Williams, Arizona

Hi All,
We had a good ride yesterday from Gallup to Williams. It was a little windy but at least not gusty so it wasn't difficult to control the coach. We will stay here for two nights and rest up a bit after three straight travel days. Unfortunately when we arrived here I discovered that the battery in the car was dead from three days of driving with the key on and not driving it between stops. The park sent someone over to give it a jump and we drove around a bit yesterday and will do the same today to get the battery charged. I talked to my friend Steve back home last evening and he will send the wire I used on the old car to charge it while we traveled. I thought the problem was a dead cell in the old car so I never hooked it up on the new car and I didn't bring my jumper unit either since we no longer had the problem. As I think back all of our travels since we bought the new car in March have been single days of driving and then unhooking the car and driving it around so the battery never got too low. Oh well, just another hiccup and the glass is still half full.

We are off to Barstow tomorrow, our longest driving day of the summer at 320 miles but all on the interstate so it shouldn't be too bad. Our new GPS will arrive today, the tracking indicates that it is now out for delivery. It is pretty windy here in Williams and much cooler thank goodness. It was 60 degrees when I walked Alex this morning at 8:00. She hasn't caught onto this time change stuff yet so she still thinks it is 10:00 and it is time to get up. I am sure she will adjust now that we are in the Pacific Time Zone for a month or so. Sorry about the lack of pictures but there hasn't been much exciting stuff to share. There were some pretty vistas as we entered into Arizona yesterday. Much different than the New Mexico dessert.

On the bright side our HD-DVR worked last night, hurray! Don't know about tomorrow after the move but we at least had two additional nights from the old receiver. We discovered yesterday that FedEx will require a signature to receive the new receiver at home. I have alerted Steve and Kay but we don't expect them to just watch for the FedEx truck and forget about everything else. So they will probably get a paper to sign and re-delivery the next day. We have decided to have them send the receiver and the charge wire to us when we are in Gold Beach, OR for five days. Hopefully we won't ned the charge wire before then and we can certainly do without live TV for a few days. More next time so you folks be safe.

Heading west.

We arrived in Gallup, NM yesterday afternoon, about 16 miles from the Arizona border. Today we will drive to Williams, AZ where we will; stay for two nights and catch up to ourselves a bit. Unfortunately for us the hiccups continue. Our GPS will not acquire satellites anymore and the Garmin folks told me yesterday that it would cost $190 to repair it. For another $100 I can get a new one and that is what I did. I ordered a new Garmin 1490-T unit yesterday from GPS City in Las Vegas and they will get it to us in Williams on Friday. No problems that money can't solve I guess. As I was completing my deal on the phone with GPS City we got a message on the TV screen that there was a problem with the storage device and that we should reboot the receiver. After doing this three times I called DirecTv, and to make a long story short, after over an hour on the phone, mostly on hold, I was told that they would ship a new receiver to my home in Texas! I know it doesn't make much sense since we are moving away from there at a rate of almost 300 miles a day. So after speaking to a supervisor and his manager they stuck to the company line and refused to send the receiver directly to me. The receiver will be sent to Texas where our friends Steve and Kay will retrieve it and then forward it to us at some yet undetermined location. On a brighter note the refrigerator seems to be cooling much better. Maybe it was the 100+ degree temps that caused the problem. Anyway we will be off to Williams in a little bit. We gain another hour today so we aren't in a great rush. Be safe.

Finally out of Texas!

We have had three travel days since we left home last Friday and we finally got out of Texas. We spent tonight in Santa Rosa, NM and will travel across New Mexico tomorrow before stopping in Gallup, NM for the evening. On Thursday we will travel from Gallup to Williams, AZ where we will spend two nights.

In the metroplex we discovered that we had an electrical problem and after contacting my friend in Louisiana computed that I needed to replace my house batteries. So $1100 and six batteries later we have that problem solved, hopefully. We also noticed that we were having a problem with our outside cooler which normally is too cold. Now even on the coldest setting, normally this would freeze everything, nothing was even cold. Since we use the outside fridge for our water, sodas, and other drinks (read beer) it was off to Camping World on Saturday to pick up a new portable refrigerator. Another $600 gone but hopefully another problem solved. On Monday we drove to Goodlett, TX and Tippy noticed that the inside fridge wasn't as cold as usual so she turned it up and then later turned it up again. It is now on 9, the highest setting, and it still wasn't as cold as usual but it was still making ice and we don't think we will lose any food, hopefully. We will try to have someone look at the fridge while we are in Williams to see if there is an easy fix, seems unlikely based on our recent experience.

While driving to Santa Rosa today our GPS mentioned that it had lost satellite reception a few times but always got it back after a short time. Then as we neared Santa Rosa it did it again but never came back. I checked the Garmin website, downloaded the newest software, already had it but re-installed it anyhow with no change. I have now written an e-mail to Garmin Tech to see if there is a fix. After searching their website I wasn't able to find the problem in a FAQ but hopefully, boy I have been using that word a lot, it can be fixed without replacing the unit.

The glass is half full attitude seems the best and we hope that we are getting all of the hiccups out of the way at the beginning of our trip. We still look forward to seeing old friends, double meaning here, again and playing some golf and having some good laughs. I will try to provide an update in a day or so but please pray for us and be safe.

Cole walking on a log at Lake Grapevine.

Heading west.

We are really on our way now. We had a great weekend in the metroplex with the grand kids and David & Rachel. They spent Friday afternoon and evening and Saturday afternoon and evening with us and we had a ball. They also stopped by for a few hours on Sunday afternoon but left before dinner so they could get the kids to bed at the usual time since they were up so late the last two nights. It was quite hot outside, over 100 all three days, but we did have the lake and the kids enjoyed that and we did have some shade which we all enjoyed. We played several games of Uno each day and I introduced Cole and Maryn to the game of dominoes. We played Mexican Train with a set of double twelve dominoes and just had a great time as we fumbled through he game.

The kids also fed the ducks and chased the squirrels in between all of the other stuff. I cooked hamburgers and hot dogs on Friday and David & Rachel ordered Chinese food for all of us on Saturday. All of the food was excellent and we were all full after each meal. It was too hot to have a campfire so we roasted marsh mellows on the grill flame with the grill plate removed. Coupled with some nice Hershey's Chocolate and graham crackers we all enjoyed some smores.

Cole is really getting tall as you can see from the video above. He just loved kindergarten this year and is looking forward to first grade in the fall. His school seems to be most excellent! When I visited on Grand Parents Day I was quite impressed with the facilities, the class size, and the attitude of the students and the staff.

We left the metroplex this morning, Monday, and drove north west to Goodlett, Texas, about 120 miles south east of Amarillo, Texas. Tomorrow we head for Santa Rosa, New Mexico as we boogie across the U.S. on Interstate 40. We will drive again on Wednesday to Gallup, New Mexico and on Thursday to Williams, Arizona where we will spend two days and catch our breath a bit.

I will do another travel update from Williams, AZ and will try to include a few pictures for your viewing enjoyment. In the meantime enjoy the video above of Cole walking on a log that is mostly floating in the lake. He finally made it all of the way without a tumble. Enjoy and be safe.