Here we are, on the road: We’re in Santa Clara, California

August 17, 2014 Lorraine’s report

Well, we are now at the Santa Clara Elks Lodge in Sunnyvale, CA. What a grand time we had there in Bellingham! I loved being back with my family and friends. And birthday week was a blast!!! Many thanks to my sister, Thelma & John, my nieces and nephews for the grand time spent with you! I loved visiting with each one of you..

I loved being with John & Breta, and Richard & Sandy, too. Dinner was great, loved being with each of you. It was fun to catch up with you and hear about your families. Thank you again to Breta & John for getting us from the airport at midnight. Wow, that was pretty incredible, for me to call you and have you change your plans to get us. Thanks again!!

So Chuck wrote about our many problems. Guess that’s what happens when you sit and rest all summer, not using the rig…problems happen! It was pretty hard driving down the I-680 with no right hand mirror and the day/night shade all the way down. Thank God no one ran into us and we arrived safely!!!

So we got in to Sunnyvale on Tuesday, set up and went over to Susy’s. From there it was a marathon to finish packing her up and the “Big Move”. Susy had done a lot already, but needed help with the rest. From the time we got in until today, she is now in her new home. Wow, so fast, with most things set up and ready: now for the water and TV guys to get in there and complete the move. Susy said back in March she finally finished all her unpacking from her last move, 3 years ago. Probably why she had to move.

We are so sorry to hear Uncle Keith passed away last week. We are so happy he made it to Chuck’s family reunion in Osseo, MN last year. Many thanks to Aunt Lila for getting us together.

I want to wish my sister, Thelma & John a very happy “HAPPY ANNIVERSARY” on the 21st of August. It will be 49 years for them. Sure do hope they enjoy their day.

That’s it for me.. See you..down the road..

Hugs,

Lorraine

8/16/14 Chuck’s report

Ok, we didn’t get a blog posted last week so this will be covering two weeks. We received the bad new that my Uncle Keith passed away this week. He lived in Minnesota and we were able to visit with him during and after the family reunion we attended last summer. Unfortunately we are unable to attend the services but wish his family all the best during this trying time. Sure glad we had a good visit last year, you just never know.

Our last blog report had us planning a combined birthday party for Lorraine and her sister, Thelma, at their house on Sunday. This turned out out be a great time and one of the many birthday celebrations she had during the week. Guess you could say she had a great birth week??

Monday we invited Thelma and John to join us at the casino for senior day lunch. Once again we had a good time, especially knowing our time with them was running short.

Tuesday we continued with the birth week celebration by meeting our friend John for dinner at the Mexican restaurant in Ferndale. His brother, Charles, was planning on coming also but he was unable to make it. Anyway, we had a very good visit with John.

Wednesday was Lorraine’s actual birthday and we ended up going to an early dinner with our friends John and Bretta at a steak house near their home. We did meet at their home first for a short visit and stopped by again after. We really had a good visit with these two friends once again. Maybe we’ll see you down South this winter after John’s knee replacement.

Thursday we continued with more of the same, this time we met our friends Richard and Sandy at the casino for dinner at the steakhouse. We’ve been here a few times before and believe this to be one of the best steakhouses North of Seattle. The food, service and atmosphere makes for a good dining experience and with our good friends along, it can’t be beat. Sure had a good time with you two, thanks once again.

Friday we had plans to attend the annual picnic at the refinery. The picnic is a two day affair and we were only going to be there on Friday. In year’s past, we’ve made chili for the chili contest, served as chili judges, served as pie judges (maybe my favorite), helped set up and run the games for the kids, volunteered as needed and mostly just had fun. This year we were just planning on attending, eating hamburger and hot dogs and visiting with some of the folks I’ve worked with over the years. We were not disappointed, had plenty of food (but they did run out of hot dogs) and visited with lots of friends. A good finish to our time in Washington state!

Saturday we got everything ready for travel, we had done most of the stuff already so only had the last minute stuff to do. We did get to see Joe and Alice before we left, they stopped by to get the keys and say our “so longs”. We hope to see them down South sometime this winter, we usually make arrangements to visit with them somewhere along the way.

So back on the road! We don’t usually stay in one place as long as we’ve been here, we got here in late April and here it is early August, wow. We haven’t had to run our air conditioners while we were here so I guess I wasn’t too surprised to have them struggle when we first turned them on. But after everything ran for a few minutes, them seemed fine. Of course, the temperature was forecasted to be in the upper 70s and with the sun on the coach, we knew we would need to run the generator so the air conditioners could run too. But the generator wouldn’t stay running, it would run about a minute then turn off. I had it set on auto start, when the thermostat for the air conditioner needed them to come on, it would send a signal to the generator to start first and would send a signal after the air conditioner shut down to turn off the generator. But with the generator not running correctly, we couldn’t run the air conditioner as desired, shoot. We do have regular dash air but it is not enough to cool down the whole coach, especially when it’s this warm. But we were on our way and heading for our daughter’s place, all is well.

Boy was the traffic bad going through Seattle. I sure didn’t expect it to be so bad on a Saturday morning, Seattle always has bad traffic but it’s usually not too bad on the weekends. But we were doing just fine until --- a class C motorhome in the lane to our right decided to move over to our lane. Only problem, he didn’t see us already there. Can you believe he didn’t see a 40’ motorhome with a tow car just to the side of him? As he started to move over, we noticed the movement, said a couple of bad words and tried to move over to our left to avoid him. We almost made it, he contacted our mirror on the passenger side, broke it off at the adjustment swivel joint but the glass was still intact. I managed to move over to the side of the road and was almost surprised to see that he followed and parked right behind us.

Lorraine called 911 while I got out to exchange information with him. The guy was from Canada and was driving his father-in-law’s rig so he has ICBC insurance. The only damage to us was the mirror and he only had a long scratch on the side of his coach. After exchanging info with him, I got out a step stool and a roll of duct tape to attempt to put the mirror back in place enough to use. I wrapped it as best as I could but it didn’t help, every time we got moving, the wind would know it back and render it useless. I stopped twice to put on more tape but it just wouldn’t stay in place, it flopped over every time. Luckily for us, we have a rearview camera that’s on all the time and side view cameras that activate whenever one of the turn signals is used so we had partial view. With Lorraine’s help looking out the window whenever we had to change lanes, we made it to our planned stop, about 100 miles down the freeway.

After we got set up, I tried making a more permanent repair. I cut a couple pieces of wood, put them under the mirror so it wouldn’t flop in the wind so bad then duct taped everything together, used up the whole roll of tape. It felt like it might work and we found we could “make it” without the mirror is need be.

We were at the Lucky Eagle in Rochester, WA. and were planning on visiting with one of Lorraine’s classmates from high school who was unable to attend the reunion this summer. We met with Judy and her husband Bruce on our trip North in April and we were looking forward to another visit. We met them at the casino for the buffet, a very good one by the way, and had a good visit with them, their grandson and a friend of theirs from Alaska. Of course, after we ate we tried our luck on the slots, nobody won enough to have their picture taken for sure but we did have fun and really enjoyed our visit. Looking forward to seeing you next time we are in the area.

I also checked into the problem with the generator not running right. As with lots of stuff nowadays, it has protection built in to shut itself down if problems occur and flashes a code to indicate what the problem is. In this case, it was showing high coolant temperature causing it to shut down. I was unable to check the level in the reservoir so I just overfilled it to make sure it was full. I checked it again the next morning before we left and found it to be still full, here’s hoping that makes a difference.

Sunday morning we headed out, our planned stop was at 7 Feathers casino in Southern Oregon, about 325 miles. As soon as we got our speed up to about 40 MPH, the tape job on the mirror showed its shortcomings, it started rotating in the wind but at least it didn’t flop over like the first repair. At least I could see something out of the bottom, concaved mirror. But that soon went away, it wasn’t long until it moved over the side to where I had a good view of the roadside beside us and could see a car as it got alongside us at the door, pretty worthless. So I reverted back to using the rear and side view cameras as needed to get us to our next stop.

But a bit of good news, our generator was working just fine and running our air conditioners as needed, YEA. At least that problem was fixed at least for awhile.

Once we got set up at 7 Feathers, I got out the step stool and removed all the duct tape, cut the wires and removed the whole mirror. It would ride in the car until we got it replaced, I had read that we couldn’t just repair it with new parts but have to replace the whole assembly. So the rest of the trip we were without any sort of mirror on the passenger’s side. Not really looking forward to the California traffic or backing into our spot here at the Elks lodge without a right side mirror.

We headed over to the casino to find the machines we had enjoyed (and won on) last time we were here. We found them back in the corner but this time I was the only one to have any luck. Later, Lorraine found a couple that were better to her but no luck on the ones we liked.

Monday morning we got back on the road, our planned stop was at Rolling Hills casino near Corning, CA. We figured the temperatures might be pretty high in the Sacramento valley but it was only in the 80s, not too bad considering what the temperature usually is in August. After getting set up, we caught the shuttle over to the casino and once again we tried our luck on the slots. This time both of us came away with some of their money, in my case less than $2, Lorraine a bit better. And once again, the generator/air conditioners ran fine, much better with air.

Tuesday was our last travel day, only about three hours drive time. Didn’t have any problems except for the rough roads, boy California needs to do some road repair! About 15 miles from our planned stop here at the Elks Lodge, our front windshield screen unrolled and come down to the dash. We have both a day shade (we can see out but no one can see in) and a night shade (almost a black out type, no one can see through it, either in or out). Luckily for us, it was the day shade that came down so we could still see just fine. So now we don’t have a mirror on the right side and the windshield screen is down.

Let’s see, between the generator/air conditioners, the mirror being knocked off and the windshield screen falling, I think we’ve had our three things and hopefully will be good for awhile.

After we got set up here at the Elks, we headed over to Susy’s place and started helping her with the packing. She had been packing for a while but we decided to postpone getting the moving van the next day but instead we would try to finish the packing.

So that’s what we did on Wednesday, finished packing, she had plenty of boxes so that wasn’t an issue. We decided to take a break and drive over to see her new place, pretty nice. She managed to get a nice three bedroom home with a yard even. Sure couldn’t have got one like that around here, especially for that kind of rent. Between here and North to San Francisco is some of the highest home prices in the nation and rents reflect home prices for sure. But prices are a BIT lower in San Jose, so are rent prices.

Thursday morning we headed over to Susy’s place then we drove over to get the U-Haul for the day. On the way back, we stopped in Home Depot parking lot and hired 4 day workers to give us a hand moving. I spent the morning taking furniture and beds apart while everyone else was more involved with the actual moving. Lorraine and Susy supervised the workers, who were hard workers by the way, to get the proper boxes moved and loaded on the truck so when we we started unloading, it would make sense and be easier at the new house. I was surprised but it only took about 2 hours for them to get the first truck loaded and ready to head out.

We had both beds and other furniture on the first load so Lorraine and I headed out to get ready at the new place. Once we got enough stuff unloaded, I started putting the beds together so they would have a place to sleep that night. By that time, Susy had returned with the second load so they put most of that stuff in the garage or on the back patio. After we got the beds put up, we started unloading boxes, starting with the kitchen and bedroom. We somehow couldn’t find the box we had just packed with bedding for Katie’s room, things were a bit unorganized in the garage. But we worked until late that evening and got enough unpacked that the new place was beginning to look more like home. Her old place only had two bedrooms but they and the living room was larger than the new one. She also doesn’t have a dinning room, just a place in the kitchen for a table, too small for the table she has.

We also were unable to get water to the kitchen sink although there was a leak in the cabinet under it. The landlord had just left for Australia so Susy left him a message. Also the natural gas had been turned off because they had the whole house fumigated and it wasn’t hooked up yet. That meant no gas for the cook stove but more important, no gas for the water heater so no hot water for showers the next morning.

Friday morning I had a doctor’s appointment at the VA in Palo Alto so Susy drove over to our place to take a shower and pick up Lorraine so they could continue with the unpacking until I got there. I had a bit of a run around at the VA and worked with a local repair place to get a new mirror. By the time I was done and just started down to Susy’s, she called to remind me that she had a doctor’s visit that afternoon and they were just leaving for that. So I headed over to the hospital where she had her appointment. It didn’t take long before we were on our way back to her new place but by now the rush hour traffic had started. Katie was riding with Lorraine and me so we could use the carpool lanes but it was still heavy traffic. It took us about 30 minutes to go 10 miles on South 101, sure glad we weren’t farther North as it is REALLY heavy I’m told.

Anyway, we got to Susy’s place and waited about 10 minutes for her to show up, she couldn’t use the express lane and it took that much longer. And this is part of the commute she will have to drive every day, UGG.

We spent the rest of the day unpacking and storing stuff. We also tried organizing the boxes in the garage a bit better, making it easier for them to send me out to get a box for this or that room. Even with the time off for our doctor visits, we did make a huge dent in the boxes in the garage.

Saturday was more of the same, we got started unpacking and I finished putting all the furniture together, at least with all the parts I could find. Lorraine and Susy had to make a run to the store and stopped at IKEA to check out kitchen tables, they found one that would fit and work just fine in the available space. I continued putting stuff away and getting things ready for their return. I started putting the new table together but we took a dinner break and headed over to Chili's. After dinner I completed the assembly of the new table, it looks real good and has an added bonus of 6 small drawers for her to use, the kitchen is pretty small and the cupboards don’t have many drawers.

So that brings our two weeks review to a close, whew, busy times for us. Katie starts school this Wednesday so we want to get all this move finished by then. Susy has to turn over the old place by the following Monday and it will need some cleaning time there too. So between the two, I don’t see us leaving here in time to meet with our friends Richard and Sandy who are going to be in Las Vegas, sorry guys.

The temperatures over the past two weeks have ranged from nice to hot. We didn’t need to run the air conditioners while we were in Birch Bay, temps were in the 70s most days. We did have some hot (99F) temps in Oregon, glad that was the day after we got our generator problem fixed. It’s been getting into the upper 70s, lower 80s while we have been here, we are running the air conditioner when we’re in the rig.

The San Francisco 49ers have built a new football stadium just a couple of miles from us and today is the first game in the new stadium. We aren’t sure how this will affect our ability to stay here at the Elks, there may be some folks who want to stay here just for the game. There are only 7 sites available here and only one of those is 50 amp, that’s the one we like. Guess we’ll have to see how it all turns out and have a plan B in our pocket.

Our travel plans are still non-existent, really need to look for ideas when we leave here. But we still don’t know when we are leaving so can’t make firm plans. Right now, I’ll guess we head down 101 and check out that area again, we liked it this spring when we headed North. But we’ll know for sure the day we leave, ha.

Now for some pictures then get this posted and get on with our day.

Sunset over Birch Bay near where we were staying.