Oregon – Family, Friends & Doctors
We took a car trip to Oregon for a few weeks in late June 2017. This is the first time leaving Ian after his transplant surgery and he had only been out of the hospital a couple of months so his dad stayed with him. While in Oregon, we took care of all of our preventative doctor appointments, celebrated a couple of family birthdays and helped Bruce’s dad after his back surgery.
RV Restock
In mid-August, we traveled from Southern California to Phoenix area to get the RV travel-ready again. We took separate cars, I drove the tow vehicle and Bruce brought his car to be stored. Just over the California border, I experienced a monsoon with zero visibility and flash flood warnings.
This weather was new to me and I had no idea what to do! I pulled over but was worried about the threat of flooding across the road under me. I decided to drive out of the storm despite no visibility. As I moved forward, the storm cleared up very quickly and the temperature rose 30 degrees to over 90 again! The only sign that there had been a storm was a section of the highway that was still draining flash flood water. Not a fan of this weird weather!
Bruce installed the solar panels that he had stored for a year. Solar will help keep the batteries charged without having to run the generator all the time when we are boondocking (off grid).
It was HOT and unusually humid in Phoenix due to the monsoons – not the best timing for a visit to the desert! To beat the heat, Bruce got to work on the roof early in the morning and took a few swim breaks.
While he was working on the roof, I purged outdated food, cleaned and reorganized. We had learned to live without a lot of items during the last eight months of temporary housing so we offloaded plenty of items to storage. We are still carrying around too much stuff while we learn what we really need. Clothing is difficult to decide because temperatures range from over 100 degrees to mid 40’s and locations vary from camping or beach to city.
Getting out of the backyard
First time parking in the gated area in the backyard. Bruce drove beautifully! Always something new on this journey!
This video shows my novice skills but it helps illustrate how it goes at each campsite. Can he see me? Can he hear me (no!) is he going to clear obstacles and will there be room for the slides? Then there is the power/water/sewer hookups…will they reach? We have it figured out now, thank goodness for Bruce’s patience!
Heading back to Oregon
We left Phoenix area (really Tempe) after a few days. We were intent on getting to Oregon before the solar Eclipse traffic became crazy and we had upcoming family celebrations and some follow-up medical appointments. Glad we changed our route to avoid central Oregon because the eclipse traffic got really bad!
