Jan 06 2010

Lake Cahuilla County Recreation Area

We are still wandering the Sonoran Desert, rather slowly and without much mileage, which is a good way to go. There are many subtle pleasures of the desert, and a primary one is taking the luxury of ignoring time and society while picking up a lot of dust on your boots. So we’ve hiked and explored, cooked dinner over an open fire, watched moonrise, and many other completely inconsequential things that encourage a relaxing of the spirit. That’s a good vacation.

However, with the holidays behind us, the world is once again getting to work and so I am being swept up in the tide of obligations once again, ready or not. Business will take us further down the road before we return to home base.

Dan and Marlene, our friends at Mali Mish, blogged about a nice park near the Palm Springs area. We’ve avoided that area in the past because of the prevalence of overpriced, snobbish (“Class A Motorhomes only”), and age-limited commercial campgrounds. But it turns out that in nearby La Quinta there is a fine county park up by the foothills, called Lake Cahuilla County Recreation Area.

I can second Dan and Marlene’s assertion that Lake Cahuilla is a fine place to stay while you’re in that area. The “lake” is actually rather small, calm, and artificial (it’s a reservoir). Swimming is not allowed. But the scene is very pleasant and the campground is friendly. Sunsets, as we discovered, can be spectacular. (Water and electric sites seem to be unaffected by the larger California state budget crisis. Still $22.)

In the previous blog I mentioned that it was time to do something about our repeated tire problems. The solution I chose, based on recommendations of people who have a lot of experience with Airstream tires, was to switch to Michelin LTX M/S tires, specifically the LT235-75/R15. We took a look at all five tires (including the spare) and the tally was two bad tires (broken internal belts), one questionable tire, and two good ones (the Carlisles we installed last September). None of them, by the way, had been patched.

The Michelins are considerably beefier than the Load Range D “Special Trailer” tires they replaced, with deeper tread and much more durable construction. They are Load Range C, but don’t get alarmed by that. The load rating for each tire is 1,985 pounds at 50 psi, which equals 7,940 pounds of total weight-carrying capacity. We never run that heavy and we use tire pressure monitors to ensure that we stay at optimum pressure.

The downside, of course, is that this is a monstrously expensive experiment. The bottom line was about $700 with installation, balancing, new high-pressure stems, California environmental fees, and tax. If the tires last two years without premature failure, I’ll be money ahead compared to the amount I spend on replacement ST tires, not to mention the hassle. I’m told the Michelins will wear longer in addition to being more resistance to belt failures.

A lot of people have tried going to a 16″ Michelin XPS Rib tire, and I considered it as well. But the Michelin LTX allowed me to avoid changing the wheel rims, which cut the cost of switching considerably. They also fit better in the Airstream wheel well. Whether this change will solve the problem of the constantly-failing ST tires remains to be seen. I’ll report as we go. [UPDATE April 2015: I’ve had these tires for over five years and over 40,000 miles. Not one problem.]

While we had the wheels off, we had the opportunity for a brake check, too. The Kodiak disc ceramic brake pads were, as always, wearing more on the outer pad than the inner, and it was time for replacement. It has been a year since the last wheel bearing re-pack as well, so I decided to plunge in and get it all done at once. It has been an expensive service stop, but adding up everything we did in 2009 and this early 2010 session, we are still within annual budget we set for service and maintenance when we were full-timing ($2,000 per year).

Jan 03 2010

The sinking Dutchman

Our plan for the day was to go hike out in the desert somewhere, with Alex and Charon. But along the way we spotted a dejected man walking along the road with his thumb out. He didn’t look like the typical hitchhiker, but rather like someone whose car had broken down along the road and was walking out for help. So we stopped to get the story.

Turned out he was a European living in San Diego, and he’d bought an old Subaru a few weeks before. He’d decided to take it out into the desert to try driving on the sandy washes and 4WD roads, but he wasn’t very good at it. He got a mile or two before crashing into a sandstone wall. According to him, the car was “stuck against a wall.”

Getting a tow truck out to this part of the desert and two miles down a 4WD road is not something you want to do. Not only might it take a few days to get assistance, the cost of the tow could easily exceed the value of a 1998 Subaru.

We took our car out to the accident site and found the car kissing the stone and sunk into deep sand. It had a mangled front right fender but otherwise was in good condition. We easily freed the car from the deep sand and took a look at the damage. The engine air filter canister was crushed against the tire, making steering impossible. The front of the car’s frame was bent, and the fender, bumper, and foglight were a total loss.

The nice thing about working on a wrecked car is that you don’t have to be particularly careful about how you remove parts. Since my toolbag was back at the Airstream, our tools were a Leatherman and the car’s scissors jack. It’s amazing what you can do with those two items. Alex cut away big chunks of the plastic inner wheelwell and together we bent the bumper, fender, and air filter canister out of the way.

The tire was still rubbing at this point, so we swapped the wheel for the temporary “donut” spare, which takes less space in the wheelwell, and — ta-da! — the car was sort of drivable. Our Dutchman backed the car down the wash a few hundred feet, stalling the engine five times and scraping the undamaged side of the car against sandstone as he went. He wasn’t a very good driver. When we left, he was consulting his maps to figure out how to drive this wreck back to San Diego without exceeding 50 MPH or turning left.

Now, this episode gives me a chance to talk about desert survival. By making a few simple mistakes, you can turn a simple problem into a life-threatening emergency. We saw a lot of those mistakes today. First off, the driver had a couple gallons of water in the car — smart move. But when he went hiking two miles through the desert to seek help, he didn’t take the water. He left it in the car! Needless to say, it doesn’t do any good there.

Second, he wasn’t aware of his location. When we found him, he was walking east. In that direction, it was 25 miles to the first services of any kind. He never would have made it. If he had headed west, he would have encountered services in less than five miles, and a group of campers in about two miles. He had maps with him, but he either didn’t consult them before he set out, or he didn’t understand them. They were also left in the car.

Third, he disregarded a simple idea: stay with the car. The wash he was in was a popular route, on Sunday of a holiday weekend. Someone was bound to come by in an hour or two. In fact, while we were there, two other cars came through the spot. Any of them could have given him a ride to assistance, which would have been a lot wiser than going for a walk in the wrong direction without water. The car also would provide shelter from the sun if needed.

Fourth, he was inexperienced and driving alone on a 4WD road. Bad idea.

Fifth, he was off-roading in a Subaru Outback. I’ve owned a couple of Subarus. The 1998 Outback has a great All-Wheel Drive system, but only 7.3 inches of ground clearance. That’s not enough for the kind of deep sand and ruts found on these washes. The key on that sort of road is not just traction, but high clearance. We go out with 10.9 inches of ground clearance and there are still a lot of sections I won’t attempt.

Saving this guy’s bacon put us an hour behind schedule, but we still had time to drive out on another 4WD road and enjoy lunch high up on a sandstone ledge. An easy mile-long hike followed, up to the Wind Caves that we like to explore. I think we had a much better day than the soon-to-be-ex-Subaru owner.

Sadly, this is our last day of R&R. We’ve got to get on the road Monday, but not heading home yet. Our travels will continue for at least 4-5 more days.

Jan 01 2010

Desert vacation

It is 2010 and good things lie ahead.

Christmas was a quiet success in our household. Since we are thousands of miles from our extended family, we used Internet technology on Christmas morning to videoconference with my parents and brother while we opened gifts. I thought it would seem strange to have the family on a laptop screen, perched atop a box in the living room but it was surprisingly like having them there with us. This may become a Christmas tradition in homes across America, replacing the horror of holiday air travel for many.

Just two days after Christmas, we took off to California for some desert camping. Almost every trip I take is a working trip, but once in a while I like to try to avoid work and just do the stuff that normal people do in a campground, and the hope was that this quiet week between Christmas and New Year’s Day would allow that.

On the way we stopped in Yuma to visit with Barb & Joe of MobileInternetSatellite. A couple of years ago I bought a used Hughes satellite Internet system from my friends Brian and Leigh, who had recently completed two years of full-timing. The price was right and I thought I might use it for an extended trip into Mexico. But that was before the Mexican Drug War ramped up. We found other things to do and the satellite dish gathered dust in our storage closet. With the smaller Mercedes as tow vehicle, carting around the satellite dish became less practical and I decided to try to sell it through Barb & Joe.

Unfortunately, satellite dishes are being replaced by cellular aircards, which for most people provide faster, cheaper, and highly portable Internet. The only folks who need satellite are those who spend lots of time parked beyond the reach of cellular networks and commercial wifi hotspots. So selling a dish is pretty tough these days, even one that comes complete with all the accessories.

Now that we are out in the desert, we are experiencing the sort of quiet and vigorous life we have come to like. There are hikes up palm canyons by day, and the soft sounds of birds each morning (Gambel’s Quail and hummingbirds in particular). In the evening there is the smell of tamarisk wood fires. (Since tamarisk is an unwanted invasive species, cutting it down is often encouraged.)

It’s a little cool once the sun slips behind the mountains at about 4 p.m., but shortly after sunset we have the compensation of a startlingly large and brilliant full moon rising. People in the campground are wrapping up in warm clothes and spending the night outside regardless of the temperature, which as been bottoming out in the 40s.With clear skies most of the time, nights have been bright enough that we don’t need a flashlight to walk around. When there were clouds on Wednesday, they just added to the drama of the surrounding mountains.

Little desert-related surprises come to those who watch, like the tarantula that wandered by our campsite yesterday. (Eleanor got some video of that.) So we are making no plans and letting each day come. Most importantly, I’m not getting any business phone calls and virtually no emails of importance, so the computer is off except for an hour in the morning.

I have been getting more of the “how does that car tow that big Airstream” comments this week than usual. Everyone seems to be shocked when they see the Mercedes parked in front of the Airstream. I’ll answer questions for anyone who is really interested, but most people just boggle at the sight and then wander off. I don’t think they really care to learn the details; they’d rather just enjoy the novelty of it.

The one big frustration of the week has been, once again, a tire failure on the Airstream. One of the older tires (date code August 2008) is showing a worn spot, approximately round and rather uneven, that suggests yet another internal steel belt has broken. It will need replacement shortly.

Well, that’s the final straw. I have not been able to wear out a set of tires since 2006, because they keep failing internally. We replaced two in September for the same reason, and many others over the past few years. We’ve been using the factory-recommended Goodyear Marathons (designated “ST” for Special Trailer use, load range D) as well as similar tires by Carlisle, Trailer King, and TowMax. We have had, frankly, a completely unacceptable experience, with multiple failures over the past three years. It’s 2010 and time to try something different.

I didn’t come to this conclusion lightly. We have eliminated as many possible causes of tire failure as possible. We tow at 65 MH or less, we’ve weighed the trailer, we balance the tires and also use Centramatic wheel balancers. We use a tire pressure monitoring system to ensure proper inflation at all times. We’ve aligned the axles of the trailer annually, most recently in September. I inspect the tires at every fuel stop. Still, the treads keep suffering rapid tire wear in localized spots.

I’m going to toss all the tires and try a different tire design (not an ST) very soon. Right now I’m gathering consensus from some respected experts, and comparing various alternatives. Some people swear by Load Range E tires, others use LT (Light Truck) tires, and some say that bias-ply designs are the answer. Some think a particular brand makes the difference. What I find interesting is that so many people have trouble with ST tires that are supposedly designed for trailer use, and yet have more luck with tires that aren’t specifically designed for trailers. As one experienced Airstream dealer said to me this week, “ST just means it’s a tire that isn’t good enough for passenger use!”

I’ll report further on the tires we choose, and our experience with them, a bit later. With a little effort and a little luck, I won’t be talking about tires much in 2010 … I hope.

Dec 27 2009

They’re blowing up the bridge

Since 1929, when New York Governor Franklin D Roosevelt inaugurated it, the Champlain Bridge has been the preferred way to get across the southern portion of Lake Champlain — and tomorrow (Monday, December 27, 2009), they’re going to blow it up.

Lake Champlain runs about 140 miles north-south, dividing New York and Vermont. It’s the sixth-largest freshwater lake in the US (right after the five Great Lakes), and quite deep at up to 400 feet, but most people have never heard of it. I grew up on the shoreline of this lake and it’s not too much to say that it has been a defining element of my life. In addition to being recreation, scenery, and weather-maker for lakeside residents, Lake Champlain is a barrier between the Adirondack region of upstate New York and most of Vermont.

I remember as a child looking at the broad lake, which was three miles wide where we lived. To me it was an ocean, crossable only by a grand voyage in a ship. Beyond lay the uncharted land of New York, which I had rarely seen on foot. One day I heard there was a “bridge over Lake Champlain,” and for months I had dreams of a mythical bridge that somehow crossed miles of open water.

There are a few ways to cross the lake. There’s a boring causeway bridge over the shallower part of the lake up by Rouses Point NY, near the Canadian border. Several ferries cross the lake at various points, and a very short bridge crosses the extreme southern end where the lake peters out to a mere canal. But in the middle, where the the lake is wider, the Champlain Bridge has been the well-worn path for decades, joining the rural town of Chimney Point, VT with Crown Point, NY.

It was an amusing surprise when I first found it during a random exploration at age 18 with my VW. After all those years of knowing that there was a bridge over Lake Champlain, but not knowing where it was, I felt like I’d found a secret passage. The bridge was nothing like I expected. Rather than being long and flat, it was dramatically arched and crossed the lake at a narrow spot (1/2 mile). But that made it even more fun. I was happy to pay the $0.50 toll and for the first time, drive my little 1967 VW Bug over the lake to New York state. (The one-way toll was discontinued in 1987.)

Every time I’ve crossed the Champlain Bridge since, I’ve been struck by its uniqueness and beauty. It rises steeply up, hundreds of feet above the water, far higher than necessary since no tall ships can navigate this shallow part of the lake. For some, the sharp rise brings a touch of vertigo, which is exacerbated by the narrowness of the bridge. Just two 1930’s-era lanes cross the bridge, so that as you are carefully studying the painted lines, you are also intimately acquainted with fellow bridge travelers heading the other way.

From the top, the view is always spectacular, like riding to the top of a Ferris wheel. The lake tends to be calmer at this shallow channel, with gently rippling and brilliant blue water lined by pine trees and backdropped by the Adirondacks. When you land (heading west), you find yourself in the midst of the ruins of a historic Revolutionary-era fort at Crown Point and a pleasant little campground.

I have never crossed the bridge without wanting to stop and take in the view. Alas, that is impossible. The bridge has no pedestrian lane, no place to stop, and during the summer it is always busy. I once rode my bicycle over it on a summer day, and hoped to be able to pull off to the side, but there were too many cars. I had to pedal furiously to keep up with the traffic (speed limit 25 MPH) while throwing glances to each side in an attempt to memorize the view.

Perhaps that was actually a good thing. For the past several years, it has been obvious that the bridge was deteriorating. Maintenance was never able to keep up with the rusted steel and crumbling concrete. Towing the Airstream across the bridge (as we did at least twice a year), I couldn’t help but think of our 14,000 pounds flexing the elderly span, and filling every inch of the narrow lane between steel abutment and oncoming traffic. With a closer look at the bridge, I might have lost my interest in driving over it.

The bridge is a mess. Road salt, freezing/thawing lake ice, and generally tough weather conditions have destroyed the bridge’s structural elements to the point that it is practically unfixable. The state sent divers down in to the murky lake water to look at the piers and they came back with some disturbing video. After a bunch of public hearings and Vermont-style debate, the conclusion was to blow it up and start over. We’ll all be able to watch the kaboom live on the Internet tomorrow here, which beats the heck out of standing around in the cold to see it in person.

Eighty years since the bridge was completed, designs have changed. New York State has floated a few design concepts, none of which look quite as exciting as the old arched steel span, but I expect that at least they will feel and be safer as we tow the Airstream over them again in years to come. In summer 2010, when we return to Vermont, the new bridge will likely still be under construction, so we’ll use one of the ferries or the southern route instead. I will definitely look forward to the new bridge, even though the bridge that I remember so well as the one that first opened up my traveling ways will gone.

Bridge photos courtesy of NYSDOT

Dec 23 2009

Vintage Airstreams and Modernism

Hey, west coast vintage Airstream owners: there’s a Modernism show happening in February 2010 in Palm Springs, and they want YOU to show up!

Modernism Week is an annual event in Palm Springs, CA, filled with exhibits, presentations, and house tours. The Ace Hotel is planning to show vintage Airstreams along a promenade that winds through the hotel property, and sell tickets to tour the trailers at $10 per person. If you’ve got a restored vintage Airstream up to 26 feet in length, they want to hear from you.

Other than open houses at rallies, it’s not that often that vintage Airstream owners get to show off their trailers. Classic car shows are a dime a dozen, but classic trailer shows are a lot more scarce.

Of course, coming to events like this can be expensive for the owner. Fuel alone for me to tow our 1968 Caravel to Palm Springs would run about $200 round-trip. The hotel is offering to share 1/3 of the receipts from tours with the trailer owners to help defray the cost. No telling how many participants there will be on the tours, but they do plan to offer four tours on Saturday, February 20, at 10:00, 11:00, 1:00, and 2:00. I wouldn’t count on this to cover my fuel, but it’s better than nothing — which is what you usually get for displaying your Airstream.

The hotel has reserved a room for each vintage trailer, so participants won’t be actually camping. You can stay in the hotel instead, at no cost. From the website, the Ace Hotel looks like an interesting and fun sort of place.

Participating owners are asked to bring a “fact sheet” to hand out to people on the tour, and are encouraged to make a poster board display with information about the trailer and its restoration. Also, if you’ve got a vintage trailer to sell, you can make it known during the event, which would probably yield some offers.

If you are interested in participating, email Christy Eugenis for an application. You’ll need to give some info about your trailer and include interior and exterior pictures. Deadline is January 15, 2010.