Waltz across Texas!

The trip so far!

 Friday May 24 2024. It stormed most of the night, so I checked weather radar as soon as I got up. Well, actually it was right after I made coffee, you know how mornings are! The big mass of storm moving across us was almost exactly the same as the previous two mornings. There was one substantial difference, a huge area of Oklahoma was under a flood warning. My planned route was straight through the center of the warning area. 

NOTE: On the day we would have passed through this area a tornado killed 7 people. Prudence sometimes is the better part of valor.

I changed our route, taking I-30 southwest to Texarkana and from there west through Texas on Hwy 82. The road has an interesting plan for traffic, the road is three lanes wide, two lanes in one direction and one in the other. Every few miles the center lane swaps to the other direction. It worked seamlessly, even at the 70-mph speed limit. 

Texas Hwy 82

We had gotten away at 9am, I think, I’m not sure which time zone we were using, and planned on driving all day. We have to stop for fuel every roughly 150 miles, so we several stops to stretch our legs and we took about a 45-minute break for lunch at Dieter Brothers Restaurant in Gainsville. If by chance you are ever passing thru Texas on Hwy 82 I highly recommend you stop for a meal at Dieters, it was mighty good eating! 

Mighty good eating!

In the early afternoon we had reached the end of Hwy 82, The Bee-line syndrome was creeping in, as we realized if we could make Amarillo, we can be at our destination tomorrow. We made a right onto Hwy 287 which is a four-lane road, and we angled up west/northwest, and headed for Amarillo.

 

At 6:30 we were 50 miles south of Amarillo and stopped to call the KOA campground. They had a spot for us, and we were on our way again. We arrived at the campground at 7:30 and they promptly escorted us to our pull through site. That meant we didn’t have to disconnect the truck from the RV. We usually stay at this campground when passing thru Amarillo, mostly because it's an easy name to look up on your phone, but it's also a nice well-maintained campground with friendly accommodating employees.

It's a little hard to find with all the Amarillo road construction.

 

Saturday May 25, 2024. We got underway at our normal time, we think, still not sure which time one to be using. We had a 225 mile (approx.) run on I-40 to Clines corner at the intersection of I-40 and Hwy 285. Along the way we refueled at Tucumcari NM, it's about halfway to our turn.

We refueled at the service center at Clines Corner, then parked in their parking lot and had lunch in the RV. I also wanted to check some things; on several occasions we smelled a burning grease smell. I had the gear oil in the differentials changed before we left for this trip. I also had the transmission fluid service performed at the same time. I’m pretty sure the hot grease smell was from the front differential.

A modern day Oasis in the desert!

When I first got this truck, I changed the differential fluids and the front started seeping grease from the shift plate at the top of the gearbox. From what I’ve read this is a very common problem with Ram trucks. I’d take the plate off and reseal it if I could get to it. It’s a very tight fit. The grease runs down the casing where the air catches it and slings it onto the hot exhaust. It’s a minor concern for now, after the fluid level drops a little it stops leaking.

Kamp Kolman

When we start north on Hwy 285 it seems like it is no time at all has passed and we arrived at Millie’s daughter’s house in Los Alamos New Mexico. We are parked on their driveway which is down below street level with a wooded buffer. On the other side we have an expansive view of the Los Alamos National Forest. We call it Kamp Kolman, we will be here for two weeks.

Just an afterthought. In our development back east, they forbid that residents bring recreational vehicles to their homes. They seem to be fixated on creating a 1950's Ozzie and Harriet image. Here we are parked in the driveway of a million dollar house in Los Alamos which has a higher brain trust than probably anywhere, and the neighbors are fine with it being here. Makes you wonder about priorities?

 

Hot Springs Arkansas

The trip so far!

 Sorry this post is a bit technical and that I have no photos of the repairs. When I'm working I am fixated on the task and never think of taking progress pictures.

Tuesday May 21 2024 We have a 412 mile drive scheduled for today and planned on an early start. We got up at 6am and were ready to shortly after 7, however the RV had other plans. First issue was the slide out would not retract. When troubleshooting did not disclose the problem because the fuse panel labeling was wrong and I didn’t discover this until later in the day. We retracted the slide using the backup mechanism. This required removing the fascia at the top of the slide-out to access the gearmotor. 

With the slide in we started hooking up to the truck and the electric jack would not retract. Seeing basically the same “no voltage” as the slide-out I assumed the problems were related and as I hadn’t fixed the slide-out yet, I just removed the jack and used the stabilizing jacks to lower the tongue onto the truck hitch.

Millie took this during the troubleshooting

In later troubleshooting we discovered we had two distinct problems. The jack issue was due to a electrical junction box that was full of water. In laying the blame on the manufacturer for the difficulty in diagnosing the slide out problem. The power wire at the slide out switch is purple and somewhere hidden in the ceiling the wire is spliced to a White w/pink tracer wire. Further complicating the work is the fuse panel labeling says #7 is the slide-out circuit. The purple/white w/pink wire was actually on #5. At this point I’m assuming there is a bad connection somewhere in the ceiling. This story continues a couple paragraphs down.

We our calm, delt with our problems and started towards our next destination at 9:30am. The next part of the journey was a long grueling 412 mile trek down interstate 40. 

I don’t know what I was thinking when I planned this, 400 miles towing is a long day but I-40 in Tennessee and Arkansas was going to make it a long grueling day. The highway in both states is plagued with potholes and at 70 MPH with bumper-to-bumper traffic it’s difficult to see them in time to avoid them. Not that there is anywhere to swerve to with vehicles on each side, nor is sudden swerving a good thing to do when towing an RV. The Silver Bullet and the RV took some heavy hits in deep holes, but I have not found any damage.

The journey to Hot Springs Arkansas ended at around 5 pm. We are camped at Gulpha Gulch Campground in the Hot Springs National Park. The town of Hot Springs is a few miles down the road. The campground is small but nice, some sites are along a creek, all sites are wooded and have full hookups. 

We never really got to explore around the campground.

We used the backup method to put the slide-out, I discovered the waterlogged Junction box and made a temporary repair, reinstalled the jack and used it to set up the RV on the site. It’s a good thing I was able to get it working as the site has a steep slope and I had to jack the front of the RV up about 10 inches to get the rig level.

Site 12 at Gupha Gulch Campground

Wednesday, May 22, 2024  I spent the day tracing out the power wire for the slideout. Removed many ceiling mounted devices trying to find the break in continuity. As of yet that has been unsuccessful, that is why the National Electric Code does not allow you to bury (hide) a splice box in any type construction. RV manufacturers use their own electric code, or they’re supposed to anyhow. 

I decided the best thing to do was abandon the original wire aand pull a new one across the ceiling., but first I needed to make sure there was nothing else on the slide circuit. This took up more time as I traced the path of every circuit in the RV. 

We spent most of our time in or working on the RV because it rained everyday we were in Arkansas. The morning weather map looked like this every morning.

We spent several hours driving to anywhere In Hot Springs I thought might have the proper wire, to no avail. As a temporary fix I have a jumper wire we will stretch across the kitchen while operating the slide. Amazon is delivering all the parts I need to Los Alamos and I will do permanent repairs while there. PS: I heard later that the stores keep wire in the back room because of theft, you have to ask for it.

Bath house row

Thursday May 23, 2024. Today we went to town as tourists, We walked Central Ave where all the ornate early 1900’s bathhouses line one side of the road. One of them is now a museum operated by the National Park Service, We took the self guided tour which covers all three floors, plus the mechanical workings in the basement.

It’s hard to believe that the entrepreneurs of the day built this whole town into a resort/cure all for whatever ails you using plain old water. That’s right, there is nothing special about the Hot Springs water, its just hot. The Spa’s offered hot baths, hot showers, some with deluges of water, steam baths, vaper chambers, hot towel wraps all using the same magic ingredient, Hot Water!

Bath house row

We also drove the 3.5 mile road to the top of a nearby mountain. At the summit there is a 200 foot observation tower at the summit.  For $10-$15 you can ride an elevator to the top for a panoramic view of Hot Springs and it’s surroundings. 

Lounge on the 3rd floor of the bath house

Stained glass ceiling of lounge

mosaic tile floor of lounge 

Nashville

A hot chick under a cool old tree (Osage Orange, est. 200+ yrs old)

 Friday May 17, 2024, we drove to Nashville today. Most of the route is on I-40, one of our least favorite roads because of heavy truck traffic. To ease the pain, we drove local roads to Knoxville before getting on the freeway. Surprisingly, traffic was light and we sailed along and passed the time listening to an audio book.

Campsite #24

Our campsite reservation outside Nashville is at 7 points campground on Priestly Lake. It is one of the seven Corp of Engineers campgrounds on the lake. When I made the reservations a few months ago all the waterfront sites were taken and we picked site 24 which is across the road. It turned out to be lucky for us as all the waterfront campsites were recently flooded due to heavy rains and they were all still closed.

All the waterfront sites still drying out after flood

On Saturday May 18 2024 we drove into downtown Nashville and visited the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. We had timed entry tickets for 11:15am and arrived about ten minutes early. The atrium at the entrance was busy, but there were only about 15 people in the timed entry line. 

The easy passage ended when we exited the elevator, all of the three floors were jammed with people. Apparently, there is no plan to keep the masses moving and everyone who entered that day was still there! Putting my distain for large crowds in-check, the hall of fame/museum was interesting and informative. Most of the displays are of entertainer costumes and musical instruments.  There are also videos and many tidbits of information on wallboards.

Scenes from the street

The streets surrounding the Hall of Fame are on the route of many different concepts of mobile barroom. There is almost a constant stream of people pedaled draft beer bars, old buses with the tops cut off, sporting a barroom where the school kids used to sit, and even a two and a half ton military truck (Deuce and a half) that sported an open air bar in the cargo bed. All these vehicles (term used loosely) were populated by revelers in varying stages of inebriation who were celebrating who knows what! All the mobile bars had hip-hop music blaring, yes hip-hop in Nashville, who knew?

We stopped for dinner at Chili’s on the way home and stayed at the campground the rest of the day. Millie did some laundry and I worked on the blog.

Entrance to visitors center

Sunday May 19 2024. Today we toured The Hermitage, the home of Andrew Jackson, the seventh president of the United States. Once again, we had timed entry, this time the system worked. Guides take you thru the mansion and keeps the flow of Homo Sapiens moving along and then spits you out onto the rear portico. 

View from the original residence

From there, you are on your own to walk the grounds, all 2000 acres of it, lol. Seriously there are several outbuildings and gardens in close proximity to the mansion. I noticed there were many people of foreign descent visiting the complex and I suggest that everyone, both new and long time Americans go visit the Hermitage. You will learn much about life in the early 1800’s and of just how important Andrew Jackson was to the shaping of the United States of America.

President Jackson's grave in the family cemetery

We decided to drive through downtown Nashville on our way back to the RV. The scene on Broadway Blvd looks the same as it has the last couple times we've been here. There is music trumped out of every barroom, and the barrooms are side by side all the way down the street. The sidewalks were a sea of humanity, there were thousands of people, some wanting to be part of the scene dressed in cowboy boots, western cowboy hats and butt cheek exposing shorts, I'm sure there were some with a musician's dream, but most were just tourists who I imagine, just wanted to see it.

Cornton Platation and confederate cemetery

Monday May 20 2024. Today's journey was south to the city of Franklin Tennesse. We couldn’t help but comment to each other on all the stately mansions as we entered the vicinity of town. The real treat was the picturesque downtown, it's like it's something out of a fashion homes magazine. Franklin would surely be at the top of my list if I wanted to live in Tennessee. Intrigued, Millie googled the town, it appears this is the bedroom community for the rich and famous of Nashville and real estate is priced accordingly.  Not only housing, the cost of gasoline was 75 cents higher per gallon than in Nashville, which is only about 25 miles up the road. We didn't go in anywhere to price milk and bread, but Franklin is clearly not for the working man.

1650 Confederate soldiers are buried in the 2 acre cemetery.

Lucky for us we didn’t come here house shopping, we came to visit a Confederate cemetery just at the edge of town. The Civil War battle of Franklin occurred on the 1,420 acres of Carnston Plantation. More than 1,750 Confederate soldiers lost their lives at Franklin, including four Confederate generals. 

Soldiers are grouped by state

The McGavock family, owners of the plantation, donated 2 acres for use as a confederate burial place. It is the largest privately owned confederate cemetery. This is surely a blessing for these poor souls and those of us who care about them. It’s only a matter of time before the government caves in to the insanity happening in the US and bulldozes all the government managed Confederate cemeteries. I'm stepping off the soapbox now.

To those of you who care about the history of our country, I encourage you to visit Carnton Plantation, or sometime in your life visit a military cemetery. They are hallowed ground.

PS: Carnton has never received any funding or support from local, state or the Federal government. The site is maintained and managed by The Battle of Franklin Trust, a non-profit organization.

Pigeon Forge, it's the Myrtle Beach of the mountains!

 

It's a highly contagious killer virus. Quick, lets buy an RV and go camping among strange people!

We surely would have spent more time in Virginia, but nowadays when you are making campground reservations, you have to take what you can get. This is especially true with state or federal parks, they have been in high demand since the Covid crisis.  It seems that in a collective epiphany, a whole lot of folks went out and bought RV's thinking that somehow this method of travel would keep the family safe from the ill's of the world. I wonder how that worked out for them?

Our site at Jellystone Campground

On Tuesday May 14, 2024, we moved from Raccoon Branch to Pigeon Forge Tennessee. We have a very nice site at the Jellystone Campground which is located just off the main drag thru Sevierville and Pigeon Forge. It is no more than ½ mile from the main entrance to Dollywood.

That first afternoon it was on and off showers, so we just stayed at the RV. The original plan was to secure theater tickets after we got here, but we’ve cancelled all that. After four days of music available ten hours a day at Denton we just weren’t enthusiastic about going out to any shows. We hadn’t seen any advertisements for any show that would be new to us, we’ve seen them all. Besides we plan on going to Dollywood tomorrow (Wednesday).

It rained heavily overnight and the forecast was for rain to continue all day. That prompted us to cancel plans to go to Dollywood. We fell back on a standby plan, an outing we now consider entertainment, “Thrifting”!  We shop at thrift stores; Millie is mostly interested in clothes, and I buy DVD movies.

We keep a stock of DVD’s in the RV because believe it or not, there are still many areas of the country with no internet service. We have no interest in over the air or cable TV, on the road we only watch DVD movies.  If internet service is available, we will watch youtube, but that’s about it. We each have our favorite youtube channels, Millie is watching old house renovation in France and I’m following “Itchy Boots”, the adventures of a young women from the Netherlands who travels the world alone on a motorcycle.

Noraly Schoenmaker "Itchy Boots"

On Thursday morning we went to the Apple Barn for breakfast. This is kind of a tradition for repeat visitors to the Pigeon Forge area. I am sorry to report that I no longer recommend it. First, and this is not the management’s fault, the place is always full of families with undisciplined screaming kids. Second, breakfast for two people was just not worth $34.  That’s all I will say about it.

Best part of the Apple Barn experience, the apple fritters

 After breakfast we backtracked about 40 miles from Pigeon Forge to Jefferson City Tennessee. Betty’s husband, Paul Pedigo is a patient in a nursing home in Jefferson City. It is a temporary situation, soon they hope there will be room available in a facility closer to Betty’s home in Virginia. Paul suffers from advanced Alzheimer's. 

Betty drove down from Virgina and we all visited with Paul. Millie and I stayed a couple hours Betty dutifully stayed on before taking the long 2 hour drive back to Virginia. It’s sad, that’s all my heart will let me say. God bless the caregivers!

Before leaving Jefferson City we drove through the downtown area, other than the college campus, it’s not very impressive. Like many small towns commerce has all moved to the outskirts of town on one of the main highways. 

Traffic, people, glittering lights of the Pigeon Forge strip!

We took the scenic route on country roads back to Myrtle Beach of the Mountains (My pun, because of the tourist attractions and over building going on) the closer you get to the tourist towns of Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge and Sevierville the nicer the outlying country homes become. People who are prospering with the tourist trade I imagine.

Martijn Doolaard, youtuber

One of the Youtube channels we watch is a man named Martijn Doolaard who rebuilding a stone building in the Italian alps. He makes the most beautiful bread in a cast iron pot in a wood oven or sometimes over the hot coals of a fire pit. Now I’m thinking, I’d like to try that on my camping griddle. I’ve been looking for a small cast iron pan or pot, it has to be small because of storage concerns in the RV. I finally found one in a thrift store, but it was in bad shape and they wanted $14 for it. I’ll go to the store and by a new one first I said, Millie replied that they are expensive. 

I had seen the LODGE /cookware factory store along the main drag into town and stopped in on our way back to the RV. After making the rounds of all the designer cast iron cookware I found the 2nd’s rack in the far corner of the store. There I found just what I was looking for, the cost was $9.62. Let the cooking fun begin! 

Just the facts:

Fuel, Jefferson City $53.58, $3.12 per gallon, 17.13 gallons.

Building a door!

Denton NC to Troutdale VA

 Monday May 13 2024

On Sunday morning we broke camp at Denton Farm Park and drove northwest to Raccoon Branch Campground near Troutdale Virginia. It is a small campground in the Jefferson National Forest with only about 20 sites and only 10 with water/electric and the rest primitive. It is a pretty place and is also the trail head for the path up a mountain to a scenic summit overlook called Dickey-knob, elevation 3650 feet.

view from Dickey-Knob

The first night here at Raccoon Branch the temperature dropped to 43 degree F. That was climate shock for us, coming from the south; Had the electric heat set to low and woke up to 61 degrees F inside. The gas furnace quickly brought it up to a comfortable 75.

We have learned from previous visits here that the water pressure and volume is very low. So low you have a hard time washing shampoo out of your hair. I stood outside at the tank fill with a hose for what seemed like an hour to add 20 gallons of water to our onboard tank. It was probably only ten minutes. lol. Now rather than using the campground system, we are using our onboard water pumping system for water pressure. It much better this way.

We visited Millie’s sister Betty on Sunday afternoon, once again I’m amazed that two woman who regularly spend hours on the phone can still fill an afternoon with conversation. I wanted to look over a small project that I was going to do for Betty.

Arrow points to potting shed where we built a new door.

Behind her house there is a fair sized wooden shed and some time ago they had an extension built on the back of for use as a potting shed. The door to the potting shed had rotted and there was just some plywood covering the entrance. Tomorrow we would return and I would perform a feat of magic creating a door out of the materials at hand, there was just no way the plywood covering could be made serviceable as a door.

I had tried to plan for this job before we left and brought some additional power tools to compliment the tools I aways carry on the truck. I also had some 2x4”s left over from a home project and packed them, good thing I did. To keep from making a long story I will summarize; existing door frame was repaired and securely mounted in the wall. A new door was fabricated using the 2x4”s and a sheet of OSB (plywood like product).

The challenge was the door frame on the hinge side was falling apart, the door opening was not square, and the floor was not level. I was able to get the hinge side fairly plumb and securely fasted to the wall, I fudged the door dimensions to fit the opening, if measured in detail it would be sort of a parallelogram. I must admit the end result looks pretty darned good and more importantly it works really well too!

Sorry, I forgot to take a picture of the project.

Tomorrow we leave here and move southwest to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.

Just the facts.

Fuel: Mount Airy, NC Circle K, $3.35 per gallon, 11.3 gallons $38.03 

Two nights in Raccoon Branch campground using America the Beautiful passport= $42.00

The Denton Malpass Brothers Country and Bluegrass Festival

 

The Malpass Brothers, Chris and Taylor

Thursday May 9 2024 to Saturday 11 2024

We decided today would be a good time to miss the first couple shows and visit with Millie’s sister Lucile, knowing that the first day acts repeated in the afternoon and we could catch their shows then. 

The drive to Greensboro took a bit over an hour and we had an enjoyable visiting with Lucile. Even though the sisters speak regularly on the phone they still generated nonstop conversation the whole time we were there. Soon it was time to head back to the Malpass Brothers Country and Bluegrass Festival at the Denton Farm Park.

Just a sampling of the other Bluegrass Groups

Over the course of the three days we saw eleven different Bluegrass groups, five performances by the Malpass Brothers and the closing act by Gene Watson and his band. 

I can’t say enough good things about the Malpass Brothers. They are consummate entertainers, they sing traditional country songs, they are excellent musicians and do comedy skits too!

Taylors inflatable horse skit had me LOL!

The brothers and their band dress in western style costumes reminiscent of stage acts when they were more refined, and the actors cared about the image they projected. 

Chris always strums an acoustic guitar, while Taylor switches between two electric guitars and a yukulele.  Both are also talented singers, doing harmony’s together as well as each singing solo. 

Our view from row eleven

I estimated there were 1200-1500 people in attendance each night of the festival. Most of them were camped here for the whole four days. It is also open to walkin's on a daily basis, and we heard that the total attendance was 3000 people.

The legendary Gene Watson

On the last night of the show the closing act was by the legendary Gene Watson. He is from Texas and has been singing for a long time. His band members have all been with him for over 20 years and are as polished and talented as you can find. This is the third time we have seen him perform.

Gene Watson Band

Friday was Millie’s birthday, and we took time off from the show to drive 20 miles to Ashboro to a restaurant we discovered on a previous trip to the Tarheel state. The American Roadhouse has a fried fish special that is to die for. It is piled so high with fried fish, French fried potatoes and fried hush puppies. It probably would kill you if you ate here regularly. Lol The only thing not fried is the cole slaw!

Just the facts.

Four nights FHU camping at Denton Farm Park=$180

Four days of the music festival (2 people) $180.00

Fuel=Mobile Mart in Denton $70.49 I think it was $3.35 per gallon.

Meals out= American Roadhouse=$21.00 + gratuity, Chick-Fil-A=$21.00

The entrance to the Denton Farm Park

Camping is dispersed all around the pavilion  

The entertainment pavilion (view from the back side)