Heading South… Again

TrackTown, USA: Remember I mentioned the RV park in McMinnville was a dust cloud Thursday afternoon due to field plowing? This morning, on my walk, I saw the newly plowed fields and found the entire complex to be in disarray. The grapes had been harvested and there were smashed grapes and purple stains all over the place, and tons of raccoon poop everywhere due to tons of raccoons feasting on all the dropped grapes.

Not only that - it was drizzling. After a solid ten days of sunny days, we woke this morning to cold temperatures, clouds and a misty fog. Because Dave just washed the car?

The tractor left mud along the bike/walking paths and even cracked the cement. So sad.

• 

• 

There were still a few plants not destroyed or decimated Thursday:

Wonder how/if they will clean this up, and if they will repair the sidewalk? We may never know, because we hit the highway south to Eugene on Friday morning, and are back to our usual RV Park, Premier RV Resorts, just north of Eugene. They stuck us in the "live-in" area, which is not looking very good these days.

My Sister and our niece, Carla (home on leave from her Marine assignment on Okinawa), spent Saturday with us. It was a very good day, starting with the Oregon Ducks crushing The Ohio State University (in Ohio!) in football. A shocker, and all the talk on all the sports shows Saturday. Most of the afternoon was spent outside - My Sister brought her adorable pooch - and we snacked and talked and snacked and talked, and then DT went to fetch a pizza. A great day and so great to catch up with Carla! Though her job with the Marines is a photo-journalist, she is super buff, and has been able to travel around SE Asia on assignment. What a great experience.

Sunday was spent packing. Packing? Why would be be packing? More news, Dear Reader: we are once again leaving our beautiful motorhome in Eugene for repairs. This time, at Cummins for a huge engine repair, and this time we knew we were going to leave our RV in Eugene, so planned ahead. (I have been living out of a carry-on bag for the past five weeks.)

I do not know enough about diesel engines to explain this properly, but the gist is: the model of engine in our bus tends to fail, or a certain valve tends to fail when installed in a motorhome. (This engine model does not fail in always-running semi-trucks, but only in always-sitting-around RVs.) It is a known issue, and we know several people who have had the engine fail while they were driving. We can't risk driving around any longer. Also, if we ever want to trade-in or sell this RV, no dealer will take our bus unless the engine issue has been addressed... because this repair is super expensive. (Click away to your heart's content on that amazon link at the top/right of every page on this blog!) To add to this adventure, when we drop our bus at Cummins (8a Monday, 13 September) we don't know if they will have our bus for two weeks or three months, or who-knows. Cummins will dismantle the engine, check the valves and replace the valves with a newer version... assuming the parts are available (another problem). Fun times! Send good vibes to the Magna Peregrinus!

I have been trying to use up any bits of food and getting us organized to make the dreaded two-day drive to La Quinta. Thank goodness, Dave's brother lives half-way, so we have a safe place to overnight in order to reach home before Yom Kippur... while also not overnighting with Gina and Steve on their wedding anniversary. That would be rude.

In my spare time, our (personal) email host for the past 32 years is shutting down. Jerks. They gave us a 30-day notice. Maybe do-able if we were home, but quite difficult on the road. Luckily, I had grabbed another personal email address years ago, so have another reasonable option. I will have just a few short weeks to transfer everything over once we reach our house (i.e. high-speed internet). My Driver has only one email address, and trying to nab an address for someone named DAVE TAYLOR is not going to be an easy task. Fortunately, Dave is rarely on-line, so will only have to change his email address at a handful of sites.

Me? Yeah, not that lucky.

My RVGoddess email remains the same. Email me via this website contact link (on the right) anytime.) I'm here for you!

Remember last week when DT grilled little chicken-zucchini patties? The rest of the mixture was rolled into balls and frozen. Tonight, I baked the meatballs and served them in pita bread, topped with a tzatziki sauce. Now, our fridge and freezer are basically empty.

Randomly, our old neighbors from the Motorcoach Country Club, Sue and Gary R., are staying at this RV park this week as well. It was great to catch-up with them and see their new American Eagle coach. Wow, just wow. It's been a while since we have seen such a quality coach.

Meanwhile... in Italy... Natalie (our goddaughter) and Jake are honeymooning. They asked for restaurant recommendations in Florence, and we couldn't help to mention Buca Mario. This place serves up a one kilo (2.2 pounds) steak that has people lined up out the door - tourists and locals. The newlyweds went there tonight and had a marvelous time:

Until my next update, hopefully from sunny La Quinta, I remain, your discombobulated correspondent.

---