Flexibility is key

We are anchored outside the buoy line at mile 604 on the lower Mississippi (map). It's been an interesting couple of days since last I posted here, including a reminder why one can never have a schedule on a boat.


Sunset at our anchorage last night. That's the port's massive trolley crane; the big river is behind it.

We had a lovely evening Sunday, much warmer than Saturday, although the season of dining on the aft deck is long gone. Around dinner time we started hearing the distinctive riverboat whistle of the American Queen, presumably calling the all-aboard. Around 7 or so she pushed off the dock, and by 8:30 she was passing us, upbound for Memphis. I did my best to snap a photo as she passed. I spoke to the skipper about the missing cruise dock, and he shared that the low water meant he'd be pushing up against the Greenbelt Park on the river side and using his gangways; when I looked on Marine Traffic on Monday he was pushed up against the boat ramp there.


The American Queen passing us upbound. We were still in the same spot a day later when she passed us downbound, too. The paddlewheel is brightly lit and makes for a spectacular mist effect at night.

Monday we went nowhere at all. Conditions were fine for a morning departure, but a forecast storm meant that we'd be trying to anchor at the end of the day in storm conditions. We opted to stay put and ride it out where we were; we knew we had a good set on the anchor and we had good Internet access.

The storm hit around mid-day, and our choice to stay put was soon confirmed by myriad towboats making the same choice, pushing up against the bank wherever they could. We don't have an anemometer, but we estimate the gusts we experienced at close to 50 knots, enough to overcome three knots of river current and move us around some. This same storm wreaked havoc with the fires in eastern Tennessee later on. We scrambled around on deck stowing anything that might blow over, and then just settled in and enjoyed it. At the end of the day the storm cleared and we had an interesting sunset.


Spectacular post-storm sky. My photo does not do it justice.

Yesterday we weighed anchor for a short day's cruise to Helena, Arkansas, where we hoped to drop the hook in a slack harbor and maybe get ashore. Alas, it was not to be. We had barely reached the mouth of the harbor when we promptly ran aground; the depth sounder went from 45' to 5' in the span of two boat lengths. Trying to back out we hung up on the starboard fin, spinning around and heeling over fifteen degrees. Fortunately, it's all river silt, and the big 370-horse Lugger easily pushed us back into deep water to lick our wounds.

We moved a few miles downriver and tried to drop off-channel behind some green buoys, which would have been acceptable if not entirely comfortable. But a couple of tow drivers called us to tell us there was another slack harbor just a few miles further down that would be perfect, and that's where we ended up last night, at the Phillips County Port. We anchored mid-canal just a short ways in, with enough room for the working boats to pass on either side of us (map). It was calm, peaceful, and quiet.

Not so the radio, which has been abuzz the last three days with groundings. The river is at an extremely low level right now; the Captain of the Port has issued a low water warning spanning 550 river miles. A large tow went aground near mid-channel at mile 493 and was stuck there for two full days, with one-way traffic restrictions around it. Last night 13 barges ran aground at mile 636, just a few miles downriver of our anchorage, but they managed to get off before we were under way this morning, and we passed them on our way out of the harbor.


Passing the Tunica Riverpark dock, where American Queen tied up. Fitzgerald's casino is to the left. Had we felt the need for a casino experience, we could have gotten ashore here.

The forecast calls for the river to rise as much as six feet starting just a couple of days from now, but that will be short-lived as winter sets in to the north. As long as the tows are getting through, we'll have no trouble navigating, but the low water makes finding anchorages a much bigger challenge.

When we were making ready to depart yesterday, I went up to the flybridge to fire up the "new" plotter, and it was dead. The storm had blown the cover off it (fortunately not overboard), and then doused it for hours with driving rain, which managed to infiltrate the supposedly weatherproof unit. It's predecessor had been up there in the same spot for nearly three years with nary a problem.

After we were well anchored I took the unit apart. Rust and circuit damage tells a tale of a long history of leakage; this storm was merely the last straw. One of the problems with used gear is that you can't tell what sins the last owner may have committed. In this case it looks like the unit had been opened up but not properly sealed on closure, and water entering the trackball area dripped onto the front panel circuit board. There may be other damage, too, but I won't know until I replace this board. Fortunately, I have one in the old plotter that I tucked away. It looks like I have my project for the next few days cut out for me.

Endless flat water makes you complacent, and the last couple of days have reminded us to keep the boat squared away. Under way yesterday we were passed in a narrow section by an upbound tow pushing very hard; his prop wake reverberated for over a mile behind him and had us porpoising over four footers for nearly ten minutes. I moderated the throttle to null as much as I could; meanwhile Louise stood in the galley holding onto the crock pot, which had just been sitting out on the counter with dinner in it. In the ocean, we put the crock pot in the galley sink. Then we had the aforementioned 15 degree roll at the end of the day, which, fortunately, happened in slow motion.

This morning I had to pass astern of two towboats pushed against the bank in order to exit the harbor. I had to pass close astern to avoid being pushed into the shoal by the combination of river current and prop wash. We were prepared for rough water but had neglected to dog the fridge door; with the stabilizers pegged that prop wash rolled us at least 20 degrees to port. We rolled quickly and snapped back almost as quickly, and a good part of the fridge contents ended up on the galley floor. A drawer launched out of the saloon table, and apparently every dresser drawer, all of which are to starboard, came open below decks, notwithstanding being latched.

Vector handles all of this with complete aplomb, and I had no trouble driving through it, but it was a good reminder. The cat was completely blasé about it all. A little later in the morning we had another porpoise episode after passing an upbound tow in a narrow stretch; by then everything was again secured.

At this writing, there are no tows aground, although that could change overnight. The river is rising slowly, and we've made a note of some shallow spots ahead that the Coast Guard has been announcing on the radio. We should be in Greenville, Mississippi in a day or two. There's a marina there, but it's very pricey, so we will probably anchor in the slack harbor and dinghy ashore instead. It will be nice to be able to get off the boat.

Racing downriver to Memphis

We are just zipping down the river, now with an average of three knots behind us. Yesterday's cruise from Caruthersville took us all the way to Osceola, Arkansas, some 66 miles, where we dropped the hook in a slack harbor in a now-dammed oxbow of the river (map). Today we'll be in Memphis before 2pm.


Sunset over Caruthersville.

After my last post we made our way ashore in Caruthersville, landing at the concrete city boat ramp right at the foot of the main drag. Unfortunately, the bank here consists of rip-rap revetment, so after disembarking the tender we had to push it back into the river and line it around to the bank, then tie it off to a couple of large rocks.

It was too dark after we landed to get any shots of downtown, which is typical rural small-town America. We walked the few blocks to A Little Pizza Heaven for dinner. The pizza was acceptable but not worth repeating, cut into squares in traditional midwest fashion rather than slices. At least they had beer. At the next table a large group of ten year olds was celebrating; it turns out their team won the flag football championship. I gathered from the jerseys that their team is the New York Giants -- perhaps all the teams in this league are named after pro teams.


Vector as seen from Caruthersville landing.

Landing the tender at last daylight has been sending us to dinner quite early, and so our whole daily schedule is also early. We've been getting up at dawn, and even after a leisurely morning with two cups of coffee, we've been under way before 9am each day. I had originally budgeted three days to Memphis from Caruthersville, but it was clear we'd make Osceola by mid-afternoon, and we figured arriving on a Saturday would be better for sampling the Memphis nightlife, anyway.

As I've written here many times when we were traveling in the bus, crossings of the Mississippi are few and far between. One such crossing is just downriver of Caruthersville, carrying Interstate 155 across the river. We crossed it several times in Odyssey; I never noticed until we passed under it on the river that the truss structure is asymmetric.


I-155 bridge astern of us.

When we arrived at Osceola, the slack harbor looked quite crowded with barges, and it was unclear if there was room for us at the back, beyond the working berths. Instead we crossed the river and dropped the hook in 15' over sand, between the wing dams. We had a good set, but even with a wing dam upstream, we were in so much current that our propeller was windmilling, and the upbound tows were passing close aboard to stay out of the worst of the current.

I hailed the small working tug in the harbor; our guide listed their working channel. He was able to inform us that there was a little room for us at the north end of the harbor with sufficient depth, and a pathway through the barges. He just asked us to keep clear of a diver in the water repairing one of the barges. We weighed anchor and made our way over to the harbor, where we had a quiet and peaceful night. We could have gone ashore here, too, but the town of Osceola is a very long walk, and there was nothing we needed.


Our view of the harbor this morning, with the main river beyond.

Today, in addition to already having passed several large tows, we've also passed two small fishing boats. We may well be the only cruising boat on the lower Mississippi, and we haven't passed a single marina since we turned onto the Ohio River. But there are boat ramps on both sides of the Mississippi, every dozen miles or so, and now that it's the weekend, we're seeing folks in trailerable boats out fishing.


Looking "upstream" you can see the dike across the oxbow and sand deposition. Our sounder went from 20' to 10' in less than a boatlength.

Today we also passed two small houses. You might think that with a couple thousand miles of riverbank, we'd be passing hundreds of riverfront homes, as we did on the Tennessee. But the flood reality of a meander river is that nothing built on the riverbanks is sustainable. In many parts of the river, the flood walls are nearly a mile back from the channel -- we can't even see them because the intervening space is basically a forest.


Rare riverfront house.

The handful of towns still intact along the river are either naturally elevated, or else have massive flood walls to protect them. A mark halfway up Cruthersville's wall shows the height of the historic 2011 flood level. So it is rare to see any structure along the river itself other than a commercial loading terminal, and these typically ride on pilings extending some 50' or so above the river.

We're looking forward to being in Memphis in just a couple of hours. We'll stay for at least three nights and perhaps longer; our mail should already be waiting for us. It's supposed to be very cold the next few days, and we'll be happy to have the heat available any time we want it.

Couldn't find the Flippin Wal-Mart

We are at the Elks lodge in Mountain Home, Arkansas (map).

We spent another private, dark, and quiet night at the Moccasin Gap Horse Camp -- the mini-C that had rolled in after noon pulled up stakes and left the park by 4 or so; we were mystified, since they had set up their chairs and tablecloth, and it looked like they had settled in for the night. They had even walked over to the iron ranger, and we had assumed they had paid for a night. Not that I am complaining; we prefer the solitude, and besides, we were able to spend another evening in the hot tub umm, "as designed."

Yesterday morning some yahoo rolled up in her car, got out, and put several large bags of trash in the receptacles, then drove off. The Forest Service had just emptied the bins the day before; I'm guessing this is some local who doesn't pay for trash service, and has figured out that the campground bins are emptied on Tuesdays. She did not stop to pay the day use fee. Later, the guy who mows the grass showed up, mowed all around us, then left. Other than those four vehicles, we didn't see a soul after the Labor Day off-roaders left.

Since all is quiet on the disaster front, we decided to get moving again and clear out of Arkansas, so first thing in the morning I hooked the hose up to the hot tub and ran it off into the weeds to drain. We had everything packed and loaded by mid-day, which was good because it was starting to rain again. Which reminds me, we've had two or three big gully-washers here in Arkansas, including Tuesday night, and I am happy to report that most of our major leaks seem to be gone. We have a drip or two here and there, what I would characterize as "normal" for any RV older than a year or two (and before anyone writes in to tell me they have a leak-free rig: all RVs leak after a while, it's just a matter of how much, and whether they leak where you can see it or not).

We had a very pleasant drive north on scenic route 7 (although we both noted that this hardly qualifies as the most scenic road in America, notwithstanding people making that claim on the Internet). Unfortunately, we we pressing into not only rain, but also extreme fog -- at one point, I had to put my rear fog lights on for safety -- and a couple of the scenic overlooks were completely socked in. I'm sure in better weather we would have had a nice view of the Buffalo River valley. And speaking of the river, it was, indeed, quite scenic where we crossed, near Jasper, and we got to see at least a little of the limestone canyon. We opted, though, to keep moving instead of circling back to one of the campgrounds.

We were completely out of some supplies, including milk for our morning coffee -- and we do not function without our coffee. So after the driving workout that was route 7 (no cruise control here -- the road is winding and hilly, requiring both hands on the wheel, and one foot on the throttle and the other on the retarder), we set our sights on the nearest Wal-Mart on our route, in Flippin (really). Jill-the-GPS didn't even know about it, though, and Google Maps knew it was there but couldn't seem to place it.

If we had gone through town on the old highway, which would have been the direct route and was also the way Jill thought we were going to go, it turns out we would have driven right by it. apparently, since Jill's database was last updated, they have diverted the highway around the town (the "Flippin Bypass," I assume), and we were already past the turn for the old road before we realized it. Only a GPS (and over-reliance on its accuracy) can screw up like that; had we followed the signs, I think we would have been fine. In any case, we went all the way past the town on the bypass, then circled back into town from the east on the old road, and we went back and forth past the spot where Google said the Wal-Mart was twice. Had we gone just another two blocks past town to the west, of course, we would have run into it.

After the 15-minute Flippin diversion, we gave up and decided to continue another 15 miles here to the Elks lodge. There is also a Wal-Mart here in Mountain Home, just a few blocks further east, but this resort destination, unsurprisingly, does not permit overnight parking. We'll stop there today for the supplies we couldn't get at the Flippin store.

This turned out to be a fine spot, fairly quiet and away from the road. Plus, the lodge was having burger night, and we had a pleasant if casual meal with all the fixin's, complete with wine, for $20. We seldom eat in the lodges, because often they are too smoky for us, but I did not see a single smoker at this one. Some states have banned it, but there was plenty of smoke in Fayetteville/Springdale so I assume Arkansas is not one of them.

Today we will continue east. At some point we will face a choice between crossing the Mississippi on the 60/62 bridge at Cairo, or taking the Dorena/Hickman Ferry. I expect, though, we will still be west of the river tonight.

Photo by .bobby, used under a Creative Commons license.

We brought 475

We are at the Moccasin Gap Horse Camp, in the Ozark National Forest (map). There are no horses here, other than the mechanical ones we brought with us.

We left Aux Arc park yesterday right at the 2pm checkout time, and availed ourselves of one of the two dump stations (incredibly, there was no line). We had to loop back through to one of the hookup sites to take on water -- there was only the rinse spigot at the dump, and besides, it takes a long time to fill our tank, and two people had lined up behind us while we were dumping.

Space #3 was again vacant Sunday night, and our last night in the park was fairly serene and quiet, although the Shasta two spaces over was still running their genny, and their yipper dog got left outside and was still barking incessantly at 2am, presumably to be let in. I am guessing the occupants could not hear the dog over the din of their generator and air conditioners. They were far enough away, though, that the Fantastic fan in our bedroom pretty much drowned it out when I turned in.

With nothing really on the horizon disaster-wise, and temperatures having climbed back into a slightly uncomfortable range at the river (considering the humidity), we decided to get back on the road and once again head northeast, to get some relief. I plotted a course back to the Buffalo National River, but given the late start, we decided to make a shorter day of it. We had decided to take Arkansas 7, which the map shows as scenic and many web sites refer to as one of the most scenic roads in the US. Since that route would take us right through this stretch of forest, we pulled out the relevant USFS map. That map showed this campground, just off the highway, and our National Forest Campground guide indicated a max length of 99' (really).

When we arrived, however, the only sign out at the road said "Horse Trail" -- no indication there is camping here at all. You'd never know from driving by. As we rolled in to the campground/trailhead, a group of six or seven ATV's was gathering at the trail; the area gets day use not only from horsemen but also off road enthusiasts. They stared at us in disbelief as we rolled past.

It took a little maneuvering to make it around the short loop, due to a couple of low trees, but we found an ideal site with a clear view to the satellite, plenty of afternoon shade, and some nice grass for the pets.



The place claims to have 19 sites, although none is numbered, and there are probably that many spots, although not that many tables, fire rings, or lantern hangers. Most sites seem adorned with at least one of these items, and many have tether posts for the horses. However, there is little "evidence" of any recent equestrian use.

After the day use crowd left yesterday afternoon, we had the entire place to ourselves, a condition which persisted right up to about 1pm today, when a mini-class-C rolled in and set up across the large group-style pavilion from us. There is a single water spigot right in the middle of the loop, and after we paid for two nights (grand total: $6), we set up the hot tub and ran 100' of hose over to it to fill it up. We enjoyed a nice soak last night under the stars. (Well, OK, in our little screen tent -- it's a bit buggy here.) Today the water temperature is back down into the 80s, and now that it's quite warm outside, we are thinking about a cool plunge.

There's a burger joint a couple of miles back down the road that we passed on our way north, and we might take the scooters out and roll down there this evening. Otherwise, we are just enjoying the pleasant weather here, and the almost complete solitude, a marked contrast from Aux Arc on Labor Day.

At some point today or tomorrow, I will be tearing into the dashboard. While we were at the dump station yesterday, I had the ignition off but the marker lights on, and I noticed the fuel needle read 3/4 (it should read zero -- less, actually -- with the key off). Hmm. Turning off the lights caused the needle to return to its rest peg, and back on gave me 3/4 again. Turning the lights off and the ignition on gave me a reading of 7/8 or so, about what we actually have.

This was an "Aha!" moment. You may recall I ran out of fuel (fortuitously, at a fuel station) a week or so ago, and I was scratching my head because I thought I had at least 30 (usable) gallons left. Apparently, there is a short between the dash illumination and the gauge input, and the extra juice from the lights is causing the gauge to read high. I wonder how long this has been going on. Usually, I have the engine running before I turn the lights on when I do my pre-trip inspections, so I had not noticed the problem.

Tomorrow morning we will decide whether to pay for another night or two here, or pack up and continue on to the Buffalo River. In part it will depend on whether we find milk someplace today -- we only have enough left for one more morning.

Allez Aux Arc

We are at the Aux Arc (pronounced "ozark," en Francais) Corps Of Engineers park and campground (map), just across the Arkansas River from Ozark, Arkansas and adjacent to the Corps-operated Ozark Lock and Dam. We've stayed here before -- that's our power steering fluid all over the ground in front of Odyssey in the photo, and I am happy to report that, almost exactly two years later, there is no trace of the stain remaining; I distinctly remember spending an hour or so with the kitty litter cleaning it all up. Oddly, on this visit, we've seen only one tow pass by on the river since we arrived.

Speaking of familiar places, after we left the Wal-Mart in Van Buren, Louise pointed out that we had stayed next door at the Lowe's there when we zipped through on I-40 back in January of 2006. I remember the stop (neither the Chili's nor Frank's Italian restaurant existed then), but I can't for the life of me recall why we chose the Lowe's over the Wal-Mart right next door. Historical satellite imagery (now available in Google Earth) shows the Wal-Mart to pre-date the Lowe's by a fair amount.

Friday morning brought us no closer to a real resolution on which way to head, but we realized that it was the beginning of Labor Day weekend (these holidays always seem to sneak up on us), and we had best find someplace to settle in while the tidal wave passed over us. We decided to remain more or less in NW Arkansas, and within striking distance of the Interstate, and so after one final check of the NHC forecast and the fire reports from California, we set out on what I though was a well-planned and Interstate-free route directly south on Arkansas 59 to Barling, then due east on Arkansas 22 to Paris (where I hoped to take a blog-titling photo of the bus for an "Odyssey in Paris" post here). From there it would be a short jaunt to the Ozark National Forest, with plenty of dispersed options, as well as a developed campground at Cove Lake if it was not already full for the holiday weekend, and even an easy scooter ride back for "dinner in Paris" as well.

Alas, it was not to be. After we crossed I-40 on 59, we started seeing giant yellow "No Trucks on 59 Through Van Buren" warning signs. The first few we ignored; often when we roll past such signs we both say out loud "we're not a truck." But as we got further along, the signs got more dire, with the addition of flashing amber lights, which we take as not a good sign. Eventually, just before the well-marked (but poorly paved) truck turn-around, we hit the sign that said "Weight Limit 12,000 lbs." Now, we're not bound by signs that apply to trucks, but a weight limit is a weight limit, and we weigh four times that amount. Reluctantly, we availed ourselves of the turn-around and headed back toward the Interstate.

The presumed work-around for my planned route would involve bypassing Van Buren on I-540, after first heading a few miles east on I-40. We'd then pick up 59 south of the city, and the total added to the route would only amount to a few miles. Nonetheless, once we were on I-40 and heading east, we decided to just continue on past Alma and pick up US-64 to Ozark, knowing that would give us this COE option, yet still keep open the possibility of continuing southeast on 309 to Paris if necessary, actually a shorter route than the original.

We did not hold out much hope there would be any space at this park. It's popular and well used, and it is on the reservation system. Like most COE parks, it is nicely developed, with three playgrounds, a boat ramp, a dozen or so river docks, restrooms, and 30- or 50-amp power and water at most of the sites, along with large gravel patios, nice tables and fire rings, and the ubiquitous trademark COE lantern-hanger "candy canes." So I was not surprised when we rolled up mid-day to be told that they were completely sold out.

The did allow as two (out of a total of four) unreservable "primitive" sites were still available, but "there's no way you'll get that rig in there." They were willing to let us try, however, and site #4 turned out to be plenty capacious enough to fit us, and with a rare open shot to the satellite as well. We did, however, first have to turn around in the nearby boat ramp parking lot, then back all the way to the site. We paid for three nights, at $9 each (half the 30-amp rate).

Primitive is something of a misnomer, as these four sites all have picnic tables and steel fire rings/grills, as well as paved driveways. The four sites share a concrete dock on the river, affording a nice view of the bridge just upstream, which is decoratively lit at night. Just next to the bridge, perhaps only 1,500' from here, is a decent Mexican restaurant, Mi Casita, which served us the largest portion of mixed fajitas (beef, chicken, shrimp, and chorizo) we've ever seen for less than $10, and our beer and margarita were just $2.50 each. The restaurant would be an easy walk, if not for the fact that there is a gate across the road with a "No Trespassing" sign just past it (although I think it is really a public street), and so we had to ride nearly three miles around the long way to get there (as shown on this map).



Now that we are nicely settled in with plenty of food and wine, we can sit back, relax, and watch the Amateur Hour that is Labor Day weekend at most any public campground. We're right next to the boat ramp, which is often entertaining enough, but we also have the class-C in #2 two sites over, traveling with the tent in site #1 beyond that, who have been running their generator more or less 24/7 since we arrived (even though quiet hours run 10p-6a), and blaring country music from some local station occasionally on a tinny radio. Their little yapper dog is also running around loose.

Our site shares a driveway with #3, and we luxuriously had it to ourselves when we arrived and all night Friday. Yesterday afternoon, a couple of fishermen with the world's oldest and most decrepit bass boat pulled in there and set up a giant tent; fishermen are usually quiet and sedate, so I thought no problem. As evening rolled in, though, so did another pickup truck with a pair of women in it, and these four partied well into the wee hours of the morning. I'm pretty certain they polished off two full cases of beer among the four of them, and they yakked loudly and carried on all night. At least I no longer felt any guilt that our air compressor would kick on a couple times in the middle of the night just 40' from their tent.

Around 2am or so, while I was still plugging away at getting my new computer up and running, I heard one of the women allow that she was very drunk, and wondering if she would get home safely, and then I heard her say "I wanna ride those scooters." Of course, "those" scooters would be ours, and I noticed she was eying them. Now, drunk folks have been known to lack judgment, and I would not have put it past her to hop on one of them just to try it for size, and they are actually rather easy to knock off their center stands and drop, so I doused all the lights (mostly, my computer screens) and kept an eye on them until they wandered back to their camp site and their attention turned to, umm, each other. No word on whether the ladies made it home safely, but both pickup trucks were gone this morning. The two fishermen came back just at checkout time, in yet a different pickup truck, loaded up their gear and tent, and took off. With any luck, the site will be vacant again tonight.

This couple days of downtime has been just what I needed to make progress on the computer project, and I am happy to report that I am posting this from my new laptop, although I am not quite finished getting everything in order. I am still getting used to the ~90%-sized keyboard (the one on the Gateway was luxuriously full-sized), and I've done a lot of backspace-retype here. Hopefully either the spell-checker or Louise will catch all my typos. Lots of folks have asked about the new computer, or computing on the road in general, and the detailed notes I am keeping about getting this machine set up may get turned into a dedicated blog post at some point.

We are paid up through mid-day tomorrow, at which point we'll either need to figure out where to head from here, or we'll move to a hookup space for a night to charge up our batteries and maybe even wash the coach.

The eighth President

We are at the Wal-Mart in Van Buren, Arkansas (map), just north of I-40 and Fort Smith. Notwithstanding the title of today's post, the city actually acquired the name when ol' Marty was still Secretary of State.

We arrived here late yesterday after a most scenic drive down US-71 from Fayetteville. This old road traverses a ridgeline above the White River valley, revealing views to the river below at various points. Now bypassed by I-540 and mostly untraveled, the road is dotted with the ghosts of quaint resorts and long forgotten way stations. Our kind of road, with nary a soul ahead or behind.

After dallying in the Springdale/Fayetteville area for four nights, paying $15 per night for hookups we did not need, and truly uncertain as to whether east or west was a better call, we decided to split the difference and come more or less due south. In addition to giving us something to do for a day, and getting us back on the road, this puts us back on the I-40 corridor, where we can make a speedy getaway in either direction should we need to do so. Our goal in having angled north in the first place was to move into cooler weather, but fall is taking care of that for us nicely here. Of course, we had also wanted to get off the Interstate, so this is a bit of a step backwards there.

This morning found us no closer to a decision on which way to head, and, lacking a plan, we ended up waffling all day here. We did go into the store for supplies, and I spent most of the day on the computer, between working on Red Cross documents (lacking any actual disasters, they are finding other things for us to work on), and delving in to the lengthy process of setting up my new computer, having finally concluded that getting the old one back up to snuff would actually be more work.

And so it was that four o'clock or so rolled around, and we were still right here. Generally, we try to avoid spending more than a single night at a Wal-Mart (though there have been exceptions), but we are actually quite unobtrusively tucked in the back, between the Lowe's next door and the Tire and Lube bays, and I don't think anyone even knows we're here, except for the tire guys who've been talking about the bus since we first pulled in. So we decided to just spend another night. We even grabbed a movie from the Redbox (Milk).

Tomorrow morning we will get rolling again, although I can't quite say where to. Erika has fizzled into a weak tropical depression, and there is nothing else on the Atlantic horizon except a disorganized wave off the coast of Africa. The western wildfires, meanwhile, are thankfully becoming less of a threat each day. Unless something happens to push us one way or the other, we will continue to split the difference, moving only very slowly from our very central location here.

Move we must, though, because this is a dry county. We had a nice Italian dinner last night at a local joint called Frank's, where the food was quite good, but the only wine was in the sauce. And tonight we ate at Chili's, where in 25 years of eating at that venerable establishment, this is the first one I've ever visited that did not have a bar. Tomorrow, I'd like a glass of wine with my dinner.

Photo by cliff1066, used under a Creative Commons license.

At a standstill

We are at the Elks Lodge in Fayetteville, Arkansas (map), just four miles from where we spent Saturday night in a Wal-Mart in Springdale. This is a nice lodge, with probably the nicest interior we've seen at an Elks, along with two swimming pools, 18 holes of miniature golf (really), and a single RV power pedestal with 50/30/20 amp outlets. The 50 was taken when we arrived, but the 30 (or even the 20) was plenty for us in this weather.

On Sunday morning our plan had been to continue moving slowly east, and we had our eyes on the Buffalo National River, where there is a nice campground and visitor center. We had even figured on a couple days of downtime there, and stocked up the larder at Wal-Mart so we could enjoy some remote dry camping.

By the time we were ready to hit the road, however, the wildfires in California (and one in Utah) had jumped the lines and were on a course to potentially destroy thousands of homes. News of mandatory evacuations was sobering, and even the historic Mount Wilson observatory is threatened.

In light of this news, and recalling the fact that, two years ago, we were all the way across the country in Florida at the tail end of hurricane season when enormous wildfires did serious damage in California, prompting us to drive all-out across the country to help, we decided it would not be prudent to move any further east. Unless and until Investigation Area 94L develops into an actual storm, that is.

With temperatures here in the very pleasant 70s, we opted to simply stay in the Springdale/Fayetteville area. Not wanting to overstay our welcome at Wal-Mart (and not knowing if the Sam's layout facility would have a bunch of employees arriving Monday morning), we opted to just come down here to the Elks lodge until we knew what we were doing.

That gave me the opportunity to tackle some projects that have been languishing, and after we got settled in Sunday afternoon, I started on Louise's scooter. She's been having trouble keeping up with me on the hills, and her on-line research indicated that moving to more specialized and slightly lighter centrifugal slider weights was the single best modification to make to improve this performance. We've had the new slider weights in our hands for a good couple of weeks now, but we just have not had a solid block of time to install them.

As it turned out, we lacked tools, as well. One of the steps involves removing the nut that holds the "variator" pulley onto the drive shaft, and there is no way to get enough leverage with a standard wrench to remove the nut, without risking breaking the fins off the variator. The right tool is a powered impact wrench, and somehow I have avoided owning one of these for my entire adult life. I've instead always managed by using a hammer and a normal wrench, or my cordless drill with a low clutch setting, or even a manual impact driver. None of those would work in this situation (well, the cordless drill might have, except I lacked any way to chuck the huge 22mm, 3/8" drive socket into it -- it only accepts ¼" drive items).

Fortunately, a Lowe's, Home Depot, and Wal-Mart are all within a short scooter ride from here, and with Louise's scoot in multiple pieces all over the parking lot, I rode down to two out of the three to get what I needed. I am now the proud owner of an el-cheapo Campbell-Hausfeld ½" drive impact wrench, along with a 3/8" drive adapter. The impact wrench made short work of the hub nut, and, as a bonus, I'll be able to avoid those make-shift methods the next time I need to remove a sticky nut or bolt. I can probably make a few quick bucks changing car tires on the side of the road, too, but, alas, this unit is not beefy enough to remove the bus lug nuts.



Adding the tool foray to the scooter project had it run well into the dinner hour by the time I had everything back together and cleaned up, and we decided to just run out to Olive Garden rather than fix any of the things we had just bought for dinner. Besides, Louise was chomping at the bit to test-ride her new slider weights -- she reports the bike is much more responsive now. (It remains to be seen whether there is a price to be paid in top speed -- slider weight changes are always a compromise.) I brought half of my pasta home, and somewhere on the return trip the unopened set of ½" drive metric sockets I had in the trunk for return to the store interacted badly with the leftover clamshell, resulting in linguine al portabagagli. I'm sure Wal-Mart will hardly notice the Bolognese sauce.



Yesterday was also a day of waiting and watching the weather and fires, and opportunity for more projects. Now that it is cool enough to work up on the roof, I removed all three roof air conditioner shrouds and set to cleaning the condenser coils, a task we have not done in the five years we've been on the road (actually, the A/Cs were up there a good six months before that, even). Everything looked to be in good shape, with the exception of a handful of bruises and cracks on the shrouds themselves from banging against low trees. The coils were quite dirty, and I would estimate that about a half cup of dirt came out of each one. I used compressed air and a toothbrush for the cleaning; the pressure washer would probably have been more effective, but I would have had to bag up the motors somehow to keep the water out of them.

Oddly, the fan motors and bearings have no lubrication points, and the Dometic manual says the units never need lubrication. I would have liked to lube them anyway, as long as I have them open, but there was no obvious way to do it. I did spin each fan by hand to make certain there was no turning resistance or excessive bearing end play. The compressors are completely sealed units, so nothing to be done there.

There is a strip of open-cell foam weatherstripping that seals between the sheet metal ducting and the shroud, which is there to keep the forced air flowing through the coils, rather than over them. It also keeps the hot air exhausted from the coils from getting sucked right back in to the cool air intake. Several inches of this material had become brittle with age and crumbled to dust on two of the units, and Louise had to make a Lowe's run to pick up some generic weatherstripping to replace it. Given how many of our readers have these (or similar) units, I am sorry now that I did not snap a photo while I had it open.

While I was up on the roof, I had two different computers plugging away at trying to recover and save my files from the failing disk drive fiasco. I also spent about four hours last night trying to recover my Blackberry sync capability -- the combination of falling back to older data on the PC end on top of just having upgraded the BB to v4.5 (which screwed up the calendar entries) was deadly. It's all working now.

In anticipation of most likely having to completely reinstall Windows and all my apps from scratch, I went ahead and picked up a brand new laptop at Wal-Mart before we left their lot. It's actually a "netbook" -- the only kind of new computer Microsoft will still allow to be sold with XP on it -- and I believe it is exactly the same model my niece just got for her 14th birthday (except hers is pink). I'm not sure what that says about me. In any case, I have not yet opened the box, and I have two more weeks to return it if it turns out to be unnecessary. But it does not seem to be universally stocked, and I wanted to pick one up while I could, in case we're in the boonies when I pull the trigger on the project.

Last night we scooted over to the little burg of Johnson, nestled between Springdale and Fayetteville, to dine at the award-winning James at the Mill restaurant, in the luxurious Inn at the Mill hotel built in the historic Johnson Mill. The food was excellent, if just a bit pretentious (chef Miles James has trademarked the phrase "Ozark Plateau Cuisine™" -- c'mon). We escaped pecuniary injury by ordering appetizers in lieu of entrées, which turned out to be plenty of food anyway.

This morning we are continuing to watch the weather and fire forecasts, and will likely continue to hover right here in the middle of the country. We need to move Odyssey, if for no other reason than to put water in our now empty tanks, and so we may very well head south, putting us closer to the Interstate should we need to scamper off in either direction. The Buffalo River will have to wait.

Wally-docking close to the nest

We are at the Wal-Mart in Springdale, Arkansas (map). Actually, more precisely, we are in the parking lot of an abandoned big-box hardware store adjacent to the Wal-Mart, which is apparently now being used by the company as a training or prototyping site for Sam's Club layouts. But the enormous empty parking lot allowed us to be a little further away from the store traffic.

Across the street about a block away, in a run-down motel, is a hole-in-the-wall Thai restaurant, Pad Thai, where we had some of the best Thai food we've ever tasted. Too bad their beer-and-wine license is expired, but still, it was a find. This morning we will take advantage of the large Wal-Mart to stock up on supplies.

Once again we did not get very far yesterday. Although we got a much earlier start, around 1ish, we slowed down a bit and took our time, naturally choosing the much narrower and more winding Scenic 412-A in preference to the Cherokee Turnpike toll road, 412. But the real killer was hitting a Lowe's right on 412 in Siloam Springs, just across the Arkansas state line.

I've been looking for a convenient Lowe's for a bit over a week now. As happens about every six months or so, one of our Rainbird irrigation valves that we use to return fresh water to the tank, as we "pre-heat" the water for the shower, started leaking -- so far, this has been 100% due to calcium build-up on the diaphragm from taking on hard water. I already had a rebuild kit (although, in a pinch, simply removing the diaphragm and cleaning off the calcium crystals also works), but this time I wanted to add a manual stop valve in line with the solenoid one while I had the kitchen drawers out to rebuild it. This way, the next time the solenoid starts leaking, I can simply shut off the return line until I get the chance to repair it -- as it stands now, we need to either turn off the hot water to the fixture at the manifold, requiring trips to the bay to turn it off and on, or we need to remember to turn off the water pump between uses, otherwise we end up with no hot water, and no cold water either.

Back when I did this with the kitchen sink return line, adding a stop valve was a snap -- Lowe's carries an in-line valve with PEX fittings, and I simply cut the PEX and installed the valve. Unfortunately, there was not enough accessible PEX line upstream of the shower valve inside the cabinet, and when I returned from the store with the ~4.5" long valve assembly, I realized there was no way to install it. Thus I was glad I had opted to do the work right there in the Lowe's parking lot, as I ended up right back in the store to return the PEX valve and spend 20 minutes in the plumbing aisle noodling through an alternative solution.

I ended up with a brass ball valve and a "close nipple", which together were only 3" or so in length, and I set to installing it right against the existing Rainbird valve, then shortening the PEX and reusing the adapter fitting. It took quite a while to get it all in place, working on my back in cramped quarters, and then, of course, it started leaking around one of the joints, so it all had to come back apart, get re-doped, and be re-installed. The second time was the charm, and I was able to wrap up, going back into the store to return some extra parts that were not needed.

(No photo of this project. The valves are crammed in behind a wood support brace behind two drawers under the stove, and I simply could not place the camera anywhere that allowed a focused shot. If I can't even take a photo, try to imagine Sean's contortions to even install the valve! Try not to imagine the swearing involved. -Louise)

All in all, though, we ended up spending close to three hours there at Lowe's, and it was well past six when we rolled into Springdale, so we opted to just stop here rather than press on. Sprindale/Fayetteville is a stone's throw from Wal-Mart's headquarters in Bentonville, so I suppose it is not surprising to find this unusual facility here, which actually made this a more comfortable stop than the usual Wal-Mart.

Today we will continue our slow roll east. We have our eye on Investigation Area 94 in the Atlantic, but unless and until it becomes an actual tropical cyclone, there is no need for us to work towards a faster route just yet.

Spleenless

Opal is out of surgery and recovering nicely from the anesthesia. The good news is that the doctor found no evidence of any problems at all -- even the spleen looked good. Because of the anemia, though, and the sonographic evidence of lesions, he removed the spleen as a precaution. After he had it out, he sectioned it, and did find a mass in there. He's sending some of the mass, as well as some of the normal tissue, to a lab for analysis. That said, he found no visible issues with the liver or other organs.

All of this is really good news -- she likely does not have cancer, and the splenic lesions may well be a benign hyperplasia. We are hopeful that the splenic lesions were the sole cause of the anemia -- we'll have to have another blood panel drawn in about a month to see if her counts are coming back up.

We just came back from a brief visit with her, and she is alert, though in some pain when she moves. She's just about done with IV fluids, and it's looking like we'll be able to bring her back aboard in about an hour, when the office closes. We'll be in the parking lot again tonight, as the doctor wants to have another look at her in the morning.

Suffice it to say, we are much relieved, especially considering how invasive and risky this type of surgery is. Thanks again to everyone who has contacted us with well-wishes -- Opal never knew she had such a fan club!

Photo by transCam

Arkansas: 2, Odyssey: 0

If you have found this post from the IRV2 forum, welcome! Scroll down several paragraphs to find out how we repaired our own windshield. It was easy and inexpensive.

This blog is primarily about our travels in our bus conversion named "Odyssey." Take a look around, visit the latest post, take a video tour of our bus, or share your thoughts in the comments.

We are at the Cloverdale Animal Hospital, in Little Rock (map), where Opal will have her surgery tomorrow. We arrived here this afternoon for some pre-op blood work.

The blood work indicated the anemia is still worsening, but all else appears normal. Normal enough that the doctor gave her a steroid injection to help settle the spleen. The doctor had originally intended to keep her over night, but, since we are staying in the parking lot, we agreed it best for her to stay with us until the doctor arrives in the morning and is ready for her. The office here even has a 15-amp outlet outside, and we are taking advantage of it to run an air conditioner.

I have to admit that we are still apprehensive and preoccupied with Opal's condition. One distinct possibility tomorrow is that they will find her spleen and liver riddled with cancer, in which case we will need to decide even whether to take the spleen out. We are hoping for the best, though, which in this case would be a few benign splenic lesions and some indeterminate but also benign mass in the liver, in which case he will simply remove the spleen altogether. We'll be right here at the clinic the whole time, so it will be easy to consult. We are holding pleasant thoughts for the best outcome, and, by the way, thanks to everyone who has called, written in, or posted with well-wishes for Opal and for us.

We did end up coming across 412 and down 67 as I had planned, and it was pleasant, relatively quick, and mostly uneventful. I say "mostly" because we did take yet another huge rock strike to our windshield. I find it quite ironic that this happened the day after Louise's "Road Debris" post.

We were southbound on US67 just north of the incredibly tiny burg of Russell, AR, which is a four-lane, divided section of road. The posted limit is 70 (65 for trucks), and, as is customary for us in this type of situation, we were doing 62mph. Several trucks had passed us, and I am now in the habit of braking to back off quite a bit if a truck should pull back in ahead of us without a sufficient gap (which I define to be at least a full truck length -- preferably two, or 150'). Some type of flatbed semi with a load of steel parts pulled ahead of us, and, even while I was braking, "CRACK!" -- a large rock hit us, on the curb side about a foot up from the bottom of the glass. This one was really bad -- an extensive star about 2-2.5" in diameter. Ironically, the last time this happened, we were also passing through Arkansas.

From that last experience, we were carrying a "Fix-a-Windshield" brand repair kit, which we had picked up at Wal-Mart. Being, as we were, many miles from any other repair resources, we did not waver for an instant: we pulled off on the next exit, where we ended up parking at the local Baptist church to make repairs.

Here's what the damage looked like, from outside:



And from the inside:



The repair is actually quite simple. First, place the frame directly over the bull's-eye of the strike:



Insert the barrel of the tool into the frame, and screw it down until it is well sealed against the glass (I'm sighting through the barrel to ensure the opening is dead-center on the pit):



Place a few drops of resin into the barrel, and screw the plunger into the barrel to inject the resin into the strike:



The resin immediately begins to flow into the cracks under pressure:


It takes 4-6 minutes for the resin to flow into the cracks, after which you are supposed to remove the plunger and simply reinsert. We've also learned a couple of tricks from the pros, though: while the resin was flowing into the cracks, I repeatedly wet my finger and rubbed it on the inside of the glass. Think "Ajax Squeak" or the vibration that makes a wine glass ring when you rub your wetted finger around the rim. The slight vibration helps the resin to flow and any entrained air to come out. Also, after the first three or four minutes, I took my heat gun to the inside of the glass, on low setting, while Louise shot the area with the IR temperature gun. The heat trick happened to also be mentioned on the instructions. At around 125°F we saw a marked improvement in the cracks "disappearing." Also, when I removed the plunger after the first pass, I put more resin in the barrel before reinserting and tightening it back down. After a few minutes, this is what it looked like -- barely visible:



After the second six-minute pass, we removed the tool, placed another drop of resin over the pit, and covered it with a sheet of clear plastic provided with the kit. All of the steps up to this point had to be done in the shade, and we had the coach facing north. After the repair was done, we then backed around to be facing southwest, with the repair in direct sunlight. The resin is ultraviolet cure, and ten minutes of direct sun makes the repair road-ready. We opted to remove the plastic after ten minutes, but leave the glop of resin on the windshield while we finished our drive south to Little Rock, both to give the repair more cure time, and because the half hour we just spent had already put us behind schedule.

After Opal was done with the vet for the day, and we were able to settle back in to Odyssey and collect ourselves, I went out to finish the job, which involves scraping the excess resin off with a razor blade. Here I am mid-process, and you can see the matte-finish resulting from the scraping on the resin. This large oval is the result of the plastic sheet spreading the drop of resin out over an area much larger than the pit itself:



We had to park facing south at the vet, so we'd put up our silver mylar insulated window cover. When I was done scraping, I tried to capture a shot of the finished repair, but it came out so well that it's hard to see from the outside:


This was our second D-I-Y repair, and it came out much better than our first attempt, when we were still learning how to properly use the kit. If you have a vehicle with expensive and hard-to-find windshields, I can now recommend you get yourself a couple of these kits. Then take an afternoon and go down to the local junkyard, and practice on a windshield with a star. Just that little bit of practice makes a big difference when you'll have to do it for real.

Now that we've used up our emergency back-up glass repair kit, it's a priority to stop back into Wal-Mart and get another one or two. If they release Opal to us tomorrow, we'll likely spend the night at the Wal-Mart just a little further down the road from here, and we'll pick one up then.

Done in Little Rock

We are in the parking lot of a Kroger supermarket, in the Lakewood area of North Little Rock (map).

We're really just a mile or so from Jackson Wrecking, where we did not finish up until well past 5. We really did not want to hit the road that late, and at rush hour to boot, so Louise found a Wal-Mart and some other stores not far from here, with the bonus of an Olive Garden nearby. After driving past the Olive Garden, this was the closest lot that looked comfortable (24 hour grocery stores rarely hassle vehicles in the lot overnight, especially if you do your shopping there).

Harold, the service manager at Jackson's, came out and did the work himself yesterday. He's a skinny guy -- good thing, because he spent most of the time squatting on top of the transmission, through the hatch below the bed. That gave him access to most of the clamps and one end of the bad hose. The other end could only be accessed by squeezing under the bus -- I put the back air bags all the way up to give him a bit more room. And, of course, with tranny fluid everywhere, he was a greasy mess after being "in the hole." Whenever we get someplace that can tolerate the effluent, I need to get under the bed with the pressure washer and clean as much of the gunk out of that area as I can.

Harold wasn't sure he could get a replacement hose made in double-braid stainless, but that's what he came back with. It was one size larger than the one he took out, but with the correct fittings on it. After it was all back together, we put nearly half a gallon of ATF in the reservoir and fired it up. It took quite a bit of revving the engine and tweaking the wheel to get the giant air bubble to move through the system, and, even then, my power steering faded in and out several times as we circled Olive Garden and maneuvered into the Kroger lot. It's a bit hair-raising to be mid-turn in a parking aisle, with cars on either side, when the steering wheel no longer wants to budge. I had to pick my butt up off the seat and throw all my weight into the wheel to finish the turns.

Harold also took a quick look at the fuel system for us, with no real conclusions. An oil change was out of the question -- it was already past 5, and they don't stock 40-weight. They only charged us for two hours, even though it seemed like he was down there for over three, plus the 70 bucks or so for the hose, which is probably not much, if anything, over what the hose shop charged them, and $7 for two quarts of ATF. We're keeping their card -- clearly they do everything from engine overhauls to tire repairs, and they have a fleet of tow trucks that can easily accommodate Odyssey (including one that's been chromed out and painted in flames that has, apparently, been on one of those trick-my-truck TV shows, so we were told).

Now that we are done here, and with little chance of being asked to head to Brownsville (hurricane Dean is no longer forecast to be of any threat to the US), we will resume our eastward journey today. We've had to abandon our leisurely meandering on US64, but we'll substitute US70, which roughly follows I-40 from Little Rock to Memphis. Again, we shouldn't have to get back on the Interstate until it's time to cross the Mississippi.

Monday Miscellany: Opal Update

Monday is the day for miscellaneous topics

Using my patented method for finding pet-related service providers, I lucked into a really good vet here in Little Rock, at the Cloverdale Animal Hospital on Baseline Road. This clinic had the distinct advantages of 1) being able to see Opal first thing this morning, and 2) being close enough to take the scooter since Sean was busy dealing with the bus leak.

Dr. Mike Gillum was very knowledgeable and helpful. The tentative diagnosis is Coccidioidomycosis, or "desert flu," a fungal infection that is common in both dogs and people that have recently visited Arizona or New Mexico. This is consistent with the type of cough she has, the time frame of 7-10 days since exposure, the mild lesions on her lung that show up on X-ray, and the fact that her white blood cell count is not elevated (like it would be for a bacterial infection.) It is also possible that she has Bordatella, or kennel cough, although she has been vaccinated against that. He reassured me that Opal most likely does not have lung cancer or heart disease, although in older dogs such things are always a possibility.

The only way to be certain of the fungal infection is to send a blood sample off to the state's testing lab. Dr. Gillum thought we would have those results by Wednesday. In the meantime, he prescribed medication for the coughing and a diuretic to help clear the fluid out of her lungs. We also have an anti-fungal medication, but won't start that until after Wednesday, if necessary.

If the results are inconclusive and/or her symptoms get worse, I will call Dr. Gillum to get his recommendation for a vet in another town. Turns out he is very active in the Southwest Veterinary Symposium and knows many of his colleagues across this part of the country. Of course I can call him anytime about any new symptoms Opal shows in the next week or so. I'm definitely adding this guy to my Rolodex!

No matter how carefully I try to screen vets and kennels for our pets, the truth is that any new vendor can be the wrong choice. Once when they simply needed vaccinations, I found a vet that looked good on paper. We sat on the bench in the exam room with Opal next to us on the floor, in the corner. This guy (I don't remember his name or the clinic; sorry) marched right into the exam room and without so much as a little gentle talking first to draw her out and build some trust, reached down to lift Opal's lip and look at her teeth. She bit him, of course. Wouldn't you? Big tall stranger looming over you in a scary-smelling vet's office? He even stuck his fingers in her mouth to make it more convenient to bite them. But since all we needed was the shots, I didn't worry too much about this guy's bad bedside manner.

Today, Dr. Gillum spoke softly to Opal, approached her slowly and was exceedingly gentle with her. She licked his hand. When she needed to go in the back to have blood drawn twice, the staff let me pick her up to calm her. All good signs. Let's hope that we have a firm diagnosis on Wednesday.

If you're wondering how Opal rides on the scooter, the answer is quite well, thank you very much. We have a mesh backpack dog carrier similar to this one. The handles loop around the scooter's handlebars and the bag sits on the floorboards. The top of the pack has an elastic closure that allows Opal to stick her head out but not escape. She sits comfortably on the floorboards inside the bag and peeks around the front fairing to get her snout out in the wind. I'm thinking about getting her a helmet, too. Next time she rides the scooter, I'll try to get a photo.

Weird coincidences do happen...

We are at Jackson's Wrecking Service, in North Little Rock (map).

This morning we rolled in to United Engines at 8 sharp. They were so busy, I had to wait half an hour just to talk to the service writer. The earliest he could get us in for transmission work would be Wednesday, and possibly later than that for the fuel issue and oil change. But he did agree to send a tech out to take a preliminary look, to see what would be involved.

Gary the tech spent a few minutes looking at the tranny from below, then asked me to pull the hatch so he could see it from above, and he was as perplexed as I, though it was clear there was tranny fluid all over everything. After discussing the fact that it seemed to happen more when hot, he sent me out to drive the coach and warm everything up. In the meantime, Louise loaded Opal onto the scooter and hauled her off to the vet (I'll let Louise tell that part of the story herself).

After I came back with the drivetrain hot, Gary got back underneath and poked around. After a while he noticed fluid coming from a braided steel hose above the tranny, but not the cooler hose. We noodled a bit and decided to try starting the engine and turning the steering wheel. Bingo! We had a hydraulic leak in the power steering system, which just so happens to be filled with transmission fluid. It turns out that two braided hoses were touching each other, and vibration finally abraded one of the steering lines all the way through.

United Engine could certainly fix this problem -- but not until Wednesday at the earliest. I made three calls around town based on numbers that United gave me, with no success. But one of the truck drivers hanging around waiting for service overheard this, and he had a card for this place. I called, and they said they could take us sometime today. As soon as Louise got back from the vet, we headed up here (after I topped off the power steering reservoir, which was already a full gallon low). We're waiting in the yard for them to get to us, which I am hoping will be this afternoon.

So, bottom line, a series of coincidences had us looking in the wrong place. After all, (1) we just had the tranny worked on in CA, when the in-frame was done, (2) the leaking fluid was clearly transmission fluid, (3) it was visibly coming from the transmission, which was literally covered with the stuff, (4) backing the coach up seemed to make the problem worse (reverse gear), and (5) we've had two Code 12 alarms (low fluid) from the tranny in the span of a week.

Items 2-4 are all readily explained by a power steering leak right above the transmission. In the case of #4, what looked to us like the result of selecting reverse was actually the result of cranking the wheel hard to one side, which we often have to do when backing into a space. #1 and #5 seem to have been sheer coincidence.

Once we get someone working on the hydraulic hose, I am going to ask if they can also look at the fuel problem, and maybe change the oil. If not, we'll try to cover that in Memphis.

Various updates...

We are at a Wal-Mart in Little Rock, Arkansas (map). Careful readers will note that we had intended to continue on US64 all the way to Tennessee, and US64 does not go through Little Rock.

This morning I crawled under the bus to see if I could isolate the fluid leak on the transmission. Unfortunately, fluid was everywhere, and I did not see any obvious damage or anything loose. I also removed the hatch above the tranny, in the bedroom, and did not find anything obvious from that angle either. Louise started the coach and shifted into forward and reverse with no spurting fluid. Hmm... seems this only happens when the tranny is hot.

We buttoned everything back up, deciding that, at this level, we could probably make it to the Allison dealer in Memphis to have it checked professionally. I did put a quart or so of TranSynd in to replace what we lost backing in.

Last night's stop was so lovely that we stayed until past noon today, catching up on email and news after we were done fiddling with the tranny. Today's good news was that the windshield repair is holding, so far, and actually looks pretty good, considering the original extent of the damage.

When we finally got under way, though, we barely made it two blocks before we got a Check Transmission light, and grounding the diagnostic lead revealed a Code 12 (which can be, among other things, low fluid). I emptied the rest of the open TranSynd jug, about a quart, into the tranny, and cleared the codes. We got back on the road, and I pulled over when I was certain the unit was hot. No codes, good fluid level, and we were dripping about one drop of fluid every ten seconds or so. Even at $40 a gallon, it still seemed like, at this rate, we could make Memphis on US64 without too much trauma.

We made it as far as Russellville, where we pulled in to Wal-Mart just to get some routine supplies. Here I noticed we were now dripping at an alarming rate, and in forward gear. I picked up some sorbents in the store, and we made the decision to proceed direct to Little Rock, the closest Allison dealer, on the freeway, where the tranny could stay locked up and not have to shift for most of the run. As a side note, the Russellville store is the largest and nicest Wal-Mart I've ever seen. I saw merchandise in there I've never seen at any other Wal-Mart (for example, yellow diesel jerry-cans).

We proceeded directly to United Engine here in Little Rock. Unfortunately, there was not a really good spot there to park overnight (their parking lots are all gated off), so we came here to this Wal-Mart just a half mile or so away. We'll pull up stakes first thing in the morning and try to make it over to United when they open at 8am. I have my fingers crossed that they will be able to take us as a drive-in tomorrow. We don't want to drive any further in this condition, so we'll be waiting here regardless.

Once they get us in, we'll have them find and repair the transmission leak, of course, but we will also have them diagnose the remaining fuel delivery issue, which I still have not overcome. We'll also ask them to change the oil, as the in-frame rebuild is now broken in, and the break-in oil needs to come out. Incidentally, Odyssey rolled past the 100,000 mile mark a couple days ago.

In other news, we are very concerned about Opal. Friday night she started coughing sporadically, and it continued all night. She seemed mostly OK yesterday, with only the occasional cough, but it started up again last night and she has coughed on and off throughout today. She also seems really low-energy. Louise is concerned that these are symptoms of heart disease in older dogs, so, while Odyssey gets a checkup tomorrow, so will Opal. We found a vet just a mile from here, and we're hoping (as with Odyssey) that the vet will be able to squeeze us in.

I expect to be off-line tomorrow while we are in the shop. And I have my fingers crossed that we don't get a call from the Red Cross while we are down for maintenance (although the forecast track for Dean now has it passing south of the US, so I think we might be OK).

A nice visit

Yesterday we had a nice drive from Foss Lake, although we abandoned the Route 66 plan early on, as the route was hard to follow and the roadbed was in bad condition in many places -- we'll try again when we are in a more leisurely mode. We ended up getting back on I-40 after Weatherford (although we did follow the old route through Clinton and Weatherford before giving up). That took us all the way to Oklahoma City, where we took on 130 gallons of fuel at the Flying-J before crossing the city on the freeway and bailing off onto US62, which took us most of the way to Okmulgee.

Louise found us a great place to stay -- Okmulgee Lake State Park (map), where for $16 we snagged 30 amps of power for our air conditioning. That meant our friends had to trek about five miles to come get us, but we really needed the AC in the humidity. We almost had to turn around before the park entrance, as we rolled up to a bridge clearly posted "Weight Limit 10 Tons" (we weigh 24 tons). While we were sitting there with our flashers on, digging out the two-way radios so we could back out onto the highway again and head off to who-knows-where (probably the Okmulgee Wal-Mart for a night of generator fun), the park ranger rolled by in the other direction and stopped to ask what the problem was. We explained the bridge issue and he told us to just go over it -- the park gets deliveries all the time by semi-truck and they cross the bridge with no problem. Having thus been granted permission by law enforcement, we proceeded over the bridge and into the park, which was actually quite beautiful. The campground, while not empty, was lightly used on Friday night, and we found it quite enjoyable.

We had a very nice visit with our friends, who fixed us dinner on Friday, and then fetched us again this morning for breakfast. After breakfast, I spent a few minutes trying to further tighten the fuel supply line, filled up the fuel separator, and we got back on the road. Although as we were leaving I noticed quite an oil slick leading into our parking space from where we pulled up to back in -- I asked Louise (who was standing outside giving me signals as I had backed in) if we had made it, and she emphatically said that, no, nothing was leaking while we were backing and, besides, it was in the wrong place to have come from us. So I thought nothing more of it.

After leaving the park, we passed through Okmulgee and headed east on US62 again, which eventually connected us to US64. 64 follows I-40 rather closely, criss-crossing it and winding its way through cities and towns that 40 bypasses, and this road will take us all the way to Tennessee. We won't need to get on I-40 again, but it's available in short order should we get a call and need to speed up our progress.

US64 was a beautiful drive today, crossing the Arkansas river several times, and showing us the underside of Salisaw, OK, and Fort Smith, Van Buren, Dyer, Mulberry, and Ozark, AR. Tonight we had intended to be even further east, but just west of Ozark, we heard a loud "crack!" as a rock from completely out of the blue hit the windshield, just above and to the right of my main field of view. It left a volcano the size of a dime, and the beginnings of a star the size of a quarter. I haven't a clue where the rock came from -- a car had just passed us in the opposite direction, but it seemed like the rock hit a good second or more afterwards.

Having much experience with this by now (we are on our third windshield), we immediately slowed down to around 30mph (from the 45-50 we had been doing in a 55 zone) to take the wind pressure off and reduce jouncing and vibration, much to the annoyance of cars behind us. We limped along this way to Ozark, where we stopped at a Wal-Mart to take stock of the situation and make some phone calls. Why, oh why, do these things always happen at ~4:30 on a Saturday afternoon? Most of the glass repair places we called were already closed for the weekend, and the couple of major national chains allowed that the best they could do was have someone out Monday morning.

We briefly considered just staying there at the Ozark Wal-Mart until Monday morning. But the fact of the matter is that the last time this happened, the star became an 11-inch crack overnight, while we weren't even moving. Now, without any special insurance on the glass, we really, really wanted to get the chip filled not only before we moved further, but also before nightfall.

After about a dozen phone calls came up dry, and realizing that Ozark, Arkansas is nearly the middle of nowhere, we decided to fill it ourselves. Wal-Mart carries the fix-a-windshield brand repair kit (from the makers of fix-a-flat), which appears to be one of the better ones out there. The kit consists of a suction-cup-mounted frame, similar to the ones professionals use but made of plastic, and a screw-in pressure fixture to inject the resin, along with a small bottle of resin, a razor blade, and several clear plastic sheets to cover surface repairs while they cure.

The kit worked reasonably well, as far as we can tell. We'll know in the morning, I guess. Because our windshield is dead vertical, it was hard to get the resin into the fixture -- a complaint that the professionals made on more than one occasion as well. But it did seem to get quite a bit of resin into the damaged area. After the injection fix, we put two liberal coats of surface resin on everything that looked like it might be an all-the-way-through crack. Tomorrow morning I will scrape off the excess with the razor blade. I have my fingers crossed that the repair holds -- you can definitely still see some damage, but I don't care about the appearance as long as it does not spread into a windshield-eating crack. We liked the kit so much, that I went back into the store and bought another one, to have on hand for the inevitable "next time."

By the time we were done with the repairs, including letting things stand for a while in full sunlight, or at least as much as there was (the resin cures in UV light), it was getting late. And I was past done for the day. So Louise dragged out the guides and discovered that right across the river was a Corps of Engineers park, "Aux Arc Park", with a nice campground and electric hookups (map). It's actually quite lovely -- we have a site right on the river, just upriver of the Ozark Dam, power house, and lock. As we arrived, a tow was locking down-river.

We found a nice space that looked good for getting on the satellite. As Louise was standing behind Odyssey backing me in, she screamed that smoke was coming from the engine. We decided to get fully backed into the space to deal with it, and that's when she noticed transmission fluid all over the road where we were backing up.

Aha! This was the same fluid pattern I had noticed back at Lake Okmulgee. So it was, indeed, us. And the symptom seems to be that we are leaking gobs of tranny fluid (the expensive, $40-a-gallon stuff, natch), but only in reverse. Leaking so forcefully that the fluid is hitting something hot and smoking. Now, on our way to Stewart & Stevenson from Santa Fe, we had a brief "Check Transmission" light and found a code 12, which sometimes indicates low fluid. I put half a gallon of fluid in and cleared the codes, and S&S found the tranny to be low. Odd, since we thought it had been topped up properly at PEDCO, but sometimes it's hard to get the level right after replacing the pan -- some of it disappears into the filter or the cooler or whatever. We did not think much of it.

I am now pretty sure that the tranny leak developed either at PEDCO or not long afterwards, and we've been leaking fluid across seven states. As soon as we figured this out, I called S&S, who, fortunately, was open today. I managed to get the same tech who did the work on Odyssey, and I related the symptoms. He thinks it's the reverse pressure switch, which is, basically, what makes the backup lights work. It makes sense -- this switch is on the outside of the tranny, threaded into a 1/8" port through the case and into the reverse hydraulic circuit. When you shift into reverse, fluid pressure builds in this circuit, and, among other things, closes the switch to make the backup lights work. If the switch is cracked, or loose in the port, or broken internally, then fluid will shoot out under pressure, but only in reverse gear.

Tomorrow morning, when all has cooled down, I will crawl under the bus to see if I can get to the switch. Hopefully, the problem will be obvious, but, if not, we will chock the wheels and Louise will put the tranny in reverse while I keep my eyes open for where the fluid is spurting out. Fortunately, I have a 1/8" pipe plug and two extra gallons of TranSynd with me. But I do feel bad about spilling toxic waste across seven states and in some pristine campgrounds. I would have fixed it sooner -- had I only known.