Mesquite-grilled

We are still at our lovely and free digs on BLM land in Box Canyon, east of Mecca.

Tomorrow will mark one full week since we arrived here and set up camp; it's been a great spot. Traffic on Box Canyon road has been very light -- just a handful of sand-toy types heading up-canyon at the start of the weekend, and down-canyon at the end, and maybe a dozen other cars a day. Only a pair of ATVs today, and a motorcyclist last week, approached our camp closer than the paved road, unless you count the three vans from some college or other, that literally drove right through our site Saturday on their way to who-knows-where, then right back again an hour later. I had set out our orange cones for just such an occurrence.



We've been enjoying fresh home-cooked meals nightly, but today we basically ran out of fresh veggies, and, horror of horrors, cheap wine. We hopped on the scooters and rode the ten miles back into Mecca, where Louise found some great fresh veggies -- cheap, too -- at one of the three Mexican markets in town. While the market had beer, we had to cruise over to the AM/PM at the Arco truck stop on the west edge of town to find table wine, for which we paid probably three times the supermarket rate. But the nearest supermarket is in La Quinta -- not really a scooter ride from here.

Now we're all set for up to another week -- we're still above half on our fresh water supply. I don't expect we will actually stay that long, though.

One thing we have no shortage of here is mesquite. We are parked in a triangle more or less defined by three mesquite trees, and the desert is littered with dead and dry mesquite branches. Some previous group even did the work to collect a fairly large pile of it fifty feet or so from here. All I needed to do was take the reciprocating saw over (we also have a chain saw that runs on the same battery packs, if needed) and cut the branches to an appropriate size for the small fire pit I made, and we've enjoyed nightly campfires.

We brought a couple of steaks with us, and tonight will be the second night for mesquite-grilled steak. I simply take one of the three small pieces of grate from my LP grill, perhaps 6" x 8", and support it on two rocks over the mesquite coals. I cover it with the lid from our wok while grilling, which, over the years, has made the wok cover brown with smoke char, but it helps the meat cook evenly, and it's a cheap wok lid anyway.

We've had some visitors while we've been here. Last week, readers Shelly and Karen stopped by to chat for an hour or so, and yesterday we had a visit from long-time reader Ron, a.k.a. "Spyderman," who rode out on his Gold Wing, making me miss my old ride just a tad -- I had the same model and year. It was a great visit in both cases.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go flip my steak.

Long overdue Red Cross video

One of the reasons we wanted to spend at least a week here was to catch up on some long overdue chores. Lots of niggling little projects have gotten pushed to the back burner, including transferring our last few videotapes to digital format.

If you've been following this blog long enough, you might remember that we spent Christmas of 2007 in Beaverton, OR, finishing up a Red Cross disaster relief operation there. Only a handful of volunteers stayed behind to close up shop after the holiday, and somehow this caught the attention of the local TV news crew. They interviewed the few of us who weren't camera shy and put together a nice little "feel good" story for their Christmas eve broadcast.

We managed to tape the clip from the TV onto VHS, but had no way to convert the tape into something we could put on the blog. Months later, we bought a video capture device, and today finally got around to finishing the conversion.

So here, for your viewing pleasure, is the video. Okay, this is mostly for our parents, because who doesn't want to see their kids on TV? And it's also a plug for the American Red Cross, because it's a darned good organization and it never hurts to be reminded that disasters don't take a break for holidays.

Camping Reference Guides updated

Back in August 2007, I wrote about the printed reference books we use to find great places to spend the night. Several of them helped us zero in on the gorgeous spot we're in right now. If you haven't read it, check it out.

Most of the titles are available from RV Bookstore. This afternoon, I received a Twitter notice that RV Bookstore was having a one-day-only sale, so I took a peek at my list to see what needed updating.

If you order from RV Bookstore before 6PM Pacific today (March 27, 2009) and use the checkout code GNUJDKGC you can save 15% on their already low prices. Update: Another sale. Order before 11 am today, 3-29-09 (Pac. Time), & save 15%. Use code AQJFXGLE at checkout. Kind of short notice, but it prompted me to get moving, so maybe it will help one our readers, too. I found newer versions of the The RVers Friend and Casino Camping, so I ordered them.



If I see any other sales pop up on Twitter, I'll let you know. I usually give away our old books when we get newer versions, so watch for a chance at free, gently used guides in the next couple of weeks.

Pilgrimage through Mecca

We are parked in a sandy wash in Box Canyon, on BLM land, east of Mecca (map).

We knew about the boondocking opportunities here because we passed through this way just over a year ago, staying one night in a similar spot right at the upstream end of the canyon. On that trip, we noticed many such pull-offs throughout the canyon as we drove downhill to the small community of Mecca, north of the Salton Sea. We are technically "dispersed camping," which we may do here for up to 14 days. While many dispersed opportunities require a spacing of ¼ mile from the paved road, BLM rules here in Box Canyon require only 300'.

This area is well-used, and there are several fire rings scattered around (and some trash as well, unfortunately), but we are all alone right now, and we only passed one other rig, a truck camper, on our way up-canyon yesterday. I had, frankly, expected it to be more crowded. That's a good thing, not only because we like our solitude, but because the sand and soft gravel all around us make maneuvering Odyssey without getting stuck something of a challenge, and we need to be parked on pretty firm ground, which, here, means a small triangle at the confluence of two dirt tracks.

We're closer to the road than we'd like, but there is very little traffic here, perhaps a dozen or so vehicles per day in each direction. This is a great spot, because it is quiet, dark at night, and well-protected by the surrounding canyon from the wind, which is incessant and strong enough in this part of the state to make wind-turbine power generation cost effective.

Except when there is traffic, we can't really see the road from our spot here, and, with majestic rock formations surrounding us at every compass point, it has the feeling of being even more remote than it is. (As it stands, though, it is remote enough that our cell phones do not work.) It took us a while to find a firm, mostly level spot far enough away from the road, but, now that we're parked, we are settled in for the long haul.



Our plan is to spend at least a full week here. After we left the Morongo Casino yesterday, we made a quick stop at the Palm Desert Wal-Mart to return my Redbox video, then proceeded to the Valley Sanitation District wastewater treatment plant in Indio, which provides a free RV dump. There is no potable water available there, so next we stopped at the TA truckstop in Coachella to fill the fresh water tank. With two weeks of groceries already aboard, courtesy of our Wal-Mart and Ralph's stops on Tuesday, we are all set to spend up to the full 14-day aliquot here, if we are so moved. We'll be burning most of our trash in our campfire, and burying the pet waste in accordance with dispersed-camping guidelines, so it is only storing our already-giant pile of recyclables that will be a bother (we tried, unsuccessfully, to find a drop-off on our way here).

Even though my plan was to just chill out completely for the first day or two, we've already jumped into some projects. Louise has been a whirlwind of coach-cleaning, and I've replaced the inset mirror on the driver side of the coach (knocked off on a narrow bridge by an inattentive cowboy) and a burned-out license light on my scooter. I expect that I will whittle down the backlog of minor coach projects as the week progresses, including broken bay door latches, minor body repairs, faulty dash gauges, and reorganizing the tool and parts drawers.

Our decision to come here to the desert paid off last night, when we were able to dine al fresco for the first time in ages. Our general route plan involves heading up the coast on California-1, the Pacific Coast Highway, with a variety of coastal stops before making some visits in Monterey and the SF bay area (including many much-needed and overdue doctor visits for both of us), and we were 140 miles closer to that route when we were in Whittier. We'll go right by there again when we leave here, making this a ~280-mile detour.

At our current operating cost of about $0.48 per mile (with diesel at $1.99), it's therefore costing us just $135 to be here in this lovely, warm, and free spot. The extremely mild weather here also means we will probably average less than an hour a day of generator run time, or about $2.60 per day.

By contrast, we might have chosen, instead, to spend an extra week to two weeks driving up the coast, or maybe even in some kind of campground in the LA-to-Santa Barbara area. That would have been just as lovely, albeit much colder. However, the least expensive coastal stopping opportunities run $20-$25 per night, and that's for dry camping. In addition, the colder temperatures would mean an hour or two of Webasto run time daily, and more generator time as well. Even at just $20 per night, the curves cross at just over six days; every day we spend here beyond that saves us at least $20 and probably more like $25 or more. On top of that, being here forces us to eat in for all our meals; we know from experience that we are tempted to eat out a lot more on the coast, and more still when in developed areas.

Now that we're parked for a while, blog updates will be more sporadic. I generally try to post at least once from each and every place we stay, and this post is already in the bag. I will probably post at least once more, though, before we leave, and, of course, if anything interesting happens (such as an earthquake -- last night was the second swarm in this region in less than a week, and scientists are watching the San Andreas carefully). Otherwise, you will likely find more updates from us on our Twitter streams over the next few days.

Escape from LA

Photo by youngthousands

We are at the Morongo Casino, in Cabazon (map), a venue we have enjoyed before.

We wrapped up at Freightliner Monday afternoon. Upon investigation, it turned out that the tag axle alignment had never even been checked, and so it was a good thing we went back in to the shop to do so. It turned out to be out by almost an inch; not surprising, given how bent the A-frame had been. I expect that setting the toe correctly and having the follower locked in a more straight orientation will help considerably with the tag tire wear.

After we rolled out of the shop and paid the bill ($3,300, counting the $600 we already paid them after the initial visit -- gulp), we got settled in at "our spot" on the street. When I double-checked their work on the steer axle, though, I noticed that the pinch clamp for the left tie rod was dangerously close to interfering with the frame, a serious safety hazard that has bitten us before -- there is even a safety recall bulletin on it from NHTSA/Neoplan. This annoyed me because I had told them about it explicitly before they started the work. The service manager ended up sending his thinnest mechanic out to where we were parked to slide under and take care of it.

By the time all was done, we would be leaving in the horrendous LA rush hour traffic, so we decided to just spend another night. We rolled out yesterday just as the 11am street-cleaning parking restriction kicked in, putting our departure at just three hours shy of a full three weeks since we arrived at that spot. Prior to this, the longest period we have ever spent on a city street was when we were working the wild fires in San Bernardino over a year ago.

We are en route to the desert near the Salton Sea. There is quiet, scenic, and free boondocking on BLM land there, and we need a week or so of complete downtime. On our way out of town yesterday we stopped at a Batteries Plus store in Brea for a new battery for Louise's scooter, a Ralph's grocery right next door to it, and a Wal-Mart in Banning to stock up on a couple weeks worth of provisions -- there are no real stores anywhere near that part of the desert. As long as we were at Wal-Mart, I grabbed Quantum of Solace out of the RedBox dispenser. I have to say, I'm glad I only spent a dollar on it. Today we will swing by the Wal-Mart in Palm Desert to drop it back off.

Last night we ate at the fancy Cielo restaurant on the 27th floor of the casino hotel, something we skipped last time (in favor of one of the ground floor restaurants) because we were under the weather. The menu was very pricey, but they were offering a "Stimulus Package," which was a prix fixe affair involving prime rib and a salad with two glasses of wine, plus dessert, for an unbeatable price. The views out across the San Jacinto mountains were spectacular; we're glad we did it.

We're debating whether to wander back in to the hotel today for a massage, something else we skipped last time due to feeling crummy. We walked in a tad too late yesterday to catch the 2-for-1 Tuesday spa special, which would have been perfect.

Going for the record

We are still/again on the street in front of Los Angeles Freightliner.

I had really hoped they would be finished yesterday, and, indeed, they had "completed" all the work. However, they failed to activate the locking mechanism when they checked the tag axle alignment. Since the lock cylinders may well be trying to push the tags out of alignment, I don't consider the alignment complete, and I was very clear with them about this.

Unfortunately, it was past 4 when everything else was completed, so the alignment re-check will have to wait until Monday. I really, really hope they are done Monday afternoon -- if we are still here on Tuesday, that will make three full weeks that we have been in this area getting mechanical work done. I think that's the longest we've ever been "down" for mechanical work. Of course, if you count the fact that three Mondays ago we had the A-frame replaced in Escondido, we'll actually have been at this more than three weeks by end-of-day Monday.

In the meantime, we've "missed out" on any number of things we might have done here at the end of March, including seeing friends in Mexico, a bus rally in Arizona, and SXSW in Austin. Having come to this point, we are now completely re-evaluating our options moving forward.

Given our commitment in Salt Lake starting June 24th, our need to be in Washington sometime before the start of hurricane season, and wanting to get some work done at Infinity Coach, I've asked them if we can arrive at the shop basically on Memorial Day, which gives them plenty of time to work, while still allowing for a very leisurely trip to SLC with plenty of stops. That gives us about eight weeks to work our way to Sumner.

We're thinking it's still too cold to start heading north directly from here, so we are toying with heading east to the desert for some agenda-less downtime for a couple weeks. It has been a while since we had the opportunity to just do nothing for a while, which is what we had basically planned to do in Mexico, had we made it there.

Just to recap what's been done over the last three weeks, we've had the bent tag axle A-frame replaced, fixed a bunch of oil leaks in the engine, transmission, and differential, inspected the liners, re-packed the wheel bearings, replaced a worn tie-rod end, changed and sampled the engine oil, changed and sampled the differential lube (to synthetic), put six new tires on, balanced the front wheels, and aligned the wheels. We also discovered an air leak in the emergency brake release circuit, and had that air line replaced.

In addition to discovering the air leak, which was likely caused by trauma to the exposed line while entering a steep driveway, we found the threads on the differential fluid drain plug to be nearly completely destroyed.



I can only guess the plug stood proud of the drain hole by a little bit, and some under-trained tire jockey once jacked the drive axle up by the pumpkin. 20,000 lbs of force on the little drain plug would certainly cause this sort of damage. We had to use the fill plug for the drain hole, and re-tap the fill hole for a larger plug.

The air leak discovery reminded me of just how important the pre-drive inspection is, but also that such an inspection just can not catch everything. It was a pinhole leak, invisible to the naked eye. I heard it while walking past the coach when they had the front wheels on stands, greasing the bearings. It was a very distinct and audible hissing, and my first thought was that I had never heard it before, and it certainly was not leaking that way before we came to the shop.

Not necessarily so, as it turns out. The leak is in a circuit that is only pressurized when the emergency/parking brakes are released. Of course, when I do my inspections, the brakes are applied, and so I had never noticed it, either on walk-around or just while we were parked (not sure if I would even hear it on the walk-around, with the engine running). It was only by virtue of the fact that the brakes need to be released to work on the bearings (the coach was chocked) that the leak was evident. It never showed up as any kind of pressure drop, because the engine-driven air compressor easily overcame the tiny amount leaking from the parking circuit.

In other news, I apparently made someone in Bakersfield quite cranky with my post on sanitation Thursday. I guess the years I spent as Director of Operations for a public utility, or the nearly two decades I spent in the facilities business do not qualify me to know my, err, "stuff" about, umm, sanitation. I left the comment up (often I delete such diatribes), even though it comes perilously close to violating our decency standards here. But that suggests I need to mention those:

I am not easily offended. It is hard to imagine that there is any sort of vulgarity which will shock me (or that I have not heard before). But this is a family blog -- we have little kids reading here. We even have nieces and nephews that are just now coming into their reading years and will be following along as they become able. So no foul language of any kind will be tolerated in the comments, period. That includes words where one or more letters have been omitted or replaced with punctuation such as underscores or asterisks -- if it's clear enough for a reader to understand, and it is a word that would be flagged if written in plain text, then it is not appropriate in the comments. If you feel moved to swear at me, then send me an email -- our addresses are easily found at the "Who we are" link in the sidebar.

Separately, if you are going to tell me how "little" I know about a subject, you had best be prepared to educate me. I am not above being told I am wrong about something, if that's the case. But don't just yell "you're wrong" -- provide links to the correct information, or cite your sources, or at least display your credentials. The internet is full of self-proclaimed experts, and I'd be the first to say don't believe anything you read here without checking it out for yourself.

Thursday night we again had dinner with readers and fellow bus owners Tom and Donna, at BJ's in the mall nearby. Yesterday, readers Flo and Dan from La Quinta were passing through, and stopped by to see us. They found us, of course, in the Freightliner waiting room, surprising Tom who stopped in to check on us shortly thereafter. I think the conversation among the five of us annoyed the truck driver who was stuck in there with us.

In a few minutes, we'll be taking the scooters to dinner. We've pretty much exhausted all the dining opportunities within four or five miles; last night, we returned to the Olive Garden in Whittier (around eight miles), and tonight I think we'll head back to Charley Browns. We'll certainly be glad when we finally leave this neighborhood, although we are quite thankful for the free parking and the quiet, and the weather's been great, too.

Thursday Tips: Creative Sanitation

Tuesday's post garnered a comment about, umm, sewage that I feel needs to be shared here in the main blog, for two reasons. First and foremost is that I don't want anyone reading here to make the sort of mistake that is alleged in that comment, especially if they got the idea here in the first place. Second is that I want to be sure no other readers have the same misunderstanding of what happened as did that commenter. That said, if talking about (and photos of) sewage and dumping of RV waste tanks is not your thing, feel free to skip the rest of this post.

The comment specifically addressed this statement in Tuesday's post:

... this particular spot was just 20 yards from Freightliner's city sewer connection, and ... my macerator hose end ... fit in the pick hole on the manhole cover ...

To which reader Leland responded:

Sanitary sewers are sealed, pressurized systems, if you found an unsealed cover it is access to valves and pumps now covered with .....

First, let me say that, having overseen the construction of a dozen or so major buildings, right down to the sewer connections, I have more than a passing familiarity with sanitary sewer systems. I am not sure where the impression is coming from that sewer systems are sealed and pressurized. While there are, indeed, some types of sewage transport pipes that happen to be pump-fed and thus pressurized, this is not true of the vast majority of the sewer network in most cities. Sewers almost universally work by gravity alone, at least until there's no further down that you can go, at which point a "lift" or "ejector" pump is used to move the effluent back up to a higher level. These systems are not pressurized, and, in fact, rely on open venting to the environment at periodic intervals to avoid hydraulic locks in the pipes.

This is one reason that every few hundred feet or so there will be an "SSMH" (sanitary sewer man hole). Sewer manhole lids, BTW, are also never sealed or tight-fitting, and usually have extra large "pick holes" (so called because manhole covers are removed with a bent iron bar called a "pick," and this is where the pick is inserted to remove the cover), for a very important reason: Sewer gas contains methane, which rises and needs to escape from the manhole. If methane is allowed to build up in the manhole, a spark (from, for example, an iron tool, or a passing vehicle) can ignite it and cause an explosion, which can easily eject the ~300lb manhole cover hundreds of feet. People can be and have been killed or injured by such flying manhole covers.

There are dozens of different kinds of manholes; many contain electrical wires, water mains, natural gas lines, telephone cables, fiber optics, or cable TV lines. I have spent more than my fair share of time in many such manholes, including sanitary sewer ones. Some manholes also lead to "storm drains," which are sometimes confusingly called "storm sewers" although that term is not really accurate. To avoid confusion, sanitary sewers are usually referred to by that term explicitly, and manholes for sanitary sewers are usually marked SSMH or SS, and sometimes just Sewer, which is how they are marked here in Whittier.


Sewer manhole in front of Freightliner

If you are going to dump into a sewer manhole, you had best be absolutely certain that the manhole you've found is, indeed, a sanitary sewer. It helps to know not only how they are marked, but also generally how they are designed and laid out. But the last step must always be a visual check. If there is a pick hole large enough to insert a hose, then it is large enough to see inside. The trick is to wait until it's dark out (your eyes will never adjust enough in the daylight), cram your flashlight into one pick-hole, and put your eyeball up to the other one. If you don't see sewage, it's probably not the right kind of manhole.

This is much easier with the naked eye than with a moderate-priced digital camera, but I attempted to capture a picture of the aforementioned manhole this evening. The super-bright LED flashlight that I used Monday puts out a too tightly focussed beam, so I had to resort to a Mini-Maglite I had lying around, and set the camera on manual with as wide a shutter as I could get. It's blurry, because only the lens fit in the pick-hole, and the autofocus window was obscured:


Inside view, as seen through the pick hole

The city lateral flows from right to left in this photo, and, yes, that's raw sewage (toilet paper, I think) in the right quarter of the shot (timing is everything). The connection from Freightliner comes in at the top of the photo; note the channel is "sweeped" in a curve toward the direction of flow. To the left is visible the bottom rung of the built-in ladder, obscured by the shadow of the top rung. As you can see, the sewage flows "open" in the bottom of the manhole, but there is a "floor" level that normally is dry. When sewers run heavy, this floor will sometimes be under water -- you can just make out that the floor level is below the tops of the sewer pipes. Nevertheless, I try to get the hose to land in the "channel." Those "dots" all over the floor are, yes, cockroaches.

Now, the legality of emptying effluent into a city sewer system is another matter entirely, and I'm not really going to get into it here. Suffice it to say that sewers are paid for by the residents and businesses in a city, and fees are assessed for their use. It is generally best to utilize the sewer system on private property with the permission of the owner, who is paying the fees.

We generally try to do this whenever possible. We will hunt around for what is known as a "sewer cleanout," usually a 4" or 6" diameter pipe which rises vertically from the building's underground sewer connection to the city lateral.



Graphic: City of Santa Clara

Cleanouts sometimes stick up through the grass or shrubery right next to a building, but more commonly, they are in the driveway or parking lot, recessed a few inches into the ground, and covered with a heavy iron plate called a "traffic cover" (so named because it supports the weight of vehicles driving over it).


Image: Genista

The cleanout pipe itself will have a threaded PVC or metal pipe end on it as well, which must be unscrewed with a wrench.


Image: State of Hawaii

Once again, you must be certain that the pipe you are unscrewing is a sewer cleanout, and not, for example, access to water or irrigation valves. The traffic cover, if any, will usually be marked "Sewer."

We prefer these, both because they are on private property, thus avoiding any legal issues, and they are large enough to accommodate our regular sewer hose. Dumping is just as easy, just as fast, and utilizes the same procedure as at a regular dump station (however, do not use a threaded or other "tight" coupling -- the cleanout is not, itself, vented, and you'll need some room around the hose for air to escape the pipe). Freightliner has one of these, but, as luck would have it, it is right smack in the middle of their main entrance to the service department -- a very busy driveway indeed. The manhole I chose happens to be where Freightliner's connection to the city system is made, and so my position is that I used Freightliner's sewer connection. (As their customer, to the tune of several thousand dollars when we are done, I have no moral qualms about using their sewer connection, just as I used their spigot today to fill the water tank.)

Dumping our tanks into sewage connections that would otherwise be inaccessible to us is the key reason why we have a permanently installed macerator pump on board. While we have traditional gravity dump valves on the left side of the bus, with 3" terminations for both black and gray water (it would take much longer to empty our 135 gallon gray tank through the more common 1-½" valve), we also have additional 1-½" gate valves on the curb side of the coach leading directly to the macerator. A "garden hose" fitting underneath the coach allows us to connect a ¾" diameter, 50' long rubber hose we keep separate just for this purpose (note: do not mix up special macerator hose and fresh water hose!).

To date, the macerator has come in handy mostly in Mexico, where the Mexicans have cleverly located dump stations 30' away from the closest place you can drive, and sometimes up hill to boot. The macerator pump will, indeed, allow us to pump our sewage uphill. But it could also be used to pump out into a household toilet, for example, or a sewer cleanout too far away or too high for our gravity hose to work, or a vault toilet in a primitive campground. Or, as we've now discussed, through a small pick-hole in a manhole cover.

The problem Monday was that the heavy brass end on our super-duty rubber hose has hexagonal wrench lands on it, and those would not fit through the pick-hole. While the end would fit in far enough to, umm, spray sewage into the manhole, that's rather discourteous. I wanted to be able to get the hose down the 5' or so to the actual sewage troughs in the bottom, and so I bought a cheap 5/8" diameter hose (which slowed things down a bit -- the ¾" hose is faster) with an even cheaper stamped-metal end on it (which I was prepared to cut off, if necessary), which slipped right through the hole.

So there you have it -- a more detailed explanation of Tuesday's post, and a primer on creative RV dumping as well. Complete with graphics and a mildly disgusting photo; oh, the things I do for an informed readership.

Slooow going at Freightliner

I am once again on the street in front of L.A. Freightliner, after an agonizingly slow day in the shop.

I rolled in about 7:15, and they rolled the bus over to a service bay around 8:30 or so. By 3:00, they had just finished up the front wheel bearings, apparently due to difficulty removing the drums from the spindles. At least I have a clear reading of my brake status, though, something we've been thinking about lately. They are telling me 30%-40% left. Conventional wisdom is to replace at around 25%, so we have anywhere from another 10,000 to 30,000 miles in them before thinking about replacement. That's about a year for us.

They started to work on the tag wheel bearings, and managed to get the coach hung up on the wheel lifts. They tried to lift just the tags in order to put jack stands under the wrist pins, and the 10,000-lb rated lifts quit, unsurprisingly, as soon as any weight transferred from the drivers to the tag. At one point, it looked like they had 30,000 or so on the single pair of lifts, and the lifts refused to go either up or down. They ultimately had to do what they should have done in the first place -- put a second set of lifts under the drivers. By the time they sorted that out, it was too late to start on the bearings, so they put the coach back down and I rolled out of the shop around 4:00.

Our friend Tom, who is a salesman for the dealership, took me out to lunch today -- I think he is feeling a little sheepish about how much money we are dropping in the service department. It was very nice of him to buy me lunch (and get me out of the depressing customer lounge), and we are looking forward to another dinner with them when Louise gets back tomorrow evening.

The delay with the wheel bearings knocked out any possibility of me making it over to Prevost in Mira Loma for an alignment tomorrow, so I've canceled that. If all goes well tomorrow with the wheel bearings and the pinion seals, I will probably just stick with Freightliner for the alignment here on Friday. At this point, the earliest we can leave the L.A. area will be Saturday.

After I wrote about La Penita here, friends Bob and Shirley posted in the comments -- it looks like we are going to be too late to catch them there. They'll be leaving by way of Texas, and perhaps we can hook up with them somewhere en route. We'll see them in any case sometime this summer, when we get back to Washington.

I'm due back in the shop again tomorrow at 7am (ugh). With any luck, I'll be rolled back out in time to go down to Norwalk and pick Louise up from the Metro after her flight.

The luck o' the Irish

Happy St. Patty's day, everyone.

I am parked for the afternoon at the Corps of Engineers/LA County/Pico Rivera Arena and Equestrian Center, down the block from the Freightliner dealer (map). I am just a few hundred feet from the sadly defunct campground here, which you can make out in the satellite image (it is, of course, fenced off).

Monday, as I was on my way toward the dealer, Raul called. He was on the street in front of Freightliner, where we had been parked, looking for us. Great timing, as I was just five minutes away. The parts had come in right on schedule Monday afternoon. I thanked him, then grabbed his parking spot as he pulled away. It was mostly big enough for Odyssey, except my snout protruded about 6' into a red zone (of unknown purpose -- it was not near, say, a fire hydrant or street corner). That pretty much trapped me on board, at least until the evening when the car behind me moved and I could back up out of the red. I did run into the service department several times to have the manager take a look at the parts, but, apparenly, he was out for the afternoon.

It turns out that this particular spot was just 20 yards from Freightliner's city sewer connection, and, having been here now a full two weeks today, I needed to dump the tanks. My macerator hose end, though, was just a hair too large to fit in the pick hole on the manhole cover, so I ran down to Home Depot on the scooter and picked up a cheap $7 garden hose, which slipped right in. I had to wait until midnight to dump, because I needed to pull Odyssey up to a point that actually blocked part of Freightliner's gate, and that's when the service department closes (casualty of the economy -- they used to be open 24/7).

It takes a good 40 minutes or so to empty the tanks with the macerator (and that's if it doesn't have to pump up hill at all), so between starting at nearly 12:30 and fiddling around with hoses and fittings, it was 1:30 or so by the time I was back in my tidy and secure space on the street (map). The 2am bed time made it hard to get up this morning; I set the alarm for 8:45, hoping to catch the service manager before things got too crazy today.

After looking at the parts and determining that they were likely correct, we set an appointment for tomorrow morning at 7am. I'll need, at that hour, to prop my eyelids open with toothpicks. They did ask me to pull in today at 11, just to have another look at the differential pinion to determine what it was going to take to access it. That was also fortuitous timing, because the street parking in front of the dealer is posted No Parking on Tuesdays from 11 to 3 for street sweeping. I rolled out of the shop at 12:30, which meant I had to find someplace to park for another couple hours before the parking restriction ends. The lot where I am at now is actually posted as event parking only, but I'm here alone, and it does not seem to be an issue at all.

I expect that tomorrow they will only get as far as the leaky pinion seals, and repacking the wheel bearings. That will leave the aligment to Thursday, where I also have an appointment at Prevost for the same work. We'll see how things go tomorrow before I cancel the Prevost appointment. Prevost, at least, has full-hookup parking for its customers awaiting service.

If all goes well, I should be wrapped up with shop work by the end of the day Thursday, and then we have a blank agenda. We had talked about heading down to La Penita, near Puerto Vallarta in Mexico, to meet up with friends there, but we're rapidly coming up to the end of their season there, and I don't know how much longer they will be there. It's a good week or so drive for us, and it doesn't make sense to go unless we can get a couple weeks in down there before heading back. Once Louise gets back Thursday afternoon, we'll put our heads together and figure out what's next.

The next firm commitment on our calendar is the Unitarian Universalist General Assembly, in Salt Lake City June 24-28. Once again we are voting delegates this year, so we will be there barring breakdown or civic disaster. Speaking of which, we will go back on the Red Cross availability list shortly thereafter, in time for the bulk of hurricane season. Somewhere between now and then, we'd like to get back to Infinity Coach in Washington to have the leaks looked at again. Besides, we're both driving on temporary one-year extensions to our Washington licenses, and we absolutely must appear there in person before Louise's birthday in October.

Photo by cobalt123

Bachelorhood

I am still parked on the street near PEDCO in Santa Fe Springs, around the corner from where we were last week (map).

A few minutes ago, I dropped Louise off at the Norwalk Metro station on my scooter; she's heading to LAX for a flight to Monterey. It is her dad's birthday this week (Happy Birthday, Jerry!), and her stepmom is heading into the hospital tomorrow for knee replacement surgery. They asked if she would fly up at their expense for a couple of days, and, since we're really just stuck here waiting on parts and service anyway, it's really not a hardship for me to bach it here for a few days. She'll be back on Thursday, and I am holding positive thoughts for Kay's surgery.

We finally wrapped up here in the shop Thursday afternoon. We got the oil and all the filters changed, a leaking fuel pressure switch replaced, and a full engine inspection, including plugging up about a dozen leaks. Even though it has been over a year since we had the motor in-framed here, PEDCO very generously did not charge us for hunting down and fixing the leaks, which was really the bulk of the labor on this visit. They gave us a clean bill of health -- we still don't know where the silicon in the oil is coming from (we pulled another sample, as well), but there is no abnormal wear evident in the cylinders.

It was late enough in the day that the bill was not going to be ready until Friday, so we just spent the night here on the street. Friday we ended up having lunch with Virgil down at the marina where he keeps his boat, and we had our first look at it since it was on the hard right here at the shop. By the time we got back, paid the bill, and fiddled around figuring out where to go, we decided to just spend the weekend right here -- it's quiet here on the weekend, as it is a completely industral neighborhood, and there's plenty of grass to walk the dog. I toyed with the idea of getting back up to Freightliner yesterday, to get a good spot on the street, but that would have put us another ten miles from the Metro station.

In a few minutes, I will load Chip, pack up, and trundle up to Freightliner. With any luck, our parts should arrive at Raul's place today from England, and that's where he knows to look for us.

Our favorite truck shop

We are at PEDCO, in Santa Fe Springs, California (map). Long-time readers will know that we've been here several times before, twice for over a week each time as our Detroit Diesel engine was overhauled "in frame."

The guys over at Eagle Tire in Riverside were great, getting us in and out quickly and efficiently. When we pulled the old drivers off, the inner shoulders of the inside tires were worn to the belts, with progressively less wear moving to the outer shoulder.



Likewise, the outers had more shoulder wear on their inside shoulders as well. What this means, of course, is that our axle is bowed slightly in the middle -- not surprising, as we have nearly 24,000 pounds of load on it.

There really isn't anything that can be done about this, short of replacing the whole drive axle. If I could find a way to shift 3,000 pounds to the tag axle, which, at just 11,000 pounds, is that far under its rated capacity of over 14,000, we'd get better wear on the expensive drive tires, not to mention less wear and tear on all the components in the axle. The only way I know to do that would be to go to larger diameter air bags on the tag -- a non-trivial undertaking.

What we have decided to do moving forward, though, is to take the trouble to rotate the outer drivers to the inner wheels and vice-versa periodically. In the past, we've only swapped the wheels side-for side, because we have steel inner wheels and aluminum outers. Rotating the tires inner-to-outer will mean dismounting and remounting all four tires each time, but we can try to even the wear across the shoulders that way.

The new Bridgestone M711's look just as butch as the last set did back when they were new. There is something about a Mud & Snow rated tire that just looks all business.



Given the inevitable shoulder wear, and the inherent vibration of the block treads, we opted not to spin-balance the drivers, and we also did away with the Equal powder that we had been using in those positions.

The steer tires were very badly cupped, as we knew from the bone-jarring ride. I took dozens of photos of the damage, in case we need to analyze the patterns as part of diagnosing whatever is causing this rapid and irregular wear.



One benefit of the new 12R22.5 Firestones that replaced them was immediately noticeable: the smaller contact patch made low-speed steering much more effortless.

Riding over here on the new shoes was a velvet experience -- smooth as glass, and, with the square tires gone, we could once again enjoy the legendary Neoplan ride; no other bus is as smooth, in our experience. The new block-tread drivers are "singing" again, which is just barely noticeable in the cockpit. The old ones were so worn, they were as quiet as rib tires.

After we landed here at PEDCO, we checked in with the office, then settled in for the night in an empty spot across the street (map). Proprietors Virgil and Rachel Cooley were just about to go for a late lunch with customers Steve and Shawna, who were picking up a monster engine for, I think, a show truck, and they invited us along. It was great catching up with the Cooleys, and we really enjoyed meeting Steve and Shawna, who seem to have irons in a lot of interesting fires.

Despite rumblings that they might not get to us until tomorrow, we had a knock on the door around 9 this morning, and were backed into the shop half an hour later. Well, more precisely, we backed in to the fenced yard next to the shop, where we can be comfortable on board for several days, if needed. During one of our visits here, the yard was occupied with another half-dismantled truck, and we ended up in an inside bay, where we lived for a week.

They spent the rest of the day tracking down and rectifying a dozen or so oil leaks, a sort of trademark of two-stroke Detroits. A good deal of oil has been oozing out around the alternator housing, which was cause for concern. We put tremendous loads on our oil-cooled alternator, typically 6 kilowatts or so, and we need to watch for early signs of bearing failure or other issues, since catastrophic failure of the unit can easily do serious damage to the engine as well. After some consultations, the determination was that the oil seepage was not a harbinger of imminent failure, and they did not feel the alternator needed to come out for either rebuild or inspection. Good thing, because it weighs over 100 pounds, and would need to be wrestled through the bedroom hatch.

What they did not find is any indication of how we are getting high silicon levels in the oil. While they had the airbox covers off they inspected the liners and rings, and all looked normal. Tomorrow, they'll change the oil, pulling another sample for analysis, and inspect the transmission, which seems to be seeping expensive synthetic fluid at an increased rate of late.

With any luck, we should be finished up here by the end of the day tomorrow.

Down by the Riverside

We are on a street in a light industrial neighborhood in Riverside, California (map). After spending all morning again on the phone yesterday, I finally located a set of tires here, and we decided it was worth the 40 or so mile drive to come get them.

After having mostly convinced myself to retread the casings we already had on the bus, I talked myself right back out of it for two reasons. First, we'd have to spend a full three days (two nights) up on blocks at the re-tread shop. More importantly, I checked the DOT codes and the casings are already a full five years old. Put them on almost exactly four years ago, but they must have been a full year old already at the time. Even though we figured to get two or three years out of a new tread, we would not want to go to seven or eight years on the age of the casing.

The guy here in Riverside, at Eagle Tire just a few blocks from here, said he could get a set of four Bridgestone M711's, the same tires we've had on that axle, by this morning, so here we are. We also asked him to pick up a pair of Firestone FS560's for the steer axle. I prefer the Bridgestone R250, but it was another $150 or so per tire, and I don't want to spend any more money than I have to up front until we convince ourselves that we have cured whatever is eatin the tires there. We've barely gotten 40,000 miles out of the very expensive Goodyear 315's we put up there.

It was 4:00 by the time we knew the tires would be here for sure, and so we slogged our way over here in the brutal LA traffic, arriving well past 6. The area of the street near the tire shop, where I had planned to park for the night, did not feel right (lots of trash, and too close to a residential area), and so we drove around for another half hour or so until we found this spot. Right after getting completely set up, we discovered we were out of water, and I had to hunt down a spigot and jockey Odyssey around the neighborhood -- it was past 8 by the time we finally settled in for the night.

We hoofed it down to local eatery Ciao Bella, a white tablecloth affair that turned out to be quite good, walking in the door just before closing time. After dinner over a friendly bottle of Chianti, we both crashed fairly early.

In a few minutes, we will drive over to Eagle Tire for our new shoes. This evening, we'll head right back to Whittier and down to Pedco in Santa Fe Springs, where we are hoping they can squeeze us in tomorrow to look at our oil leaks. When I called the San Diego Yacht Club yesterday, they told me the FUBAR kickoff dinner was sold out, so that nixed heading down there tonight.

In other news, we had a visitor yesterday afternoon -- LiveWorkDream's dad Raul, who lives just a couple miles from the Freightliner dealership, and worked there as a mechanic for many years.



Raul was kind enough to agree to let us have our parts shipped to him from Europe, and he wanted to come by and introduce himself. We find it sort of ironic that we've never met Rene and Jim -- we keep missing each other by mere miles (or days), even though we read each other's blog religiously -- but at least we've met Rene's dad!

Too dang lazy to move

We are still on the street in front of L.A. Freightliner.

In my last post, I had suggested that we were going to move to more pleasant surroundings for the weekend, but I ended up spending so much time on the phone Friday trying to find parts and tires, that it was too late to move when I was done. We also did not feel any sort of pressure to be anywhere else.

By yesterday morning, I was closing in on having our existing set of worn-out 12R22.5 drive tires re-treaded. Getting anything else in the tread design we wanted was proving to be a big challenge, and after a great deal of thought, we talked ourselves out of moving to a 315/80R22.5 -- in new tires, they were just too expensive, with another $100 in excise tax on the set to boot, but, more importantly, unavailable in any reasonable time frame in our tread pattern. In re-treads, we were persuaded that the tread was incredibly heavy, and we'd likely have to run the tires at 110 or so anyway, defeating the purpose.

Since the re-tread shop is just up the street from here, by mid-day yesterday I was convinced we needed to be right back here by tomorrow morning. And, with the shops around here closed for the weekend, it has been incredibly peaceful and quiet here. The weather's been perfect, so riding the scoots a few extra miles to dinner has not been a hardship -- we went to a familiar Olive Garden last night, where somehow I managed to score a table in the bar as soon as I walked in, after being informed there was a 40-minute wait. Friday night we went to Charley Brown's, which was a déjà vu experience -- the interior layout was identical to the Charley Brown's we had patronized in Sunnyvale, which closed years ago. But the prime rib was as good as I remembered.

So this morning finds us in the same spot, and the industrial nature of the area made it a perfect spot to work on Louise's new Vino 125. I wanted to change the engine and transmission oils and clean the filters, since the bike had sat in a garage for two years, and who knows when, if ever, the fluids were changed. When they came out, they did look overdue to be changed. We also pulled the battery out, which has been dead since we got it -- Louise has been kick-starting the thing. After prying off the "sealed" caps, I found several cells to be critically low, and topped them all up with distilled water. We'll see if the battery comes back to life after a few more rides to get some charge into it.

Yesterday we rode around the neighborhood, exploring the nearby equestrian park and the defunct campground adjacent to it, as well as the San Gabriel river, the Whittier Narrows Dam, and the nature center nearby. We even walked the nature trail, where you can almost convince yourself that you are not surrounded by the megalopolis that is the LA area.

The more important thing that happened yesterday is I got an email back from the Neoplan parts distributor in England. I think that they will be able to get the tie-rod end, and the bearing and pinion seals that we need.



Good thing, too, because Friday we learned that all the seals that were in the US had been sold to a company which subsequently scrapped them due to lack of market. Wish we had known when that happened -- I certainly would have bought a selection of every kind of seal they had for our coach.

I am hoping to hear back from them again tonight (Monday morning in the UK), after I spent a couple hours yesterday sending them every part number, photo, manual page, and dimension I could find on the parts we needed. If they can provide the parts, I will need to come up with a residential address to have them sent -- I don't want to take the chance that Customs will misconstrue them to be for commercial resale by having them sent to the Freightliner dealer, which would put them in a different import category.

So we'll be here yet another night, and, with any luck, we will trundle off to deal with the tires in the morning. I'm hoping to get new shoes on the coach in time to make a quick jaunt back down to San Diego Tuesday afternoon -- we'd like to attend the kick-off planning dinner for the FUBAR Odyssey (no relation) Baja powerboat rally in November. As one of the next steps in our multi-year journey toward moving onto a "trawler" style power boat, we want to get sea time and familiarity with a variety of boats, and we are hoping to volunteer as watchstanding crew on one of the boats on the FUBAR. We missed the registration deadline for the dinner, so I will have to call in the morning to see if they can still accommodate us.

Hitting us like a Freightliner

We are parked on the street outside of Los Angeles Freightliner, in Whittier, California (map). Tonight will be our third night in this spot. Ironically, there is a deserted municipal campground less than a mile from here, next to the Whittier Narrows Dam, but the city shuttered it years ago due to "lack of maintenance."

We arrived here after a lovely drive up the coast on Tuesday. We more or less had to stay on I-5 through Camp Pendleton, which also afforded us the opportunity to dump and fill at the CalTrans rest area along that stretch. But the rest of the drive, we stuck to county roads and El Camino Real, both because it is much more scenic and pleasant, and also because we really wanted to keep our speed down with the tires so close to end-of-life. We noticed that the couple of ocean-front state campgrounds had plenty of room, and were sorry we had to press onward.

Tuesday afternoon we met with the service manager, Rex, with whom I had spoken earlier, and it looked like all was set. He was going to be out Wednesday, and he introduced me to his lieutenant who would be honchoing the job. We rolled into the yard at 8am the next day.

Things got off to a somewhat rocky start. The head honcho never got the full detail of what was needed from Rex, and I didn't list the litany of what we had discussed for the service writer, either. Somehow, the folks doing the work never understood what was needed, and, after sitting in the waiting room for nearly eight hours, wherein we watched the bus roll into the service bay for only about an hour, we got a report that informed us of several things we already knew, and nothing that we didn't. I was pretty much livid when I discovered that, in spite of my direct request that they do so, the bearing dust caps were never even removed. To add insult to injury, they tried to charge me $240 for "diagnosis."

This morning, Rex was back in the shop, and we had about a half hour meeting wherein we both acknowledged mis-communication had happened, and sorted out what actually needed to be done. Back into the shop we went, and this time they actually took the front bearings out. The good news is that the bearings look pristine. The bad news is that, to pack the inner race, they will have to pry the bearing off the shaft, which will likely damage the seal. We're now scrambling to find seals; as a Mercedes axle, Freightliner is the part source, but the part is odd enough that some database magic needs to happen that will take two business days. So we will not even know if the parts are anywhere to be had before Monday.

They repacked the outers before reinstalling them, and we stopped short of pulling the tag bearings. They'll have exactly the same issue, and, fortunately, take the same seals. On the alignment front, we've also run into a snag. Long-time readers may remember that, when we had the alignment done a couple years ago, the tie rod ends needed to be replaced. We were only ever able to get three of the four ends, so we had to pick the best of the two left-threaded ones that came out, and re-use it. Well, lo and behold, that end is now critically worn, and needs to be replaced.

Between then and now, however, the source for that part has dried up. NeoPart can't get them anymore, and I now need to track one down, possibly in Germany. The alternative is not pretty -- fabricating an entirely new tie rod, to accept some more common ends. So we are dead in the water, for the time being, and I will spend tomorrow on the internet and the phone trying to track down tie-rod ends and bearing seals. While I am at it, I'll try to rustle up a pinion seal for the differential, too, since that's also been seeping for some time.

In the time we've been sitting around waiting in the customer lounge between yesterday and today, I've been calling around to tire dealers to find a new set of shoes. That, too, has had its hiccups. It is beginning to look like the only way we can get the tread we want in our size in any reasonable time is to get a set of Bandag re-treads. We'd prefer new, of course, and I'm still looking. It seems we will once again have to forego our preferred 315/80R22.5 drive tires in favor of the 12R22.5 size. If there is an upside to that, it's that the federal excise tax on the 12R's is only $36.76 per tire, versus $61.43 for the 315's.

We'll spend tonight right here, because it's convenient to the shop, and I'm sure I'll be walking in tomorrow to sync up with Angel, the parts guy.


Angel, not the parts guy

But then we'll go find someplace else to spend the weekend. If not more comfortable and scenic, then at least closer to some decent restaurants. If we can find tires anywhere in the LA area, we'll probably also go get them mounted while we are waitng on parts from Freightliner.

Tag axle fixed!

We are again on the street in front of E & C Spring, in Escondido. Our bad A-frame is gone, heaved into the scrap steel bin here at the shop. The scooters are still out, and we went for a celebratory dinner last night at local white-linen eatery 150 Grand.

The shop opened at 8, and owner Ben Elkins had already booked us in based on my previous phone call. We backed on to the concrete and they set to work.

Still nervous that the take-out replacement we had might not be an exact match, we asked about straightening the piece, and his opinion was that it should come out to be straightened anyway. And his further opinion was that the tube was badly enough damaged that he would actually cut that section out and replace it. The replacement turned out to be exactly correct, rendering all that moot.



The infamous hinge pin that is reputed to be the source of all trouble with this job turned out to be no problem.



The pin came out with a combination of an air chisel (with a flat drift head on it) on one side, then a short section of pipe and the original nut as an extractor from the other. And the pin went back in with some coaxing from the same air chisel -- no need for the dry ice routine.

It turned out the thorniest problem was removing the bolts holding the other end of the arm to the frame. At least one nut was frozen on, and the A-frames on both sides are through-bolted, so bolts needed to be moved around to keep the other side in place during the procedure.

The bill was for eight hours of labor (split between two men), as we had supplied all the parts. In addition to the take-out A-frame, friend and former Neoplan Skyliner owner Russ Barnes had also furnished us with four new bushings and pinch bolts.

Now that the A-frame is done, we are on our way to L.A. Freightliner to have the bearings looked at and the alignment done. We normally stay out of these sorts of major shop operations, preferring smaller shops where the service is somewhat more personal. But getting parts or even drawings and service instructions for our weird Mercedes axles is something of a challenge, and Freightliner is Mercedes' official US service channel. We chose the Los Angeles location because a friend of ours happens to work there, in the sales department.

Once the bearings and alignment are taken care of, we'll proceed directly to a tire dealer for six new tires, as we're now well below legal tread on all four drivers, and the steers are so lumpy they are rattling our teeth out. In fact, Ben expressed concerns several times while under the coach that the drivers were too worn to go back out on the road.

Monday Miscellany: Trawler Fest Edition

Monday is the day for miscellaneous topics

While we were at TrawlerFest last week, I noticed many parallels between the boat and RV worlds. In particular, boats "camp" in very similar ways to RVs.

There are three broad categories of places to stay overnight in a boat. The first is a marina.


Photo by pbo31

Like RV parks, marinas often offer "full hookups." In the boat world, that usually means a shore power electrical connection, a water spigot nearby, and a pumpout station. There is often a fuel dock, restrooms, laundry room, restaurant, and other services within easy walking distance. Prices vary, but usually are charged by the length of the boat.

Marinas can range from rustic to resort-like, just like RV parks. The more touristy the destination, the pricier the dock. Some are membership-only, similar to Outdoor Resorts, and many require advance reservations.

Boat people choose marinas for many of the same reasons RVers like RV parks.

• Everything needed provided by the facility
• Feels safe
• Easy and comfortable to stay for an extended time
• Conveniently located to a given destination
• No need for a dingy; can step onto dock and walk
• No need to be conservative with water, power, food supplies
  
• Unable or unwilling to rely solely on boat's systems
  

The next option for overnighting in a boat is mooring out.


Photo by Leslie Willis

A mooring location is a place that has been designated for boats to tie up. In the photo above, each vessel is tied to a ball that is anchored in place inside the harbor. Moorings can also be stakes, piers, or cleats along a dock. It is usually very clear that others have used that spot before you, and there is sometimes a small fee.

Moorings strike me as similar to rustic campgrounds, such as those in National Parks, National Forests, or many state parks. There are no hookups; the boat must be able to provide its own power and have enough water on board. Depending on the location, there may or may not be services nearby.

The advantages of mooring out are:

• Less expensive than marinas
• May be in a more natural setting
• More separation between boats
• Near enough to other boats for companionship and "safety in numbers"
• Clearly marked, no need to hunt for a place or guess if staying is permitted
  
• Usually first come, first served

Finally, there is anchoring out.


Photo by storm crypt

Dropping anchor on your own is very similar to boondocking in the RV world. You choose the place, scope out the surrounding area, and are often completely on your own.

Anchoring near a town can be similar to urban dry camping at a WalMart. There are services nearby, but no place to get electricity, water or a place to dump tanks. Anchoring in a remote cove is more like dispersed camping in the backwoods, with quiet and solitude.

Mariners choose anchoring for some of these reasons:

• It may be the only choice; no marina or moorings
• Free
• Access to prime fishing locations
• Peace and quiet
• Solitude
• Unspoiled natural setting
• Feeling of independence

Our regular readers can easily guess that when we eventually move onto a trawler, we will be eager to explore remote anchorages.

Back to reality

We are parked on the street in from of E & C Spring, in Escondido, California (map). This is the shop which, we hope, will be able to replace our bent tag-axle A-frame.

Not a moment too soon, actually, because the steer tires are now so badly cupped that they sound like hexagons thumping down the road, rather than circles. As I've written here before, we don't want to invest another grand in a pair of new tires until we've done a proper alignment and serviced the bearings, and we wanted to get the axle fixed before the alignment is done.

I'm not sure when they'll be able to get us in, or whether any parts may need to be ordered before they can start, so we are prepared to spend several days right here, if need be. All things considered, there are worse places to be stuck, though. There's an Olive Garden just a few blocks away, and we pulled the scooters out and went to dinner there tonight. And the weather is just perfect.

Speaking of which, we woke this morning to a perfect day, sunny and warm. From our lovely vantage over the harbor, we watched several of the TrawlerFest boats making their way home along a bay brimming with weekend pleasure traffic. The breezes were perfect for sailing, and we saw many sailboats whizz by, including a gorgeous two-masted schooner. We even walked across the street and had lunch on the patio at the Island Palms, with a view over the harbor on the other side of the island.

With such a beautiful day in the park, it was hard to pull ourselves away, but the siren call of bus maintenance can not be ignored... On the way here, we stopped at a shopping plaza to catch up on laundry and re-stock the fridge.

With any luck, we will be wrapped up here within the week, and on our way to Los Angeles Freightliner to have the bearings done.