We rolled out of Tamarack RV Park on Thursday morning and headed west out of Coeur d’Alene. We intended to make an early start and be on the road by 9:30am at the latest. I thought this would give us ample time to reach Aubrey’s RV in Union Gap, Washington to have our slide-out repaired. I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s start over.

I had organized the trailer and added another strap on the left side to secure cargo on Monday afternoon. It was hot in the trailer. The outside temperature reached the 90s and it was even hotter inside the trailer. While I was working in the trailer, we had visitors – Suzanne Holman and her boyfriend, Doug. This gave me a good excuse to take a break. Donna and Suzanne met through a random connection on Facebook. Donna learned from a recent post that Suzanne was taking Doug on a quick tour of Idaho and Washington and invited them to stop by so they could meet in person. We sat at the picnic table enjoying some of Donna’s homemade artichoke hummus and veggies and talked for about an hour. Then I went back to work.

That night, Donna prepared garlic scapes that she picked up at the farmers’ market on Saturday. She was excited to find them after trying them once many years ago. I’d never eaten a scape before. Donna massaged the scapes with olive oil, wound bunches of 4-5 in a loose knot, and sprinkled them with sea salt and fresh pepper. I grilled them in our veggie grilling pan.

I should mention that before cooking, you need to break off the lower, thicker part of the stem and discard it. It’s tough and woody. The white garlic “flower” (it doesn’t really flower) and the upper stem are tender and delicious.

I grilled boneless, skinless chicken thighs marinated with the honey-maple dressing, another find at the farmers’ market. Served with the scapes and garlic smashed red potatoes, it was a meal worth repeating.

On Tuesday morning, we were up early and walked next door to the Broken Egg for breakfast at 7:30am. We had a hearty breakfast. I ordered eggs benedict with hash browns and Donna had bacon, eggs and hash browns.

We were a little behind schedule. It was 9:40am when I was finally ready to fire up the beast. On our way out of the park, I stopped at the propane station. I wanted to fill our tank as I didn’t think we would see a better price on propane in the months ahead. That took another 20-minute chunk out of the morning by the time the tank was filled. We should be set on propane for the rest of the year now though.

Our next stop was the Pilot-Flying J truck stop at exit 2, in Post Falls (two miles from the Washington border). I knew fuel would cost more in Washington, so I wanted to fill up our fuel tank. The card reader at the pump wouldn’t authorize my Flying J card. This card gives me a discount on the price and allows me to put up to $500 worth of fuel in the tank. Many pumps will stop at $100 when you use a regular credit card.

I went inside and handed my Flying J card to the cashier and told her I was having a problem at the pump. She swiped the card and asked me for my PIN. I gave her the number and she said my PIN was wrong. I opened my e-mail on my smartphone and showed the e-mail from Pilot-Flying J with my PIN. She tried it again and said, “Sorry, it doesn’t work. You’ll have to call customer service.”  Another 20-minute chunk of time gone.

I drove out of the Flying J and went to the Exxon station across the street. This turned out to be a better option anyway. My Chase Visa card is offering 5% cash back on gas station purchases (truck stops are excluded). So, the 5% meant about 20 cents off per gallon. That’s better than the Flying J discount. I filled the tank and found that my fuel mileage from Great Falls to Coeur d”Alene was 9.8 MPG. Not bad!

It was 10:45 by the time we hit the border. We had a 2pm appointment at Aubrey’s RV in Union Gap. We cruised west on I-90 at 62mph, then turned south on US395. I planned to follow US395 to Tri-cities (Pasco-Kennewick-Richland) and pick up I-82 there. I knew we weren’t going to be at Aubrey’s by 2pm.

I asked Donna to program Aubrey’s address into Nally (our GPS). I wanted to see if Nally would come up with a faster route. Nally had me exit US395 and follow a series of county roads. When I planned our route, I though it might be quicker to cross over to WA24, which runs right into Union Gap. This was where Nally was taking us. However, that route has to jog around the Hanford Department of Energy (DOE) site. I didn’t want to drive near Hanford.

Hanford is the biggest, most toxic nuclear waste site in the western hemisphere. The site was part of the Manhattan Project in 1943. It was the first full-scale plutonium reactor in the world. The plutonium for the first nuclear test (Trinity) and for the bomb detonated over Nagasaki was made there.

Today, the 586-square-mile site has more than 56 million gallons of radioactive liquid waste stored in failing containers. In 1973, 115,000 gallons of nuclear sludge leaked there. Today, at least 67 containers of radioactive sludge are known to be leaking.

The site was decommissioned in 1987, but many experts agree the worst is yet to come. Many of the leaking containers date back to the 1940s. There are many more containers that are sure to fail at some point. This waste will eventually find its way to the Columbia Gorge and contaminate the river. It could be potentially worse than Fukushima. If you’re interested in knowing more about Hanford, click on the links below.

Koin Article

Huffington Articles

As we skirted around the desolation of the Hanford area, the day became very hot. The temperature outside was 103 degrees. I fired up the generator to run the roof air conditioner as we drove along. The intense heat was creating thermal air streams which developed into dust devils. These mini-twisters were creating funnels of dust and vegetation swirling into the sky. We were slammed by a couple of the fierce winds.

Donna phoned Aubrey’s and told them we would be an hour late. They told her that 3pm would be okay. We arrived at their shop right at 3pm. I went inside to write up my repair order.

The woman I talked to two weeks earlier when I made my appointment wrote up the ticket. Then she asked me when I needed the coach back! I told her we live in it. When I made the appointment, I clearly told her we were full-timers and I wanted to be sure they could get the work done. We found out later that she was new to the position and misunderstood what I meant when I said we were full-timers.

This wasn’t good. She told me she only booked time to diagnose and make an estimate –  they didn’t have time to do the work. Their technician was an experienced guy and he was very helpful. He asked me a few questions and then he pulled the coach into the shop with the hope of finding a simple fix. I told him I thought the seal had come loose and jammed the slide. He looked at the inner seal and told me he had never seen this type of seal jam a slide in over 20 years of RV experience. The inner seal is soft foam. He said the outer wiper seal is bonded to an aluminum strip and it could jam a slide, but our outer seal is intact.

You know how it is when you have a toothache. You make an appointment and go to the dentist. When you get there, the tooth doesn’t hurt anymore and the dentist doesn’t find anything wrong.

Well, that’s how it went. The tech operated the slide and it worked fine. He did find the hydraulic reservoir for the HWH jack and slide rams was low on fluid. His theory was the low fluid allowed air into the ram for the living room slide, as that is the last thing I operate when I set up. He topped up the fluid and operated the slide several times. I’m skeptical, but I didn’t have any other ideas. We’ve been living without opening the living room slide for about five weeks, and it’s working perfectly.

I paid for the shop time and fluid and drove to the WalMart in Terrace Heights. We were told at Aubrey’s that this WalMart is RV-friendly and we could overnight there.

We found a good spot near the end of the WalMart lot. There were a couple of semi tractor-trailer rigs parked there. It was beer thirty and I opened a cold one. About then, a security vehicle drove around our rig. A few minutes later, the security vehicle stopped next to our door. I stepped outside and greeted the security guy. He told me we were welcome to stay the night, but he wanted me to pull forward about thirty feet. He said it was a popular stop for truckers and he wanted to maximize the parking space. No problem. Free overnight parking with a security guard – I’m good with that.

We were up early Wednesday morning. We had breakfast at the McDonalds in WalMart and hit the road. We headed north on I-82 over the Umptanum Ridge to Ellensburg. From there we took US97 over Blewett Pass and continued on to Wenatchee. We were thinking about boondocking at the Twisp-Winthrop Rodeo Grounds where we stayed last year.

I’ll have to continue this story tomorrow – it’s getting too long-winded already!