We were up and busy early yesterday morning getting our motorhome ready to go to our appointment at Camping Connection to get our new door lock installed, and to have our second Norcold refrigerator recall work done.

We left the Thousand Trails campground a little after 8:30 to be at the shop for our 9 a.m. appointment. Camping Connection has been doing a lot of Norcold recalls, and I’m sure this sign helps. Along with the fact that they have such an outstanding reputation for professional RV service work.

This company doesn’t jerk you around like a lot of RV repair shops we dealt with when we had our Fleetwood Pace Arrow Vision, which we called the Motorhome From Hell. I can’t count the number of places where we arrived for an appointment, and then sat around all day, and more times than not they finally strolled out and tell us the parts needed for our repairs weren’t in stock, even though they had weeks to order them.

Not so with Camping Connection! They may be a small shop, but a lot of the big places, even the nationwide powerhouse in the industry, could take a lesson from them! Within five minutes of our arrival, they had pulled our Winnebago back to the service area and a tech was working on our repairs; a new entry door latch installed and the Norcold recall work done. We were finished and on our way by 11:30.

Compare that to the four hours we spent at Camping World in Mesa, Arizona back in May while they replaced two tire valve stems that they had screwed up in the first place! And by the way, one of the two valve stems they replaced failed again, because they crank them down so tight they mash the little O-rings in the stems.

We feel a lot more secure now that we can actually lock our entry door again. The original door latch was white, and this one is black, because Winnebago no longer stocks the white unit. But it looks fine, and more important, it works!

There were two other coaches besides ours at Camping Connection having the same Norcold recall work done. And remember, this is the second recall, because their first fix didn’t work. But, considering the number of RVs that have burned to the ground from refrigerator fires, it has to be done. We have seen RV fires, and trust me, they are an ugly sight!

Actually, we had two fires in our bus conversion, but thanks to Miss Terry’s quick response, and the lessons she learned in Mac McCoy’s RV Fire Safety classes, both were extinguished quickly with little damage.

Norcold was supposed to send customers a $50 gas card as compensation for their time and trouble after the first recall, not that $50 makes up for the hassles of calling around trying to find a shop that can do the work, sitting on your thumb for weeks waiting for Norcold to send the parts, because they won’t send a part out until you make the appointment, and then driving to a shop and sitting around waiting for the work to be done. This time around they are not even offering the $50 compensation. Not that it matters, since we never received the card from the first recall!

I have no idea why Norcold won’t just send their authorized repair shops a batch of the parts needed for the recall, so they could take care of customers as they come in.  Instead they make you wait while they send them out on an individual basis. I mean, they know that there is a potentially hazardous problem that could result in a fire, and even deaths, but they are either too cheap/lazy/stupid/incompetent (you pick an adjective, they all work) to just get the damn parts out there and installed. What a way to run a business!

We have one of Mac McCoy’s refrigerator fire extinguishers installed in our refrigerator compartment, and that makes us feel a lot more secure. Every RV should have one.

But Terry and I are in agreement that if our Norcold breaks, or if they have yet another recall (and I would not be at all surprised if they do), we’ll pull the piece of junk out and install a residential refrigerator. We had a Maytag refrigerator in our bus conversion for over eight years, and it never gave us a bit of trouble.

Thought For The Day – I’d like to help you out. Which way did you come in?

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

Yesterday we felt like we were going in two directions at once. We had to drive into Orlando to pick up the pre-printed envelopes from the mail service, and even though it was only 27 miles, it took us well over an hour to get there.

We left the Thousand Trails campground about 11:15 and ran into a lot of traffic on State Route 192 through Kissimmee, which is no surprise, since that road is always busy. When we got onto Intestate 4, it was a parking lot, with long lines of cars in each eastbound lane sitting still.

For the next eight miles, it was stop and go traffic, with a lot more stopping than going. We were close to Disney World and Universal Studios, which are both very busy with holiday travelers, and several roads merge onto the highway there, creating a bottleneck. Which meant that all of the traffic coming onto the highway was trying to push their way in, passing on the shoulder, and doing whatever they could do to get one or two cars ahead of the next guy. And once they got there, they crept along just like the rest of us. It took us over a 45 minutes to go those eight miles, and when we finally reached our exit, there was road construction for several miles, making progress slow on the surface streets too!

We finally got to the mail service, picked up the envelopes, and then had to get right back on Interstate 4 to drive to the UPS freight dock in Tampa to pick up the new issue of the Gypsy Journal. Fortunately, the interstate was only backed up in the eastbound lanes, so even though  traffic was still heavy, we made good time.

It was 77 miles to the UPS facility, and once we were out of the traffic around the Orlando area, we zipped right along. Traffic started to get busy again when we got to Tampa, but it wasn’t close to being as bad as in Orlando.

I have to say that I’m impressed with the UPS freight service. They picked up our load of newspapers from the printer in Allegan, Michigan at 12:36 Monday afternoon, and it arrived in Tampa at 6:35 a.m. Wednesday morning! I couldn’t have driven that far that quickly!

Of course, when we were picking up the load of papers, we discovered that UPS has a freight dock in Ocoee, just 17 miles from the mail service, and 22 miles from the Thousand Trails campground! When we were scheduling the shipment, I was told that the closest facility where we could pick it up was in Tampa. Hey, gasoline is cheap right? And what else do I have to do with my time but drive 140 miles round trip?

We hadn’t eaten all day, and by the time we got back from Tampa, we were famished. We met Dave and Jean Damon at a Chinese restaurant a few miles from the campground, and when I hit that buffet line, it wasn’t a pretty sight!

We had a nice dinner with our friends, and the more time we spend with Dave and Jean, the more we like them. In fact, we’ve gotten so close that I may even take our hard kayaks off the roof of the Explorer and let Dave work them over with some of his 303 products! Yeah, I’m that kind of friend.

Thought For The Day -Time flies when you don’t know what you’re doing.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

Sometimes I don’t have anything special to write about, because a lot of the time, living in an RV is just like living in a house or apartment. We do chores, we goof off, we visit friends, and before we know it, the day is gone. Yesterday was a good example.

My friend Dave Damon had asked if I could pick him up in Clermont yesterday about 12:30, after an appointment he had, and I said no problem. He actually called about 11 and said he had finished up early, so we drove the 15 miles or so to pick up Dave and his pretty wife Jean, and drove them back to the Thousand Trails campground.

The last couple of nights, I have been unhooking our water hose overnight because it was getting so cold, so back at the motorhome I hooked it back up and filled our fresh water tank, and left it hooked up so Terry could do some laundry.

I had been craving some of Miss Terry’s delicious crepes, and while I was doing that, she made up a batch for brunch. Yummy! I’ll never be a slender man.

In the afternoon, I spent some time trying to familiarize myself with a Kodak Zi8 digital video camera I recently bought for an upcoming project I’ve been working on. The Zi8 is a pretty nifty little camera. It’s about the same size as my Droid Incredible phone, and the quality of the videos, even taken inside the motorhome with just ambient light, is pretty impressive.

I knew from the reviews I had read that the camera’s built-in microphone is basically worthless for outside use, so when I ordered it, I also ordered an Audio-Technica lavalier microphone. But even with the mike, the sound volume was very low. My buddy Greg White has the same camera, so I called him in Texas and picked his brain. Greg said he’d look at his camera and try to figure it out, but about then, I found the camera’s volume adjustment, and solved the problem myself. When all else fails, read the directions.

Greg is a computer whiz, so while I had him on the phone, we talked about the fact that my Dell desktop seems to be getting slower all the time, in spite of running all of the different cleanup programs and such. The computer is about three years old, and that seems to be about the lifespan for one for me, since I use it so much, and bounce them around all over the country. We decided that when we hook back up before our Arizona Gypsy Gathering rally, Greg will try to work his magic on it, and if that doesn’t do it, it’s time to go shopping.

After I got off the phone with Greg we made a run to WalMart, which was busy, but not as busy as we had expected, what with folks returning Christmas gifts and shopping for after-Christmas bargains.

It was a good day for telephone conversations, so once I got my fill of WalMart (which didn’t take long), I left Terry to the shopping and went outside and talked to my buddy Orv Hazelton, who is at the Escapees Jojoba Hills co-op in southern California. Orv said it was supposed to get very cold there overnight. That made me feel a little bit better. If I have to be cold, everybody should be cold!

When we got back to the motorhome, our neighbor, Charles Deutschmann, invited us over for a bowl of ice cream and some conversation during the evening. Never one to turn down free food, especially ice cream, I quickly said we’d be there.

We had a nice time visiting with Charles and his wife Nancy in their beautiful Monaco motorhome. It’s a mid-entry diesel pusher, which you don’t see many of, and the layout was very nice. The ice cream was delicious, the conversation flowed well, and before we knew it the time had flown by and it was after 10 p.m. We felt bad for taking up Charles and Nancy’s entire evening, so we took our leave and came home.

We watched TV for a while, and by the time I caught up on a few e-mails and wrote this blog post, it was getting late and time to think about bed. Where did the day go?

Thought For The Day – I’m not cynical. I’m just experienced.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

I wrote in Thursday’s blog post that while the Peace River NACO campground was okay, we really didn’t care for the town of Wauchula very much, and that if we could change our reservation and leave early and go back up to the Orlando Thousand Trails, we’d do it.

That same afternoon, I got a call from the folks at Camping Connection in Kissimmee telling us that both our new entry door latch and the parts for our Norcold refrigerator recall had come in, and they wanted to schedule a time to come in to get them installed. That was all the incentive I needed; I went up to the office, told them we needed to leave early, and they shortened our reservation. So yesterday morning we pulled out and drove the 75 miles  back to the Orlando Thousand Trails.

Traffic was light most of the way, but if you hear anything about a motorhome being involved in a high speed chase with the local police, here’s the story: We were on State Route 60, waiting for oncoming traffic to clear so we could make a left turn onto the ramp to U.S. Highway 27 at Lake Wales. All of a sudden, a police car roared up behind us with his lights and siren on. He tried to climb up onto the island on the left to get past us, but his car couldn’t get over the high curb, and I was stuck waiting for traffic to get out of the way.

The way the road and ramp are configured there, with curving concrete islands and guardrails, there was no place for me to pull over or go to get out of his way, except right onto the ramp, so that’s what we did the minute there was a break in the traffic. I sped down the curved ramp and onto the highway, our kitchen drawers flying open and things rattling around inside the coach, with him right behind us. The minute I was past the guardrail and had room to get over, I did, and he flew past us headed north. Once the excitement wore off, I told Terry I bet anybody seeing that was wondering if that idiot in the motorhome towing the SUV really believed he could outrun the cops!

Once we arrived at the Thousand Trails and got settled into our site, Charles Deutschmann stopped in to say hello. Charles and his wife Nancy were at our last Arizona Gypsy Gathering rally in March, and now they are parked in the RV site next to us. It’s a small world, especially in the RV community.

We took a ride around the campground, admiring the way folks decorated their rigs for the holidays. Some opted for simple things like Santa caps on their mirrors, or maybe a wreath or bow on the front end.

A few folks went a little further, and decorated a tree, or put out a lawn ornament or two.

But these folks take the prize. Talk about going all out for Christmas! I wonder if they carry all of that stuff in their motorhome year round, or store it someplace?

Our friends Dave and Jean Damon, who sell 303 products at RV rallies, are here at the campground, so we got together and had our Christmas dinner together at, where else? A Chinese buffet! The food was good and the company was even better. Here is a picture the waitress took of our well fed, happy group.

I’m glad we came up yesterday, because the weather is supposed to get nasty for the next few days, with wind and rain predicted for today. In fact, just before midnight when I wrote this, it was raining off and on, and the wind was really rattling our window awnings and slide toppers!

Today’s high is supposed to be 51 degrees, and overnight lows the next three nights are supposed to be in the 20s! I probably won’t be doing much, except sitting inside reading, watching TV, and oh yes, sniveling. Lots and lots of sniveling. Tell me again, why did I come to Florida for the winter?

Thought For The Day – Eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow they may make it illegal.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

I’ve been working on the new issue of the Gypsy Journal, which I will be sending off to the printer early next week, and we still had a few bundles of the November-December issue left. We needed to get them distributed so we’d have room for the new issue after it’s printed.

So yesterday, we spent the day dropping off sample bundles at RV parks along Interstate 4 between the Kissimmee area and Interstate 75, on the west side of the state.

It was interesting see how folks were bundled up, due to the cold snap that has hit the South. Everywhere we went, we saw people in jackets, scarves, hats, and even gloves! And they thought they were coming to Florida to spend the winter basking in the sunshine!

I was surprised by how many Carefree RV resorts we stopped at! They have a lot of RV parks in Florida! All of them were very nice, and I really appreciate the fact that Carefree Resorts also gives veterans a 50% discount on RV sites. That’s very nice, and I made it a point of telling their managers that, at the resorts where we stopped.

Check Out Our Holiday Subscription Special Offer!

One of the campgrounds where we stopped, Tampa East RV Resort in Dover, has a special weekly rate that is good until the end of December, so we may pop in there for a week between Christmas and New Years. It’s about a half hour away from my nephew Steve’s place in Pinellas Park, and might make a good place to stay while we visit Steve and the rest of the family in that area.

One place where we won’t be staying, or doing any business at all, is at Lazy Days, the mega-dealer just off Interstate 4 that has an RV dealership, campground, Camping World, and Cracker Barrel on the premises.

We stopped there to drop off a bundle of papers, and the manager on duty said no, because we had two ads for RVs for sale in the paper. One is a tiny little 1984 Mirage camper with an asking price of $4,000 up in northern Indiana, and the other is an eight year old Class A gas rig a couple have for sale in Texas.

The manager never actually gave me the courtesy of talking to me, the message relayed by the young lady at the counter was that since Lazy Days is a dealership, they don’t want to “encourage the competition.” Yeah, that sixteen year old $4,000 Mirage is sure some competition for the land yachts that Lazy Days sells!

I find it interesting that Lazy Days has contacted us in the past suggesting that we consider holding one of our Gypsy Gathering rallies there, and they have sent me press releases in the past when they want free publicity for something. But I guess that’s a one way street.

But that’s okay, we found another campground just down the road that was happy to get the papers, and whenever anybody is RV shopping and asks me my opinion of Lazy Days (and I get a lot of people asking for advice), I’ll be happy to share it. Did you ever notice that the little mom and pop places are so much nicer to deal with, and that the biggest outfits are the most chickensh..?

By the time we were done, we only had two or three bundles left, and I’ll get rid of them at a couple of places we’ll be stopping in the next few days. It was twilight by the time we were headed home, and I don’t see well after dark, so Miss Terry took the wheel. We stopped for dinner at the Sonny’s Barbecue in Clermont, and by the time we got back to the Thousand Trails, it was downright cold again! It sure felt good to get inside, turn up the thermostat, put on our Teepee Creepers slippers, and warm back up!

Bad Nick is no fool. He stayed inside where it was warm all day, pounding out another Bad Nick Blog titled I’m Sorry, I Just Don’t Get It. Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – When you are dissatisfied and would like to go back to youth, think of Algebra.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally