaff was Liquid Gravity’s “Twist & Stout”, an imperial double stout. We took everyone out to dinner at a little hole-in-the-wall called “Don Q’s Restaurant”. The service was not great (mostly due to the China virus hysteria, no doubt), but the food was unique and very tasty.

After saying our good-bye’s it was eastbound & down. It would seem the motorhome gremlins had recently hitched a ride with us. We started with my DEF system. We had just fueled up, DEF included, when out of nowhere my “DEF Low” emergency warning light and dinger came on while driving down the road. Scratching my head, I got out and checked the DEF tank. No obvious leakage, the little red light on the gauge lit up but the gauge showed full, so I popped the cap and re-seated it thinking it could be similar to when your “check engine” light comes on in your car & they always start with checking your gas cap. As we continued down the road, the “DEF Low” warning continued, but stopped after a short distance, so I repeated the “scratch head” motion and kept going.  Probably a couple hundred miles down the road the Gremlins were thinking I had it too easy, so my “jacks down” warning light and siren goes off. Repeating the “scratch head” motion, I got out and checked the guilty jack. Sure as $hit, it had rattled down about an inch from it’s normal seated position. I checked the bay containing my hydraulics system, found no obvious leakage, then hit the auto-store button again. The errant jack pulled back to it’s normal storage position and my hand returned to it’s now-normal “scratch head” position. So, our escape from Kalifornia went like this. Keep in mind, I personally do not like long travel days, and if I drive more than about 4 hours I am not having fun. We did a long run from Atascadero to the Needles Elk’s Lodge. Their RV lot is just a flat dirt/gravel lot with FHU’s, but you can’t complain about the $20/night rate. Since it was just an overnighter, we left the Jeep hooked up to Rosie the bus. The next day it was off to Gallup, NM and the USA RV Park. There, we needed to disconnect and use the Jeep but in unhooking it, BAM! the gremlins struck the Jeep and killed the battery. Now, when the supplemental air brake system was installed the tech told me they put in a trickle charger for the Jeep battery, so I did not need to disconnect the battery when towing any more (as I had been up to then). So much for trusting the “trickle charge”. I got a jump from the clerk at the park and ran the Jeep for a while to get it back up to speed. In the morning I ran the Jeep into town for a little more charging, then we hooked up, disconnected the battery, and off to the races we were. Another long day brought us to Clovis, NM and the Wagon Wheel RV Park. We left the Jeep hooked up overnight, then continued eastbound into Texas. We landed in Waco after yet another long day’s drive, just barely beating the sunset. Jeanne found an RV park called Flat Creek Farms RV Park and we pulled in just as the sun disappeared. Those dang gremlins hit me again! Dead battery, again! Bottom line – there were no spaces available at the park, so we had to overnight at a nearby Flying J, with another jump start to start the next day. And just to pile on my already $hitty disposition, driving through the nightmare of a residential area just to get to the RV park I had to maneuver through skinny streets and low hanging trees. In doing so, my satellite antenna took some serious damage from one of the branches. Hey, Jeanne, have you had enough lessons in 4-letter word vocabulary yet? 

Well, we found space the next day at the North Crest RV Park in Waco. There, we got set up and promptly drove the Jeep to Autozone where they checked the battery and charging system, no issues. Head scratched. I also found a mobil satellite repair outfit, SATS2GO, out of the Willis area, so after a few days of rest and decompression, we moved the short distance over to the Conroe Lake/Houston No. KOA. So here we sit, waiting for the satellite repair, then it will be on to some good ol’ Texas ‘splorin’.

I guess it wasn’t as short as I thought it would be. I mentioned saving some greenbacks. Our road warrior buddies & fellow Texans, Bud & Meredith, recently turned us on to an RV Fuel Program by TSD Logistics, Inc. It is a credit card system you use at truck stops. They have a $20 sign up fee and easy-to-use phone app (that’s “easy” according to Jeanne), you just need to use the trucker lanes at the truck stops when you fuel up. It does not include discounts for DEF, but the diesel savings is substantial! There are various participating gas stations and each has some minor (cents, not dollars) fees they add to the transactions. Examples of the savings we have enjoyed are: 32.97 gallons purchased, saved $19.03; 40.29 gallons purchased, saved $12.97; 55.73 gallons purchased, saved $34.94; 63.75 gallons purchased, saved $36.15; and 63.94 gallons purchased, saved $48.09. I’ll leave it to you do do your own math re: price per gallon savings. Pilot stations (and presumably Flying J) do not participate in the TSD program for RV’s, they already do the Good Sam program.

That sort of catches us up for now. Until next post…