On The Road Again

The storm offshore

Harley Dog and I woke up alive! Yippee doodle doo doo!

We traveled yesterday and traveled today. Didn't get very far. The GPS froze up in Richmond Hills, Georgia and it claims we are still there, but we aren't. Of course I have no GPS to tell us where we are either. My cell phone is erratic and the backup one, that usually works in weird areas, if you give it some money, well it died completely. Good grief. Technology melting down everywhere.

We were just passing through Richmond Hills, stopping by the Dollar Tree for provisions. Everything is $1 or less at the Dollar Tree, so it makes it easy and affordable to load up on provisions, since they carry food and household supplies. I had not shopped for food in 29 days other than splurging on ice cream and eggs at the park store. Some of that spare change we found picking up litter this summer, went for ice cream! The cashier was bemused as I handed her 4 baggies of 25 pennies each plus assorted nickel and dimes. (I hoard all quarters separately for laundry or tolls or parking fees. )

Yepper, I have a unique way of managing funds.

Well, the emergency pantry full of sale and dented goodies, saw us through the rest of the 29 days when the refrigerated goodies ran out plus Harley mail-ordered his dog food to be delivered (lucky dog)  then an angel sent him a bag of organic treats and an oh so fluffy purple blanket that we are fighting over. Harley says it's his, I say it's mine.

So I bribe him with treats and snatch the blanket back. Tee hee hee.

We pulled over at a  truck stop in Brunswick so I could move the bicycle from the homemade back rack to the inside of the motorhome. I was planning to let Blue Beacon about a half mile away,  give the rolling doghouse her semi-annual power wash (a huge bargain for only $28).

I managed to get the bicycle moved inside, but the effort made me so tired, I thought I would take a quick nap. When I woke up, it was dark thirty and we still hadn't washed the RV. Now it was too late to get into a campground. So we spent the night at the truck stop, but it got so c-c-cold it woke me up again. I turned on the computer to watch a movie while I piled on more clothes and blankets. When the the laptop battery died, I plugged in the inverter (which runs off the RV battery) to recharge the laptop. It worked for awhile then the inverter squeaked and died too! Oh my gosh.

So no GPS, no inverter. I decided to run the generator so I could heat the bed, it has a mattress warmer because it's over outside storage area and it makes it cold as an ice cube at time. I watched some of the movie and turned on the electric heat pump to warm the doggy. A few hours later, the carbon monoxide alarm rudely woke us up. I was sleeping fine through all the noise of the truckers and highway but the alarm got me out of bed quickly. Turned off the generator, opened all the windows. This made the alarm happy enough to shut up again. But now we were cold. All our warmth blew out the open windows.

I love the jungle look of Hunting Island, I would love to be a castaway here for about 10 years.

It was nearly daylight, so I drank some of yesterday's coffee, after heating it up on the propane stove,  then headed out to wash the RV. Long line there, so we were having a leisurely time. Harley and I played on the grassy field by the truck wash while we waited.

A dim light bulb came on in my silly head. Bingo! I figured out a way to block the refrigerator vents, so the power washing wouldn't get the wiring wet (for good luck!). I turned off the fridge, opened up the outside vent which exposes the wiring and innards and workings. I used two floppy chopping mats to block off the area. They fit perfectly! Then I put the vent back on. Once they were through power washing, I removed the vent, removed the floppy plastic chopping mats, put the vent back on, then went inside to turn the fridge back on.

For you sticks and bricks folks, an RV fridge typically runs on both electric and propane, depending on what's available. The fridge is built into the motorhome or travel trailer or caravan with an outside access vent that helps keep it cool (as it heats up to cool down.)

About a year ago, when I had the rig power washed, the fridge stopped worked 2 weeks later, and needed a new control board wired in. Whether from power washing or sheer coincidence, I have no idea, but I LOVE my fridge, having lived over 10 years with no refrigeration on a boat at sea, so this time I wasn't taking any chances. Last spring when I had the rig power washed, I asked them to avoid the fridge vents, but they avoided the whole area, so I ended up with a big dirty section where they skipped the vent and four feet left and right, above and below in every direction.

I've tried washing my own RV by hand and three weeks later when I finished, it didn't look any better, but those power wash guys used soap, suds and magic then rinsed her clean again. The pressure wash gizmos they use really get the gunk out. With all that grime gone, we are surely getting better gas mileage. I better hurry up and take pictures while she looks so good.

I just wanted to throw open the doors and ask the guys to power wash the inside too!

Today after all that and a few more provisioning stops for bargains I was having some medical problems. So I mapped out a campground nearby to aim for. Now I am POOPED out tired. But the new place is rather nice, never been here before. Will explain more about it later.

 I have a method to my budget madness, of mapping out the bargain shops in route to my next campground. It saves gas, saves money and we end up plenty happy with all our needs met. Life is goof!

New islands forming!

All pictures are from our stay at  Hunting Island, even though this article is about rambling and rattling down the road.

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