Strolling Amok

Pops goes on tour.

Archive for the category “Daily Life”

02 Nov 2013

Another View

After sunset.

After sunset.

The photo above is simply one taken after a cloudless sunset. Even with some digital massaging, the many layers of mountains forming the background aren’t really discernible. You gotta be there to see it (or I need to learn how to use that camera better)!

The existential essence of a bike tire. Since this is a British-brand bike, maybe I should say bike tyre.

The existential essence of a bike tire. Since this is a British-brand bike, maybe I should say bike tyre.

The photo above is my bike’s front tire. I figured that it has earned some recognition since the long series of leaking inner tubes is over now, thanks to a pair of super-thick Slime tubes that are working great. They’re heavy, but when all you care about is getting there, they do the job. These are the Raleigh’s original 1993-ish tires, which are showing no signs of disintegrating in the sun. The tread design is superb on both gravel and pavement, since the linked center rib eliminates the unnerving vibration common to many aggressively-lugged bike tires. The bike’s Shimano derailleurs and shifters aren’t too happy with all the grit and dust out here, but are hanging in there when used regularly.

Posted in Campsites, Daily Life and tagged , , | Leave a comment
28 Oct 2013
4 Comments

Batten the Hatches Again!

A gorgeous day...with high winds.

A gorgeous day…with high winds.

Not a fascinating post, but it’s all part of daily life in this rig. The heat wave of 90+ degrees in Quartzsite is over, and it’s expected to be a long spate of low-80’s for quite a while, which is the top of my Ultimate Comfort Zone. The new temperature front moving in is expected to produce southwest wind gusts in the  45 MPH range though. That means take all precautions, so I staked down the telescoping poles supporting the solar panels, and added the tie-down ropes, two to a panel. None of it should be needed in a wind hitting the trailer at the southwest corner (the trailer, as always, is aimed straight west) because it tends to merely drive the panels downward instead of lifting them. Since I don’t plan to move a thing for many months though, I figured now is better than later. The highest winds should arrive in a couple of hours and continue through until suppertime. That isn’t preventing the Enterprise from rocking a bit right now, however.

A larger concern has been the relatively ineffective rubber wheel chocks. They seemingly were designed for smaller-diameter tires, because they don’t allow these tires any chance to Read more…

Posted in Daily Life, Mod Squad and tagged , ,
23 Oct 2013
2 Comments

Oops!

MakingMistakesFor those of you foolish enough to have signed up for e-mail notification about new posts here, you’ve all gotten automatic notification about a post called Deep-Cycle Surprise, and then clicked on the link to see…nothing. My apologies. I’ve been working hard on that particular piece, but it isn’t yet ready for prime time. I simply hit the wrong button and unintentionally published it before it was done. Then I yanked it.

It has to do with the Enterprise’s solar power system, and some unexpectedly big performance differences between two of it’s different battery packs – marine hybrid flooded and AGM. Sounds like a boringly technical piece, but I’m trying to keep it from being that. It isn’t ready to post because the events feeding it are not yet over, it seems. New performance anomalies streaming in affect the reconfiguration direction to take, and there’s little point in posting a problem/solution article until the “problem” shows some consistency.

ProfHigginsNothing is malfunctioning here – it’s just the usual process of fine tuning things so that each system will let me do what I want to be able to do, without introducing too many drawbacks.  As Professor Higgins explains in My Fair Lady, “I’m an ordinary man, who desires nothing more…than just an ordinary chance to live exactly as he likes and do precisely what he wants! An average man am I, of no eccentric whim, who likes to live his life free of strife, doing whatever he thinks is best for him… Just an ordinary man!”

Posted in Daily Life
17 Oct 2013
6 Comments

Starting Out With a Whimper

My nondescript but level campsite at Hi Jolly in Quartzsite, AZ.

My nondescript but level campsite at Hi Jolly in Quartzsite, AZ.

Before posting about the trip down here (which was notable), I’ll bring you up to speed on current info, which I’m sure you will find riveting. Sure. After running by the Lifestyle RV dealership in Quartzsite and making an appointment for the next day, I rolled into a nearby 14-day site for the overnight. BLM sites within Quartzsite are unusual in that they require sign-ins with volunteer camp hosts. That’s because they want to keep tabs on the crush of visitors that come in for the Winter gatherings. With the government out of action, the camp host was present but not authorized to do anything, so one can wander in and out as one pleases – for now.

The next day, Tuesday, I hauled the Enterprise in for repairs to the refrigerator. The fridge thought it was fine, but actually refused to cool, and left propane flowing even though the electronic pilot ignitor never sparked to fire things up. Fortunately for me, the issues turned out to be Read more…

Posted in Daily Life, Travelin' Man and tagged , , , ,
10 Oct 2013
2 Comments

Shootout: In Doubt

DSCN0154Today is Thursday AM. The 2013 Top Speed Shootout guys are having to contend with rapidly changing weather forecasts, which has made putting their wallets on the line risky. The problem for them is squirmy logistics. It isn’t exactly cheap for them to haul trailers of carefully-prepped racing equipment cross-country, or to buy no-discount airline tickets, or book motels or the local KOA campground. These guys are in the upper echelon of speed crazies, and most have sponsors to keep happy. To be sure, none of these guys are poor, but each has invested way, way too much in their speed addiction. I liken it to owning a horse. On the grand scale of things, you have to be comparatively wealthy to own and stable a horse. Once you do that, you are by all accounts no longer wealthy.

The salt surface has proven problematic, and a few days ago was deemed unsuitable for high-speed runs in Read more…

Posted in Daily Life and tagged , ,
08 Oct 2013
2 Comments

Busted!

It seems worthy to note that right on completion of a post mentioning that RVs have stuff that fails, my fridge went out. All the indicator lights read just fine, but it ain’t cooling at all. It thinks it’s running, and so the gas keeps going, which it’s not supposed to do. I goofed with it a little, and there apparently isn’t much to be done until I get to Quartzsite, 3 days away. So I shut it off. Food loss was minimal – mainly just a bag and a third of “Sea Varmints”: a frozen seafood mix of  critters dredged up from the ocean, and some frozen lima beans.

I’m not leaving in 3 days, though. Despite a forecast spritz of rain Wednesday and Thursday, I’m hoping the final speed event is able to take place from Thursday over the weekend. So, I’m changing my diet to foods that don’t require refrigeration. Desperate men do desperate things. To that end, I made a trip to town to mail off the failed Kidde smoke alarm, and for the dump station, diesel fuel, propane refill, laundromat, and food for my readjusted no-fridge diet.

On the way back, I went out to the Salt Flats entrance and saw Read more…

Posted in Daily Life and tagged ,
05 Oct 2013

Out For a Walk

A canal feeding brine back toward the Bonneville Salt Flats.

A canal feeding brine back toward the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Nothing spectacular today, which is nice for a change. The daytime temperature edged back into the 70’s today, and since I was already out to pump the camper’s waste tanks into the Tankmin in the Furd, I went for a 2-mile walk down the road heading for the Salt Flats. There are two 12-inch pipes coming out of the ground, each a hundred yards from the roadway. There must be a heckofa pump or two somewhere, because the flow rate out each of those pipes is impressive, and they flow 24/7. It seems that a potash plant on the other side of I-80 is returning leftover brine back to the salt flats.

That’s good, because the Bonneville Salt Flats used to be 90,000 acres in 1963, and today covers only 30,000 acres because of that plant. For speed freaks, that has reduced the former 10-mile track surface to just 7 miles. 18 inches of salt have been removed, and this voluntary return is hoped to slow further shrinkage, not hold or reverse it. Potash is a key ingredient in fertilizer, and this result makes sustainable methods of farming look like an admirable thing to me.

The last few days have been inordinately cold and windy, with highs at about 50. Officially, wind gusts registered Read more…

Posted in Daily Life and tagged , , | Leave a comment
30 Sep 2013
2 Comments

Oh, You Kidde!

New pump above, old pump below. Notice the gyrations the water had to go through to get to the old pump.

New pump above, old pump below. Notice the gyrations the water had to go through to get to the old pump.

Yesterday was not a good day, mechanically speaking. The day before at 11PM, the newish Kidde combination smoke & CO detector went off. That was odd, because nothing was going on that should have triggered it. It was signaling its smoke alarm. What’s more, pushing the “hush” button only made it hiccup, but not reset for the 10 minutes its supposed to. I paid a pretty penny for it, and it contains a lithium battery that’s supposed to last for 10 years. I set it outside for awhile to give it a change of scenery and some fresh air, but that made no difference, either. The only way to silence it was to turn a screw in the back that permanently grounded out the battery, so now it’s out of action. Hopefully, I can find my receipt and get Kidde to send me a new one.

The next day at mid-morning, the water stopped. That is, turning on a faucet did nothing. The water pump is Read more…

Posted in Daily Life, Mod Squad and tagged , , ,
26 Sep 2013
6 Comments

The Fear Factor

Prepping the ill-fated solar system for the Glorious Adventure.

Prepping the ill-fated solar system for the Glorious Adventure.

Actually, I should have posted this a month ago, but August 28 marked the anniversary of my moving into The Enterprise as a full-time home, and October 9th will commemorate when I first hit the pavement. Venturing rapidly into a completely unfamiliar lifestyle always has its pitfalls and concerns, but I believe that when you’re handed a one-way ticket to Elsewhere, it’s time to look at what hasn’t worked, and consider something different. Kind of a start-over. What would you do differently, considering the here and now? Make lemonade out of lemons, if you can. The march of time prevents a do-over, but if you’re still breathing, there’s always at least a little time left for a new start. Action movies contain precious little philosophy, but one brief interlude in the film Bullitt has the disillusioned female lead ask her boyfriend, “What will happen to us, in time?” He answers sagely, “Time starts now.” My takeaway is to live deliberately. The future may not be entirely in your hands, but the course you decide to set is.

Many of you live vicariously through this and other similar blogs and websites, enjoying the “adventurous” mobile lifestyle and wishing – slightly – that you could one day do the same. Sure, it’s cool in a way, but you know deep down that you’ve got a lot of other things going on that are much more vital to you, so it will probably never actually happen. Doesn’t hurt to daydream about the possibilities open to you though, regardless of what similar or very different form they may take. Living mobile is just one tiny little niche. Living deliberately is a wide, wide span. Dream that.

Getting shoved into a dream

I’ve found that the waterfall effects of the Read more…

Posted in Daily Life, Navel Gazing and tagged , , ,
21 Sep 2013
2 Comments

The West As It Should Be

Just coming into the West side of town...

Just coming into the West side of town…

I was in West Wendover, NV for some propane, groceries, and tie-down rope when I saw a gentleman of the Old West persuasion just clip-clopping in on Old Paint. It might be more accurate to say he was a caballero on old Diablo. He got my attention of course, especially since he was mainly keeping to the concrete sidewalks beside the 4-lane, 35 MPH paved roadway.

Despite numerous semis, campers, and speeding cars in close proximity, his horse kept its cool.

Despite numerous semis, campers, and speeding cars in close proximity, his horse kept its cool.

Now that’s how to come to town to shop. Actually, he was aimed for the casinos on the main drag, which is where all the vehicular action is. I was curious about whether he was actually heading for Wendover, Utah, which starts about a quarter-mile from where I saw him. Much more horse-friendly there.

My reality was that there’s a wind warning today “in excess of 45 MPH” which will peak at 6PM. It should be okay because the worst of it will be directly into the south or panel side of the trailer, but a shift to the northwest is likely late this evening, so I came up with a makeshift but effective way to rapidly tie the panels down flat against the side of the trailer if needed.  One would think that a south wind straight into the paneled wall would tend to lift the solar panels up and over, but it seems that when the panels are inclined down at about 30 degrees (their normal working height), their leading edges want to move down more than trapped air underneath them wants to move up. It’s apparently a leverage thing.  All bets are off in a northwest wind, since it’s approaching the first panel from underneath. Fortunately, that wind is supposed to be slower, so in theory, it should be no problem. The tie-down rope is just in case reality overrides theory.

I tanked up on propane while in town at the only source available, a KOA campground. At $4 a gallon, it’s close to double the prices in Quartzsite.  I won’t be looking forward to dumping the waste tanks here in the next day or few, either. The $15 cost is a bit more than the usual $5-$10. Unfortunately, they appear to be the only game in town for that.

The salt flats? It still looks hopeless to me as far as drying out goes, but neither remaining club has cancelled yet, mainly because the first of the two is still almost two weeks away. We’ll just have to see! At any rate, it’s a three-day haul to Quartzsite, with ample opportunity to stretch that out as needed. No need to get there now, since it’s 100 degrees and won’t be livable until mid-October!

Posted in Daily Life and tagged

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