Another trip to Buckeye

We drove to Buckeye today, mainly because they have a Verizon store there and I'm having trouble with the charger to my MiFi. It is under warranty but of course I didn't bring any paperwork. The clerk tried it on their charger and suggested the problem is likely to be in my charger and not the MiFi unit itself, and she recommended using my Verizon cell phone charger. I am back now and tried it and at first I didn't think it would work, but it did, and here I am.

I also bought a watchband at Walmart. Mine broke a week or so ago and it drives me crazy to have to look for a cell phone to see what time it is. While at Walmart I also bought an inexpensive wall clock for the camper. The best purchase I made was two small boxes of Arm & Hammer baking soda - one to replace what I dumped onto the oven fire, and another for spare.

I scraped almost all the residue from the oven floor, and it took me a long time to clean all the soot from every square centimeter of oven, racks, etc. I have a potato in there right now and so far so good.

My tailbone is still bothering me and the ibuprofen helps from about an hour after I take a pill, and it lasts for a couple of hours. I'm going back to Sacramento earlier than I had planned so I can seek medical help from my own doctor. With all the joking I've done about wishing I had an Rx for something stronger, I feel I really need something stronger for the pain.

I feel fairly confident that I can handle all the systems of the truck camper. I had planned to top off the propane tank today as well as the fuel tank in my truck, but since we didn't even start out until after Noon, and since my energy is usually lagging by 2:00 or 3:00, I didn't want to bother with it. I may go into Salome tomorrow and do the propane thing, and pay a bit extra for diesel, but I will go early.

I'm thinking about taking AZ 95 up around Havasu City and then I-40 into Needles. I'd like to try the stretch of old Rte 66 shortly after Needles, which looks to be about 75 miles. If anyone has done this section of road, and especially if there are any recommended campgrounds or RV parks along that portion of Route 66, please let me know. I hope I can continue to use the Mi-Fi with the cell phone charger until I get back to Sacramento.

I hope everything will work smoothly, but when I think of all the little snags I ran into with the 5th wheel, I know there will be some bumps in the road ahead. I began towing the 5th wheel with very little, if any, instruction on how to do anything. I was given a big 3-ring binder and told I could find all the answers there. A Good Samaritan Hitchhiker owner drove about 250 miles to help me hitch up because the owner didn't know how, and the Good Sam read my posts to a forum asking for help - I was asking for verbal instructions, but this wonderful guy drove all that distance to help me out.

Having learned the hard way about the 5ver, and probably getting more instruction from Dave than my brain can process in this short time, I think I will do OK. There will be glitches, but hey, that's the stuff of blog entries!

Another near disaster

Yesterday afternoon I decided to bake a potato to go with my dinner. This would be the first time using the oven in this camper, and before I lit the pilot I notice a sheet of that rubber mesh non-slide stuff that RVers often use to keep things from sliding around in the cabinets. I removed it, and then stooped down with the fire starter in hand to light the pilot. I didn't notice anything on the floor of the oven, but there must have been another rubber mat on the bottom, because in just a few minutes after I lit the pilot and closed the door, thick clouds of black smoke began pouring out. There was a strong chemical smell that burned my throat and lungs.

I opened the oven door and more smoke poured out, and I found the oven full of flames. I had visions of the camper and truck burning up within minutes. Remembering that Dave had left a little yogurt cup of baking soda in the fridge I threw the entire contents towards the flames and used a spatula to stir it around a little, and the flames went out. Lady stood at the door when we first noticed the smoke, and fortunately I had the door open with only the screen door latched, so we weren't completely without air. It took a while being outside to finally be able to breathe again without the burning sensation in my throat and lungs. Now today I have to clean the mess up!


Between my recent fall and now this oven fire, I'm beginning to wonder what message I'm supposed to be getting. I want to figure it out quickly before something else happens. And dang, I still want my baked potato! I had even bought some shredded Tillamook cheddar to go on top of it.

The main reason for relating this incident is to stress the importance of having baking soda on hand, and in the most accessible place. I always had a box in my 5ver, but it often got shifted around with the baking supplies and spices, and might have taken longer to locate it and take action. I couldn't have told you where the fire extinguisher was in my panic, and I have never used one so would have had to read instructions first. Baking soda doesn't need instructions.

I wanted to show a few pictures of the inside of my tiny house. There isn't much space to stand back and get a view of the whole thing.




I swept some of the baking soda and residue from the oven, but much of the melted rubber is stuck. I'll try scraping it when I get back to Sacramento, but I wonder if I will ever have the nerve to cook anything in it again.

First time

This must be the third day (I fell on Thursday afternoon) and I feel worse than ever. The only halfway comfortable position is standing, and I sure can't stand all day. Will this ever get better?

On a much nicer note, I am posting some pictures taken by Tim, Snowbird West's roadrunner-whisperer.





My body may have been hurting but I was in a great frame of mind, so I asked Dave if he would like to go with me to Wickenburg. I needed a couple of things and didn't want to go all the way to Buckeye, with its traffic. What a pleasant drive it was! My first time driving the truck with the camper mounted, and it was just like driving the truck alone. No problems whatsoever, and the side mirrors gave me a good view of the road behind me.

There was barely any sway, except maybe for a bit of uneven roadway. All in all I can say I love it! I got a surprise when I brought my groceries out to put into the fridge - after all my experience with a 5ver and packing for the drive, I completely forgot about securing anything. Surprisingly, there wasn't much movement - just in a few items - and nothing breakable. I think I left in too much of a hurry to think about giving the inside a check out. I am definitely going to be a happy camper!

Third day must be the worst

Today is day #3 of my "troubles", and it is by far the worst. I can't seem to get comfortable in any position, and right now I wish I had a strong narcotic pain killer rather than the ibuprofen. Maybe by tomorrow I'll feel differently though.

My thanks to all those who have wished me a speedy recovery and who sympathized with my plight. I just wish I had been aware enough to avoid it - I can see in my mind exactly what I did, how I was doing it, and where I went wrong. I lay awake last night thinking of how I can do it correctly in the future, but never came up with a positive answer. Instead I got out of bed and began to write down all those things you think of in the dead of night, that you forget when you are wide awake and trying to make a list.

Here are some photos of the loading up process:





And here is what Lady thought about it:


Dave doing some tightening-up work:


Ready to test it out:



I should be out driving it around right now, but a couple of people came by to visit and that tired me out a bit, combined with being awake in the middle of the night last night and up earlier than usual this morning. To top it all off, the bright sun went behind clouds, and I see much better on a sunny day, so I will test drive tomorrow. Maybe I'm just too afraid to try it out yet? No reason for that, when I had no problems with towing a 34' fifth wheel. I think I'm slightly overwhelmed with the mounting process, and I know it is something I will never try to do myself.

Emergency care on the road

I left after 8:00 a.m. this morning, intending to find the med center in or near Salome that I had googled. I never did come across it or any signs to it, so I just continued to Wickenburg, another site found online. That is the long way to Wickenburg, around 85 miles or so. I went to the clinic first, to find out that it wasn't an urgent care center but that they could give me an appointment with just a 45 minute wait.

I opted to go across the street to the Wickenburg Community Hospital Emergency Room. What a great hospital! From the folks at the front desk back to the doctors, techs, admissions personnel, xray techs, etc., they were professional, kind, and caring. It is also a beautiful place, obviously new, with a decor in keeping with the southwest and not like most medical centers.

I was admitted promptly and the admissions person came back to the examining room with a desk on wheels, so I didn't have to move from place to place - they all came to me. I was seen by the doctor and then sent for xrays, which showed no broken bones or fractures. I am so relieved, and think how close I came to possibly never walking again. I left with a prescription for Ibuprofen, which I chose over a narcotic type drug. I would have loved a feel-good pill, but there will come a time when I really need one of those and I'll gladly take them - this time I can survive with the "vitamin I".

When I got back and later talked to Dave, he mentioned that I was so fortunate to have fallen where I did. Creosote bushes grow everywhere, and the site owners often trim them down to several short, bare spikes. I could have been impaled if I had landed on one of those. But I am so grateful to have had nothing worse than a really sore tailbone, and I'm noticing aches in my neck, probably because my head hit the ground so hard.

I took a short cut back to the Park, and it turned out to be about 60 miles. So my little accident cost me a 150 mile trip, but I'm so glad for the outcome I didn't mind it at all. I noticed that I was beginning to feel a bit uncomfortable by the time I got to Wickenburg, which means that I really shouldn't be driving any distance for a while. I will know if I need to buy a step or ramp for the dog once the camper is mounted. She may be able to make it, but I notice she has more trouble climbing up steps or into the truck lately, but then so do I, at least for the time being.

So that was my day, at least 5 hours of it. I only wanted to take a nap when I got back to the camper.

Truck Campers can be hazardous to your health!

I had an accident today and will probably suffer from the effects of it for a while. I was trying to insert a full propane tank into the camper. It's a small tank and I can handle it fairly well, except that the bay is up a little higher than on a 5ver, plus the tank lies horizontally in the bay. So I stood on a small 4-legged stool and tried to hoist it up level with the bay so I could get in and situated. I might add that it's a very tight fit as well. (I originally posted that the tank is in the bay in a vertical position. Maybe the bump on my head got me confused, but it lies horizontally.)

I must have leaned back slightly and the stool tipped, I hit the ground on my tailbone still holding the propane tank which must have been what cut my lip, and then my head hit the ground really hard. I just lay still for several minutes wondering if I had broken something. Finally I was able to move both legs, then into a sitting position for a minute, and then stood up. I have been hurting ever since, but it's not likely that I broke a bone or got a concussion.

I'm going to look online to find the hours for the Urgent Care facility in Salome, and depending on how I feel in the morning I might drive the 30 miles and hope they can x-ray me. At least I would like a prescription for the pain, although I can't take Vicodin or Tylenol, which seems to be the prescription of choice. I'll live, but I might start back for Sacramento sooner than I had thought.

The truck is ready for the camper to be mounted, but if I need to go to get a medical check then it can wait.

On a much happier note, one of the campers in an nearby site came over to say that a roadrunner he feeds now and then had gotten into a structure where he stores water barrels, and which is enclosed in a heavy black netting. Of course I had to go see it because I've never seen a roadrunner in person, and I got some pictures of it. Tim said the bird had let him get some good photographs, including one that was close enough to show its eyelashes!




After I had taken the photos Tim lifted the netting on one side and I held it open on the other, and the bird flew right out. (The blue in the picture is the water barrels.)

Back to Buckeye

I was up very early this morning as we needed to go to Buckeye and be back in time for the honey wagon I'd signed up for. There is some construction on I-10 that really slows traffic, as it is reduced to one lane in each direction, so Dave found an alternate route that was virtually traffic free. It certainly was more scenic.

We arrived in Buckeye at 8:00 a.m. Walmart had my reading glasses and so far I think they are going to be a big help. I did some shopping at my "unfavorite" store, mainly in the RV and tools section. Those little items such as connectors, hoses, etc., can really rack up at the cash register, but I felt I might as well get everything all at once. I'm not sure what I did with some of the small stuff from my 5th wheel but I probably left a lot of it with the RV, or else tossed it, because at that point I was seriously considering a teardrop camper that would be fairly simple to hitch and tow.

I had ordered a rubber bed mat for the Ford and it came in a day early, so we picked it up in the same shopping center as Walmart. Dave put it in the truck as soon as we got back, so it is ready for the camper to be mounted. I hope that goes easily. The original owner of the truck had installed a drop in bed liner that I will probably get rid of eventually, but there is really nowhere to dispose of it here. I doubt if I could sell it because there are cut outs where the 5th wheel hitch rails are located.

We went to Buckeye early in the morning to be able to get back so that I could dump the waste tanks. It was fairly easy because the two guys on the truck told me the sequence of the whole process, and it didn't take long. I'm familiar enough with emptying of the waste and grey water tanks, but they are in a different location and the set up is slightly different than my 5th wheel. Now that I've done it I shouldn't have any problems at all, I hope.

Today was a little more comfortable - not so windy and while it was cold overnight and this morning, it warmed up to a bearable level. I think the next few days are going to be warmer. I'm getting acclimated except for the wind, which is extremely hard on aging skin.

I hope I can get some good pictures of the camper mounting process, and take something suitable for my header picture.