Another training in the bag

We are parked at an undisclosed location in the greater Phoenix area. And by "we" I really mean Louise, the bus, and all the animals, as I myself am actually in Memphis at the Red Cross chapter office. We have just completed the second in a series of hands-on technology training sessions, and I am happy to report that the revisions and corrections we incorporated after the pilot event two weeks ago made for a mostly smooth and trouble-free experience this time.

This afternoon we need to pack and ship the equipment, and the chapter is providing lunch as they have done for the last two days as well. My flight does not leave until 7:30, much later than I would like but that's what was needed to get the fare down. I'll be back at the bus this evening. This will be my last training until the program comes to San Jose; now that the curriculum is done and working, more local instructors can pick it up in the successive cities.

We arrived in Phoenix around mid-day Wednesday, and rode the scooters downtown for dinner at our sole remaining restaurant investment there. This one, at least, is making enough money to break even, unlike the last two which went out of business in an agonizingly slow and painful way. As minority investors none of the staff recognizes us, which gave us a great incognito perspective into how the place is running, at least until the managing partner arrived. The food was quite good and the place has a nice vibe. It's called the Ghost Lounge and is situated in the historic Hotel San Carlos.

Tomorrow we need to get back under way in order to have a leisurely and pleasant drive to Death Valley, where we have reservations at the Furnace Creek Campground starting Thursday. I am hoping to top off our fuel as we pass through Las Vegas, as well, since it will be much higher in California.

Photo by * YUKO_M, used under a Creative Commons license.

Wild horses

We are at the Wild Horse Pass casino, near Chandler, Arizona (map). In stark contrast to our last visit here, where the RV parking was entirely full and some rigs had clearly been here well past the 48-hour limit, this time the area was less than half full, and most rigs appear to be staying just a single night. I think our last visit was just when they started enforcing the new rules, and now apparently the word is out.

We arrived early in the afternoon, which gave me a chance to take another crack at the water pump. The check valve assembly that I had installed a couple days ago turned out to be even worse that the one I put in back in Texas, and, with nothing to lose, I decided to try to recondition the one I had removed a year ago. I had carefully saved it away with a note saying "works, but leaks."



Reasoning that, like many other facets of our water system, the valve had a build-up of calcium and other hard-water deposits from years of taking on some very hard water in places, I soaked the assembly in vinegar for half an hour or so. Then I worked the vinegar into all the orifices with a toothbrush. The seals in the valve are EPDM rubber and my toothbrush and the vinegar soon turned black as the weak acid took off a layer of oxidation and maybe even some of the rubber. Washing with dish soap and water stopped the process.

Next I took the valve outside and liberally applied WD-40. Petroleum distillates can swell EPDM rubber -- one reason why you should generally not use them together -- which, in this case, is just what was needed. After letting it soak in and working it into all the crevices by blowing/sucking on each valve chamber (blech), I again washed the entire assembly with soap and water, to get as much WD-40 out as I could. WD-40 has very low oral toxicity -- you'd need to drink it by the ounce to suffer any ill effects -- and this pump is only used for wash water, as we have a completely separate tank and pump for drinking water.

Between the cleaning and the "reconditioning" of the EPDM, it looks like I have resuscitated the valve. I reinstalled it around 3pm yesterday and, after purging all the air out of the lines that accumulated while it was leaking, we have had no further problems. Time will tell if this is a "permanent" fix, but at least now I can order a replacement valve to have as a spare at my leisure. No sense in doing it before they are needed, as they would likely just dry out again, but I now have a procedure I can use on the other two used spares in my kit for the next time this happens.

A few days ago fellow Neoplan owners Jim and Barbara, who live in their coach on a private airstrip nearby, contacted us as we were heading toward Arizona. They dropped by yesterday evening and we chatted over a glass of wine for about an hour. They have a German-built Jetliner that was once owned by Richard Petty; they brought pictures and it looks to be a beautiful coach. Of course, they are in the same position as we are with regard to chassis parts.

After they left we spent a few minutes catching up on the unending stream of Red Cross emails associated with my upcoming class this weekend, and then headed into the casino for dinner. I was tempted by the current special at high-end Shula's steakhouse, a three-course dinner involving a salad, a fillet and Alaskan king-crab combo, and a slice of cheesecake all for $39 (a rock bottom price at Shula's, where the least expensive steak starts at $40 a la carte), but that sounded like way too much food so we went to the Asian-themed restaurant instead. We both had spicy dishes which were very tasty, and made it out for less than one meal at Shula's, and that even included the wine.

In a few minutes we will head down the hill to Phoenix so I can catch my flight tomorrow morning. I still have to review the training materials and do some other prep this afternoon, and of course, pack. We'll try to find a place for a nice dinner out as well; Louise wants to save all the leftovers for while I am away.

Wild Horse Pass photo by Jo Naylor, used under a Creative Commons license.

At the roost

We are at the RoVers Roost Escapee Cooperative west of Casa Grande, Arizona (map). We are in the "boondock" area where the first night is free, immediately across the street from our friends Tom and Kathy. The sole purpose of our stop here was to visit, and we went to dinner with them last night in town.

We had a great visit. Tom and Kathy are fellow full-timers and, of course, Escapees, whom we met in the Red Cross. Medical issues have kept them trapped here in Casa Grande for the last year, and we can tell they miss traveling. We are holding a positive thought that the latest surgery on Kathy's foot will be the one that finally releases them from their desert bondage, and we can meet up with them elsewhere on the road next time.

In a few minutes we will pack up and head north to the Phoenix environs so that we have plenty of time tomorrow to get settled in someplace for my flight to Memphis. I leave first thing Thursday morning and don't get back until fairly late Sunday night, so we need a place that will be good for five nights; there are a couple of Elks lodges and a casino on our short list. Tonight we will probably end up at one of the casinos just south of the city.

Photo by corydalus, used under a Creative Commons license.

Tucson fly-by

We are at the Desert Diamond casino resort on Nogales Highway in Tucson, Arizona (map). This is a familiar stop for us, having been here twice almost exactly a year ago. On this visit we are just passing through and needed a place to park; we tried the TTT truck stop east of town but it was too crowded and we don't like to deprive the professional truckers of a parking space.

I spent most of the morning on the phone with every RV dealer in town trying to find a new valve assembly for our water pump. I've tried both spares I had lying around (both take-outs) with no improvement, so we definitely need a new one. Unfortunately, it looks like it will have to be ordered from elsewhere no matter what. We might have a dealer in Phoenix order it, or I might have one sent to one of our friends meeting us in Death Valley. In the meantime, we have a pump that is working only marginally.

With no luck on the water pump front, we will be heading out in just a few minutes. This evening we will be in Casa Grande to visit friends.

Zen nomadic meetup

We are in a gravel lot across the street from El Charro restaurant, adjacent to the train tracks in Lordsburg, New Mexico (map). I'm pretty sure the Amtrak station used to occupy this spot, back when Amtrak stopped here. It turns out to be a pretty active rail yard, as well.

We arrived yesterday afternoon around 2ish, after a quick stop at the Flying-J at the east end of town to dump and fill tanks. We asked at the restaurant if they thought we'd be OK here for the night and they told us we would not be bothered. Zen Nomads Tracy and Sam pulled in about half an hour later and we passed a pleasant afternoon chatting over a couple glasses of wine.

The four of us had both dinner and breakfast at El Charro, which was authentic and tasty. In a gesture of small-town hospitality, we ended up with cake after dinner, courtesy of the baby shower for twins that wrapped up just as we arrived. All in all it was a great visit and we enjoyed getting to know Sam and Tracy who are fellow technologists, UUs, full-timers, motorcyclists, shunpikers, boondockers, and toad-less travelers. They are also Escapees and were curious about the DOVEs and our work with the Red Cross.

We were having such a good time this morning that time got away from us, and we are now getting a late start. Tonight we will be in Tucson, most likely at one of the casinos, and we'll stay on I-10 the whole way in the interests of time.

Deming laundry

We are at the Wal-Mart in Deming, New Mexico (map). Last night we walked to dinner at Palma's Italian Restaurant down the block, which was excellent even if the ancient bank building it was in has seen better days. There were also several Mexican options, natch, but we wanted a glass of wine after a long day, and we figure to have Mexican tonight, anyway.

That's because we finally settled on a plan to meet the Zen Nomads in Lordsburg, about an hour west of here. And while we could have taken our preferred route of NM-9 to Columbus, spent the night at the Depot Museum there, and still made Lordsburg today in plenty of time, we needed desperately to do laundry. No laundromats (or almost anything else, either) in Columbus, which would have meant spending most of the day in El Paso doing Laundry, then driving west into the sun late in the afternoon.

Instead we opted to fuel up in El Paso at $3.31 per gallon, make a quick stop at Camping World for a new Fresnel lens, and book out of town on I-10, putting us here in Deming in the early afternoon before the sun got too brutal on the windshield. There are three laundromats here and we spent most of the afternoon at one of them, as all the bedding needed to be washed in addition to our normal loads.

In a few minutes we will make the one-hour drive to Lordsburg, where I am hoping we can just park across the street from the landmark El Charro restaurant there. Failing that, our fall back plan is Kranberry's, where we stayed almost exactly one year ago.

Photo by 1031 , used under a Creative Commons license.

Resupply stopover

We are at a Wal-Mart in El Paso, Texas (map), along I-10 toward the east end of town. This is a familiar stopover for us; in addition to the enormous Wal-Mart store itself, the Cielo Vista mall is right next door and sports an Olive Garden, where we had an early dinner.

We also browsed the mall on our walk back. I spent most of my time there at the Sprint booth, as my Blackberry is on its last legs, and I wanted to check out the three 4G Android options as possible replacements. I am on the fence between the HTC Evo 4G and the Samsung Epic 4G, and I'll need to make a decision before we reach California, where sales tax on cell phones is assessed on the unbundled price (ouch).

Today we will head into the store to restock our supplies before heading off in search of fuel. My research last night actually suggests we can find cheaper fuel in Nevada, but with nearly two weeks before we are there, that is almost certain to change. We'll fill up here at $3.30, and top off again in Nevada before heading into California, where fuel is at least 10% higher -- do you detect a theme here? We'll need more fuel today than we had projected, as we've been bucking 30mph headwinds for two days. Yesterday we dropped our speed to 55 to help with the mileage as well as the noise, which put us a full 25mph below the speed limit.

We have been in touch with fellow travelers Sam and Tracy of Zen Nomads, who are heading in this direction from Tucson via Tombstone. We've agreed to meet up somewhere in the middle tomorrow, and we are trying to nail down where that might be. That will somewhat dictate our route from here, but tonight we should end up either in Columbus, NM, near the border on NM-9, or somewhere near Deming on I-10. This morning I need to wrap up my submissions for next weeks Red Cross training before we leave, and we might run some other errands here in El Paso before we leave the city limits as well.

Photo by Cushing Memorial Library and Archives, Texas A&M, used under a Creative Commons license.

Life is a picnic ... area

We are at yet another Texas roadside picnic area, at the end of Texas 17 where it intersects with I-10 (map), just south of Saragosa and east of Balmorhea. We found this one quite by accident, even though I wrote yesterday that I thought we would not have this option.

We got a very late start yesterday, owing to being hip-deep in our Red Cross curriculum development project. I still had lots of writing to do, so I also wanted to be off the road fairly early, and, besides, now that it's in the high 80s during the day, having the western sun streaming through the windshield makes driving late in the day uncomfortable. So we ended up driving less than two hours before I decided I was done and we needed to be looking for a place to spend the night.

We already knew there was an Interstate picnic area further west that was too sloped to be comfortable, as well as a large parking lot at the lone business in Kent, but I wanted to stop even sooner than that, so Louise found a small truck stop at this exit in her directory that claimed to be RV-friendly. The truck stop is just south of the highway and even sports a small RV park. As we came down the exit ramp, expecting to turn left back under the Interstate to the truck stop, we spotted this picnic area. In stark contrast to the truck stop, it was very dark and nearly silent here overnight.

This picnic area is not indicated on any of our maps and is also not really visible from the freeway, so we have now marked it on our Texas map. We did end up walking over to the truck stop after dinner, and picked up a pint of ice cream for dessert. The place was nearly empty, which I attribute to their diesel price being sky high. There are a couple of tables in the C-store masquerading as a cafe (it is also the office for the RV park), but the place reeked of cigarette smoke. Next door appeared to be a bar.

Today we expect to get an earlier start, and make up some of the mileage we missed yesterday by pressing all the way to El Paso, a familiar stop for us. If experience is any guide, El Paso will have the cheapest diesel we will see from here to the Pacific, and I expect to top off the tank tomorrow morning.

Photo by archer10 (Dennis), used under a Creative Commons license.

In west Texas #gettngslizzerd

We are at another lovely picnic area along US-190, just east of Iraan, Texas (map). We've been through here before, and while we had never actually spent the night here, we wrote on our map that it had wonderful views. When our hoped-for accommodations adjacent to the courthouse in Eldorado, an obsolete listing from Days End, did not pan out, we decided to press on another hour and a half to this spot.

It was a wise decision, because it really is a breathtaking view over the Pecos River valley and the tiny burg of Iraan across the river. This is Texas oil country and most of the traffic we passed yesterday consisted of oil field service trucks, but there is nary a well in sight from this spot. We enjoyed a nice sunset after taking in the view over a couple glasses of wine. Although we did not actually "get slizzerd," whatever that means.

The hashtag was from a tweet that came across the official Red Cross Twitter feed last night, and we knew instantly that one of the social media mavens there had simply hit the wrong button on her smartphone, intending the tweet for her personal account. Louise responded right away with "dude, wrong account" and we noticed the tweet was deleted almost immediately. Nothing said on the Internet can ever be unsaid, of course, a fact we bloggers and tweeters are painfully aware of.

This official blog post explains what happened, and our entertainment for the morning has been watching the Twitter streams of all the Red Cross PR folks we routinely follow. It was, of course, an honest mistake and some good has come of it, so all's well that ends well. But we know what the PR department will be working on most of today. Our only regret is that we did not hang with Gloria the week we were in DC.

Speaking of following folks in the Red Cross, our big boss was interviewed for his upcoming seminar at the Satellite 2011 conference next month. We were pleased to be referred to as "high caliber"; read the interview here. In addition to his duties at the Red Cross, Keith teaches technology in emergency management at George Washington University.

Between the extra two hours on the road yesterday and the fact that I worked up a monster headache somewhere along the line, I did not get my own Red Cross work completed -- updating the teaching materials for the next training. So today will be a short day in order to finish it up this evening, when it is due. I expect we will end up somewhere between Balmorhea and Kent. Unfortunately, by then we will be on I-10, pretty much the only route option through that part of the state, and these lovely picnic areas will no longer be one of our stopping options.

Ahhhhhhh....

We are once again in "the west" after a too-long absence. This morning finds us at a quiet picnic area on a remote stretch of US-190, a few miles east of San Saba, Texas (map). This is actually the first picnic area we came across since leaving Killeen, and even though we had planned to be another 50 miles west, in Brady, when we stopped, this spot was very appealing and we made it an early day.

That was just as well, because it was in the 80s when we stopped, and perfect conditions for me to wrap up the repairs that I started on Sunday. My first project then was to replace the wiper motor, which was actually a slam-dunk, if a bit tedious. The new motor went right in, although I had to add some washers since I had enlarged the mounting holes for the interim motor, and this direct replacement had smaller bolts.

The replacement hydronic pump had actually arrived Friday afternoon, so my next challenge was to get that in place. Mid-project we had to borrow our friends' car and run out to Wal-Mart for gasket sealer, so we also picked up a full load of groceries, two gallons of coolant, and a pair of shorter wiper blades. Ironically we had to go another mile to Auto Zone anyway, since Wal-Mart did not have the right stuff for the pump gaskets.

Getting the pump into position was a challenge, as it involved lying on my back under the rear bumper, holding the pump in place with one hand, and trying to position the mating flanges, with tacky gasket sealer already applied, with the other. A third hand would have been useful to align the bolts, but there was just no way to get anyone else in there. In hindsight, I should have removed the hoses from the flanges and assembled the flanges to the pump on the bench, but I was worried the hoses were getting brittle and I did not want to introduce another failure.



I topped up the expansion tank with the extra coolant (actually one gallon of straight coolant and one distilled water), left the pressure cap loose, and opened the downstream valve in the hopes that the two foot slug of air in the lines would bubble its way out the downstream end, which goes through the boiler. The pump is at the lowest point in the system for exactly this reason. I left the upstream valve closed until we could drive a while to jiggle everything around, so that no air would work its way upstream.

We took our friends and their whole family out to dinner Sunday evening as another thank-you. It was our first ever visit to a Five Guys Burgers and Fries (their choice). Very tasty, but not exactly diet-friendly. We spent another couple hours with them yesterday morning, after the kids went off to school, before packing up the bus and getting ready to head out. It was a great visit, and we really appreciate them watching our pets and taking care of Odyssey while we were gone.

We were on the road by noon, with our first stop at the Wal-Mart in Lampasas about an hour later. I had to return the 26" Rain-X wiper blades I bought on Sunday as they did not fit the mounts, even though the last 28" blades I had bought were also Rain-X models. I ended up buying 24" Anco blades, the longest Anco which fits the mount (the 26" and 28" models lack the necessary hole). It turns out the 24" ones provide plenty of coverage with our overlapping wipe pattern, and shaving a full 8" of blade drag off the load on the new motor should help a great deal. There was nothing wrong with the old wiper blades, but I felt the massive 28" of blade drag, times two wipers, contributed to the early demise of the original motor a year ago.

As long as we were stopped, I took the opportunity to open the other hydronic valve. I reasoned that most of the air should have jiggled its way up past the boiler after the first hour of driving, and any air still trapped between the upstream valve and the pump would have to migrate back through the upstream part of the system anyway. This would give us the rest of the day's drive to move that air to the top of the system, or at least string it out into a long series of much smaller bubbles, unlikely to damage the pump.

We arrived here at the picnic area before 3pm and I got to work reconnecting power to the pump and testing the circulating system. We did hear some gurgling as entrained air moved through the system, but it sounded mostly minor. After a few minutes of holding our breath we decided to fire up the boiler, even though it was in the 80s here, to make sure the entire system was operating. We had heat coming out of the fan units in just a few minutes, so it looks like we were successful, although I am still nervous about possible air in the system.

After wrapping up the hydronic pump and installing the new wiper blades, I turned my attention to the fresh water pump. When we arrived at the bus after returning from Virginia, we noticed the pump was running constantly -- never a good thing. Normally when we leave the bus for a week we turn the pump off (although it is almost never off any other time), but this time we left it on in case the boys who were watching the pets needed it for anything.

The temperature in Killeen dropped into the low teens a couple nights while we were gone, and, with no Webasto running to keep the bays warm, I expect that we had some freezing in the plumbing. Most of our plumbing is PEX, which is tolerant of freezing, but it is possible that some water actually froze in the pump head itself. In any case, even after re-priming the pump we noticed it was ingesting a lot of air, and it would sometimes continue to run after closing the tap.

So I ended up emptying the top of the bay and pulling the pump head off. I had just rebuilt most of this head within the last year, as the internal check-valve assembly had finally worn out after six years of full-time operation. I neglected to change the diaphragm, as getting the swash plate off the shaft is a lot of work, and this time I found the diaphragm to be seeping slightly. After changing the diaphragm and swash plate, things are much better, but we are still getting some air and pump run-on. I suspect that whatever did the pump in has also worn out the check valve assembly, even though it is less than a year old. That could have been freeze damage, or it might also have been the pump running continuously for several days without pumping any water. In any case, I am out of spares and so will have to order another rebuild kit for it.

It was past 5pm by the time I got all the projects finished and the tools packed up, just in time to sit outside with a glass of wine and enjoy the developing sunset. This picnic area is at the crest of a hill known as Fivemile Hill, a feature so prominent that it was used by Native Americans for smoke signals. That gave us a wonderful sunset view as well as some twinkling lights in the distance from San Saba after sundown.

In just a few minutes we will continue west, and should end up somewhere near Eldorado tonight. Now that we are in the west, where scenic, dark, peaceful, quiet, and free overnight spots are abundant, we are more relaxed.

Atlanta Downtime

It is an oft-repeated quip that when you die in the south, it doesn't matter whether you are heading to heaven or hell -- you have to change planes in Atlanta. Our flights were on Delta, and the only place Delta flies from Killeen, Texas is Atlanta, on a plane so small they gate-checked our bags (free, as opposed to $25 to do it at check-in).

All well and good, but we only had a 50-minute layover on the schedule, and our flight was half an hour late taking off. We hit the ground with only 20 minutes to make our flight to DC, and waiting on the Jetway for our bags to be handed over was an agonizing five minutes or so. And so it was that we sprinted, O.J. Simpson-style, from gate C-42, at the absolute end of the C concourse, all the way to the escalators in the center, shoved our way onto the inter-terminal train just as it was ready to depart, and sweated bullets until we finally made it to gate B-12 just as they were calling our boarding group. I managed a mad dash into the rest room, but the hoped-for snack or quick check of email was not to be.

By contrast, today's flight pair had a scheduled two-hour layover, and due to a 15-minute early (really) departure from BWI, we arrived at ATL a full half hour ahead of our scheduled arrival, sending the ground crew scrambling. We had the same huge distance to cover today, arriving as we did at B-5 and departing again from C-42, but we could amble in a leisurely fashion and even browse the terminal amenities on our way. As I type, Louise is getting a mini-massage from the little spa down the hall, and this terminal even has a "mini-suite" place where you can get a miniature room with a bunk to rack out for a while. We'll even have time for a light dinner at the Sam Adams pub next door to our gate before we have to board.

Our training in Virginia went remarkably well, considering we were still hammering out the agenda and curriculum by the end of the day Monday. We got it all done at the last yawning moment, and the students, who knew they were the pilot group, were all very positive and appreciative of what we delivered. We spent most of Thursday afternoon, after the students left, debriefing on the whole experience, and a good part of Friday was spent fixing minor glitches in the printed exercises and making agenda and syllabus adjustments. I have more reservations on Delta to do it all again in Memphis in two weeks; Louise will be staying with Odyssey and watching the pets. We will be somewhere in the Phoenix area by then, possibly staying with friends in Casa Grande.

We were graciously put up at the home of one of the technology activity leads while we were here. John and Lynn were excellent hosts, even fixing us dinner most nights as well as breakfast each morning, and John schlepped us from and to the airport, a good hour from their house. They have a nice place just a few blocks from Old Town Alexandria, and we had dinner there a couple of evenings. John is the Communications lead, and I developed the Communications curriculum, so this gave us a chance to work together on Monday and again each evening to iron out the kinks.

This evening we will be back in Killeen. I expect to spend some of tomorrow getting the replacement wiper motor installed, as it arrived at our friends' place shortly before we did. The replacement hydronic pump, however, has not yet arrived. I hope we'll see it Monday so we can be back on the road sometime Tuesday. My flight reservations out of Phoenix mean that we are once again under a travel deadline.

Off to Virginia

Just a quick update before we head to the airport.

We are safely ensconced in the driveway of our friends' house in Killeen, Texas. They made us a nice barbecue chicken dinner last night, and the 9 year old has been thoroughly instructed in the care and feeding of the pets. Our friend Don has been briefed on the bus and what might stop working in the sub-freezing nights to come, and he's got my cell number just in case.

In a few minutes we will head off to the Killeen airport, AKA Gray Army Air Field, for our flight to DC, which connects through Atlanta. I expect over the next few days that we will be too busy to blog.

I also must apologize for several unanswered comments here as well as my back log of unanswered email. It has been a whirlwind few days and I am very behind. I will try to catch up a little on the plane, but mostly it will have to wait until we return. I'm not going to declare email bankruptcy just yet, but for sure I will have to declare Twitter and Facebook bankruptcy when I get back.

Photo by Storm Crypt, used under a Creative Commons license.

Finally warming up

We are at the American Red Cross Disaster Services Technology Maintenance Center (DSMC) in Austin, Texas. We're here because it was only a short diversion from the shortest route to Killeen, we wanted to have dinner with our friend Paul to commiserate about the loss of his cat a couple weeks ago, and Louise needed to exchange her Red Cross laptop for a fresh one.

We've spent lots of time here in the past, teaching classes, helping maintain the equipment, and working on various projects. So we knew there is a receptacle here as well, and we needed the power. Once upon a time we used to be able to park here for however long we needed while working at the facility, but the landlord put a stop to that. However for a single Friday night, we asked and were granted permission to park. I am told it got down to 16° last night, and this morning we had enough coolant dribbles and air leaks to confirm that, so we were glad to have the power to run the heaters.

Yesterday's drive was remarkably uneventful. Notwithstanding apocalyptic predictions for Houston, by the time we arrived there after 2pm the chaos was over and done, and we did not encounter any precipitation at all, let alone the dreaded "ice pellets." To be fair, we delayed our departure from Beaumont until noon, when the dire travel warnings expired. We did observe ice on many of the bridges, but the wheel tracks in the travel lanes were clear and we had no problems.

We found Tollway 8 completely shut down when we arrived, though, and we had planned to take that around the north end of the city to get from 90 to 290. The frontage roads were open and flowing well, however, so it was not a huge problem. Louise has family not far from where 290 crosses the outer beltway, 6, and we stopped for an hour or so visit at a Starbucks near them -- not anyone's first choice, but we all had gift cards to use up and it had a large parking lot. It was a nice, if brief, visit, but we really needed to get back on the road to make Austin by nightfall; as it was, we arrived here about five minutes after sunset. The tollway closure probably ate about 20 minutes of our visit on the front end.

We had a nice dinner with Paul last night at local favorite Trudy's, although we ended up eating at a corner of the bar. It's a popular place, we were famished, and the wait for a table was an hour and a half. I'm sorry we did not get a chance to say hello to any of our other friends here at the DSMC, but we did arrive after 6 on a Friday night.

Today we have just a couple hour's drive to Killeen. The sun is shining and it is warming up nicely, so we will wait until the afternoon to unplug and get on our way. We have one stop to make, to stock up on pet food, before we roll out of Austin. Tomorrow we should be on our way to DC, assuming the air travel morass from yesterday's storm has sorted itself out.

Heading to weather

We are at the Elks lodge in Beaumont, Texas (map). We have good friends here, and we try to see them whenever we pass through. Usually we stay closer to town, or else meet them at their ranch in Woodville, however our current need for power sent us here.

We've been here before, notably on a pair of visits bracketing Hurricane Rita, so we got to see the old lodge both before and after it burned down, a side effect of the storm. The RV parking area in the back has a couple dozen pedestals with 30-amp, 50-amp, or both, and water spigots. There is also a dump station. After Rita, the campground was full for a long time.

In the past we've simply parked in one of the numbered spaces, which are on a grassy area underpinned by gravel. When we arrived yesterday the area was very muddy, and we carefully chose what looked like a firm spot nearest the graveled entrance. However as soon as I drove out to it, with Louise watching from outside, we sank into the earth a good 3", and rather than risk getting stuck in the mud I gave it more throttle and drove right back onto the gravel. We're parked on the very edge of the gravel nearest the RV area, and I checked in with the lodge to make sure it was OK for a single night.

They've finally completed a new lodge building, and while it is not nearly as elaborate as the old one, it seems fairly nice. However it was way too smoky in there for us, so I paid our $12 camp fee and bolted. Today on our way out we will avail ourselves of the dump station; we already put water in yesterday, just before they shut it all down due to the freeze. Nothing here is protected from freezing weather because, really, it doesn't happen often.

Yesterday's drive along I-10 was uneventful and the Rain-X again did its job, although when we arrived here there as a nice glaze of ice on the non-glass portions of the nose, including the headlight covers, and icicles were hanging from the mirrors. We stopped mid-day to call Sure Marine in Seattle to finalize the order for the replacement coolant pump, and we got a bit of bad news.

After discussing it with them on the phone Wednesday and sending them a photo of the pump, we were pretty certain it was the smaller 1200 model. But when they did a little research yesterday morning they decided it was actually more likely the larger (and twice as expensive) 12000 model, which normally sports 1.5" hose barbs, retrofitted with 3/4" barbs for our application. The only way to know for certain was to try to get a number off the pump.

So after we got settled in here yesterday I spent half an hour under the rear bumper loosening the clamps holding the pump in place, in order to remove the rubber vibration pad between the pump and the clamps so we could get a number. When I finally got the pad loose, the label was stuck to the pad and not the pump; peeling it off left the part number stuck inside-out on the pad.


Sure Marine was then able to confirm it was the larger pump. They had one in stock which should have gone out yesterday afternoon, and we are hoping it will be in Killeen by next Monday, right after we return from DC. Our friends there have promised us at least a 15-amp power outlet, so we ought to be able to keep the bus and pets from freezing while we are away.

On top of everything else, we discovered yesterday morning that one of the check valves in the air suspension has started leaking, likely in part due to the cold weather. Fixing that is an uninviting task, involving cramming myself into the wheel well behind the tire, removing the valve, disassembling it, cleaning it, and reinstalling it, all while seated cross-legged and hyperventilating due to close quarters and steering gear capable of squashing me like a bug. It's damp and freezing cold right now, and we've decided to defer that little repair until we have more time and better weather, so we spent the night with the suspension deflated and the bus down on its stops. It's not a problem when driving, because the massive Bendix compressor hardly notices this minuscule leak.

As if it was not already bad enough that we have no wipers, no diesel heater, and a leaky suspension, today we will try to make it half way to Killeen, where we need to be on Saturday afternoon in order to make our Sunday flight. Between here and Killeen sits Houston, and this morning's weather headline was "Ice Storm Cripples Houston." Indeed, Houston, where almost no one has snow tires or any cold-weather, slippery-surface driving experience, has ground to a screeching halt, with accidents on every major highway.

We have all-weather tires and we grew up and learned to drive in the snow and ice, so we are not overly concerned about our own safety, but it is going to take everything we have to pick our way through to the other side, stopping for a breif visit with Louise's brother and his family in the middle. We will be arriving on US-90 and departing on 290, so at least we will miss a lot of the Interstate chaos. Also, we are waiting right here in Beaumont until after noon, so that at least some of the ice will be gone.

There is an adage that the most dangerous thing to have on a boat is a schedule, and I suppose that could also be said of an RV, or even a car for that matter. If we did not already have flight tickets out of Killeen for Sunday, there is no way we'd be pressing onward into this mess. And with the Webasto out of commission, we'd rather not get stuck someplace along the way with no power. But the worst case would be to have to pull over somewhere to wait it out, running the genny at $3.75 per hour to keep warm, and that seems more sensible than waiting here another day and trying to make the whole 8-hour drive to Killeen tomorrow.

Too cold at the hot site

We are in the Baton Rouge, Louisiana area. We are parked for the night at the American Red Cross "hot site" facility here, the location of which I can not disclose, as usual, for security reasons.

When we woke up this morning in Biloxi it was in the 30s and we ran our wonderful and toasty Webasto diesel-fired boiler to warm the bus up. We also used it to pre-heat the main engine for an easier start. As is our custom, we turned the system off after a while, and just before departure, set it on "engine heat" which is where the pump runs, but the boiler does not, in order to extract waste heat from the main engine to produce domestic heat and hot water.

All of that was working fine throughout our very pleasant drive along the gulf coast to Pass Christian, where we stopped at Wal-Mart for fuel. We drove up to the store first to charge up our "gift card" with $600, as using a Wal-Mart card at the pump gets you another three cents off per gallon. After Katrina, Wal-Mart rebuilt the store a good ways further inland and uphill from the original site, although the fuel station is still where it was, I presume due to the cost of moving the underground tanks.

In any case, between the store and the fuel station we were there for around 45 minutes; it takes half that long just to pump 200 gallons from a single automotive nozzle. In that time, with outside temperatures still in the 40s, the coolant dropped below the hydronic system's thermostat setting, and it shut off. We figured we'd have heat again fifteen minutes or so down the road.

When the heaters never came back on we knew we had a problem. I pulled over and stopped somewhere in Bay Saint Louis to have a look. It would appear that our circulating pump has failed; I can hear it spinning but it does not seem to be pumping fluid. These pumps do wear out, and after seven years and over 1,000 hours, I suppose I should not be too surprised.

Getting the pump out is a chore, and without opening it up it is hard to know if this problem can be fixed with a rebuild kit. I am probably going to order a new pump, which costs $425 and must come from Washington. If this one is rebuildable, I'll do that too and then we will have a spare. But until I can get a replacement pump, we have no hydronic heat or hot water.



Of course this would happen as we are on our way into one of the coldest climates we've ever traversed. The mercury is heading for the freezing mark even as I type, and it will just get colder as we get closer to Killeen. In Bay St. Louis we bridged the electric heaters over to the inverter, so we could run them from the big alternator as we drove. And then we started looking for power outlets.

One of Odyssey's greatest assets is independence from the grid, and having to live receptacle to receptacle is disheartening, to say the least. We did build quite a bit of redundancy in, so at least we have heat, in the form of three electric heaters (and electric hot water heater) and a generator. But having to run the generator at $3.75 per hour, or hunt for receptacles at $10-$40 per night compares very unfavorably with waste engine heat, which is free. Even running the boiler would cost just a half buck or so per hour.

So tonight's planned stop was somewhere perhaps an hour west of here, but the pump failure forced a change in plans. After our stay last night adjacent to the Isle Casino in Biloxi I got a friendly email from my buddy at corporate there reminding us that their property in Lake Charles has RV hookups for just $10 per night, which includes access to the resort's facilities. That was sounding mighty attractive after the pump failed, so even though Lake Charles is a full two hours further than I had hoped to drive today, we set that as our goal for the day.

Separately, we had already planned to make a stop here at the hot site. I even emailed HQ yesterday asking if they needed us to look in on anything here, but they said no. Nevertheless, we wanted to check the new location out, as the facility had to move here from its previous digs across town, where we've spent some four months or so on relief operations in the past.

From satellite imagery I knew the parking lot entrances were gated and locked, so I expected to park outside the gates and just take a quick walk around. When we arrived, however, we found one of the gates wide open, and drove on in to look around. When I spied a working power outlet outside the building I called HQ and asked if we could spend the night -- no problem. So here we are with a free 15 amps, enough to run the electric heaters and blanket for the night, and off the road a little ahead of our planned stop and a good couple of hours sooner than if we had to press on to Lake Charles.

We ended up working here a little anyway. After we'd been here for perhaps an hour, one of the local chapter folks showed up, responding to some kind of alarm from the air conditioning. These sorts of things happen routinely at these remotely monitored facilities. This fellow remembered us from a previous operation and asked if we wanted to have a look inside the building; lo and behold, the computers were powered off because workers waxing the floors had closed all their lids. When the computers are powered down they don't get their automatic updates, nor can they be remotely managed for routine maintenance, so we walked around and powered them all up, fixing a couple of power issues in the process.



After making a few funny faces in front of the security web cams, which are recorded, if not constantly monitored, in Austin we buttoned it all back up and retired to the bus for dinner. Our batteries let us draw considerably more than the 15 amps of input power when we need to, but we've spent the evening shuffling the limited power among the heaters, microwave, water heater, and miscellaneous items so that we can make it through the night without having to run the generator.

We've already asked our friends in Killeen if they can give us at least 15 amps while we are there, as there is no way I will be able to get and install a replacement pump before we fly to DC. Tomorrow I will order the replacement and have it sent to them as I did with the wiper motor, which I am told arrived today. With any luck I should be able to get it installed and running before we depart Killeen for points west.

Tomorrow we will head west into Texas, and should be in either Beaumont or Woodville by the end of the day, depending on the availability of our friends there. Due to our somewhat early stop tonight, I will need to drive an extra 45 minutes tomorrow.

Into the storm

We are at the Isle of Capri Casino Resort in Biloxi, Mississippi (map). More correctly, we are at an abandoned parking lot next door that belonged to some waterfront attraction destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. We have a lovely spot right on the water, adjacent to the bridge.

Yesterday we got a fairly early start from Quincy because I knew we'd eventually run into weather, and I wanted to try to get a full four hours of driving in before the absence of working wipers forced us to stop. We had clear sailing through the rest of the Florida panhandle and all of lower Alabama, but the skies were threatening as we crossed into Mississippi. Louise pulled up the weather radar on my Blackberry and we decided to try to make it here to Biloxi, which was our planned stop, with at least two Wal-Marts on US-90 east of here as back-up options.

I-10 all the way through Mississippi would have been faster and more direct, but this stretch of US-90 along the gulf coast is one of our favorite drives. Besides that, the Wal-Mart in Pass Christian has the cheapest diesel fuel we will see from here all the way through Texas, and I want to fill the tank. The second cheapest station I found was also on US-90, in Pascagoula, and we stopped there yesterday to put another 25 gallons in, so we'd be certain both the heater and generator dip tubes would be immersed last night -- we went through the 50 gallons I added in Quincy faster than normal due to severe headwinds from this storm.

The extra fuel stop meant the rain hit us in Ocean Springs. But the Rain-X again did its magic and I was able to nurse it all the way over the bridge. This is the first casino after the bridge, and we got parked just as the rain turned into a deluge. We were in quarters uncharacteristically early, before 3pm. While it rained cats and dogs, sideways at times, for a couple of hours, it let up enough by dinner time for us to walk over to the cafe inside the casino. I was disappointed that Farraday's steak house, where we would have preferred to eat, is only open on the weekends now.

Today we will fuel up in Pass Christian and head into Louisiana. After we cross the Mississippi from Baton Rouge into Port Allen, we need to decide whether to take the shorter but more minor route along US-190 through Livingston, or stay as far south as we can until past Houston before turning north. It dropped to freezing here last night, and is only going up to 45 today, and things will only get worse as we head west, until this massive storm system clears out.

Photo by OneEighteen, used under a Creative Commons license.