School on a Bus (a.k.a. Radical Sabbatical)

There are a few critical items that make an RV a home away from home. One of those is having lights and 120 volt plug-ins for computers and the such – without which life would be a more primitive affair. This requires a bank of batteries, an inverter, and a generator. If any of these components is misbehaving, life is more difficult. Especially since we boondock at least 4-5 days per week. I had already changed out the generator in Missouri and the batteries in North Carolina. Now it was time for the inverter to act up.

I have a Xantrex inverter that was purchased new before the trip and is still on warranty. Unfortunately, the internal fan stopped working and so the inverter would shut down due to overheating. This meant that the batteries would not receive an adequate charge and were constantly being drained lower than necessary. To give Xantrex credit, they did help me diagnose the problem. Then they suggested I take it in to a certified service shop. Xantrex is a northwest manufacturer. Service shops are almost non-existent on the east coast. I also couldn’t afford to take the inverter out and leave it somewhere waiting for a shop to order parts and fix it. When I started asking Xantrex to send me a replacement fan so I could fix it myself, they stopped responding.

That’s when I knew I had to take matters into my own hands. A trip to Radio Shack for a new fan and I was ready to open up the inverter. The inside of the inverter is somewhat like a PC with circuit boards and a fan for cooling (no hard drive of course). However, there was no way the generic fan from Radio Shack was going to fit. So I had the great idea of bolting it on to the outside of the case and running the wires from the old fan through the case. It looked a little strange but it worked. Life is now back to normal.

While in Oklahoma City, both our furnace and our generator went on the fritz. The two should be unrelated since one is AC and the other DC current. Is this just a coincidence? My best guess is a short in the generator caused feedback through the inverter and blew the circuit board on the furnace. For the time being we’ve moved from Wal-Mart to a campground at Arcadia Lake so we can plug in. We can still heat the bus using heat strips built in to the air conditioners though they’re not effective if it gets much below 45 degrees. I’m spending time getting faxes from PacWest RV in Sultan, WA and troubleshooting components on the generator and furnace while checking on parts in the local RV shops.

Cannot complain too much as Arcadia Lake has a beautiful campground. We’ve been able to fish in the lake, play on the beach, and setup the badminton net. The water is too cold for wading any further than the kneecaps but the weather is warm in between a few rain storms. Citizens are celebrating the rain as they’re suffering a bad drought here.

Today we woke up with snow on the ground! The wind rocked the bus through the evening as a cold front blew in from Canada. Temperatures dropped into the 20’s. Once the roads warmed up a bit, we left Wyoming and are now camped at Spearfish, South Dakota. Temperatures are expected to drop into the teens.

One problem in the cold is the bus door is a bit off and doesn’t latch well. Someone must push the door closed from the outside to enable the latch to engage on the inside. This never bothered us before but with the cold weather it created a bad draft. Thus, before bedtime, I went outside to hold the door tight while Caleb latched it. I then had to crawl through an open window – losing a slipper on the first try but successful on the second. We then used duct tape to stop the remaining drafts. Now it feels like were packed in a sardine can; but we’re warm.

After spending the night at Christina Lake, we headed down to Spokane where we stayed at Riverside Park. This allowed me time to work on the bus with hardware stores close by. Our camp was on the banks of the Spokane River with no indication of the city nearby. A nest of Osprey with two overgrown chicks oversaw my work on the bus.

I was able to fix a leak in the toilet and finally install some sprinklers for the radiators. I teed off a pipe from the fresh water system and ran piping under the bus back to the radiators where I attached a sprinkler head. Eventually, I will install a solenoid and wire a switch up to the driver’s dash. But for now I just have a manual valve that I’ll turn on when we travel and use the main water pump to douse the radiators. As long as it keeps the bus from overheating I’m not too picky right now.

Today we headed up the steep, winding North Cascade Highway. The temperature was around 90 degrees and the grades were long. We almost made it over the top of Washington pass but overheated about 1 mile away. When an MCI bus overheats, it stops without warning. There is a shutoff valve that just turns the engine off. This happened in Kansas so I wasn’t totally taken by surprise. I was able to coast over to the side out of traffic where we waited until things cooled down. We continued on to the top of the pass and took a breather to enjoy a spectacular panorama of the Cascades. After two weeks on the road, we have finally crossed over to the East side of the Cascades! This is truly a milestone and makes us feel like we’ve really started our journey.

We continued on through Winthrop and Twisp only to find we had to climb another pass – Loup Loup pass. We overheated again. This time there was no shoulder on the two lane road so we blocked our lane of traffic – and on a curve no less. This was not a good situation but in lieu of a better idea we started making dinner. The traffic was not bad and so everyone was able to get around us without causing an accident. One forest service fellow stopped and we had a good chat about the current drought in Washington. Few people are aware that there can be droughts even in a climate such as that in the northwest.

Once we got started and made it to the top of Loup Loup pass, the Highway Patrol had been notified of our presence and was there waiting for us. He was also a very nice man and suggested we do something to fix our problem. I wholeheartedly agreed and said I’d get right to work on it although I really didn’t have a lot of ideas. He also told us of a nice campground in Okanogan where they had showers and only charged $5 / night. This was a great tip and we took advantage of it for a couple of nights while we waited until Monday when I could order some parts for the bus at a local truck diesel shop. Fortunately, the patrol man did not notice the brake lights were not working while he followed me down the pass for a short ways before zooming by. The lesson for the day was that you meet nice people when you overheat on the highway.

Once we were encamped for the night, I called Sonny to see what he thought about our problems. He told me I needed to change out the brake light switch and sent me a scanned article on how to install sprinklers for the radiators to help keep them cool.

Today we stopped by our house to pay a final visit to the Kobayashi’s and collect the things we forgot. Remaining in the vicinity for two weeks allowed us to make a list of all the things we should have taken but forgot to pack. It was wonderful to see the house one last time.

On the way out of town we arranged to meet Sonny, the mechanic, in a parking lot so he could take a look at a wheel on the tag axle that was locking up and burning rubber if I stopped too hard. Sonny figured out that the rear air bags needed adjusting to put more weight on the tag axle. The tag axle is the rear most axle – right behind the drive axle. It’s what allows the bus to carry 45 passengers and all their baggage. After an hour of adjustments and trial drives around the parking lot, we were back on the road. I will miss not having Sonny available if we have problems on the trip. Though he did say I can call for advice anytime.

The goal for that day was to camp at the KOA at Concrete, ready to climb the North Cascade Highway the following day. After the events of the day, it was starting to get dark. This made me a bit stressed as I have no desire to drive the bus in the dark. The rest of the family took the van separately to pay one last visit to our good friends the Hathaway’s while I drove the bus to Concrete to avoid any night driving. Even so, it was dark by the time I got to Concrete.

My first mistake was to miss the KOA turn-off because I couldn’t stop in time once I saw the sign. At first I tried to back up going in reverse down the highway the 30 yards back to the turn-off. It’s not easy backing up at night because the backup lights are very dim and do not provide light to see behind. The traffic turned out to be too prohibitive as well. I would start backing up and then see headlights coming round the bend and have to pull forward to get off the road again. Finally, I chose to continue down the road until I found a road to turn off. That road was deserted so I was able to turn around at a farm without too much concern.

Once on the dirt road to the KOA, my second mistake was to somehow miss a fork in the road and I went right when KOA was left. That took me down a winding, narrow road with no opportunity to turn around. I called KOA when I saw a sign that said “narrow road ahead” to find out what I had done wrong and where I was. The lady at KOA said she wasn’t from this area and had no idea where I might be. She seemed to have no pity that I was driving a 40 foot bus down a narrow winding road in the dark with no knowledge of where it was leading! My advice to KOA is to man the phones at night with people who can help with directions! Fortunately, the road lead eventually back to the highway after another couple miles of nerve racking driving on a country road.

Once at KOA the place was packed but fortunately we’d reserved a spot. The woman who greeted me when I drove up (not the woman on the phone) said, “Wow, I don’t think they knew how big your rig was when they assigned your spot!” In order to fit into the spot I had to thread the needle between three large trees backwards since it was a back-in site. And it was dark. Fortunately, all the neighboring campsites showed up with their flashlights and by the time I was safely backed in I had four men watching my back and sides for me while another told me when to cut the wheels over! Finally, I was safe and sound in our home for the night! The rest of the family arrived 30 minutes later oblivious to my harrowing journey.