The title of today’s blog pretty much sums up how I have felt for the last two days. All the while we were driving north toward Indiana, we were passing RVs going in the other direction. In the past, when we have been the southbound RV and we have spotted rigs going north late in the year, I always told Miss Terry “That dummy’s got it all wrong. He should be headed south like us.” Well, this year I am that dummy!

After spending the night at the Tennessean Truck Stop, we woke up early yesterday morning and were back on Interstate 65 a little after 8 a.m. I never like driving through Nashville, and this trip was no exception. The traffic was terrible, and on the north side of town we saw a UPS tractor trailer rig towing tandem that had rolled onto the drivers’ side. I sure hope nobody got hurt in the accident.

As we passed Bowling Green, Kentucky, where we taught for Life on Wheels so many times at Western Kentucky University, we reminisced about all of the good times we had there. The schedule was a real grind, but we miss all of our other instructor friends, and interacting with the students.

About 50 miles north of Bowling Green we hit a rough spot in the road, and suddenly a loud beeping noise startled us. Terry grabbed the PressurePro tire monitor control, sure we had blown a tire. But she quickly realized what we were hearing was our “Jacks Down” alert, and the red light was flashing on the dashboard. I pulled off the road and into a truck stop and turned on the HWH system. It showed our left rear jack was down. I checked to be sure that all of our automatic leveling jacks were in the travel position, then hit the Store button and the alarm went off. I guess when we hit the rough pavement, it jolted the system enough to give a false signal.

Back on the road, we continued north through Louisville, where traffic wasn’t as bad as I expected, then crossed the Ohio River into Indiana. We stopped for fuel at the Flying J in Whiteland, a few miles south of Indianapolis, and I was disappointed that the sign on the highway said diesel was $2.69 a gallon, but a sign at the pump said it was $2.83. What’s that about?

We circled Indianapolis on the Interstate 465 bypass, and got on U.S. Highway 31 northbound. We have driven this route so many times that I could do it blindfolded.

Blindfolded maybe, but not in the dark. My night vision sucks, so about 100 miles out of Elkhart, the sun was getting low in the sky, and Miss Terry took the wheel and drove the rest of the way. She test drove our Winnebago before we bought it, but this was her first time to drive it on the highway, and she did just fine, as I knew she would. I have been putting off letting her drive, because I was afraid that once she got a feel for the big Cummins diesel engine, she might never let me behind the wheel again! And I think I was right!

We are big believers in both people in an RV knowing how to drive it. While I do the great majority of the driving in our coach, it is an extra measure of safety knowing that Terry can take the wheel whenever necessary if I get sick, tired, run out of daylight, or just need a break.

We arrived at Duncan RV Repair in Elkhart about 6:30 p.m. local time, with just over 500 miles behind us this driving day, and 900 miles total in two days. That’s a lot of driving!

Duncan RV has several 30 amp RV hookups available, and can do any type of RV service or repair, from simple tune-ups to body work and refurbishing. Our regular hangout here, Elkhart Campground, is closed for the season, so we’ll be staying here while we wrap up our business with the bus buyer. We also have an appointment to have Duncan do some work on our motorhome while we’re here, killing two birds with one stone. Or at least in one trip.              

Thought For The Day – Was learning cursive really necessary?

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Friday morning we left Traverse City, Michigan about 9:30 a.m. and drove about 56 miles south on State Route 37, a nice two lane road that passed through the Manistee National Forest, a land of dense trees and few people.

There were a scattering of canoe and kayak rental places along the slow moving Manistee and Pine Rivers, several lakes, some lodges, and a campground or two. I told Miss Terry we need to come back here someday and float the rivers, which really looked inviting. There was little traffic, and we used the occasional passing lane to get over to the right and let everybody get past us.

When we got to U.S. Highway 10 we followed it west 27 miles, through the little communities of Walhalla, Custer and Scottville. At one point Terry spotted two big deer standing on the left shoulder of the highway, and just as she told me to be careful, they bolted across the road right into our path. I had to do some heavy braking to avoid hitting them, and the incident upped our adrenalin level by quite a bit.

When we hit U.S. Highway 31 in Ludington, a divided four lane road, we turned south, and arrived at Fisherman’s Landing Marina and Campground in Muskegon a little after noon. We registered, dumped our holding tank, and backed into the same site we had a couple of weeks ago. As soon as we had water and electric hooked up and the inside of the bus arranged a little bit, we drove over to visit with Rocky and Berni Frees.

We always have a good time with these two characters, and this was no exception. We went out to dinner, and then returned to their apartment to play Mexican Train, our favorite domino game. In addition to their cat, they were babysitting a friend’s Chihuahua, and it was fun watching the two critters playing and chasing each other through the apartment. 

Saturday morning, while Terry and Berni had a girls’ day out, Rocky and I drove to nearby Grand Rapids for a gun show. Folks, I’m telling you, if you had invested your money in firearms instead of giving it to some stockbroker, you’d all be a whole lot better off today! I had quite a large gun collection before we hit the road ten years ago, and looking at how much the same guns I sold back then are going for now really made me hurt. Most are selling for almost double what I sold mine for, and some for even more! Try getting an 80 to 125% return on your investments anywhere else! Plus, playing with guns is a lot more fun than playing with stock certificates!

Of course, you do have to know how to buy them right if you hope to ever sell them for a profit someday. I’m not sure my pal Rocky really understands that concept.

Rocky was looking for a cheap beater shotgun to keep at the place where he parks his motorhome at a cousin’s place in the woods. He found one on a table at the gun show that had a price tag of $100 on it. “Do you think I should buy it?” he asked me.

I told him yes, but to see if he could get a better deal. Rocky asked me what he should pay for it, and I told him to offer the seller $75 or $80 and see what he said. I couldn’t believe my ears when Rocky said to the guy, “Would you take $75 or $80 for it?”

The guy looked at him a second and said “I’ll take the $80.”

We had a good laugh about that when we got in the car, and I had to explain to Rocky that given the option of two prices, you can just about bet that every seller in the world is going to take the higher of the two! If you’re shopping for a new RV or tow vehicle, I wouldn’t advise taking Rocky along to help you negotiate!

Thought For The Day – If you’re born again, do you have two belly buttons?

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Yesterday morning we were up and getting the bus ready to travel a couple of hours before we are normally even out of bed. We had a short driving day planned, only 150 miles from Elkhart, Indiana to Muskegon, Michigan. We never pull out of a campground before 10 a.m., because we prefer to let the morning rush hour traffic get over with, though Elkhart doesn’t have much of a rush hour anyway. 

But, things don’t always go as we plan, do they? We have a set routine we follow when we are traveling; while Terry stows things away inside the bus, I check our oil and water, give the engine compartment a quick inspection to be sure the motor is still where I left it, then unhook our utilities, stow our TV dish, and scan the bus and van tires with our PressurePro tire monitoring system to be sure of proper inflation.

With all of that done, we hook up the van to our Blue Ox tow bar, disengage the Remco driveshaft disconnect, and do a brake light and turn signal check to be sure everything is working properly. The whole procedure only takes a few minutes, and while we used a printed pre-trip checklist in our early days, after ten years of fulltiming, we have it down to memory.

As I was checking things inside our engine compartment, I spotted green antifreeze dripping from a short three inch diameter hose that carries radiator fluid to the engine. Since we were parked on grass, there had not been a puddle to notice before. Closer inspection revealed a hole in the hose.

We carry a few spare parts with us, as all seasoned bus nuts do, so we happened to have some extra hose of the same diameter in one of our storage bays. We put a bucket under the hose to catch as much fluid as possible, and replaced the bad one with new, then refilled the radiator.

The entire process wasn’t that hard, even for someone as inept of a mechanic as myself. (Let’s be honest, Miss Terry did most of the work while I tried to look busy in case anybody wandered by.)

With all of that done, we cleaned up (in case you have never been around a bus conversion, all you have to do is open the engine bay doors and grease and oil jump out and cling to you), made a stop at the dump station, and pulled out of Elkhart Campground about 11:30 a.m.

This just illustrates how important it is to do a pre-trip inspection every day when you are traveling. You never know what minor problem is just waiting to become a major problem once you’re on the highway. While it was aggravating to lose 90 minutes of traveling time and get all dirty replacing the hose, it was still a lot easier than trying to replace a hose on a hot engine while broken down on the shoulder of the highway, or waiting for our roadside service company to send out a tow truck.

We had a short nineteen mile trip west on the Indiana Toll Road to South Bend, where we picked up U.S. Highway 31 and followed it north 130 miles to Muskegon. We have a week’s reservations at Fisherman’s Landing, a city owned RV park and marina, and we plan to spend the time visiting family here, and maybe we’ll even get our kayaks in the water!

Thought For The Day – It’s hard to make a comeback when you haven’t been anywhere.

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