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As a teenager, I took Driver’s Ed in school. I learned all the things I needed to know to pass my driving test plus the importance of driving defensively. I’m a pretty good driver. But man, this behemoth we just bought scares me. I’ve never driven anything even close to that size. So, being the intelligent person I am, I signed up for Driver’s Ed again.

This one is called RV Driving School. You can check them out at http://www.rvschool.com/. Since, I wanted to have confidence in Dave’s driving as well, we signed up for a combination class where we would take turns driving for two days of six hours per day. I had my doubts about my ability to spend that much time doing this but our instructor, Dan Sheppard, said he could work with us on timing and what we’d do when. We ended up doing three hours on Friday afternoon, two three-hour sessions on Saturday, and a final one Sunday morning with the morning ones starting at 9 am rather than the usual 8 am.

To make it easier on all of us Dan has an RV lot with a casita and two RV full hookup spots in the Yuma, Arizona, area. He and his wife live in their RV using one set of hookups and he rents the other one to his students.

This is so none of us will have to function quite so early in the morning. It turns out Dan is not an early morning person, either. Each morning he came out to greet us still eating his cereal.

Then once he and Dave checked everything out we set off for our lessons.

It was fantastic! Dan taught us how to use our RV as a measuring device. We learned how to set up our mirrors so we could see the things we’d need to be able to see.  We learned how to line up the side curb along the windshield wipers then how far to pull forward to be able turn right corners without driving over the curb. We learned how to line up the center line of the cross street in our side window to turn left without wiping out the car waiting there for its own left turn. We learned how to line up our tailpipe with a campsite’s entrance to get in with enough room on each side to be able to open our slides. We leaned how much tail swing our RV has in case we ever get parked next to the railing of a ferry so we know how to exit the ferry without hitting the railing. We learned how many typical traffic lanes it takes us to be able to make a U-turn. We learned how to test our air brakes. We learned how to make our engine shift into high idle and when and why to do that. We learned how to use our transmission and exhaust brake to help us go up and down mountains. And we learned how to keep the transmission from hunting back and forth for the correct gear which can make me car sick.

We are now exhausted but we know a LOT more about how to handle this behemoth we bought. You are safe being in our vicinity when we are driving now. Of course, I need LOTS of practice yet so don’t come too close if you see me trying to park the thing.

TTYL,

Linda

Nick & Terry Russell, who publish the Gypsy Journal, some RV how-to books, and several blogs, http://gypsyjournal.net/blog/ sponsor two rallies each year. We are currently attending one in Yuma, Arizona.

Arrival day in the staging area where RVs lined up waiting to be escorted to camping sites looked like this.

Yuck. I had to walk through that muck from the motorhome to the car. Dave had it worse; he had to unhook the car from the motorhome in that muck.

Here’s the good news.  Look how close to an entrance gate they had us park. That’s Dave coming through the gate with our dash and windshield wiper in the foreground.

But, here’s more bad news–our electrical hookup. It’s only 20 amp. When it works at all. Dave has had to go our several times to reset the circuit breaker.

Then more good news. The seminars have been fun and informative and the vendors have lots of good stuff we need.

Of course, that means we are spending lots of money. Here’s the company that got most of the money doing upgrades to our RV.

At least now our car has it’s own braking system for when we are towing it so it won’t try to push the coach if we should have an emergency. And the coach itself should be much easier to handle while driving down the road. We’ll find out how true that is when we take our driving lessons starting tomorrow afternoon.

In the sunshine.

Which we’ve had all week once that first day’s rain was over.

Life is good.

TTYL,

Linda

We’ve been talking about getting a car to tow ever since we started talking about buying a bigger motorhome. After much discussion we decided we’d buy a Honda CR-V because Dave wants all-wheel drive so he can explore roads like this one–look for the backwards number 3.

And go places like this.

After looking at some of the roads he’d like to drive he decided we should look at Jeeps. So we did.

The Jeep Wrangler is too tall for me to get into. The Jeep Liberty doesn’t have enough foot room on the passenger side to accommodate my cranky knees. The two Dodges we looked at also had the lack of foot space problem. We didn’t even bother looking at the Ford he thought might work.

So now the view in our backup camera looks like this.

And the side view of our motorhome looks like this.

And the car that’s following us looks like this.

Yup. It’s a Honda CR-V. Amazing how that worked out, isn’t it?

TTYL,

Linda

In the midst of all the work it takes to move into and furnish a new RV we decided we needed to take a play day. So we made a day trip to Hoover Dam.

After a long drive over we turned in to the parking garage where we saw this statue.

Here’s the view from level three of the parking garage towards the new visitor center down the hill and across the street which made me wish we had my Segway with us. I made the walk down OK but had to take a break coming back up. I’m sure glad my cane has a seat on it so I could take that break. And I’m glad I didn’t have my Segway because the slopes coming out of the parking garage were intimidating to say the least.

Turning the other way you see the new bridge they are building that will route traffic away from the dam visitor traffic. When the new route is done, the old route will be closed on the Arizona side. You will still be able to drive across the dam from the Nevada side with a turn around on the Arizona side sending you right back across again. If you make it past the security checkpoint, that is. We saw a utility trailer turned back and were glad we were driving a rental car since RVs had much more detailed checks than we did.

And here’s the dam itself.

We both went down to the visitor center where we saw a film about the building of the dam. Then  I sat people watching and reading my book while Dave went on a tour. Here’s bunch of pictures he took on the tour.

And here’s a few of Lake Mead behind the dam.

As you can see, it was a good day to go play.

TTYL,

Linda

We spent all day today shopping at Camping World. OK, we didn’t leave here until after noon. And it’s about an hour’s drive over and another back. And we were home before five o’clock. And we ate lunch while we were out. But, it felt like all day at Camping World.

I can’t believe how much stuff we need to buy just because we traded motorhomes. The new one has a 50 amp power system and the old one had a 30 amp power system so none of our electrical cords and adapters work. The new one has different sized fuses so even that part of the electrical system had no backups in our collection.

The steps are bigger in the new one so we needed to buy new step carpets to help keep the outside where it belongs.

The dump hoses can be reused but we needed some new fittings.

We need to buy a new ladder for this taller rig but it wouldn’t fit in the tiny rental car so that one is still on the list.

We bought a new water pressure regulator which then needed a short section of new water hose in case we can’t screw it right to a campground’s water bib.

We bought a new folding step because the jacks on this thing can lift it so high off the ground that I need help getting up onto the first step of the RV.

And that’s just stuff we bought today.

We’ve already bought a new lap rug to keep me warm when sitting in the Euro Chair. And new glasses and dishes because we have room for them now. And a couple pocket litter trays because we don’t want to scratch the buffet by dumping our keys on it. And a new coffee mug that  I can microwave my morning eggs in. And a bar stool I can sit on while I cook.

And we still need a new paper towel holder because keeping the one from the View would have left screw holes in the wall and we weren’t willing to do that.

The good news is we didn’t have to buy a new couch for the old RV. The dealer we traded it to called today to see if we, by any chance, still had the old couch. It seems it will cost them $1700 parts, shipping, and labor to replace it. So we’re good with the money we are spending.

TTYL,

Linda