#57 – Coveys Great Adventure – June 2019 – Shedd OR

June 2019 – Shedd OR

We had done a lot of reading about Thompson’s Mills State Heritage Site since we were selected to be hosts at the park, but the pictures hadn’t prepared us for the shear size of the place when we rolled down the driveway the first time. The silos are as tall as Cape Blanco Lighthouse, and then there is that five story, 130,000 square foot mill behind them. We turned to each other and wondered what we had gotten ourselves into, especially when the chickens and ducks were pretty casual about getting out of the road.

Luckily the fowl weren’t the welcoming committee. We were expected, and one of the current volunteers directed us to a temporary site for the night until the outgoing hosts cleared one of the regular sites in the morning. After setting up, we went to the mill for a quick look around. It was as big inside as it looked from out, and packed with very old, dusty machines driven by a bewildering array of line shafts, pulleys and belts. I was right when I stumbled onto this on the ‘net; this is my kind of place!

Schroeder is going nuts

The three host campsites are brand new and all we had hoped for. New lawns separated the sites which are surrounded on three sides by large fields. After a few days, I used the large riding mower to cut a path around the perimeter of the fields for better dog walks, and Lucy and Schroeder clearly seemed to enjoy exploring it. It is far enough from the chickens and ducks that they can be off leash, a real treat for the dogs, for the fowl and for us.

The first morning it became apparent that hosting here was quite different than any other place we’ve been. Hosts are encouraged to “own” the place and to use considerable initiative maintaining the mill, making any needed repairs and suggesting improvements. I’ve done a little carpentry, electrical repair, plumbing, pump repair, rigging and other stuff I’ve forgotten. We have the run of a pretty good workshop for whatever we need to tackle.

Tom Parsons has been the ranger in charge for ten years and really knows the whole site, inside and out. Luckily, volunteers Don and Penny overlapped with us through June. They have spent six months a year here for five years and are intimately familiar with every facet of the mill structure and operation. Penny is the go-to person for the ducks and chickens. Yes, three days a week we are also farmers. More on that later.

Original posts and beams

Describing this place isn’t easy. On the one hand it is OSHA’s worst nightmare because almost everything will seriously hurt you if you aren’t careful. That’s why it’s so interesting, though, because everything is right there: belts fly, pulleys spin, machinery pounds away and you are in the middle of it all, watching the whole show. Some of the belts go up (and down) over five stories, from the water powered turbines in the cellar to the top of the main grain elevator.

Water powered, and it still runs

Don and I got to figure out how to replace a belt, including making a splice when one broke. We used a tool that was on display as an artifact that might be as old as the mill, and parts that the archivist had cataloged and put in storage. It took two attempts but it’s been running for a month now.

Visitors are free to wander the grounds and the first floor of the mill, but most join us for a tour which includes visiting the basement where we can open the flume gates to run one of the turbines that is still connected to machinery on the first, second and third floors. That’s a real kick for everyone, and it never gets old for us, either. We also have a section of the mill that was electrified in the 1940’s and set up as a very live demo. Four elevator banks fly by, a corn cracker starts hammering away, and a big seed separator comes to life. Everyone gets a real kick out of that, too.

It will take weeks to finish the logos

When we arrived, the silos were encased in scaffolding and surrounded by safety fences. The roof of the silos and much of the roof support structure was being replaced. That work wrapped up in late June and the scaffolding finally came down. The painting crew moved in and spent the next week water blasting every surface of the silo to prep for paint. That really made a mess! It did get a little old trying to give tours while all that was going on, but the visitors were all understanding. Finally, a muralist began to repaint the large, colorful logos that have graced the silos for over 100 years.

This mill is the last survivor among hundreds of small water powered mills that dotted western Oregon’s fertile valleys beginning in the mid-1800’s. Few decent roads, no navigable rivers and no railroads made it a real challenge for farmers to get their wheat turned into flour. Moving grain by horse and wagon averaged just 6 miles a day, so they were enthusiastic customers for the new mill to reduce their travel times.

Top of #1 turbine

But, you couldn’t just decide to put a mill anywhere. Water powered mills need two things besides customers and capital: an adequate flow of water and a minimum “head”, or drop, of 16 feet to pressurize it. Richard Finley found what he needed along the Calapooia River and built the mill here in 1858.

Main drive shaft from #1 turbine still operates

It was his third mill, and he poured everything he learned from the first two into this one. One decision, though, probably did more to insure the mill’s survival than any other. He bought the water rights to seven miles of the river upstream of the mill. Since Oregon was still a territory in 1858, those territorial water rights were never successfully challenged by farmers or by the State right up to the sale of the mill with the water rights to the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department in 2004. In 2011, the state demolished two dams that mill owners had built on the Calapooia, restoring the river’s natural flow to assist Coho and steel head salmon spawning.

Originally roughly 3,000 square feet and two stories high, the mill is now 130,000 square feet and five stories tall, excluding the silos. Most of that expansion took place under three generations of the Thompson family, from 1891 to 1976. Despite that growth, the original mill is still in place, buried within the present structure. The mill was expanded in every possible direction, and then the expansions were expanded! The original 12" x 12" hand-hewn posts and the beams that connect them are easily seen and still make up over 50% of the mill’s machinery space. 

Building a platform over the mill race, just
part of the job

We certainly enjoyed hosting at Cape Blanco Lighthouse, but our duties were constrained by it being an active aid to navigation and by the fact that it’s mission over time didn’t change: it’s a lighthouse, period. Now we had five stories and the basement jam packed with stuff to explore and to figure out. We are not restricted from any part of the mill. We are encouraged to  poke around every floor and locate and understand as many of the bins, elevators, augers, chutes, belts and pulleys as we can. When we aren’t giving tours we clean (it takes almost 5 hours to vacuum the main floor), knock down cobwebs, mow, trim flowers, repair whatever needs it, change the store displays, or whatever else crops up. We had three sets of hosts in June and all were busy, but Tom couldn’t find someone to replace Don and Penny, so July is going to be a challenge.

We really like this part of Oregon. The Willamette Valley is very different from the coast. Home to about 300 wineries, the valley is also the second largest grass seed growing region in the world (New Zealand is first, who’d of guessed?). When we arrived, the huge fields all had a slight yellowish fog of pollen hanging over them.  My allergies immediately kicked up to the point that I was afraid we would have to quit and leave – nothing I had on hand worked at all. On a whim, we stopped at a local pharmacy in Brownsville. The pharmacist asked me a couple of questions and handed me two OTC products that I’d never heard of and I was cured. That, and Randy’s Main Street Coffee where Randy makes everything himself made Brownsville one of our favorite places in the area. Don’t miss Randy’s and the town itself if you are anywhere nearby.

We also enjoyed exploring Corvallis and Albany, small cities just a few miles apart with pretty different personalities. Corvallis is a college town, home to Oregon State University. It’s a lovely town with great charm during the summer when school is out. The population increases close to 50% when OSU is in session, which I’m told by everyone I asked makes a big impact on congestion, parking and the general tempo of daily life. No one sounded like they were planning to move, though.

A college town wouldn’t be complete without Trader Joe’s and Corvallis didn’t disappoint. It was one of the first places we went, since we hadn’t been close to one for a few months. On the same trip we celebrated my birthday at Sada Sushi & Izakaya. I had been looking forward to sushi since we left California last fall. That’s way too long between fixes, and it was really good, too. We both ate way too much.

Albany is not an academic community, but that isn’t a criticism. It’s a younger city than Corvallis, which means the streets are wider, parking is easier and the shopping is more varied and accessible. The area’s Costco is in Albany, along with Home Depot, Lowe’s and the rest of the usual suspects. We are equal distant from Albany and Corvallis, and probably spent twice as much time in Albany because the access and the stores make shopping easier.

Albany doesn’t lack charm of it’s own, though. The old downtown district is small but worth visiting. It’s nice to spend a pleasant afternoon wandering the shops and restaurants, but the highlight is the carousel. The city has come together to restore an old carousel, and it really is impressive. Hundreds of people have donated over 160,000 hours so far to rebuild, restore and operate the carousel, including carving all new animals. Each animal is sponsored and there is a waiting list. Visiting it is worth a trip on it’s own.

A month into our stint here and I think we are now comfortable guiding visitors through the mill. Like she did at Cape Blanco, Kayeanne has spent many hours poring over the records that Doug Crispin, the first ranger in charge of the mill, and several others have created. She has also watched hours of interviews conducted by Doug with the last owner of the mill and with people who worked here over several decades. She now knows the history of the place in more detail than I do. I want to take one of her tours.

Books I read this month included

             Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon

             Leave Tomorrow by Dirk Weisiger

         

More soon,

Bob

#56 – Coveys Great Adventure – May 2019 – Port Orford OR

May 2019 – Port Orford OR

Spring finally arrived at Cape Blanco, it actually got to 60°! We have promised ourselves LL Bean or Carhartt jackets before we return to the Oregon coast in the spring.

This place may be cold and wet, but the vegetation certainly loves it. You can almost watch stuff grow. We had to get the rangers to bring over a chainsaw to remove limbs that we wouldn’t clear when we left, limbs we easily missed when we arrived.

The (relatively) warm weather certainly brought more visitors. Kayeanne became good at traffic management. As you can imagine, the narrow, winding stairs in the lighthouse quickly became congested, and the constricted spaces in the watch level and the lens room really limits how many people can be in the tower at once. In addition to telling the story of the light keepers duties in the work room, she now had to control the flow up the tower. I could only handle five at a time in the lens room, which limited visitors to just a few minutes to take in the view, ask questions and take a couple of pictures. Firm diplomacy was often required.

We had been waiting impatiently for May 1, opening day for the Port Orford Coast Guard Lifeboat Station Museum. While it doesn’t have the wow-factor of the lighthouse, we really enjoyed our visit. Opened in 1934, the station served the coast for over 30 years. Don't miss it if you visit this area. The Cape Blanco Heritage Society does a great job preserving the site and giving tours. The site is also a state park, and has hiking trails to the beach and several picnic facilities.

The Hughes House also opened the first of May. It was built in 1898 by Patrick Hughes to house his large family. The house was so well built by a local architect and builder that it remains solid over 120 years later. It even has running water, and possibly the first flush toilets in southern Oregon, because he sited the house downhill from a spring that still flows today. Hughes arrived in Port Orford from Ireland in 1860 and built one of the most successful dairy farms in the area. One of his sons, James, was an assistant keeper at the lighthouse for 37 years. Hughes also built a school and hired a teacher for his and the local children. His descendants donated 1600 acres of land to create Cape Blanco State Park.

Battle Rock

We celebrated our anniversary at the Redfish restaurant in Port Orford. We wanted a special evening and a memorable dinner to mark 34 years of marital bliss, and it didn’t disappoint. The food was outstanding and the setting is remarkable. The site overlooks the coast at Battle Rock and Port Orford Head State Park. The owners also own the adjacent art gallery and select pieces are on display in the restaurant, too.

Bandon is about 25 miles north of Port Orford. It is a much larger town with a fully established tourist industry. It isn’t too tacky, though, so we enjoyed visiting it a few times. Don’t miss Tony’s Crab Shack. The fish tacos are the best that we've eaten in a long time. They make their own taco sauce by cooking down the fish bones and adding secret spices. They don’t sell the sauce and they won’t discuss the recipe; I know, I asked.

For dessert, walk a couple of blocks to the Coastal Mist chocolate shop. Leave good sense and restraint at the door. They make everything on site and it’s all delicious. I like chocolate and have eaten a lot of it. This place comes close to the one we found in Quebec City, the best we’ve ever tasted.

The food at The Spoon in Langlois is great, too

Docent work clearly agrees with us. We enjoy camp hosting; we are looking forward to doing it at Nehalem Bay State Park in September for our sixth visit. But learning about new locations and events, and talking with people from all over the world is certainly more interesting than cleaning yurts and fire pits. We are looking forward to taking on more docent assignments in the near future.

We also made new friends. Ray and Leslie moved in next door on May 1 as they transitioned from camp hosts at the state park to lighthouse hosts. We managed to fit in a couple of camp fires between the wind and rain, and discovered that we had a lot to talk about. They are practicing Dudeists, the first religion I have ever heard of that makes any sense at all. I hope they make it to Benson this winter.

At the end of the month we woke up Ripley and headed off to Thompson’s Mills State Heritage Site near Corvallis to learn all we can about the flour mill business in the 19th century in Willamette Valley.

I read a couple of books this month that I really liked:

             Splitting an Order by Ted Kooser (poetry)

             Rules of Civility by Amor Towles

More soon,

Bob

#55 – Coveys Great Adventure – Apr 2019 – Port Orford OR

April 2019 – Port Orford Oregon  

       

We arrived at Cape Blanco State Park and pulled into one of the lovely sites reserved for the lighthouse hosts. We have been looking forward to being docents at Cape Blanco Lighthouse for several months. In early March we got several documents from Greg Ryder, the ranger coordinator for the lighthouse volunteers. Besides the housekeeping stuff pertaining to camp sites, mailing addresses, etc., he also included background documents on the lighthouse, the early lighthouse keepers, and scripts that we would use while giving tours. Frankly, it was both exciting and a little intimidating. We both felt like we were going back to school and were a little worried that we would be graded, too!

Looking North. A little breezy today.

All lighthouses are very interesting, but this one is pretty special. Cape Blanco is still a functioning aid to navigation and one of the few in the country that allow visitors onto the same level as the massive lens itself. At Umpqua Lighthouse in Winchester Bay, for example, visitors can only  look up into the lens from the floor below, which is interesting but hardly the same experience as standing right next to it. I haven’t had any visitor who was even slightly blasé about it, especially when they take in the spectacular 360° views of the coast from 250’ above sea level.

The light has been in continuous operation since it was built in 1870. It’s on the western-most promontory of the Oregon coast. Originally oil burning, it was electrified in 1936. The combination of its height and intensity make the beam visible for 26 miles on a clear night.

Dress for April on the Oregon coast

The Oregon coast in April has a well-earned reputation for lousy weather. It was raining when we arrived on March 31, and it didn’t stop until April 18. Lighthouse tours close down when the wind exceeds 50 mph as measured by the National Weather Service’s weather station next door. It closed down for three days in the first two weeks of the month. One day the gusts hit 85 mph. The average wind is about 25 mph, gusting to 45 mph. It never stops. Seriously, it never stops blowing. The porta potty is installed inside a shelter and it is strapped in place. I can’t imagine what it must have been like to live on the headland for decades like the keepers did. We are somewhat protected in the campground by a forest of large trees, but all the trees on the headland were cut down to reduce fog. There is no protection at all at the light station.

Telling the story in the Work Room

Four couples share the docent duties five days a week. Two couples are on duty at a time. Each person has a specific role in helping visitors and making their visit as enjoyable as possible. 

The Greeter welcomes each visitor, gives them a brief orientation and a couple of warnings about areas that they cannot visit. The Story Teller then introduces visitors to the life of a lighthouse keeper in the days before electricity, and even before roads on this coast. The second head keeper stationed here was James Langlois, who served as head keeper for 42 years, from 1876 to 1919, and raised five children at Cape Blanco. He holds the record for lighthouse service on the West coast, maybe the entire country. Cape Blanco also employed the first woman lighthouse keeper, Mabel Bretherton, in 1903.

64 steps up to the top

Two more volunteers staff the lighthouse proper. The first is stationed in the Work Room at the base of the tower. She/he explains that oil burning lamps were used from 1870 to 1936, and introduces the equipment and procedures used during that period to maintain the light. Several original items are on display, and there are a number of drawings and pictures that explain what was involved before electrification occurred in 1936. The Work Room volunteer also acts as traffic control to pace the number of people in the tower because the stairway to the top is narrow and space on the upper levels is pretty tight.

Steep and narrow, but worth it!

The volunteer at the top of the tower welcomes visitors arriving at the Watch Level, the floor below the lens room. They explain that after lighting the original oil lamp at sunset, two keepers spent every night on the Watch Level adjusting air flues to keep the light burning as brightly as possible. At dawn they extinguished the light and climbed inside the lens to clean out all the soot from the oil flame to be ready for the following evening.

The volunteer then escorts small groups up a steep, narrow ladder to the Light Level. The lens is quite impressive, standing almost seven feet tall, five feet wide and slowly, silently rotating within the glass walled room that stands about 250’ above the sea. That lens has been in continuous operation, 24 hours a day since 1936. 

As interested as people are in the lens, it is the view that really wows ‘em. It’s the embodiment of the term “sweeping vistas”. Green grass, blue ocean, white surf and blue/green forests stretch in all directions. It really is mesmerizing. When I don’t have visitors in the tower, I just watch the birds ride the winds off the cliffs and the waves crash onto the offshore rocks and the beach. Did I mention it is windy here? Even 250’ above sea level the windows get salt encrusted.

Both of us have gone a little nuts about lighthouses. There is a trove of information on the web about lighthouses, lens designs, light technology and about the keepers and their lives. It’s amazing how tough the people who built lighthouses had to be, given where many of them are located. The keepers’ lives were also not easy, often isolated by weather and distance, occasionally for weeks at a time.

Port Orford is easy to dismiss as a slow spot along Route 101 between Gold Beach and Bandon. At first glance, it doesn’t look very interesting, but it has turned out to be just the opposite. Yes, it has just one market, one gas station, one laundromat, one car wash, one hardware store and one pot shop. See the theme? But a closer look reveals that Ray’s Market (an Oregon family chain) carries six kinds of imported balsamic vinegar, six brands of sourdough bread, makes fresh corn chips every day and smokes excellent ribs and tri-tip every weekend. The laundromat is bright and clean, and the car wash is excellent.

Then you notice the small food co-op that carries a lot of good food, right next door to The South Coast Gourmet that sells some of the best cheeses we’ve tasted and serves terrific soups, quiches and sandwiches. Just down the street is the Golden Harvest Herban Farm and Bakery that serves really, really good food, all cooked on site by people you can actually talk to. Griff’s has good chowder and fish ‘n chips, TJ’s served Kayeanne the best burger she can remember for years, and we have a few more to try to be sure we hit them all.  We are reserving the Red Fish for our anniversary, so I’ll give you that review next month.

Schroeder on rabbit watch

Anyone thinking of visiting this area should consider Cape Blanco State Park. It is small, kind of off the beaten path and very charming. The sites vary in size, but all have significant separation and most have thick bushes that screen them from the neighbors. There are several hiking trails, and beach access is decent, although not to Nehalem standards. About the only drawback is the lack of a dump station, which limits the length of time most people stay. There are several commercial RV parks and a couple of county parks with campgrounds in the local area, too. I’ll cover Bandon in the next edition.

So, this isn’t about our travels, but I wanted to mention a few books I’ve read recently that I really enjoyed:

             A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

             Standing in the Rainbow by Fanny Flagg

             Local Wonders: A Season in the Bohemian Alps by Ted Kooser

More soon,

Bob

#54 – Coveys Great Adventure – Feb & Mar 2019 – Benson AZ

#54 - February and March 2019 – Benson AZ

Some evenings are just spectacular

When I sat down to write the February edition, I realized that we spent the month living at the Co-op, hanging around with SKP friends, working on the coach and the casita, and going to doctors in Tucson. None of that seemed to be the stuff of legend that these blogs usually embody, so rather than just fill space, I decided to combine February and March. Ok, maybe sloth and indolence played a role, too. 

Really annoying

Tucson has become our medical destination. We are now firmly established with the local medical services industry that is dedicated to fixing (plucking?) the snowbirds that flock to this area every year. Get your appointments early, though, because demand is high. Tucson is roughly 50 miles from Benson, and one week we made four round trips, two in one day. Scheduling is not our strong suit.

I had been looking forward for months to getting a carpal tunnel problem fixed. The procedure worked great, but for some reason the incision has refused to close. As I write this six weeks later it is still not completely fused. It isn’t a problem as much as it is an aggravation at this point, but it is annoying to be still dealing with it several weeks later.

Bingo Queen

That problem did put a halt to my co-op volunteer activities. I usually work with the landscaping and facilities groups three days a week, and take on special projects if needed. The family honor was redeemed, however, when Kayeanne stepped into the breach. The Co-op is a local mecca for Bingo. Every Tuesday night, close to a hundred people from our park and a couple of the adjoining parks gather to do battle with Lady Luck. When a plea went out for new callers, she stepped right up and is now one of the stars of Saguaro Bingo night. 

Due to the unusually cold weather this year, unanticipated trips to Tucson and the recalcitrant incision, work on the casita didn’t move as fast as we planned. We did get the ceiling and wall joints sanded, replaced the window and door trim, installed new

The back yard

baseboards and painted everything, but we didn’t get to the wallpaper or the floor, never mind furniture. At the rate we are working, we might actually get to use it in a couple of years. We’ll see how much energy we have next winter. That said, it is nice to have a place to store things. We moved a load of books, clothes and “stuff” out of the coach, something we haven’t been able to do since we hit the road.

It's called "Out Takes." Broadway calls!

There are several annual events on the Co-op social calendar that everyone looks forward to. The Cactus Wrens provide all of the entertainment at the park and their big fund raiser is the food auction. Over two hundred dishes are prepared by members for sale, and progressive dinners and gift certificates to local restaurants are also auctioned off. This year the auction raised over $5,900. Kayeanne baked one of her signature key lime pies and it sold for $45! We won the bid for a Japanese dinner offered by one of our friends that we’ll claim in January. Saki is included!

I may have mentioned that the Co-op is the single largest source of volunteers in the town of Benson. Our members actively support the hospital, the library, the hospice and two local food assistance programs. The highly anticipated Polar Bear Party and food drive helps feed many needy people in the area. Much alcohol is involved and everyone has a really, really good time. This year about 2,600 pounds of food was collected, and over $6,000 in cash had been donated to the Benson Food Bank, doubling both totals from last year.

We were very happy when Liesa and her boyfriend Cory decided to take a road trip to visit Bisbee. We were able to get together with them a couple of times. We all enjoyed the day we spent together walking around Bisbee, one of our favorite Arizona towns. They stayed in a 1920’s era high school built during Bisbee’s mining heyday that has been converted into a really nice B&B.

Bisbee and Jerome, AZ, share a unique vibe that is distinctly different from the rest of the state. The collapse of the mining industry in both areas made real estate so cheap that hippies and artists began to move to these towns in the 60’s and 70’s, creating a local flavor in both communities that we and many others find attractive. Bisbee residents also claim to have the best climate in Arizona, and they may be right.

One of Bisbee's alleys

Remember last year we visited Chet and Cheryl Baffa at their new house near Phoenix? We managed to shoehorn Ripley into their yard and spent three great days visiting with our very close friends. Well, they recently bought a trailer, and came down to Benson to see what we have been raving about. We spent a couple of days drinking wine and getting caught up, and we introduced them to Benson and to Bisbee, too. Lunch at Ana’s Seasonal Kitchen was just as good as we remembered.

We pulled out of Benson on March 21^st, headed to our first volunteer job of the season at Cape Blanco Lighthouse near Port Orford, Oregon. We stopped in Tucson to try to get an air system problem on the coach fixed, but no dice. We spent the next two nights at Walmarts in Surprise and Bullhead City AZ, and then a night at Bear Mountain RV Park in Bakersfield, CA, all three eminently forgettable. We took a short break then, spending two nights at one of our favorite parks, The Park of the Sierras SKP Co-op in Coarsegold, CA. Think of it as Benson with trees. Raleys’ market up the road in Oakhurst has one of the best deli’s we’ve seen in quite awhile. Pass on the El Cid Mexican restaurant, though.

Emigrant Lake is just as pretty as we remember

We spent the next night at Walmart in Red Bluff, CA, and then three nights at another favorite, Emigrant Lake Park in Ashland, Oregon. All of the sites at the park have lake views, but we were lucky enough to get one of the big pull through sites that have especially good views. The county clearly takes pride in their parks and the maintenance is flawless, but a little heat in the showers would have been appreciated!

Ashland is a neat town to visit as long as the Shakespeare festival and the other major art events aren’t going on. Locals just shudder when you ask them about traffic during those times, but none of that was happening last week and we wandered around, parked wherever we wanted to and generally had a good time.

Schroeder on the mend, we hope

Schroeder continues to have issues. We took him to a vet in Benson three times to get help for his back and hips, but all that did was make him very, very sick to his stomach with the drug they prescribed. He was so bad that we took him to a vet when we got to Ashland, expecting to be told that there was nothing more that could be done. This vet really knew her dogs. She diagnosed his problem in five minutes and gave him a spinal adjustment and new meds. He has a degenerating patella that won’t heal. The new drug will help make it tolerable. He seems to be on the mend for now and we are cautiously optimistic that he will be with us for some time to come.

We pulled into our volunteer’s campsite at Cape Blanco State Park on March 30 to give ourselves a couple of days to settle in before we start giving tours of the Cap Blanco Lighthouse for the next two months. This is our first non-camp host volunteer gig and we have been boning up on the history of the lighthouse.

More soon,

Bob

#53 – Coveys Great Adventure - January 2019 – Benson AZ

January 2019 – Benson AZ

1/2/19: Sunny Arizona

Last summer our number finally came up. After three and a half years on the Hot List, we finally worked our way down to a low enough position to successfully select a lot at the SKP Saguaro Co-op. Faithful readers may recall that we have spent two or three months here every winter since 2015. We joined the Hot List that winter and waited impatiently while those ahead of us became lot holders, joined the Co-op and dropped off the list so we could move up. In July, based on a short description and a couple of pictures we “bid” on lot 19 and were the lowest Hot List number: lot 19 was ours as soon as the check cleared.

When we pulled into Benson on December 31 the office was closed until January 2, so we backed the coach onto OUR new lot and peered anxiously through the windows to see what we had done. The outside is great. It has been freshly painted and the roof is just four years old. The windows are also new, nice vinyl thermopane units. The slider work ok but is pretty dated. We’ll replace it at some point but for now I’m
going to try to find new rollers for it.

When the office opened and we got the keys, the interior was a bit of a letdown. It needs more work than we expected, not because it is in bad shape, but because it wasn’t finished very carefully. The carpentry is solid but the craftsmanship is kind of slapdash, to put it kindly. Lots of refinishing, replacing trim, adding base boards, paint, probably wall paper, certainly carpet, etc. I am finding that my enthusiasm for this kind of work has waned a little, but none of it has
to be done tomorrow, or even this year so we’ll get to it as we can.

 We love the lot. High on our “wants” list was a full concrete pad to park the coach on, and a paved walkway to the street so that the dogs didn’t have to walk on the gravel all the time. The lot has both and it’s in good shape, or will be when I patch the corner I drove the coach over. We also wanted a covered patio area and it has a small one that has some view.

This park is arranged in terraces and we wanted a rim lot. This one is on the top row on the highest level in the park with an expansive view across the San Pedro Valley to the east to the Dragoon Mountains. The setting sun shinning on the mountains is spectacular, and the play of  light across the valley is fascinating at all times. Now, if it will just warm up and stop blowing, maybe we can enjoy it!

Sunsets are pretty awesome

On of the reasons that we aren’t enthusiastically jumping into casita updates is that coach problems persist. Despite the efforts of two seemingly competent shops the rear suspension is not right. I don’t have a plan yet on how to next attack that, but it is really bugging me. Then the Aqua Hot heating system is acting up again, a problem I am really tired of dealing with. I’ll work on it when the weather is warmer, so if parts are needed we can live without it for a few days.

We start the engine about once a week to refill the air tanks (never have found that leak) and got a serious scare. The turbo boost pressure read zero. Revving the engine didn’t move the gauge. Dollar signs started flying through my head as I tried to figure out what was going on. The engine sounded completely normal. How could a turbo go bad while the engine wasn’t running? No one I talked to in the park had any suggestions. One guy very generously disconnected his engine management system and brought it over to see if that would tell us anything. It did, but we didn’t understand it at the time. I spent

RV'ing is great

hours on the internet and on the phone with Ed Woznicki trying to understand what was going on. We finally concluded that we were stuck and it was time to call a pro. Tucson Truck Service sent one of their mobile rigs out with a computer full of Cummins diagnostic software. After reading all the data exam and an exhaustive physical exam and test drive the conclusion was…no problem. I guess the hundreds of times I’ve started this coach I never looked at the boost gauge while in neutral. I watch it all the time when moving, but never noted that it doesn’t move when the engine has no load on it, even when revved up. The turbo only operates when a load is placed on the engine. An expensive lesson, but worth every penny for the peace of mind. It wore me out, though.

And, as I write this, the front slide started to leak again last night. At least I’m pretty sure what that is and how to fix it.  

Rereading that sounds very negative. All that notwithstanding, we are really happy to be back in the Co-op, especially as official lot holders. We’ve made several friends over the years and it was great to reconnect with them. We do look forward to seeing them and bringing each other up to date on what we have been doing for nine months since we last were together.

As I have described before, “Co-op” means that everyone volunteers to share all of the work needed to keep a place like this running smoothly. Think of it like a small town. There are groups and committees that take care of the extensive common areas throughout the park, maintain the structures and infrastructure, review architectural requests for modifications to casitas, plan entertainment, help take care of folks when they get sick, plan and run a very busy entertainment schedule, write bylaws, install, maintain and troubleshoot a good wifi system, operate the office, run two private tv channels, plan budgets and run community charity events (the Co-op is the largest charitable contributor in the town). We both jumped right into the thick of it: I rejoined the Landscape and Facilities groups, and Kayeanne started back up with Bingo, Helping Hands, Beading and Polymer Clay. Kayeanne is now one of the regular callers at Bingo, and I got talked into managing disposing of all the brush and cactus waste that we generate. All in all, we certainly don’t get bored.

Desert sunrise. Thanks, Ellen

Despite all the other distractions, we are beginning to fix up the casita. For this year, we’ve decided to replace the interior trim, add baseboards, refinish and paint the ceiling, wallpaper the living room and replace the carpet. There are other changes we are talking about, but we’ll wait a year or two to see if we really want to move walls, replace doors and other “stuff”. We’ll see how far we get this season.

More soon,

Bob

#52 – Coveys Great Adventure – December 2018 – UT, NV, CA, AZ

December 2018 – UT, NV, CA, AZ

For some reason, I haven't been taking many pictures lately. Since we've been to most of these places a few times, I guess the urge to immortalize them again hasn't gripped me. More graphics next month, I promise. 

Leaving Salt Lake a day early to avoid the snow storm changed our plans a little. We planned to stay in the Home Depot parking lot in Cedar City, but overnight temperatures under 20° were forecast. The coach heating system would be working too hard to cope with that, so we got space at Willow Wind RV Park in Hurricane UT instead. The 50 amp power connection let us run a couple of space heaters to help the Aqua Hot system keep us warm.

We like Hurricane and weren’t unhappy returning. We stayed at Willow Wind when Liesa lived in St. George and liked both the park and the town. It was a little shocking, though, to see the scale of home construction surrounding the town. Several large developments are underway. It seems that southern Utah is being flooded with people fleeing California. When these homes are completed and occupied, the character of Hurricane, Santa Clara, St. George and the rest of the surrounding area will certainly change. Willow Wind is effectively sold out all winter as new snow birds fill it and other RV parks in the area. I talked to two people who had sold California homes and were waiting for their new houses to be completed. It looks like prices for RV sites will continue to climb as demand appears to be increasing everywhere.

Ripley was due for annual service, so we planned to again stop at Speedco on our way through Las Vegas. Speedco is the “Jiffy Lube” for trucks and large RV’s like ours, and the one in Las Vegas is right off I15. They were busy that morning, but a couple of hours later the engine and generator had 50 quarts of fresh oil and several new filters.

While we were waiting, we noticed several RV’s in line at the Blue Beacon truck wash next door and decided to try it. What a deal: for $35, four guys power washed the entire coach using deionized water that left it virtually spotless. It takes us over four hours to wash it ourselves. We may have hand washed it for the last time. Ripley almost danced down the road.

Trying to drive from Saint George to Simi Valley in one day means fighting LA rush hour traffic and arriving after dark in Simi. We really try hard to avoid both if we can. Camping overnight in the casino parking lot in Jean, NV near the CA-NV state line lets us miss the traffic and pull into Simi in the middle of the afternoon, which is what we did.

Tapo Canyon Regional Park hasn’t changed much. I think this was our sixth visit and we feel right at home in the park and in Simi. We come here to catch up with friends, visit a couple of doctors and generally unwind after a hectic year on the road. We stayed a few days longer this year. It is so nice to see everyone and to catch each other up on our lives, families and events. We really regret leaving, but we can’t imagine returning to the pace of life in SoCal! We eagerly look forward to coming, but we are always relieved to leave.

We decided to try something different this year for Xmas. We had been staying at Jojoba Hills SKP Park in Aguanga for two weeks, but the drive back and forth to Kayeanne’s family in Hemet was too hard, especially at night, and it was too far from Ed and Christine Woznicki in San Juan Capistrano, too. This year we solved both problems by splitting the time between Meadowbrook RV Park in Perris and Golden Palms RV Resort (GPRV) in Hemet. Staying in Perris cuts the time to San Juan Capistrano in half, and the Golden Palms RV Resort is about three miles from the Wiklund enclave in Hemet. Everybody wins!

Xmas, Ripley style

We haven’t been back to Meadowbrook in three years and were pleasantly surprised to find several changes. It is essentially a 55+ residential RV park that has a few transient spaces that they rent out for extra income. The community hired a new management company a couple of years ago that has made a number of needed and highly visible improvements throughout the park. Many overgrown areas were cleared out and trees trimmed, lot holders were forced to clean up their sites and park structures were refurbished. The air of gentile seediness that we sensed before has largely been replaced by renewed pride and interest by the residents. Plus, staying here is a real bargain, so don’t tell anyone, please.

We've stayed in RV parks smaller than the GPRV pool area

GPRV couldn’t be more different from Meadowbrook. I think it may be the largest park we have ever stayed in, with almost 1100 sites, 3 pools, a snack bar, 12 pickleball courts, etc., etc. The laundry room is larger than most laundromats that we have used! It’s right in downtown Hemet, near about anything you need. We wouldn’t pay the exorbitant "regular" price, but in September they briefly offered 70% off, making it a deal we couldn’t pass up.

Liesa and Ed hangin' at Xmas

Staying at GPRV made it so much easier to visit with the family at Xmas. Kayeanne could run back and forth as often as she wished, and they could visit us without having to face a long, dark drive home.

We met Liesa at the San Diego airport and her cousin Ed drove down from LA, so almost the whole family was together. My sister and Kayeanne’s brother were the only ones missing, both suffering through winter in New England. Linda won’t fly, and Grant just moved to Cape Cod and couldn’t take the time off. We missed both of them and were glad to talk when they called.  Xmas was really nice, with way too many presents and far too much good food.

While we were in Hemet we took one more shot at fixing the air leveling and leak problem that has plagued us for months. Alliance Diesel gave it their best shot, but to no avail. I’m really reluctant to work under the coach, especially on the air system that holds the whole thing up, but so far no one seems to be able to understand or fix whatever is wrong. I’ll give it another shot in Benson.

Sunset at Cocopah in Yuma

We pulled out of GPRV on December 27 and arrived in Yuma that afternoon. It sure was nice to see affordable diesel fuel and gas prices again. CA fuel costs are really, really high. The following morning we crossed into Los Algodones MX to visit the dentist and stock up on medicines. I didn’t expect anything more than a cleaning and maybe a filling or two, but it turned out that a lot more work was needed, about $2k more! I’m not sure which hurt more, my mouth or our bank account.

On the 31st we left Yuma for Benson and pulled into lot 19 at the SKP Saguaro Co-op, our new winter home. More about that next time.

Bob