May 22 2012

Something stupid under the hood

In the last blog our trip through Colorado was just beginning. Colorado is always interesting for the many mountain passes that offer spectacular views, dramatic climate changes, and occasionally an exploded bag of chips in the closet. Altitude changes everything, especially in a rolling house. For example, we’ve learned over the years to be very careful when opening toothpaste after a tow up to higher altitude, as an air bubble in the container can result in you ending up with a lot more toothpaste than you needed at the moment.

This trip was uneventful except for a strange loss of power when climbing, and another Check Engine light on the car as we approached the Eisenhower Tunnel on I-70. We were at 11,000 feet, but since the car is a turbodiesel the altitude should not have affected the power quite as much as it did. This called for an appointment at the Denver Mercedes dealer, but I also called Super Terry for a consultation once we were settled into our campground.

Super Terry suggested I look for “something stupid” under the hood, so I did and immediately discovered that one of the two cold-air intakes to the engine was disconnected. Our home dealership had just serviced the engine last week, touching this very intake hose. This seemed like a proverbial smoking gun, but S.T. advised having the Denver dealer check it out anyway, just to make sure the problem wasn’t something more serious. The diagnosis turned out as I expected: the Check Engine light was caused by the disconnected air intake, which allowed hot engine air to get in where cold air was expected. The bill for this diagnosis was $132, which I have passed on to the dealer that disconnected the line, for their careful consideration. Ahem. [Update: they agreed to credit us the full amount against a future service.]

There was supposed to be an annular solar eclipse on Sunday evening, but clouds in Denver prevented us from seeing most of it. A shame, as there won’t be another one in North America for many years. We had even built a cereal-box viewer for the occasion.

But our evening was not entirely dull, as we had an unexpected visit from the Zimmer family, local owners of a 1963 Airstream Safari. They were passing through the park and spotted our Airstream, and ended up coming in for a tour and visit.

The big point of coming to Denver was to conduct a site visit of Lakeside Amusement Park, where we will be holding Alumafandango in August. I met up with Brett Hall of Timeless Travel Trailers and we walked every inch of the site to consider logistics such as power, parking, entry /exit points, seminar space, sewage, lighting, etc. There’s a tremendous amount of work that goes into prepping for a big event like this, and it’s doubly complicated when you are basically trying to build a campground too. Still, it looks like we’ll be ready in time. (By the way, there’s a new Wal-Mart going in next door but it won’t be open until November.)

One of the nice parts about walking Lakeside in the heat yesterday was the informal guided tour we got from Brett Hall. He has been associated with the park for decades as the Consulting Engineer, and has done a lot of historical research. The place has quite a few interesting stories. Brett will be leading guided tours of the park during Alumafandango so everyone who comes can hear the tales.

Now that the site visit is done and the car is set, we have one day to do work, household stuff, and school before we head east. Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday will be roadtrip days either on I-80 through Nebraska or I-70 through Kansas. That’s a drive of about 1,250 miles. We don’t have any particular plans or stops worked out along that route, since it’s just going to be a slog if we are going to get to Ohio on schedule. I always feel badly about short-changing NE or KS when we go through in a rush, but long-time blog readers know that we did make many stops in those states back when we were full-timing.

Meanwhile, the phone is ringing like crazy lately, as people with last-minute Alumapalooza questions are popping up. Like us, many of the attendees are already on the road, and others are packing to leave next weekend. Everybody seems pumped, which helps us, because as close in on our big week of Alumapalooza, we can feel rising tension and excitement. Alumapalooza is a great week but also a really tough one for those who work the event. It feels to me like the days before the opening of a musical. Despite all the rehearsals and planning, there’s always a fear that something might go wrong … until the moment you open the curtain and realize it’s all going to work out just fine.

May 19 2012

Colorado National Monument, Grand Jct CO

As we expected, the cool night in Sunset Crater National Monument’s “Bonita” campground was excellent for sleeping. The first night in the Airstream is sometimes a little hectic, since we are adjusting to life in 200 square feet again, and we are usually still figuring out where things should go. That tends to keep us up late, but this time I was so exhausted I collapsed at about 8:45, and E&E were not far behind.

We didn’t have time on this trip to go to the companion park, Wupatki National Monument (connected by about 20 miles of loop road), so we made a note to come again sometime. Wupatki offers five ancient pueblos and some box canyon dwellings, all of which we’d like to see. We packed up and headed out at 8:30 with the intention of making some serious miles—but also covering some seriously scenic territory.

The route we planned was sort of a Arizona/Utah dream trip, up Rt 89A and then Rt 160 deep into the Navajo Nation, then up through the incredibly beautiful red cliffs and buttes of Monument Valley, and then up the edge of Utah past some great parks we’ve visited before (Hovenweep, Natural Bridges, Canyonlands), through Moab, and finally into Colorado.

The route goes up and down quite a lot, but I never saw us below 4,400 feet and never much about 7,000. The important thing is to bring three items: a camera, a bucket of time so you can stop frequently, and a full tank of fuel. There are fuel stations but of course prices tend to run high in the more remote areas. We had the cameras and fuel but not as much time as we would have liked, so for us it was primarily a driving tour (and a fine one).

I am happy to report all systems are functioning well on the Airstream and Mercedes. The Merc did an odd thing yesterday during a steep climb, giving us a Check Engine light. It wasn’t overheated and the light cleared itself overnight. I can’t detect any issues with the car, so I’m not going to sweat it for now. The car’s computer will store the fault code and we can get it read out later if we want. The Airstream seems perfect. The fridge is cold, the tires needed no air at all (after five months of storage!), the hitch is silent, etc. At this point we’ve run up about 700 miles and everything is fine, although I’m noting a few things I’d like to update soon.

We stopped at a rest area south of Moab where there’s a great sandstone arch that you can easily climb to. If you are in this area and missed Arches National Park, this is a nice consolation prize. You can also get a nice shot of your Airstream down below in the parking lot if you want (and of course, I did).

We decided to make our overnight stop at Colorado National Monument, in Grand Junction CO. Faithful blog readers Jay & Cherie suggested we stop at the James Rob Colorado River State Park, which is just off I-70 at the same exit as the National Monument. We checked it out and it does look very nice, but this we had our hearts set on driving up to the monument. We’ve been here twice before and never managed to camp in the monument’s Saddlehorn campground, so it was nearly a mandate for us.

There was another reason for coming up the extra few miles to the monument. We’ve recently acquired a GoPro Hero2 sports video camera for use at Alumapalooza, and I wanted to try it out shooting a video of the Airstream climbing the hairpins and tunnels that lead up to Colorado National Monument. We shot video looking forward on the way up, and we’ll shoot video looking backward tomorrow morning, on the way down. I’ll have the video edited and uploaded to YouTube in the next few days, and I’ll post when it is available. Should be very interesting!

May 18 2012

Sunset Crater National Monument, Flagstaff AZ

We’re off … and blogging again.

This time of year the sun comes early into the east window of our bedroom. It may have been the bright light, or just the anticipation of finally taking off in the Airstream that got Eleanor and I up and working on the final prep at 6 a.m. We needed to start that early if only to avoid the heat that quickly builds each morning in Tucson in May. I let the air conditioner run in the carport as long as possible just to offset a little of the heat that the Airstream was destined to absorb today. Around 9:30 a.m. we were ready to go, so I unplugged the trailer, pulled it out into the sun, gave it a quick rinse to get the worst of the storage dust off, and then we were off.

Our drive today brought us west on I-10 to Phoenix, then I-17 north all the way to Flagstaff. I-17 heading north has a couple of tough climbs, the type where signs warn “Turn off air conditioner to avoid overheating”. They mean it. It was about 95 when we hit the first steep grade north of Phoenix. I watched the engine temperature and mostly it was stable, but there was one point at which it started to rise and so we went without a/c for a few minutes.

The GL320 is a good tow vehicle in most circumstances, but its weak spot is climbing steep grades. Anything over 8% with our 7,000 pound trailer in tow means slow going. We usually end up with the 18-wheelers, moaning up the hill at 35 MPH with flashers on, while cars zip by at 65. That’s the result of having 400 ft-lbs of torque, but only 210 horsepower. It’s kind of like having a diesel tractor. We always get there, but we don’t get there fast. I don’t sweat this, because the slow part ends up being five or ten minutes out of an eight-hour drive, which hardly seems worth getting excited about. The rest of the time we can tow at any speed we care to.

After a few hours the brown desert began to give way to the pine forests and cooler temperatures of high altitude. Flagstaff is at about 7,000 feet, only a part-day drive from Tucson but worlds away in terms of climate and geography. We stopped here to pick up 20 gallons of diesel and then headed north on Rt 89 towards Page, with the intention of continuing on to Navajo National Monument, a place we’ve visited and enjoyed before.

And then something great happened. We passed by a sign for Sunset Crater National Monument, and Eleanor said, “Why don’t we stop here instead?” It was only 3:30 in the afternoon and we hadn’t covered the miles I had hoped for. I wanted our first day out to be a big one, so we’d have less pressure in the next two days to get to Denver. But I was feeling tired, and we’d never visited Sunset Crater before, and there was a little blue symbol by the road indicating that it had a campground. We considered the pros and cons, and then turned around and drove a mile back to Sunset Crater.

This turned out to be a good choice. Sunset Crater offered much more than we expected. As you drive in a few miles along the entrance road, there’s a spectacular view of the dormant volcano, and you can immediately see from the red and purple cinders along the crater’s edge how it got its name. It is just beautiful.

The campground is very nice (no hookups, $18), with sites set among tall Ponderosa pines and well spaced. We parked the Airstream in site #13 and headed to the Visitor Center, which was small but well-done. Then we drove a short distance to the one-mile Lava Trail and took a walk to get a better view of the volcano and shake off the hours of travel.

It was a stunningly beautiful afternoon, with temperatures in the 70s, beautiful sunshine, dry air, and a pleasant breeze. You couldn’t ask for a better day to visit this great National Park, and yet the campground was half empty (on a Friday night) and the trails were uncrowded.

We had all changed into long pants and grabbed sweatshirts for the trail, and as the afternoon began to fade we were glad we had them. It seems like the heat of Tucson was weeks ago, but we have a souvenir in the Airstream—it’s 80 degrees inside from the heat accumulated during towing. That will fade quickly. Tonight we are expecting a low of 37 degrees in the campground. Eleanor and I added blankets to our bed and we expect to sleep well and rise early. Our roadtrip is well and truly begun.

May 17 2012

The night before departure

The Airstream is loaded and we are aiming to depart at 8 a.m. tomorrow morning.

Of course, that won’t happen —it never does, because there’s always 55 last-minute things that need attention, and Emma is groggy if woken before noon, etc. But at least the intention of leaving at eight means that Eleanor is feeling fairly optimistic about our packing process this year. If we actually get out at 9, it will still be a reasonable start by our lax standards, for a multi-month trip. It means we started early enough on the packing process and weren’t left with a lot of last-minute things to do.

You’ll note I said Eleanor was feeling optimistic. I emphasize her because she’s really the Chief Packer in our family. I pack my personal gear and all the stuff I need for business, plus I take care of the Airstream and car. If I hurry, I can have all of this done in a couple of days, otherwise four or five days. Eleanor has the harder job: packing her stuff, all the household gear, and (most challenging of all) Emma’s stuff. This takes at least a week every year.

The major problem is that darned children keep growing and changing. So the toys, books, crafts, clothes, shoes, sundries, and even foods that were perfectly suited to a kid in 2011 have little to do with what she’ll require in 2012. And that’s in addition to figuring out a multi-functional, all-weather wardrobe that fits into a couple of plastic bins and four tiny drawers. Inevitably this means shopping for all kinds of things: clothes that fit, replacement batteries, foods that pack well, new games (lately on the iPad, another sign of change).

I’ve struggled a little this time with packing as well, but not nearly as much. These days I’m packing for magazine publishing, Alumapalooza, a brief visit in Vermont (possible lake activities), and (Dr C, avert your eyes!) a motorcycle tour through upstate New York. That translates to roughly 50 pounds of books (Newbies, Tin Hut, Wally Byam), 30 pounds of technological gadgetry such as computers and cameras, a Dutch Oven, quite a bit of bulkiness in the form of apparel that will be for sale, plus one high-visibility armored motorcycle jacket and full-face helmet. Eleanor is also doing two cooking demonstrations at Alumapalooza, which means she’s toting extra ingredients and tools too. All of this has to go somewhere in the confined storage of our 216 square foot home.

This is what really makes it tricky. When faced with this sort of problem, most people either get a bigger RV or a bigger truck, which explains the popularity of massive Class A motorhomes and sky-scraping fifth wheels. We could make life much easier on ourselves if we traded the Mercedes GL320 for a 3/4 ton pickup truck with a fiberglass bed cap, but that’s not our style, so we instead we spend extra time meticulously deciding what can come with us, and where it will fit. This forces us to be ruthless about leaving behind things we really don’t need. Eventually all the important stuff gets in there, even things one might not expect. Two years ago we made the trip with a four-foot fiberglass greyhound on the bed, destined for a friend in Chicago.

We tend to pack like submariners. As we depart, the trailer is stuffed to the gills with food and supplies. As we travel, the space gradually clears out. I’ll sell the t-shirts and books, we’ll drop off gifts and deliveries to friends along the way, we’ll eat the food, and thereafter we’ll be more careful about what we acquire so that the interior remains liveable. We try to buy very little that is not consumable, and tend to come home with a freezer full of interesting foods, but not much else in the way of souvenirs. These are habits that come from years of full-time living, and I see no reason to break them. We just have never been “weekenders,” and I doubt we ever will be. So we try to take only what we need.

At times I am a bit jealous of the weekenders, because they only have to pack for a few days and they can bring all kinds of fun stuff. We often camp with people who have brought their plastic pink flamingos, awning mats, Weber grills, paper lanterns, table decorations, bicycles, even outdoor kitchens. They make wonderful presentations, even to the point of having holiday-specific decorations. By comparison, we look rather stingy—we don’t even bring folding chairs! That’s a part of compromise of traveling for long times. When others are spreading out their stuff and preparing for a cookout, I am usually rummaging around in the toolkit so I can fix something.

In recognition of the fun displays that people like to put out, we are once again going to give someone at Alumapalooza the coveted Airstream Life “Wally” award for Best Open House Presentation. I am hoping to see some really great setups while we are parked on the grass at Airstream. A few people have already made it known that they plan to really go nuts this year. The only limitations we impose are (a) no ground fires; and (b) no big light displays (since each trailer only gets 3 amps of power). That leaves a lot of room for creativity.

We don’t have a traditional last meal before we leave, but it is always something dead simple. I sometimes have to restrain Eleanor from trying to cook something elaborate, because it’s her nature to feed us well, but this year she has come up with a convenient choice of lobster ravioli from the freezer and sushi from the grocery store. Usually our last night in the house is a little frantic, as the final tasks end up getting done in the dark of night, so it’s best to have an easy meal.

At this point I’m feeling that we are already well set. Tonight Eleanor will move over the last of the food from the house refrigerator to the Airstream refrigerator, and pack up the last items that are strewn around the Airstream. In the morning I’ll dump the water that we used to clean the interior, hitch up, and pull the trailer out of the carport and into the sun for final walk-around.

It will be a great feeling to be driving the big rig again. There’s always a moment when I feel sad to be leaving the house in Tucson, but in just a matter of hours the Airstream will become our home again and we won’t look back. We will experience that exhilarating combination of freedom and uncertainty, as we drive on Friday to a destination we haven’t planned. We’ll know it when we get there. See you on the road.

May 15 2012

Walking tour of Tucson

Although these days we’re focused on getting ready to launch the Airstream, it can’t be all work all the time. To get a break from the long list of “to do” items and a little exercise, I planned a day out to explore downtown Tucson’s historic sites. We’ve been living here for four years, on and off, and I am still constantly surprised by the many hidden corners of Tucson that I’ve never seen. It has quirky neighborhoods everywhere, oddball homes, tons of cultural artifacts, great museums, surprising restaurants, and historic buildings. For a small city, it has a surprising amount to offer.

We used the map provided by the Tucson Presidio Trust for Historic Preservation for our tour. The entire walk they recommend is about 2.5 miles, which is pretty mild by our street hiking standards especially since downtown is mostly flat. The catch, however, is that this is mid-May, and so daytime temperatures are pretty consistently in the upper 90s or low 100s. I tried to get Emma out early with dire warnings about hiking in the heat, but ultimately she decided that snoozing on a Sunday morning was more important than avoiding the heat. With the 30 minute drive to downtown, our hike didn’t get started until about 10 a.m., and the air was already well into the 90s by then.

Oh well. We’re used to it. I know to a northerner the idea of walking around on asphalt in 100-degree heat would be horrendous, but of course it was the famous Arizona “dry heat”. You put on light colored clothes, apply sunscreen, wear a big hat, and carry a water bottle or two. With all that prep, my only problem was a burning sensation through the soles of my sneakers …

The first stop on the tour is the best. Right in downtown there’s a recreated presidio, which is a sort of fortification from the Spanish Colonial era. Spaniards needed to migrate from Mexico to California through some pretty tough country inhabited by the Apaches, and they were not on good terms. So Spain established a line of 17 presidios, of which Tucson’s was the largest (11 acres) and and last. Almost nothing of the original presidio still exists, but on part of the original site a very good recreation has been installed, and it’s well worth a visit. Being a hot Sunday, we found ourselves the only visitors and so got a private guided tour from the volunteer who was on duty. Fascinating and free.

The tour ultimately passes 22 sites, including statues commemorating the Mormon Battalion, Pancho Villa, and a Spanish “soldado de cuera” (leather jacket soldier, wearing a sort of armor made from deerskins), two footbridges, historic houses, cathedrals, parks, gardens, a historic hotel, a shrine, and even an elementary school from 1930.

We particularly liked the little shrine called El Tiradito (“The Castaway”), a.k.a. “The Wishing Shrine,” which is said to be the only shrine in the US dedicated to the soul of a sinner buried in unconsecrated ground. It’s obvious that many people still visit this shrine regularly to light candles and leave notes for those who have departed. It’s hard not to be struck by the poignancy of this site and the offerings.

(There’s also a public water fountain nearby, which was great for us since we had already used up most of our supply. In 2.5 miles of 100 degree+ heat we drank about 24 ounces of water each.)

I was most impressed by the fact that walking the streets of Tucson, we encountered no “bad neighborhoods” and discovered several areas that I never knew existed. There’s really nothing like walking or bicycling a city to get to know it. I was also pleased to connect the dots between several old neon signs that I’ve documented over the past couple of years. Some are gone, others have been restored as a result of the new Historic Sign Amendment, including the famous “diving girl” sign. (She used to advertise the Pueblo Hotel, but now the building houses a law firm. Thanks to Piccaretta Davis for investing the money in having her restored.)

Of course, being a hot Sunday in downtown, we also encountered very few people until we got to the Congress Street district where retail is concentrated. It seems few are interested in street hiking when it is over 100 degrees — go figure.

Toward the end of the tour we found ourselves on familiar ground at the Hotel Congress, famous for being the place that John Dillinger and his gang were caught in 1936. The Hotel Congress has managed to survive by adapting, still offering hotel rooms that hark back to the 1930s, but also offering a nice little restaurant downstairs, a bar, and live music regularly. We have so few historic hotels left in Tucson that we treasure those that remain. It’s a huge neon sign on the roof that I’ve photographed several times.

Besides the tip of carrying water and dressing correctly, there’s one other thing you must do if you are to street hike here in the summer: find covered parking for the car. On Sunday most of the lots were free, so we chose the main Public Library’s underground garage and were glad we did. Parked underground, the car was only about 102 degrees inside, whereas parked in the sun it would have been unbearable for a while. The Honda Fit is a great car but its dinky AC really can’t handle desert heat.

What do you do when you’ve conquered downtown on a day that even the lizards are seeking shade? You go to one of our many cheap and wonderful Mexican restaurants, in this case El Guero Canelo (“the blonde guy”) and you get a Mexican Jarritos fruit soda and a burrito. At least that’s what we did. Your mileage may vary.

We’ve got a few more days of heat and then we’ll saddle up the Airstream for points north and higher altitude. By Saturday, the Airstream will be up around 7,000 feet and we’ll be looking for our long sleeved shirts again.