November 2016 – Eugene , Sutherlin, Coarsegold, St. George, Simi Valley
After all the rain in Nehalem last month we were really ready for some sunshine. We were
due in St. George for Thanksgiving with Liesa and had about three weeks to get
some work done on the coach and to relax after a pretty stressful month. Oregon
Motorcoach Center (OMC) in Eugene was highly
recommended by the Monaco
owners group that hang out on the IRV2.com website. We called them and lucked
into an opening in their very full schedule, so on November 1, we pulled out of
Nehalem bound for Eugene .
Three days of sunshine in a row! What a welcome change.
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| Leaks are really not good |
Pleased and relieved to get all that behind us, we made the
short drive to Timber Valley SKP Park in Sutherlin ,
OR Roseburg .
Timber Valley
is a co-op park like Jojoba Hills near Temecula ,
CA
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| The neighbors out for a stroll |
We had hardly settled in and hooked up when Schroeder
went nuts. We have become a little blasé about wildlife during our travels.
Herds of elk and deer, families of raccoons and squirrels no longer phase us,
but flocks of wild turkeys calmly walking through our site was a first. Shortly
after that crowd moved on a pack of jack rabbits ambled by and I thought Schroeder
was going to have a stroke. The turkeys, the jack rabbits and a large deer herd
live in the park and are about as indifferent to people and dogs as I have ever
seen.
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| I want one sooo bad.... |
After battling the elements and dealing with the coach
issues we were ready to relax. As I backed the coach into the site the windshield
wipers came on…hmmm, I didn’t think I hit the switch. I shut them off and
turned the wheel to adjust our position and the wipers started again. Ok,
that’s a problem.
The wipers, the cruise control and some lights are
controlled from the steering wheel by a system called Smart Wheel. The device
that transfers the control signals from the buttons on the Smart Wheel to the coach
is called a clock spring and it had failed. Replacing it requires experience
and special tools. No one in Sutherlin or Roseburg
sounded like they wanted to tackle it, so we called OMC and they very
graciously fit us into their packed schedule to get us back on the road. So
instead of continuing south from Sutherlin, we headed back to Eugene for another night in their parking lot.
By 10:30 the next morning (and $300 lighter) we were back on the road.
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Drying out après la deluge
|
The other problem surfaced abruptly when Kayeanne opened the washing machine to put in a load of clothes. The machine had filled with water and several gallons errupted into the coach like a waterfall. Within a couple of minutes every towel and cloth that we carry was soaked trying to mop up the flood before any damage happened. Fast work kept the water off the carpets, averting a major crisis. We have decided that we'd rather have the storage space, so the washer is going out as soon as I can get to it.
Like last year the weather dictated our route. We would like
to cross Oregon to pick up US 395 and follow
it south along the eastern Sierras to US 50 in Reno to take us back to St. George. Last year
snow came early and this year it was just plain cold. The coach will handle
sub-freezing temperatures when the AquaHot system is working properly to keep
us warm, but it had become temperamental and we couldn’t rely on it to be
running when we really needed it.
We had “done”  |
| Site 425 |
Comparing Park Sierra (and most of the other SKP parks) to
the average RV park is like comparing Beverly Hills
to Pomona . The
lots are creatively carved into a series of small green, heavily treed canyons set on 140 acres just south of town.
About 300 sites and a large activity center house roughly 500 people if
everyone were ever home at once. The individual lots are effectively the
largest we have seen anywhere because so much space has been left between them.
Loosely organized in five neighborhoods, the roads twist and double back up and
down the canyons giving many of the lots pretty spectacular views.
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| Great walking throughout the park. The dogs also loved it. |
It is hard to imagine that the entire place was designed and
built by the members. The only work they didn’t do themselves was pave the
roads and erect the trusses in the activity center. It just didn’t pay to buy
the equipment needed for one-time jobs like those. All the design, surveying,
engineering, grading, site excavation, road building, water, electric power,
sewer and cable TV infrastructure was done and is maintained by volunteers. We
were delighted with site 425. Not only was it beautiful, when we had a problem
with the cable TV three guys showed up in 15 minutes to fix it.
We really enjoyed staying at Park Sierra but needed to get moving
join Liesa in St. George for Thanksgiving week. Again, it was a two day drive,
spending the night among the truckers in the parking lot behind Buffalo Bill’s
casino in Primm , NV
The week went by quickly. Between us we turned out a very
credible T-Day dinner. One of her roommates and one of her many friends joined
us and we all had a good time. I certainly ate too much, so I know it was a
success. Her apartment is nicely decorated and fairly neat despite the best
efforts of the two young(er) roommates. Liesa is both landlord and den mother
to those two.
The end of the week came quickly. We got everything ready to
go only to discover that the batteries were too weak to start the coach. It
took almost two hours on a charger to get enough juice into them to get the
engine to crank. We planned to get an early start and spend the night in the
Primm casino lot while doing a little shopping at the outlets nearby, but that
plan went out the window when it took almost four hours to drive 28 miles from Las Vegas to Primm. That
was the worst traffic I can remember ever being tied up in. By the time we got
to the casino we just weren’t interested in anything except going to the casino
for a drink.
On the 28th we arrived at Tapo Canyon
Park
More soon,
Bob
