Today was to be a day of relaxation for us while we did a few little things. It was true but it seems that everything was a challenge. For starters, we were slow getting out and heading for the border town to buy our bi-annual supply of vanilla. We passed the first filling station because the gas price was too high. The next one was on the wrong side of the busy road. Finally, as we were leaving Deming, we found a station and the gas was even higher.OUCH, but we filled up. Yep, a mile down the road was another station 20 cents cheaper. We were about half way to Columbus when Sandy suddenly said, "We forgot our passports!" That is a real show stopper if you are crossing the border, as we were.
So it was back to Deming where we had lunch before trying it again. Yes, we dug out the passports and headed south. For the rest of that activity, all went well and we were back in about 90 minutes (30 miles south, 10 minutes to walk to The Pink Store and get 7 liters of real vanilla and 30 miles back to Deming. (Some of the vanilla is for friends.) Then there was a quick stop at Walmart before we went to the motorhome.
Back at the motorhome, we dug into a problem that was bothering us for the last couple of days. I thought our friendly SHURFLO water pump was getting air and refusing to pump again. Finally we figured out that the problem was the presure switch in the SHURFLO pump was not turning the pump on to pump water when the pressure dropped. The problem would only manifest itself if the pump sat there for a little while under full pressure before being asked it to pump again.
Eventually we figured out that by turning the pump off and back on, the pump would restart on its own. Needless to say, I was very exasperated. We fought that problem last winter with one of our many pumps and the current pump was given to me (new pump) by the Shurflo technician at the Winnebago National Rally at Forest City in July. It has worked flawlessly since then. It was not used while at Casa Grande and now that we need it, we have our problem again.
I want to call the service technician who gave it to me, but I can't find his calling card. So tomorrow we call Winnebago and find out his name. There is a pressure adjustment on the pump, but I'm trying to be a good user and not twiddling with everything until the expert says to. At least now we can make it pump on demand.
Tomorrow we are going to call and maybe stop at one of two major RV stores in Las Cruces in hopes of getting a "three-way ball valve" to replace the leaky one in the rig. The real challenge is to find one that is a direct replacement. Perhaps I could order it from Winnebago, but where do we have it shipped ? We're on the road again. Another challenge of this life style.
The old Farmer's Advice: It don't take a very big person to carry a grudge!
Gene
Monday, October 31, 2011
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Deming, NM again
We left the casino early this morning, like at 7:30 AM. For some reason neither one of us could sleep long, so we were both up by 6 AM. The good news of that is that traffic was light on the road and no wind.
Right now, it is way past our bed time. I just realized as we were getting ready for bed that I hadn't kicked out a blog and I try to do that, especially when we've moved. We're at the Escapee's Dream Catcher RV park here in Deming, NM, which is a typical RV park. But for now, it is only half full, so lots of empty spaces around us and I'm not complaining. We like it that way. We're here for two nights.
Tonight when Sandy wanted to wash the dishes, we couldn't get water out of the faucet. It seemed that our old problem of a leaky valve down by the water pump was leaking air again into the inlet side of the pump and then the pump can't get enough prime to really pump water. The valve is a switch for adding anti-freeze to the system should we want to winterize it the motorhome. We don't use it that way ourselves. We use the inlet to draw water in from the barrel on the farm while parked their. Anyway, we'll try to find a replacement tomorrow after we return from Mexico. Then of course, there is the problem of crawling inside of the basement to change it out.
This afternoon, we went to the park ice cream social in the club house at 4 PM. I love the ice cream, but it sure ruins any need for dinner. And the ice cream servings are not small. So Sandy took a nap and I guess I may have also dropped off some.
I was reading my book on Napoleon Bonaparte and I'm in the area where he came back from his first expulsion. He returned to France, reclaimed his position, created an army of 200,000 or 300,000 men and proceeded to go attack the British in Belgium. He was badly beaten again and ended up getting thrown out of France for good and exiled to a distant island. Sandy and I visited the battlefield outside of Brussels several years ago, thus my interest in the details.
Monday we go to a Mexico border town to get some Mexican vanilla, which Sandy loves to use in the kitchen. The locals here say that it is a safe town and that they go often. So if we don't make it back, you know what happened. Hopefully, we'll be back soon enough so that I can get the part I need to fix the air leak in our water system.
(It is not a problem, just another opportunity to learn what is in the system and how it goes together.)
The Old Farmer's Advice: Don't corner something that you know is meaner than you!
Gene
Right now, it is way past our bed time. I just realized as we were getting ready for bed that I hadn't kicked out a blog and I try to do that, especially when we've moved. We're at the Escapee's Dream Catcher RV park here in Deming, NM, which is a typical RV park. But for now, it is only half full, so lots of empty spaces around us and I'm not complaining. We like it that way. We're here for two nights.
Tonight when Sandy wanted to wash the dishes, we couldn't get water out of the faucet. It seemed that our old problem of a leaky valve down by the water pump was leaking air again into the inlet side of the pump and then the pump can't get enough prime to really pump water. The valve is a switch for adding anti-freeze to the system should we want to winterize it the motorhome. We don't use it that way ourselves. We use the inlet to draw water in from the barrel on the farm while parked their. Anyway, we'll try to find a replacement tomorrow after we return from Mexico. Then of course, there is the problem of crawling inside of the basement to change it out.
This afternoon, we went to the park ice cream social in the club house at 4 PM. I love the ice cream, but it sure ruins any need for dinner. And the ice cream servings are not small. So Sandy took a nap and I guess I may have also dropped off some.
I was reading my book on Napoleon Bonaparte and I'm in the area where he came back from his first expulsion. He returned to France, reclaimed his position, created an army of 200,000 or 300,000 men and proceeded to go attack the British in Belgium. He was badly beaten again and ended up getting thrown out of France for good and exiled to a distant island. Sandy and I visited the battlefield outside of Brussels several years ago, thus my interest in the details.
Monday we go to a Mexico border town to get some Mexican vanilla, which Sandy loves to use in the kitchen. The locals here say that it is a safe town and that they go often. So if we don't make it back, you know what happened. Hopefully, we'll be back soon enough so that I can get the part I need to fix the air leak in our water system.
(It is not a problem, just another opportunity to learn what is in the system and how it goes together.)
The Old Farmer's Advice: Don't corner something that you know is meaner than you!
Gene
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Dinner at the Desert Diamond Casino, Green Valley, (Tuscon), AZ
True to our planning, we left the park this morning. What a great feeling that the shed is done and we're on the road again. Okay, it was only a 76 mile jaunt, but we're moving. Tonight we had dinner in the casino (paying our parking fee) with my cousin Larry Siems and his wife Carol. We've done this often, since they moved here a few years ago.
We're actually boondocking in the casino parking lot with about 20 other RVs. It is quiet, other than the constant road noise from the interstate nearby. I guess that will put us to sleep tonight. It could be worse, such as a train every 30 minutes, or big trucks starting and stopping. Tonight, all I hear are cars, cars and more cars.
Since it was a short drive this morning, we took a long nap this afternoon during the heat of the day. It was to get up to 85 or so today. We made it okay.
Paul: I responded to your comment with another comment this morning.
The Old Farmer's Advice: Forgive your enemies. It messes up their heads.
Gene
We're actually boondocking in the casino parking lot with about 20 other RVs. It is quiet, other than the constant road noise from the interstate nearby. I guess that will put us to sleep tonight. It could be worse, such as a train every 30 minutes, or big trucks starting and stopping. Tonight, all I hear are cars, cars and more cars.
Since it was a short drive this morning, we took a long nap this afternoon during the heat of the day. It was to get up to 85 or so today. We made it okay.
Paul: I responded to your comment with another comment this morning.
The Old Farmer's Advice: Forgive your enemies. It messes up their heads.
Gene
Friday, October 28, 2011
Friday night, we're ready to roll
Here it is Friday night and we're ready to roll. In fact, I've been goofing off for a day or two. But better that way verses being late. Just now I realized that I've been so busy that I have forgotten to fill our water tank with fresh water. (I did empty the holding tanks yesterday afternoon.)
While here in the park, I have read two books that I had a hard time putting down. Two years ago, I read the book by Steven Ambrose called "The Band of Brothers". It is the WW2 history of Easy Company of (I forget the details.) I really enjoyed it. In the park library are two more books related to the Band of Brothers. The first one was by Dick Winters (Major) who went from being a Lt. with a squad to being the battalion commander. Lt. Winters was a "People Person" who earned the respect of his men and ended up being Battalion commander after the airplane with the command staff was shot down and all hands aboard were lost on D-Day. Lt Winters knew what the mission was and made it happen. Dick Winters wrote his book after Steven Ambrose returned all of the notes that Ambrose had gathered in order to write his book.
Dick Winters looked at the notes and realized that a lot of what he thought was important was left out, so Dick Winters wrote what was really a biography of his military career. It obviously was written showing the trials and tribulations of a leader placed in an extremely difficult position.
The second book was written by two GI's in the company. It is written from their prospective as two GI's who were often called to do the impossible. Both books were easy reading for me.
As we hit the road tomorrow, I have a thick book about Napoleon Bonaparte that I haven't finished yet. It is an interesting work detailing the ups and downs of Napoleon's career. The one problem I have is that it was written by a Frenchman, who often left quotes in French verses giving the English version.
The reason we came here this fall was to get a shed onto our lot, one way or another. Three years ago, the local committee rejected my request because it was too close to a power transformer. Well, nothing moved. However, we have new members on the committee and after they looked at the permit request and the rules on the transformer, they said, "It looks okay to us." So we bought a metal shed from Home Depot and last week, we assembled it. This week, we had a load of gravel delivered and leveled and later we had the anchors installed for our shed.
With all of that done, we're ready to leave. (And the really good news is that the lot is rented for the rest of the season.)
The Old Farmer's Advice: Meanness don't just happen overnight.
Gene
While here in the park, I have read two books that I had a hard time putting down. Two years ago, I read the book by Steven Ambrose called "The Band of Brothers". It is the WW2 history of Easy Company of (I forget the details.) I really enjoyed it. In the park library are two more books related to the Band of Brothers. The first one was by Dick Winters (Major) who went from being a Lt. with a squad to being the battalion commander. Lt. Winters was a "People Person" who earned the respect of his men and ended up being Battalion commander after the airplane with the command staff was shot down and all hands aboard were lost on D-Day. Lt Winters knew what the mission was and made it happen. Dick Winters wrote his book after Steven Ambrose returned all of the notes that Ambrose had gathered in order to write his book.
Dick Winters looked at the notes and realized that a lot of what he thought was important was left out, so Dick Winters wrote what was really a biography of his military career. It obviously was written showing the trials and tribulations of a leader placed in an extremely difficult position.
The second book was written by two GI's in the company. It is written from their prospective as two GI's who were often called to do the impossible. Both books were easy reading for me.
As we hit the road tomorrow, I have a thick book about Napoleon Bonaparte that I haven't finished yet. It is an interesting work detailing the ups and downs of Napoleon's career. The one problem I have is that it was written by a Frenchman, who often left quotes in French verses giving the English version.
The reason we came here this fall was to get a shed onto our lot, one way or another. Three years ago, the local committee rejected my request because it was too close to a power transformer. Well, nothing moved. However, we have new members on the committee and after they looked at the permit request and the rules on the transformer, they said, "It looks okay to us." So we bought a metal shed from Home Depot and last week, we assembled it. This week, we had a load of gravel delivered and leveled and later we had the anchors installed for our shed.
The Old Farmer's Advice: Meanness don't just happen overnight.
Gene
Thursday, October 27, 2011
Winding down our stay
Believe it or not, but we're on our last days here at Sunscape. The gravel is leveled, the bills are paid and the shed has been hosed out. If we're not careful, we'll be ready to leave tomorrow, rain or shine. On the road again.
Today has been a fantastic day so far temperature wise. Inside the motorhome, it is 80 degrees, with only the vent fan running on low. It is delightful. I understand that in 2 or 3 days, another heat wave will roll in. We should be long gone by then.
Sandy was even outside this morning with the scrub brush and bucket, washing the windshield of the motorhome. She has a real adversion to spots on the windows or on my glasses.
Since we've not done much, there isn't much to write about. So we'll sign off for now.
Old Farmer's Advice: Words that soak into your ears are whispered...not yelled.
Gene
Today has been a fantastic day so far temperature wise. Inside the motorhome, it is 80 degrees, with only the vent fan running on low. It is delightful. I understand that in 2 or 3 days, another heat wave will roll in. We should be long gone by then.
Sandy was even outside this morning with the scrub brush and bucket, washing the windshield of the motorhome. She has a real adversion to spots on the windows or on my glasses.
Since we've not done much, there isn't much to write about. So we'll sign off for now.
Old Farmer's Advice: Words that soak into your ears are whispered...not yelled.
Gene
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
A Cotton Tour that wasn't
We were up early so that we could go on a cotton tour. We found the tour starting point, only to learn that the cotton plants were too green to harvest. (When the mechanical cotton picker rubs on the green leaves, it picks up a green residue which then rubs onto the white cotton. The stained cotton is thus graded poorer verses a pure white cotton fiber.) Thus, no cotton tour today.
Perhaps I need to tell you about the Visitor's Center where the Cotton Tour was to begin. It is located adjacent to a small town that has a divided 4 lane highway for main street (with lots of pot holes). Very few of the streets are paved. In other words, there isn't much money in the town.
With no Cotton Tour, we were leaving the building and noticed a fellow out on the sidewalk talking like he knew much of the local background. So we decided to stick around and listen for a while. When there was a break and he had been talking about irrigation, I asked him how deep the water table was or is? It turns out that when the first farmers showed up in the area, the water table was down about 40 feet. However, today the water table is typically down 800 feet. (To pump water from 800 feet down costs lots of money, thus we see lots of abandoned irrigation fields.)
As we listened, he started to tell us about the schools that were on the visitor center grounds. There were two schools on the grounds, one school for the Anglos and Hispanics and the other school for the blacks. Each school had their own privy, the white kids had indoor facilities while the black kids had to use an outdoor privy. What was interesting was that the class schedule was such that recess was at the same time so that all of the kids could play together.
In the white kids school, there were showers in both bathrooms The standard morning was for the kids to be inspected by the school nurse for cleanliness. If she felt that a kid was dirty, she sent them to the showers. (His comment was that most of the homes had very little water, and the kids bathed in the irrigation ditch.) The black kids school was about the size of a country school and made out of wood. The white kids school was made out of brick and concrete and was about twice the black school size. Both schools were built in the late 30s.
Our speaker was a local volunteer who enjoyed telling everyone what it was like way back when. (He had lived in the area all of his life.) The two schools were being refurbished and would be used as the town museum. So the Visitor's Center was actually a mobile home on the museum grounds.
Back at the RV park, we did a few things and waited for 10 tons of gravel to be delivered for our lot. In Iowa, the gravel would be very wet, but not so here in Arizona. When he dumped the gravel, there was a big cloud of dust created. I tried to water it down and finally gave up. Later in the week, the maintenance man is bringing the tractor and bucket to spread the gravel out. It would take me a month or longer to do it with a wheel barrow. Isn't technology great?
The Old Farmer's Advice: A bumblebee is considerably faster than an International Tractor.
Gene
Perhaps I need to tell you about the Visitor's Center where the Cotton Tour was to begin. It is located adjacent to a small town that has a divided 4 lane highway for main street (with lots of pot holes). Very few of the streets are paved. In other words, there isn't much money in the town.
With no Cotton Tour, we were leaving the building and noticed a fellow out on the sidewalk talking like he knew much of the local background. So we decided to stick around and listen for a while. When there was a break and he had been talking about irrigation, I asked him how deep the water table was or is? It turns out that when the first farmers showed up in the area, the water table was down about 40 feet. However, today the water table is typically down 800 feet. (To pump water from 800 feet down costs lots of money, thus we see lots of abandoned irrigation fields.)
As we listened, he started to tell us about the schools that were on the visitor center grounds. There were two schools on the grounds, one school for the Anglos and Hispanics and the other school for the blacks. Each school had their own privy, the white kids had indoor facilities while the black kids had to use an outdoor privy. What was interesting was that the class schedule was such that recess was at the same time so that all of the kids could play together.
In the white kids school, there were showers in both bathrooms The standard morning was for the kids to be inspected by the school nurse for cleanliness. If she felt that a kid was dirty, she sent them to the showers. (His comment was that most of the homes had very little water, and the kids bathed in the irrigation ditch.) The black kids school was about the size of a country school and made out of wood. The white kids school was made out of brick and concrete and was about twice the black school size. Both schools were built in the late 30s.
Our speaker was a local volunteer who enjoyed telling everyone what it was like way back when. (He had lived in the area all of his life.) The two schools were being refurbished and would be used as the town museum. So the Visitor's Center was actually a mobile home on the museum grounds.
Back at the RV park, we did a few things and waited for 10 tons of gravel to be delivered for our lot. In Iowa, the gravel would be very wet, but not so here in Arizona. When he dumped the gravel, there was a big cloud of dust created. I tried to water it down and finally gave up. Later in the week, the maintenance man is bringing the tractor and bucket to spread the gravel out. It would take me a month or longer to do it with a wheel barrow. Isn't technology great?
The Old Farmer's Advice: A bumblebee is considerably faster than an International Tractor.
Gene
Monday, October 24, 2011
Is it Wrapping up or Winding down our stay at Casa Grande ?
This was a great day for us. What we wanted to get done happened, so we're pleased. For starters, we stopped at the Walgreen's drug store to get a vitamin B twelve shot and there was a minor hiccup, but in the end, we succeeded.
Then we headed down the freeway to a sand and gravel place to buy a load of gravel to put on our lot in the park. We were there at 10:30 AM this morning and probably we could have had the gravel on our lot by noon. I think you can say that business is kind of slow. They will bring the gravel out after lunch tomorrow (Tuesday).
From the gravel pit, we headed to downtown Casa Grande for more stops, all of which were successful. As Sandy said when we left Casa Grande, "To think we had 6 stops on our schedule and all were successful. That is 6 fewer stops we won't have to make later in the week.
Our plan is to leave here on Saturday and it looks like it will work out. We're probably leaving just as the weather turns much cooler (highs only in the 70s.)
Per the old Farmer: Life is simpler when you plow around the stump.
Gene
Then we headed down the freeway to a sand and gravel place to buy a load of gravel to put on our lot in the park. We were there at 10:30 AM this morning and probably we could have had the gravel on our lot by noon. I think you can say that business is kind of slow. They will bring the gravel out after lunch tomorrow (Tuesday).
From the gravel pit, we headed to downtown Casa Grande for more stops, all of which were successful. As Sandy said when we left Casa Grande, "To think we had 6 stops on our schedule and all were successful. That is 6 fewer stops we won't have to make later in the week.
Our plan is to leave here on Saturday and it looks like it will work out. We're probably leaving just as the weather turns much cooler (highs only in the 70s.)
Per the old Farmer: Life is simpler when you plow around the stump.
Gene
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