(This is where Henry Ford was evicted from the train as a teenager for catching the baggage car on fire with his experiments. Ford’s friend Edison had the depot packed up and rebuilt in Ford’s own Greenfield Village without telling him about it. Anyway it’s a long story, go check it out.)

I was having a detailed telegraph discussion with a lady who portrayed a conductor on the train. She had a telegraph key and sounder set up as a demonstration. Of course I stepped up and bragged that I was a telegrapher on the Northern Pacific Railroad in the 1960’s and offered to demonstrate. She handed me a telegraph form that had the code printed in a table on the back. Only the code was the international code, not the railroad code. I spent the next quarter hour explaining and demonstrating the difference. For example an “O” in International Morse is dah-dah-dah and in American Morse it is dit – dit. Not di-dit like an “I” but dit – dit like an “O”. Also “Y” becomes di-dit – di-dit instead of dah-di-dah-dah.
As a reward for all my effort the lady conductor offered us a ride on her train. So for my kibitzers I have a steam locomotive video on the website this time around. (Note: I have not been able to insert it here, so jump to my Facebook page to see the video clip.)

We did have some excitement the first day. When we returned to the coach for lunch there was a big puddle of antifreeze under the front of the coach. The heater core had sprung a leak. To get by I connected the inlet and outlet hoses together. We don’t really need the heater this time of year. Temperatures run in the 80’s by day and 70’s by night.
It is just after nine here and the big red meatball of a sun is just setting at the Isabella County Fairgrounds in Mount Pleasant Michigan. We have the whole campground to ourselves. Good Night and pleasant dreams from Gary and Judy in Michigan.

This time we are staying on a lot in the Beachcomber Resort in Lake Havasu City, Arizona. It also is close to a relative, Judy’s sister, Sonja lives in the same park. The purpose is to give me some quality time to commune with “The Son of Path;” Or as Judy puts it, get my new bicycle done.

Judy looks over lot 353 at the Beachcomber

We have moved onto a lot that once housed a Park Model Home. I have had to call the maintenance people at every step of the process it seems. I did find the electricity alright, but when I started to use the water I discovered the previous tenant unhooked from the water with a Saws-All. I walked over to the office and engaged the help of Herb, the handyman. Early next morning I had a brand new water standard with two shiny new hose bibs.

It was time to wash the coach and trailer. Since everything is paved here I needed to open the sewer to dump my wash water in. I got out my big pump pliers and tried to unscrew the four inch sewer cap. I gradually worked up to my biggest pipe wrench and a two foot cheater, a three pound hammer, penetrating oil and a propane torch. Nothing could break the cap loose. I walked over to the office again. Herb and his helper finally got it open with a Saws-All.

My guess is that they have not rented this lot in a while.

I did manage to get my very dirty trailer washed and it is gleaming beside our very dirty coach. We are looking forward to sunshine and 70 degrees today, so the coach will get its due.

On a different subject; all of our friends are welcome to log in and comment on these stories. There is a “Register” button in the right hand sidebar. Click that and follow the directions. Choose a name and enter your e-mail address. Then you must solve a “Captcha” word puzzle. You will be sent a temporary password and you log in with that. Be sure to change the password to something you can remember and also be sure to put in your name and some details so I can identify you. I have been getting some spammers recently and I go in and disable them. If I cannot identify you from your e-mail address, I might disable you. To get reinstated, just request a change of password. I get an e-mail when this happens. When you log back in please fill in your name and add a little to the bio. That way I will be able to recognize you. I will immediately unblock you if I have you blocked.

Meanwhile, if you get into Lake Havasu City in February this year, be sure to look us up. We are in the Beachcomber Resort on the island.

Bye for now and feel free to register and comment. Another option is to click my Facebook link and join me there. Sorry, I don’t twitter.

Love Gary and Judy

We also bicycled for 552 miles in 2010 and walked another 256 miles. Our biggest bicycling year was 2008 when we rode 2097 miles.

We spent a lot of time with our grandchildren this year. You will remember that Mathilda was born on September 10th. Georgia is now a five year old. Grandson Bryce is 10, Patrick is 17 and Cody is 20 this year. The whole family got together at our son’s place in Gilroy, California for Christmas.

Judy and I were lucky, each night we borrowed a car and drove home to the Alpine for a quiet night. Sure is fun being a grandparent!

We attended five bluegrass festivals last year; four in the southwest and one in Tygh Valley, Oregon. Other than that we helped finish a few hundred diapers for our daughter’s on line business in Hillsboro, OR. See: http://getantsy.com

Good bye and Happy New Year from Gilroy California.
Gary and Judy

Barb’s folks live in the heart of the residential district of Puyallup, Washington. I am skittish about driving around narrow city streets anyway, but we agreed to drop by on our way through. We were then expecting to drive over to the campground at the Elks lodge a few miles away. We were thoroughly briefed on the best route and arrived without incident in front of their home. I managed to get all ten tires off the pavement, so we were set for a visit and then move along before evening.

After studying their curved driveway for a while with Ken I saw a glimmer of hope. With experts watching from every angle I slowly and carefully backed the trailer onto the driveway and then jackknifed it around the curve of the drive. It actually went rather smoothly. We didn’t ding up anything and there was even enough room to get their car out…well over the lawn, but at least it wasn’t blocked in.

Ken Judy and Christine in Front of Arcturus in Their Driveway

We picked an auspicious occasion to arrive. The Sheppeard family was having a family get together at Barb’s sister’s house to celebrate a birthday. There were grown-up children, grand children and great grand children everywhere. By the end of the evening we felt very welcome and a real part of the family.

Thanks to Ken and Christine for inviting us along. We had a wonderful time.

Gary and Judy

From Washington State

P.S. We are headed for my sister’s home on Newman Lake, near Spokane Washington. This is always a tight fit. She lives at the end of a dead end road overlooking the lake. I have to drop the trailer and slide into the RV slot she uses for her rig. Then we use their pickup to position the trailer so I can hook back up when we get ready to leave. It is either that or back in a crooked, hilly three quarters of a mile.

Gary

Hokuloa and Regal Jug in Reflections

On our original plan, Ed and Sarah were planning to meet us on the St. Helens city docks and we were to do lots of hiking and playing around town until Phil and Sue arrived on Thursday afternoon on Rendezvous. So far our plans were working just fine. On Wednesday we hiked out to Columbia City and we all had a great time looking over Pixie Park and the deep woods in-between. Then we took in the Columbia County Fair so we had a long day of walking.

Phil and Sue arrived on schedule on Thursday afternoon. Phil spent the afternoon trying to shame Ed and I into polishing up our boats. We were quite content to watch and point out little cosmetic blemishes. For our evening entertainment the city of St. Helens scheduled a “music in the park” event just a few steps from our docks. Renee, Neil and Georgia all came out to have supper with us and listen to the music. Judy and I met a remarkable number of people we knew from our earlier life living in this community. Supper was Sarah’s famous fish stew and Judy’s famous 5 bean salad that has about 7 varieties of beans. Don’t ask me why it is 5 bean salad. Georgia had great fun playing with the knobs and switches on the big boats; Ed and Sarah’s boat, the Hokuloa and Phil and Sue’s boat the Rendezvous.

Depth finder is locked out

Friday morning was bright and sunny with about 15 mph winds and a heavy chop coming from the north. I changed down to the small jib and arranged for a reef in the main. About then Ed calls over that he has a bit of a problem. A gremlin had gotten into the instruments and each of them boldly stated ‘CODELOCK.” We studied the manuals and looked for faults in the wiring for over two hours. We even studied the possibility that the gremlin was the button pusher, Georgia, but we were able to absolve her of any involvement. It appears the instruments had lost power for a few moments and all of them decided that they were now stolen. We would be required to enter a code to get them to display depth, speed and wind information. The problem is no one had the foggiest notion what the code number might be. We decided that it was unwise to tackle a trip down the Columbia River with all its sand bars and mud banks without a depth finder.

Alternate plans were debated and a leisurely trip up the Multnomah channel of the Willamette River back toward Ed’s moorings seemed the prudent thing to do. All three boats started out and we were all soon under sail. Now I don’t want to brag too much, but Judy and I got the last start from the docks and at one point we passed both of the big boats. Now if you talk to them they will have stories about only flying half their sails to make it fair, but fair is fair and we were behind and we briefly got ahead. That is a win and that is that. Unfortunately we didn’t have time to get the camera out to take the photo finish picture so you will just have to take my word for it.

We camped two nights on Coon Island, a popular boat only park in the Willamette River. We hiked around the island. We had to hike fast to keep ahead of the mosquitoes.

As usual for this group the week involved lots of eating. Menus had been drawn up long in advance so there was lots of gourmet food and tasty wines to sample each evening. Many times the leftovers wound up in the omelets the next morning.

Sarah, Head Chef

Chef Ed is Keeping a Close Eye on the Barbie

Finally on Sunday we all finished the trip to Big Island Marina on Sauvie Island. Phil and Sue returned to Portland and Judy and I were able to hang out for another day of gourmet cooking, instrument trouble shooting and hiking. Tomorrow we too will return to Arcturus who has been patiently waiting in St. Helens.

I am trying to perfect this technique myself. I used to collect all kinds of stuff that I expected to come in handy…someday. Occasionally one of these parts would come in handy for a project and of course that reinforced the hording instinct.

When we went full time traveling things had to change. Everything had to fit in a 17 foot trailer and weigh less than 7,000 pounds gross weight.

The other argument for just in time inventory is that you can easily waste a whole day trying to find that gizmo that you know you have…somewhere. The good news is that while you are looking for that gizmo you are likely to come across something else you misplaced some time ago, so the exercise is not a total bust.

So here is today’s adventure: We got ready to move this morning and there is this small puddle on the floor under the kitchen sink.

Stop me if you have heard this story before.

As I was saying, a small puddle under the sink. I assured Judy that I could fix it once we got parked this afternoon. When we got to our new camp in Mojave, California we went to move the kitchen slider out and now there is this largish puddle.

A quick inspection allowed me to identify the leaking fitting on the hot water heater. This did happen before and I did a jury rig fix that time because I didn’t have the correct parts to fix it then. Now in the interim period I did go to the hardware store and lay in some real just-in-time parts for the inevitable second failure. Only now I can’t find them. They are somewhere in the drawers, or in the cargo bay, or in the trailer or maybe in the junk box…

I removed every likely bin and box and tray and looked thoroughly for those gaskets without any luck at all. I did, however, find a bag of crutch tips that I bought just-in-time to fix the feet on one of the camp stools a few months ago. I was unable to find them when I went to do the repair.

All was not lost, however. In my search I located a bin of old parts from the garage on Bonneville Drive in Scappoose from six years ago. It had a collection of plumbers washers that I had stockpiled long ago. One gasket was just the right size.  It turned out to be too old and brittle, it split when I slid it over the fitting.  One was over-sized but still pliable.  I slipped it over a mandrel and chucked it in the drill press and turned it to the correct size with a rasp.

Yes it worked, no leak. Now I will stop at the hardware store and buy another set of gaskets and put them where I first looked this time. That way I will have two chances of finding one of them when I need them.

Oh yes, I got the legs on the camp stool repaired as a bonus.

As I finish this up I am looking out the windscreen of the motor home in the waning daylight. Just showing up through the trees are Venus and Mercury, side by side in the dusk. They are such a glorious sight. Look to the west just as the sun is setting to catch them tomorrow evening. Venus is the very bright “Evening Star” this month and Mercury is to its right and it is fairly bright. They will be side by side for a few more days and then Mercury will be lost in the glare of the sun again.

Love to all

Gary and Judy

You would think that once would be enough. Nooo… I had to go and do it again this last week.  I have to use a drop hitch to make the trailer tow level and spread the weight between both sets of tires.

Using the Leveling Jacks to Place Blocks Under the Tires

This makes the hitch vulnerable to curb cuts and steep aprons trying to get out of parking lots. Bending the hitch does two things, it angles the hitch up so that the trailer rides mostly on the rear tires. And the ball is no longer vertical.

How to get un hooked: Well we used the leveling jacks to get a plank under the tires and raise the hitch. I also placed a sacrificial skid block under the hitch. It took several repeats of the above combination of jack and block before we could get loose.

Skid Block Under Hitch

Once we got to the FMCA rally in Indio I went looking for some help. I found Wally at Metalrevelations, a metal art studio, on the internet. Wally was qualified as a heavy steel fabricator from his work on Space Mountain in Disney Word and Disney Land. They also had time to take my job on short notice and… they were close. We loaded the 50 pound stinger in the bicycle trailer and towed it behind “Path” the eight blocks over to their shop.

Compare the before and after photos below. The before hitch is from a 10,000 lb load leveling hitch assembly that I picked up. It allowed me to get the trailer tongue level, but had a lot of heavy metal hanging down in the slip-stream.

The new design brings the hitch back level and only has the nut hanging down. I plan to bolt a sacrificial wooden skid plate under the steel plate to protect the hitch bolt. That will have to wait until we get back together with the shop trailer. We had to drop it over a half mile away at the rally. No room for 53 foot long combination rigs around here. We will be leaving here on Sunday for Blythe California and the next Bluegrass festival.

Hitch Before, Note How Much Hangs Below the Nut.

Hitch is Now Level

First and foremost we are still traveling, and still having fun. We have been doing this for five and a half years now. This year we relocated 101 times and that is in line with previous two years. In 2005 we toured Canada all the way to Newfoundland and moved 169 times. Similarly in 2007 we moved 125 times on our trip to Alaska. In 2009 we drove 10,504 miles and that averages about 104 miles per move.

Besides the mileage on Arcturus, we also ride and walk a lot. We rode Path another 2086 miles, walked 236 miles and canoed 4.7 miles.

For the past three weeks we have been hanging out in Gilroy with our son’s family. For New Year’s Eve we attended a party with them at Allen V. ‘s home. Allen is the Scoutmaster for the grandsons’ scout troups. The feature dish for the feast was the Italian dish bagna caoda. The dish was a lot like a vegetable fondu. The pot contained a lethal mixture of olive oil, sardines and lots of garlic. It was delicious, but it was an eight Tums night.

Tomorrow we will be back on the road headed for southern California to Indeo for an RVer’s rally. We usually run into many of our RV friends at these rallys. Perhaps we will see some of you there.

Security Airster Wing Spar With Bushings in Place

Turning a Bushing

I have been volunteering at the Wings of History Air Museum. Here are a couple photos of the wing spar for the Security Airster showing the bushings I have been turning on the lathe. The bushings help spread the stress where metal parts meet the spruce spars. You can check out other work I have done at the museum by clicking the “museums” tag in the Tag Cloud at the left side of the screen.

Good bye and Happy New Year from Gilroy California.

Gary and Judy

Our literature also indicated there was a campground in Afton Canyon run by the BLM just outside the Preserve. It was four miles off Interstate 15. We found exit 221 easy enough and the BLM signs gave us the confidence to start down a very dusty looking desert road. It was nice and wide and well graded. The washboard effect soon had us crawling at 10 MPH. After a couple of miles the road turned into Afton Canyon and became steep and narrow. I mean like it felt like we were 4-wheelin’ in our 34 foot motor home being pushed by three tons of trailer full of tools.

We reached the campground easily enough and I have developed confidence in Arcturus; He would have the power to pull us back up the hill out of the canyon….if he could get enough traction! We were the only campers last night. There are a total of 22 campsites and there is water and pit toilets available. We spent the night wondering how many trains would wake us up. We were right beside the Union Pacific main line to Las Vegas. Surprise! Not a single train came by in the night. However, five trains passed the campground between sunrise and ten when we left. Thank you UP.

The literature calls Afton Canyon the “Grand Canyon of the Mojave River.” We hiked in the canyon and I have placed a collection of photos on the web site at www.dinsmore-enterprises.com/20091203.html. Judy also took photos of me driving Arcturus up the big hill out of the canyon. Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning not a single car or truck came down the road to the campground. Just as I started up the big hill, here comes the UP maintenance truck. I had to back part-way down the hill to allow him to swing of onto a side road leading to the train tracks. See the photos of the UP-Arcturus Saw-By.

By the way, that is a real railroading term. It is how two trains pass when the available side track is too short for either train to get in the clear. I will leave the details to your imagination. E-mail me if you can’t get your two trains past each other.

Tonight we are in Mojave, the town, and tomorrow we will climb the Tehachapi over to Bakersfield. This is the art of moseying that I have spoken of before. We will be going under a hundred miles again.

See you all down the road somewhere, Gary and Judy

UP Freight Crossing Mojave River Tressel at Sunrise

Afton Canyon,Grand Canyon of the Mojave River

Mojave River Wetlands in Afton Canyon

Arcturus Charging the Hill in Afton Canyon

No Room to Pass - Arcturus and UP Railroad do a Saw By

Arcturus Climbs out of Afton Canyon