As we drove across the bridge into the Colorado River Preserve RV Park,
a part of the Thousand Trails Membership System, in Columbus TX a couple of weeks ago,
I commented to David, “well, I’ll bet this is a low water crossing.”
Having had one of these on a mail route I delivered,
I recognized that low dip in the road, with the little creek trickling under it. . .
Lo and behold, the following Wednesday,
as we thought we were leaving the park, this was the scene.. .
After five inches of rain in two hours. . .and a huge tree from upstream blocking the culverts. . .
no one was leaving the park anytime soon. . .
it looks good here, it was almost to the top of the railing when we first arrived.
At that point, we wouldn’t even consider taking our big truck across, much less a regular sized vehicle.
I told one guy, (on FaceBook,) who said we could go swimming. . .no way, that looks like class five rapids!
Once the rain stopped,
the guys at the park got out the trusty John Deere,
to move the tree, and debris, and had us out of there in short order! Good job guys. . .
Our resident Red Tailed Hawk that we’ve been watching,
caught itself a squirrel when it made the mistake of running on the ground from one tree to the other.
I had the camera out, trying to get a shot of it in flight,
when all of this took place. I was thrilled to get such an awesome pic!
Now that we’ve decided to keep the fifth wheel rather than purchasing a motor home,
we’ve gotten started with the repairs it is going to need. . .
Our big living room slide has always needed an assist.
It’s almost like they didn’t put in a quite big enough motor for all that weight.
It used to be that Dave could just go out, and give it a push as I was pushing the button inside. . .
but a couple of trips ago, it started making a horrible sound,
like gears grinding, or some such nonsense. . .so here is Dave with the crank bar.
It’s like starting a Model A. . .he cranks away, I push the button and pray. . .
however, this is not even the worst of it.
The kitchen slide opposite this one, has been hanging up in one corner. . .
but with a little assist from the trusty crank, would always just come right in.
We’ve known it was somehow out of balance. . .
but after trips to three shops where they told us they just couldn’t see any problem. . .
that it was on all it’s rails. . .nothing was out of place. . .
we just accepted using the crank as part of our normal breakdown routine.
Well, ladies and gentlemen. . .after putting it in the shop this week, we find out that, yes, it is on it’s rails. . .
however, one of the rails has come loose from the frame,
and in order to do the repair, they will need to completely remove the slide from the coach. . .oh Lord!
Not only will they remove the slide, they will remove both refrigerators from the slide,
before it is removed. . .so, we emptied out both the fridges. . .
I’m much, much too cheap to let all that stuff go to waste. . .
Thankfully, I had been holding off on grocery shopping until we got to San Antonio. . .
so this stuff managed to fit into the hotel fridge. . .
I know, I know. . .we could have came and stayed with you. . .
there were any number of friends and family who would have been more than happy to have put us up. . .
but. . .we are soooo independent. . .we keep weird hours. . .yada, yada, yada.
A hotel room was so reasonable, and we were able to be right around the corner from the shop.
That way, Mr. Dave pops in every day to check on progress!
AND. . .prayers going up, fingers crossed. . .
upon closer inspection, our service advisor says,
now they think they can make the repair WITHOUT removing the slide. . .
that sounds like really, really good news to me.
Keep us in your prayers that everything will go smoothly,
and we will be back on track in short order.
Regardless of the cost, having the repairs done
is still way, way cheaper than a motor home payment. . .
well, at least that’s what I’m telling myself. . .
Safe travels,
Janice
