Happy Thanksgiving!

Warmer times - at Flying Goose RV Park near Fairmont, MN

Happy Thanksgiving!

We fine & remain parked near B'ham, AL.  Suppose to be a big dinner at Dad & Anna's house today as Dean, Debbie, the grand kids & Donna & I invade the place for a few hours.

It's cold here this morning.  I woke up during the night & checked on the temps.  The outdoor thermometer read 21* F.  We knew it'd get cold, so we removed all the water hoses last night.  But I never expected that the RV park's water faucet would freeze as they're well insulated.    Should have let them drip a little.  Otherwise, we'd planned ahead and filled the freshwater tank Tuesday just in case.

Only news this week is that after 103,000 miles the truck got sick Monday.  Knew this day would come and other than just an inconvenience, it picked a good spot to get sick.  Most importantly, it didn't leave us stuck on the side of the road.  The inconvenience is that it's going to take a week to get anyone to look at it.  To some people that's no big deal, but to me I want to know when things are going to be done, what reservations need to be changed, what appointments to cancel, letting the RV park where we're parked know how long we need to stay, etc.

What happened?  Well, the first thing we noticed is that we couldn't set the cruise control.  A mile or two down the road we realized the truck wouldn't downshift.  I'm telling people we didn't build boost, but the drivability problem was more like a two-speed automatic transmission that didn't have a passing gear.  Not sure our issue is a turbo problem or just the result of a module going bad on the transmission, a bad wiring harness, a blown fuse (again), or what.  Whatever it is, it won't pull the trailer in it's current condition.

Anyway, we hoping they get to it tomorrow, but we're being told it's probably next week.  And we continue to guess on what we need to tell people.

That's it from here.  Have a great Turkey Day!  David

Back in Birmingham

We're back in B'ham visiting Dad & Anna and hoping to catch up with Randy & Harolda while we're here.  Made the trip over on Tuesday with all the trailer lights working at both the beginning and the end of the trip.  The picture, above, is from 2011, but we're in the same spot.  Only thing missing is the roof satellite antenna.    We'd considered staying  at Tannehill State Park this time (first come, first served).   But by mid-morning Tuesday we were chatting with the park staff while traveling over here, and there were only a few full-hookup sites available.  The park staff also told us they'd received a bunch of calls checking on the full-hookup sites.  So we went to an RV park that we were familiar with.

Seems like we've been around the world since we were last here.  Based on the date of the pictures, it's been 19 months.  The construction along I-65 at the I-459 interchange south of Birmingham is finished & they did a nice job.

Since returning to the east coast, everyone wants to know what our best spot was while we were gone.  Well...almost all of them!  You're asking us to choose between working at Voyageurs Natl Park, to Glacier Natl Park, to the buffalo roundup at Custer State Park (South Dakota), to Rocky Mountain Natl Park, to hanging out with friends at Port Hueneme & the Channel Islands, to the Oregon coast, to Priest Lake (Idaho), to Yellowstone, to Shipshewana (Indiana), to Stone Mountain (Georgia), to whatever.  OK...we'll pick one...Oregon coast...Cape Perpetua to be exact.  I really don't think anyone understands how lucky & blessed Donna & I feel to have made this trip. There's no "one" great spot.  I mean, the trailer didn't even want to come back.  Why else would it have started to fall apart after crossing the Mississippi River?  But we're back.

Anyway, for those of you following the RV parks we stay in, Birmingham South Campground always looks like its a rundown, sorta dumpy RV park - and the reviews on the rvparksreview.com site seem to agree.  But this time we're seeing some improvements.  A new fence around the swimming pool is in place.  They've paved some of the worst sections of the entrance road and the road in front of the first (overnighters') row of sites.  But there's still work to do as the appearance remains that of a rundown, unkempt park.  Restrooms remain clean & functional as are the sites utilities (except cable - crews are here working on it).  It still appears to be a "staging" area for Tiffin Motor-homes before going to or returning from Red Bay, AL for service.

So that's it for this week.  We're just here visiting.  later, David

Magnolia-on-the-Ashley (Charleston, SC)

Stone Mtn Campground "orange" site on loop C.

We're back at Stone Mountain, GA visiting Donna's brother and sister-in-law.  We had a great time in Charleston, SC as we finally got to walk around without being soaked with rain.

We got a chance to visit the Magnolia (on the Ashley) Plantation.  Pictures to the right and below are from our walk around the plantation.  This house is the third one.  The first was struck by lightening and burned down.  The

second was struck by yankees and burned down.  The current plantation house was a cabin moved to the site of the second house after the civil war.  Owners realized the need to enlarge the house, so the house you see today was expanded (in increments) to what you see today.  The large pillars were added in the early 1990s to make it appear more of a traditional southern plantation home.

We're not well versed in South Carolina history, so we were caught by surprise that this was a rice plantation.   Makes for some nice swamp land now.

After the civil war the plantation became more of a mining enterprise.  The land was gradually turned into gardens and eventually opened to the public (for a fee, of course).  The gardens are considered informal, but I can't tell you what that means.   If you go, plan on a full day to fully explore it.  The plantation has bicycle trails for your enjoyment, too.

Our trip over to Stone Mountain got off to a late start.  We planned on a 6 hour drive (long day for us), and we've had issues with getting our trailer's "pigtail" plugged into the truck's in-bed socket over the last week or two.  This time we thought we had it fully inserted, but as we started to back out of the campsite Donna noticed that some of the trailer lights weren't working.  We spent an hour trouble shooting it.

As always, people are willing to help.  Most assured us it was probably a blown fuse, and one gentleman gave us the 25 amp fuse we would probably need.  Problem became how to get to the second fuse box under the hood.  First, I was completely unaware of the second fuse box (primary fuse box is in the truck cab).  Sounds easy to do since most vehicles have their fuse box out in the open under the hood, and we've replaced fuses every now and then on our vehicles over the years.  Not our truck.  Our second fuse box is located under a vacuum regulator (or vacuum something) which must be removed to even get to the second fuse box.  Yep, sounds easy doesn't it.  It sure didn't look easy to me or anyone else that looked at it.  So with only one side of the signal lights working, no brake lights and no emergency flashers, we drove over to Stone Mountain, anyway, and continued to trouble shoot - including a full clean up of all the sockets and the "pigtail" - once we got set up.

We have a little tool that we can insert the trailer's "pigtail" into which turns on the trailer's running lights and emergency flashers.  It's primary use is for safety - to turn those lights on if you have to leave the trailer on the side of the road.  Plugging the "pigtail" into that tool didn't give us any emergency flashers, so I figured it was the trailer that had a problem.  A quick scan through the Suites Owners forum found instances of similar trailer light behavior, and the solutions ran the gambit from tow vehicle fuses to bad wiring in the umbilical cord/"pigtail".

So on the phone to a mobile RV tech we went who told us to get the truck checked out first.  A quick call to the local Ford service department got us in the service bay early the next morning (I wasn't dealing with that vacuum whatever that was installed above the fuse box).  But before I left, I asked the Suites Owners forum how to open & check the "pigtail" and it's wiring. Once at the service bay, I asked them to show me how to get to that second fuse box once they were done.  So on to the bay they went with the truck.  15 minutes later they called me back to the truck.  They had that vacuum whatever off and the fuse box open and a neat little 7-way tester with LED lights plugged into one of the trailer plug sockets on the truck (we have two locations to the plug the trailer into on the truck).  The tech had already replaced the fuse and was ready to teach me how to do what he did.  Turns out our vacuum whatever is easy to remove and re-install (no tools needed), but the tech noted that the installation above a fuse box was "unconventional".

So with the truck back in full working condition, it was back to the trailer.  By that time, members on the Suites Owners forum had posted how to check the wring on the trailer.  So once again out we went to check the wiring.  Tightened a few things and all looked fine.  So now it was time to plug the trailer back into the truck.  Crossed our fingers, plugged the "pigtail" in, and...it all worked!  What a relief!

Sooooo...why didn't we get emergency flashers with the "pigtail" plugged into our little safety tool?  Turns out that tool is trying to flash the turn signal lights, but our trailer is wired so that the brake lights flash as emergency flashers vice the turn signals.  As it's not designed to turn on the trailer's brake lights, nothing flashes.  Good to know.

So that's been our week.  I still think we may have a "pigtail" issue (bad plug), but we'll confirm that over time.  We now carry that 25 amp fuse the gentleman gave us in Charleston in the truck knowing we'll probably need to use it.  Oh, and we now have one of those 7-way tester with LED lights.   Neat little toy that thing is!  Later, David

Charleston, SC

Trees at the park near the battery.

We've further south near Charleston, SC this week.  We're here to visit the Slussers and to try to see a drier Charleston than we saw two years ago.

So far, so good.  We've had a great dinner out with the Slussers. I didn't recognize any of the kids - they're so much bigger!  Charleston is drier, but it took a day to find the over-sized vehicle lot at the visitors center.  We got a chance to walk from the visitors center down to the battery, back up to the wharf, and back to the visitors center.

Plantations are on the list to visit tomorrow.  We'll see what happens after that for the weekend.  On Monday, we'll begin our two day trip over to Stone Mountain, Ga.  At least that's the plan.  Later, David

Horses on the beach at Myrtle Beach, SC