Keeping connected on the road

Keeping connected is costly.

Communication is always important and more so when you are traveling. You need to keep in touch with family and friends back home as well as what is happening in the rest of the world.

Modern technology obviously makes this easier for us than the pioneers who crossed the continent in the 19^th century.

Today, we have cell phones and wireless internet service, but all technology is not considered equal.

We have already established we need a cell phone service that works out in the boonies, though what we have works great in larger towns.

Internet service also is a must for today’s travelers. I’d looked into mobile hotspot before we left home, but couldn’t decide on a provider. Some of the RV parks we’ve stayed at have provided free internet service. Yea!

Then we hit Lake Havasu City, Arizona. The park here has an arrangement with an ISP which charges significantly for time, though the price does drop to an attractive rate if you sign up for a year. I decided to bite the bullet and sign up for the week we would be here. A disaster. I spent an hour of cell phone time (not insignificant since we pay by the minute) with their techies trying to get signed up. The rate they wanted to charge was higher than posted and as quoted by one technician. During this process, their website noted my account had expired two hours before I signed up and they wanted another payment to reactivate it. Then it said my credit card was rejected – I called the bank and was told the charge had never been submitted; I told the bank to deny the charge if it should come through. It took another two phone calls the next day to get the account closed.

We then headed to the local Verizon store to get their jetpack, since this seemed to be the hotspot carrier of choice with other RVers. If this is the best, then I shudder to think about the worst. We have our own network, which is not always accessible. Pages are slow to load, especially if the battery is low, and makes dial-up look like a speed demon. When the battery is freshly charged, it works well, but one bar down and you can forget about internet service. The battery is supposed to stay charged for two days, but goes down in minutes.

We are looking at this as back-up service when parks don’t offer internet, but it seems like a high price to stay. We are supposed to get internet service whenever a cell phone signal is available. I have found the reception depends on where in the trailer the device is located. Service seems to be better when it sits to the left of my laptop; nada if it is on the right. Go figure.

RV frustrated yet?

Arizona between my feet

Are we frustrated yet?

You betcha!,

The latest frustration is probably insignificant when compared to everything that has gone wrong so far, but it is indeed frustrating.

When we left Needles, California, Monday morning, we paid $4.29 for a gallon of gas, and thought it was a bargain, since most other places wanted $4.39. Twenty miles later we were in Arizona where the first gas station was selling gas for $3.13 per gallon.

Gas prices have been all over, from a low of $3.09  to the high in Needles. I budgeted $5 a gallon.

Gosh! RV ever learning things!

Ten days into our excellent adventure, we have learned a lot of things. Unfortunately, some of this newfound knowledge was learned the hard way.

Here’s a few of the things we/I learned:

You can never find a cop when you need one.

1. We sat on the shoulder of a cold, wet and dark I-84 for two hours waiting for the Good Sam rescuer. Not once did a cop stop to see what was going on.
2. We were driving south on Highway 99 out of Sacramento, when we observed a semi driving erratically, going off onto the shoulder and then over to the other side, crossing into the second lane when cars were trying to pass the truck by in that lane. Jon called 911 to report this. Ten miles later, the semi was so far over into the other lane he missed hitting a travel trailer by several inches. Jon called 911 again and was told a cop had been dispatched. Since the semi’s license plate was dirty, the dispatcher told Jon to pass the semi and describe the tractor. This was scary indeed.
3. We had a problem with the trailer a few miles out of Boron, California (home of the 20 Mule Team Museum), and parked in a wide spot off the road for the two hours it took for Jon to jerryrig a repair. No cop stopped to see what was going on.

California’s bottle deposit law sucks.

California charges a 5-cent deposit per soda can or water bottle. In Oregon, you can get your deposit back at the grocery store when you return the container, but this isn’t how it works in California. You have to take a minimum of 10 pounds of cans (no squashed ones, please) to a recycling center where they pay you 40 cents a pound. Since it takes an average of 22 cans to make a pound, the state makes 70 cents on every pound of cans you turn in.

Don’t complain about the number of tools and parts Jon brought along.

Before we left home, I complained to Jon about the excessive amount of tools and parts he was bringing along. I won’t do this again. Given the number of problems we’ve had, those tools have come in handy.

Reliable cell phone service is a must.

We don’t use cell phones enough to justify going with a monthly plan from a major provider, so we use a pay-by-the-minute plan with an unknown provider. This worked really well in Kennewick and big towns we’ve gone through on the way, but not in smaller towns, though, fortunately, we were able to get service both times when we sat on the side of the road. We need something that is reliable almost 24/7, so one of us will probably be switching over to T-mobile soon. We took a road trip in 2006 and I remember being surprised to get cell service from T-mobile out in the middle of nowhere in Nevada.
 

A Mohave rest area



Don’t turn on the water pump when you’re hooked up to an RV park’s water system.

If you do, you’re probably going to blow out the outside water system and flood your bedroom. I learned this the hard way. Nuff said.

You never know who your neighbors will be.

The RV park where we spent New Years hosted breakfast on New Year’s Day. Imagine my surprise when the couple I was sitting with turned out to be from Hermiston Oregon, less than a 30-minute drive from Kennewick. They’ve been fulltime RVers since 2005.

You can never be too prepared.

We thought we were prepared for our new lifestyle, but obviously we weren’t, or we wouldn’t be having all the problems we’ve had.  It is not much consolation when experienced RVers tell us our problems are par for the course with newbies and that ours aren’t as bad as the problems they had starting out.

The view between my feet

The view between my feet



So far into our trip, I have looked at my feet almost as much as I have the scenery in Oregon and California. I have the snack bag and the garbage bag, as well as my purse and coat, on the floor where my feet should be. When it gets too cramped down there, I rest my feet on the dashboard.



Not a happy camper

While this is uncomfortable, I console myself by noting how much better off I am than Chester. Jon has the backseat so packed with boxes of tools and parts, helmets and assorted other mechanical things, there is barely room for Chester to ride. He normally likes to sleep stretched out, but now he has to sleep curled up in a ball. To add insult to injury, a couple of times the boxes have come loose and buried him in the back seat.

RV having fun yet?

Driving down the Columbia Gorge



When we set out on our new lives as fulltime RVers, we knew we wanted to have adventures. Well, we are certainly having our share of adventures, though I don’t know how excellent they are. The question at this point that begs to be answered is: RV having fun yet? The answer depends on what your definition of fun is.

If you think skidding all over Kennewick streets the morning we left is fun, then we are having fun.

Waiting to be rescued

If you think running out of gas just before Rooster Rock on I-84 is fun and spending two hours in a cold rain on the freeway shoulder waiting to be rescued is fun, then we are having fun. (The gas gauge showed we had half a tank left.) Note: Good Sam Roadside Assistance promised us help within 55 minutes, then sent our rescuer miles beyond where we were to Multnomah Falls. Kevin had given up looking for us at Multnomah Falls and was headed back to Portland when he found us.

If you think spending four hours in a car repair waiting room while they try to figure out why you are only getting 3 mpg is fun, then we are having fun. Note: if your car ever breaks down in Lincoln City, Oregon, we can recommend Car Care Specialists. Though they had a shop full of vehicles in various stages of being worked on, they gave priority to our truck, and at very reasonable prices, too. While we were waiting for the repairs to be done, we had lunch at a sexist Subway. It’s sexist because it has two bathrooms: one labeled “men” and the other labeled “handicapped.”

If you think having the generator almost fall off the back of the trailer is fun, then we are having fun. The RV dealer where we bought the trailer said we could mount a platform that could hold 500 pounds to the rear trailer bumper. We had less than 300 pounds, and it broke the bumper; another few miles and we would  have been picking pieces of the generator off the highway. So we had “fun” for a couple of hours, taking the platform off the bumper, and getting the generator into the pickup bed which was already filled with two motor scooters, one motorcycle and tool boxes. We managed to get everything to fit, though we now have tool boxes in the bedroom and “living room.”

If you think getting ready to pull out only to find the trailer batteries are dead and you can’t put the slides in is fun, then we are having fun. Luckily, the security patrol at Spirit Mountain Casino where we were staying was able to jumpstart the trailer battery enough so Jon could raise the front jack up, unhook the truck and then swing it around for a major jumpstart so we could charge the batteries enough to get the slides in. Note: if you’re looking for free trailer parking, the casino is great. Every employee we encountered went out of their way to make sure things were going right for us.

If you think getting a frantic call from the young man who bought your house is fun, then we are having fun. He didn’t have any heat in the living room, and I told him we never had it either, and reminded him that we had told him about this before he bought it. This will probably be the last winter the house is like this. He works in HVAC and plans to put in central heat and air this summer. Other than this, he likes our house a lot.

And if you think me trying to sell Jon’s newly-restored vintage motorcycle is fun, you are correct. Jon doesn’t think so, however. We had been planning to spend two nights at one place, but after I told Jon someone was coming by after he got off work to make an offer, Jon decided we should hit the road.

And this is only how the first three days went.

P.S.

Day 4 went well. "Day 5 was great until we blew the brakes coming down the steep grades between Arcata and Redding, California. We will welcome in the new year in Redding.

We're off! (sorta)

Our excellent RV adventure got off to an unexpected start: We're spending the first four days in a local motel.

Getting our of our house was a hassle. We were very rushed due to the fact the lender and buyer's agent kept pushing the closing date back, so we thought we had more time, which we desperately needed due to me having various health problems and ordered on bed rest. At the last minute, the title company reverted to the original closing date, and it was a mad rush to get out by Monday night. At 6 p.m. on Monday, we were ready to move the trailer out and into a local RV park until we could leave on Friday. One of the jacks broke. There was no way I was going to make Jon go buy a new jack, then take the old one off and put up the new one, and then set up the trailer at the park in the dark with a cold wind blowing, after all the 16-hour days he'd just put in

So we headed off to the Motel 6 in Richland. We like Motel 6 because they never hassle you if you're traveling with a dog. When we found out their rate was $10 a night less than the RV park's, we decided to stay here until our departure on Friday morning after my last doctor's appointment. We got a new jack yesterday and Jon hopes to install it later this afternoon. Tomorrow, we both have doctor's appointments and a few last minute details to take care of.

We'll take Interstate 84 to Portland and then decide there if we will go south along the Oregon Coast, pretty but rainy this time of year,or brave the snow over the mountains on Interstate 5.

Holiday greetings!

We're in the final stages of packing up the house in anticipation of closing on the sale in a few days, and hope to leave for warmer climates shortly after that. While we won't be celebrating Christmas in the southwestern United States this year, unfortunately, it is something to look forward to next year. Yea! No more temps in the single digits at high noon. Double yea!Wherever you spend your Christmas journey on the road this year, we wish you a wonderful holiday season and the best for 2014.