Category Archives: Alpine Coach

Four States, Two Detours

We ended up spending eight nights moochdocking at Donna’s parents’ place, west of Old Bennington, Vermont. I haven’t posted in a week – this was one of the rare places where we had trouble getting a good internet connection or phone service with Verizon. I could take my laptop into the house and use Duke and Lorraine’s wifi, but it was awkward and I wasn’t very motivated to post.

Donna spent a lot of time doing yardwork. She spread mulch that was piled under a tree in the yard to create a plot about 12 feet by 20 feet. She also did a lot of weeding and learned to operate a weedwacker! The weedwacking would have kicked my allergies into high gear.

The highlight of the week was a trip for brew and dinner at Brown’s Brewing Walloomsac Taproom. This is located in Hoosick Falls, New York where Donna attended high school. Bennington, Vermont is less than 10 miles from the New York state line. The taproom and brewery is in an old building on the banks of the Walloomsac River.

Brown’s Brewery and Walloomsac Taproom

The brick building was originally built in 1854 and housed a papermill making wallpaper. In 1943, the site was purchased by the White-Flomatic Corporation and was a factory for the valves they made.

In 2006, Gary Brown bought the place with the intent of converting it to a brewery and taproom – an expansion of his operation in Troy, New York. The renovation took some time and the brewery and taproom finally opened in 2013.

We had a couple of cold ones and dinner with a view of the Walloomsac.

Donna, Duke and Lorraine

While we were dry camped, our Verizon Jetpack was giving us trouble. It was shutting itself off randomly. Sometimes it would shut off only a few seconds after booting up; other times it would work fine for an hour or so before shutting down. We’ve had it for more than five years.

On Thursday morning, Donna and I had breakfast at a diner in Bennington called The Blue Benn – excellent breakfast menu! Then we hit the Verizon store in town. Our old 291L Jetpack needed to be replaced. I upgraded to the 6620L. Five years is a long time for wireless technology. After we returned to the coach, we were surprised to find a 4G connection with the new Jetpack. The improvements in antennas and signal boosting made all the difference in the world.

Donna’s sister Sheila and Sheila’s son Connor flew in from California in the afternoon. Duke drove to Albany, New York and picked them up. We had a late dinner together.

Our site at the Connor’homestead – Mount Anthony in the background

This morning we were packed and ready to go early. We said our goodbyes and pulled out a little before 9am. We took the scenic route out of Bennington, knowing it would make for a long day. Our route took us south on Route 7 into Massachusetts.  The speed limits in Massachusetts keep you on your toes. The speed limit on Route 7 would change – it seemed like every mile or so – without warning or reason. One section might have a speed limit of 45 mph, then suddenly it’s 35 mph. Then it might go up to 50 mph only to drop to 40 mph without any notification of a reduction ahead. You need to keep an eye out for speed limit signs. In Great Barrington, we picked up Route 23 west and headed toward Catskill, New York. We planned to take 9W south to US209, but I made in a mistake in the route plan. We weren’t using our GPS – I planned the route the old-fashioned way with a map.

9W had a sign saying vehicles over 12 feet tall needed to stay on Route 23. There was a low clearance in West Camp. I usually rely on our RV specific GPS for routing for this reason. It has our vehicle parameters programmed in and wouldn’t route us along a road with clearance or weight limits that we exceed. Donna did some navigation on the fly and we made our way back to 9W south of West Camp and all was good. The only problem with the re-route came when we had to go through the village of Saugerties. We had to go through town on very narrow roads – I squeezed through at one point with a parked car inches off our right and oncoming traffic inches away on the left.

We hit US209 and thought we were home-free. But then we hit another detour – the road was closed for construction! We got back on track after traversing a couple of narrow county roads. We made a stop at Subway for lunch – it was conveniently located in a plaza with a large parking lot – and then continued south. At Port Jervis, we crossed into Pennsylvania – our fourth state for the day.

US 209 took us through the Delaware Gap National Recreation Area. We were on the west bank of the Delaware River with New Jersey just across the water. It was a long, slow slog today. Donna found free overnight parking at the Pennsylvania Welcome Center off of I-80 at exit 310. That’s where we stopped for the day. We only covered about 200 miles, but it took us seven hours!

We crossed several notable mountain ranges – the Berkshires in Massachusetts, the Catskills in New York and now we’re in the Poconos. These mountains aren’t as big as the mountains in the west, but they’re plenty steep in places.

Tomorrow we’ll head west. We plan to stop at the Cabela’s in Hamburg to dump our holding tanks and hopefully find fresh water. We’ve been dry camped for nine days. We’re just winging it and will see what tomorrow brings.

Breadcrumb Trail

The Fourth of July was our last full day in Little Deer Isle, Maine. It was a mostly relaxing day after the parade in the morning. I loaded the Traeger in the trailer and straightened things out a bit. We never got a chance to go out on Roger’s little sailboat – it’s called a Bullseye. Maybe next time – Roger just got it in the water the day before.

Roger’s sailboats in the foreground – Bullseye on the left and sloop Tarpon on the right

Roger’s neighbor Russ took the grandkids out tubing behind his 21-foot Boston Whaler in the afternoon and Donna went along for a joyride.

Tubing behind the Whaler

Everyone went out to watch fireworks after dinner, but Donna and I hung back and watched the Buck Harbor fireworks from camp chairs by our coach.

Thursday morning I had to do a bit of jockeying to get us out. First, I took the ball and mount out of our receiver hitch and put into the receiver on Roger’s truck. I used his truck to position our trailer – it was much easier than trying to hitch up to our coach in the tight space. Then I put our hitch back together and hitched up our coach, loaded the Spyder and we were ready for the road. It was 10:45 by the time we pulled out – a little later than I wanted.

We left the island and followed route 15 up to Orland. I crossed the bridge to Verona Island, then crossed the beautiful Penobscot Narrows suspension bridge. We followed Route 1 to Belfast where we picked up Route 3 all the way to Augusta and I-95. We were backtracking across the same route we came up on – basically following our breadcrumb trail.

We went back to Cabela’s in Scarborough just south of Portland to spend the night again. I dumped and flushed our holding tanks as soon as we got there. There were more RVs in the lot this time – the season is in full swing. By morning, I counted 15 RVs on our side of the lot. We walked to Famous Dave’s for a beer and dinner. They have live music on Thursdays and we enjoyed the performance.

I was a little concerned about Friday’s weather. The forecast showed thunderstorms and a cold front advancing across our path of travel. There were heavy rain and wind warnings. At 9am, all looked good so we pulled out. For some reason, our tolls on the way back were higher than on the way up. I paid $3.50 on I-95 and another $3.50 a couple of miles before we exited at Scarborough. When we got back on I-95, I hit another toll booth within a couple of miles and paid $3.50 again. Then I paid a toll on I-93 of $10.50 bringing the total for Maine up to $21.00.

We hit a few rain showers and visibility was poor at times, but we skirted the brunt of the storms which stayed mostly north of us. We made a stop in New Hampshire at the Hooksett Toll rest area. We stopped for lunch and Donna met up with her college friend, Paula Violo.  She lives and works nearby and they had not seen each other in 37 years. They spent an hour catching up over lunch while I hit the New Hampshire liquor outlet at the rest area – probably the best prices in New England.

It was an uneventful drive from there. I paid two tolls of $2.50 each to get across New Hampshire. We made good time until we got stuck behind a motorhome on Route 9 for the last 20 miles or so before Bennington. The driver seemed scared and unaware of how to use his engine brake. I could hear it activate, but it wasn’t as effective as our Jake and he would ride the brake pedal and go very slowly on each descent and slow excessively for curves. I had one chance to overtake on a passing lane on an uphill grade. Of course he hit the pedal to the metal there and drag raced me up the hill. I slowed and pulled back in behind him to allow cars behind to overtake us.

We parked in nearly the same spot we were in two weeks ago at Donna’s parents’ place. We quickly settled in. Saturday morning Donna and went to the Bennington farmers’ market. Donna picked up some cheeses and a lemon pound cake.

Bennington farmers’ market

As we often find at farmers’ markets, they had small stage and a guy playing for tips.

We also bought a steelhead trout filet at the store that I grilled for dinner.

Once again we’re boondocking without any hook-ups. Our new Lifeline AGM batteries are performing great. Saturday I had the TV and Dish receiver running on the inverter watching Wimbledon coverage all afternoon. The batteries held at 12.7 volts!

Our Xantrex Freedom 458 inverter is a modified sine wave unit. Modified sine wave produces alternating current, however it doesn’t work the same as a true sine wave like you would find from a typical wall outlet. A true sinusoidal wave rises above the zero line in a smooth arc, then drops in the same arc to the zero line and continues below before rising back to the zero line. In our 120-volt alternating current system used in the USA, the voltage rises above the zero line to +170-volts, then goes below the zero line to -170-volts and swings back again. It does this 60 times per second. The 170-volt peak results in a root mean square (RMS) voltage of 120-volts.

Our modified sine wave interverter does something similar. The difference is in the wave shape. Instead of a smooth arc as the voltage increases and decreases, the wave form is square. It goes from the zero line nearly straight up, then flattens before falling nearly straight down past the zero line before flattening again and then rising. Modified sine wave inverters use simpler, less expensive circuitry than a true sine wave inverter. Most of the time, there no difference. However, some sensitive electronics – especially those with marginal circuitry, might not get on well with the square wave.

We found that to be the case with our Mr. Coffee thermal coffee maker a few months ago. Well, yesterday after I made coffee while the generator was running and recharging our batteries, I forgot to unplug the coffee maker. While I was enjoying TV all afternoon, the modified sine wave destroyed the weak electronics in the coffee maker again! So, I’m happy with the performance of our battery bank and the inverter is useful for most things, but I have to buy another coffee maker.

We’ve had nice weather since we arrived in Bennington. Last night was cool, but I found it to be comfortable especially after the high humidity in Maine. The forecast calls for a high of 82 degrees today with the relative humidity at 42%. Nice. The next few days should be similar.

Wooden Boats and the Fourth of July

Monday afternoon Donna and I rode the Spyder to Brooklin (not to be confused with Brooklyn), about 14 miles from Little Deer Isle. We went to have a look around and visit the WoodenBoat School. The school was established 38 years ago by the publisher of WoodenBoat magazine. It’s located on a 64-acre waterfront campus. They have a variety of courses for beginner, intermediate and advanced woodworkers and boat builders.

WoodenBoat School – Brooklin, Maine

At the WoodenBoat Store, we were told we were free to wander around the campus as long as we didn’t enter or disrupt any active classes. We saw a couple of finished boats and several works in progress.

Finished small boats

Beautiful workmanship

This little sailboat was offered for $900

Some of the courses are all about woodworking and the tools used. Other classes teach marine diesel mechanics and then there are seamanship courses.

Bending wood to make a rib

Putting it all together

Another finished hull

Brooklin is a small village with a general store, a couple of boutique-type shops, a public library and a small cafe. It was an interesting way to spend a nice, sunny afternoon. Of course, I couldn’t leave the WoodenBoat store without a T-shirt to go along with the Tarpon Crew T-shirt Roger gave me.

Finished row boat near the water

Fog was rolling into the reach and I thought we might be in for a cold ride home. As we rode west through Sedgewick though, all was clear and there wasn’t any fog on Little Deer Isle.

While we were out, Sandra and Roger picked up more lobster. We just can’t get enough.

Another pile of lobster

I learned a little more about Maine lobstah. We’ve been getting soft shell lobster. The adult male lobsters shed their shell annually – it’s called molting – and females molt every other year. A new, larger shell is formed and it takes time to fully harden. The soft shell lobsters are easily cracked – I’ve been shelling them with my fingers – and the meat is not as firm or full as a fully hardened shell lobster – a soft shell lobster contains a higher percentage of water. Hard shell lobsters need tools to crack the shell and the meat fills the shell.

I also learned about the lobster pound on Conary Cove I wrote about in my last post. They aren’t actually raising lobsters there. Lobsters are held in the pound for a couple of reasons. For one thing, there’s been a glut of lobster on the market. At this time of year, supply exceeds demand. Also, a large percentage of the catch at this time of year is soft shell which has a lower market price. To counter this, lobsters are held in the pound and grow into their new shells which are hard by the fall. The market price for lobster generally goes up later in the year. The lobster pound is a way to hold lobsters to keep prices stable and generate income year-round.

While Donna and I are getting our fill of lobster, Roger and Russ wanted me to smoke more babyback ribs. Tuesday I rode to Blue Hill to buy ribs, but the store there only had one small rack and it was frozen hard as a rock. So I headed on to Ellsworth – about a 30-mile ride from Little Deer Isle. I found a couple of large racks of ribs at the Walmart store there.

We had a large dinner party – Roger and Georgia, their son Jeff and his two young daughters, Roger’s sister Sandra, neighbor Russ, his dad George and his son Zach plus Donna and I. Georgia put out sloppy joes for the kids and I cut up the ribs into portions of two bones – they were meaty and it worked out fine – most of us got two servings.  Russ also brought – wait for it – lobsters! We had quite a feast.

George has a 1919 Ford Model T – we’ll it’s really Russ’ car now as George gifted it to him. George bought it the same year Russ was born from the original owner! Donna went for ride in the old car Tuesday afternoon.

1919 Model T

George planned to drive the car in the Fourth of July Independence Day Parade in the village of Deer Isle. This morning, Donna and I rode the Spyder over to the village to watch the parade. By chance, we ran into Kate, the person we met Sunday at Conary Cove. She was there with her partner Tom. We stood with them in the shade of a tree and watched the parade. They have a different theme every year for the parade and this year’s theme was children’s books.

Start of the parade

Grand marshalls

The grand marshalls were Sally and Jane McCloskey – daughters of Robert McCloskey, a famous author and illustrator of children’s books. Robert was a resident of Deer Isle until he passed in 2003.

After I shot the picture above, the cars in the background caught my eye. I crossed the street during a break in the parade and shot a photo of them.

French vehicles

On the right is a Citroen 2CV (deux chevaux-vapeur) . These were popular for decades due to their low cost. They were built in France from 1948 to 1988. On the left is a Citroen H van. These were front wheel-drive commercial vehicles built from 1947 to 1981 in France and Belgium. The body panels are corrugated steel. The owner of the vehicles is in the photo with the wide brim hat. He told me, “The French copied no one and no one copies the French!”

The parade was definitely old-time small-town America. They had the community band set up on the grass to play music as the parade came by.

Community band

We enjoyed the parade for about half an hour and also enjoyed talking with Tom and Kate. We saw Russ’ Vespa parked near the village, but didn’t run into him. Roger and Sandra drove to Portland to pick up Sandra’s grandsons and will be back later this afternoon. Georgia took advantage of an empty house for a little quiet time.

It’s already over 80 degrees out at noon and the temperature will probably reach 90 degrees this afternoon. Donna’s hoping to take a boat ride on Russ’ 21-foot Whaler. I might go along too – but I also have to start packing and organizing the trailer. We plan to leave Little Deer Isle tomorrow and head down to Scarborough where we’ll spend the night before going back to Bennington, Vermont.

 

 

Sailing the Reach

We had a busy weekend in Maine and lots of fun. After spending most of Thursday indoors, while half an inch of rain fell in numerous squalls, we went to the Stonington Farmers’ Market Friday morning with Georgia. Later, Donna and I rode the Spyder to Blue Hill and bought some groceries at Tradewinds Market. While we were out, Roger made it back from his business trip to Albuquerque.

On Saturday morning, Roger rowed Donna and I out in his dingy to Tarpon, his 30-foot sloop. We rigged the jib and also tried to assemble the lazy jack but ran into a few problems – no big thing. We fired up the harbor motor and I putted toward the bridge over the Eggemoggin Reach. Heading into the wind toward Billings Cove, we put up the jib. I came about and we hoisted the mainsail. Roger had to undo the lazy jacks. The way we rigged it interfered with the mainsail. We’ll have to redo it another time. By the time we unfurled the mainsail, the wind died.

As we drifted back toward the bridge, the wind suddenly picked up. We were sailing!

Sailing under the bridge (Roger Eaton photo)

Heading northeast through the reach (Roger Eaton photo)

I had the helm and had us on a heading of 328 degrees as we sailed through the reach toward Condon Point. When we were near the Pumpkin Island lighthouse, Donna took the helm.

Sailing is such fun (Roger Eaton photo)

Donna takes over (Roger Eaton photo)

Donna made the turnaround  at the bell buoy southwest of Buck’s Harbor. The wind was coming from the south-southwest. Heading back down the reach we had more speed. The thing about Eggemoggin Reach is the prevailing wind lets you sail in either direction without having to tack.

We furled the jib and lowered the mainsail as we got close to Roger’s place. We ran the harbor motor while Donna steered us to Roger’s anchor buoy. I adjusted our speed by taking us out of gear as we approached the buoy. We hit it perfectly with the boat nearly stopped and the buoy stick on the starboard bow. Roger was able to reach down and pick it up on the first try! We had been out for few hours and it was great.

Later in the evening, we went to an old house called Edge Hill. It was once a restaurant and inn and now is owned by Roger’s relatives. They had a party for one of Roger’s second cousins, Morgan. Roger has so many relatives and history in the area that it can be a little confusing at times. Morgan and her husband were celebrating their wedding anniversary and they had friends from as far away as Austin, Texas there. We stayed for a little over an hour and had cocktails and appetizers.

They were grilling chicken dinner for 55 people and had dining tables set up in the barn. But, we had other plans for dinner back on Little Deer Isle.

Porch and barn at Edge Hill

Roger’s neighbors Russ and Katie invited us to join them along with some extended family and other neighbors for dinner. Russ boiled lobster while Katie grilled flank steak. So it was surf and turf for dinner at Roger’s boat house. He has two houses on his property – one is more of a party house down by the water and they call it the boathouse.

Russ’ boathouse

Russ’ pier in front of the boathouse

We had good food and great fun. After dinner, a couple of people played guitars on the porch and sang.

Sunset at Russ’ place

On Sunday morning, I downloaded the Assen Moto GP race and it was a real thriller. Later we drove with Roger and Georgia out to Conary Cove on Stimson Neck east of Deer Isle. The property there once belonged to Roger’s family and his childhood home was there. It was built around 1905.

Conary Cove

We met the current tenant of the house and took a short tour.

Inside the cove, there’s a lobster pound where Maine lobsters are being farmed. I didn’t know Maine lobsters were farmed. I’ve heard of farmed raised spiny (rock) lobster. It seems like quite an endeavor. They have pumps to keep the sea water in the pound from stagnating. It takes five years or more for a lobster to reach a size of one pound. I don’t know if they trap lobsters and introduce them into the pound to put on size or if they are raised from larvae.

Lobster pound in the cove

On the way back, we made a stop at a place called Nervous Nellie’s Jams and Jellies.  It was an interesting stop with a bunch of old outbuildings on the property and a variety of sculptures by a local artist.

Donna and friends at Nervous Nellie’s

Last evening, Roger’s sister Sandra arrived. She had been vacationing in the Adirondacks in New York and will stay here for about a month or so. We met Sandy in Albuquerque at the Balloon Fiesta last year.

The forecast calls for cooler weather today, but it’s supposed to be near 90 degrees on Wednesday, the fourth of July. We plan to move on down the road on Thursday. We’ll make another stop in Bennington, Vermont for a visit with Donna’s parents before we start heading west.

A Thousand People in the Street

I hit a milestone this week – I’ve written more than 1,000 posts on this blog. Today’s post will be number 1,003. Little Deer Isle, where we’re currently based, is in a region of Maine known as Downeast. This name originated long ago – when ships sailed to Maine from the south they were sailing downwind and eastward. Sailors called this course Downeast.

Downeast Maine has numerous islands – some large, others small and uninhabited. It also has an extreme tidal swing. The difference between low tide and high tide is usually nine or 10 feet of water. I took the photo below in the morning at high tide in front of Roger’ and Georgia’s place on Little Deer Isle.

High tide

The next photo was shot from the same spot about six hours later at low tide.

Low tide

That’s a pretty big change. In Maine, the shoreline between the high and low tide levels are considered public land. Waterfront landowners cannot legally keep you out as long as you stay below the high tide mark.

The other thing that shifts drastically around here is the weather – more about that later. Yesterday, we borrowed Roger’s car and headed out to Mt. Desert Island (MDI). Due to all of the inlets, coves and whatnot, the route was circuitous. We first headed northeast through Blue Hill and Surry to Ellsworth. The traffic steadily built up as neared Ellsworth. From Ellsworth, we followed a caravan of cars south down route 3 to MDI and on to Bar Harbor.

Along the way, we passed several cafes and I was getting hungry. Donna and I decided we would wait until we reached the town of Bar Harbor to eat since we planned to take a walk through town anyway. It was sunny with mostly clear skies – a bit of haze over the ocean.

Traffic was a bumper-to-bumper in Bar Harbor.  Parking near the waterfront was impossible. The streets and sidewalks were filled with people – thousands of people. I found a place to park uptown a bit. We sat in the car for a few minutes watching people walking shoulder-to-shoulder on the sidewalk. We thought out loud, “What are we doing here? Why would we want to join that throng of people?”

It turned out that the cruise ship Norwegian Gem from the Norwegian Cruise Line was in the harbor. This ship is 965 feet long and has the capacity to carry 2,394 passengers along with 1,070 crew. That explained the thousands of people on the streets. It didn’t explain the number of cars filling all of the available parking though.

We decided to get out of town, but as we did, I missed the turn to route 233. I wanted to cut across 233 to Acadia National Park then on to Southwest Harbor. Our friends, Clarke and Elaine are work camping there. I say our friends, but I’ve actually only met them in person once – a few years ago in northern California. But I feel like I know them because I’ve been following Clarke’s blog for nearly six years.

We found ourselves on route 3 heading to the south east side of MDI. I was really wanting to stop for lunch and we finally made a stop at Northeast Harbor. Parking was easy and it was fairly quiet there. We had lunch at a cafe called Colonel’s. I had to have a lobster roll – it’s a Maine thing and I’ve never had one. It’s a toasted hot dog roll filled with chunks of lobster meat and mayonnaise. Good eats – but a lobster roll with fries set me back $19.

Donna and I talked about what to do for the rest of the afternoon. To get to Southwest Harbor from where we were would entail a drive north the length of Somes Sound, then back south on the west side of the sound. I knew Clarke and Elaine were off from their duties at Smuggler’s Den Campground on Tuesday and Wednesday and I figured they were probably out and about on such a fine day. As much as I would have liked to meet up with them, I really hadn’t made any arrangement to do so.

We decided to head back into Acadia National Park and go up Cadillac Mountain. First we made a stop near Thunder Hole where the ocean waves erupt like a geyser through a blowhole. I took about 20 steps from the car when I felt like lightning had struck my lower back and went to my right hip. I nearly fell over. Somehow I’d pinched a nerve and could barely walk back to the car. We didn’t make it to Thunder Hole but later we were told we didn’t miss much. With the calm seas, it wasn’t spouting much.

We continued on to Cadillac Mountain.The peak at Cadillac Mountain is 1,530 feet above sea level. It’s the highest point in Hancock County and offers spectacular views. I walked around the top of the mountain gingerly. The pain in my back and hip was sporadic. Nearly paralyzing with one step, then easily bearable a few steps later.

View of islands and ocean south of Cadillac Mountain

More islands and ocean to the south east

View of Bar Harbor to the northeast of Cadillac Mountain. The Cruise ship Norwegian Gem is in the harbor, center right

We made the 50-mile drive back and stopped first at Blue Hill to gas up the car, then at Strong Brewery for a cold one. It was a warm day – in the upper 70s all afternoon.

We had dinner with Georgia back on Little Deer Isle – she made a chicken dish and Donna made pecan rice – we bought that at Konriko in Louisiana. The temperature dropped quickly before sunset. I took it easy and had a cigar while I watched the sun go down. Donna and Georgia hung out inside chatting.

Rain moved in during the night. It’s been raining off and on all morning with some heavy squalls. This is forecast to continue all day and into the night. I don’t think the thermometer will reach 60 today. They say we’ll have sunny skies again tomorrow afternoon and a high in the upper 70s – I hope they’re right.

 

Buck’s Harbor and Castine

I smoked babyback ribs on Sunday and Roger’s neighbor Russ and his son Zack joined the four of us for dinner. Over dinner, Russ invited Donna and I to go out on his boat for a tour out to Buck’s Harbor on Monday. We enthusiastically accepted the invitation.

The weather here can be fickle. It rained Sunday night and we woke up to a cold, cloudy morning with a few rain drops and sustained 20mph winds with higher gusts. It felt like a wintry day in San Diego with a high temperature of about 60 degrees. The wind whipped the water and it was very choppy. This ruled out the boat tour for the day. Instead we had a low-key day hanging out – I mostly read my Kindle. Roger had to fly out of Portland early Tuesday morning to handle some business back in Albuquerque and he left around midnight to make the drive to the Portland airport. He drove his pickup truck and left us the keys to his Subaru Forrester – thanks, Roger! Georgia stayed here in their house, but she said she would not be going anywhere.

Sunset Monday evening

The sun sets slowly this far north. I can sit and watch the sky slowly turn to different shades of pastel colors for about an hour.

We had blue skies and warmer weather on Tuesday. Around 10:30am, Russ stopped by and asked if we were up for the boat ride. He had his little Boston Whaler docked at the float on the end of his pier. The little Whaler is a flat bottom 13-foot boat with a 40hp outboard motor. He has a larger Boston Whaler, a 21-foot V-hull, but he hasn’t put it in the water yet this year.

We cruised to the northwest end of Eggemoggin Reach to Buck’s Harbor. Buck’s Harbor is a protected cove off of Penobscot Bay. A heart shaped island called Harbor Island is at the mouth of the cove, making this harbor a great shelter from stormy weather.

Entering Buck’s Harbor – Harbor Island on the left, Buck’s Harbor Marina on the right

Anchorage in Buck’s Harbor – lobsterman’s tiny shed on a float in the harbor

We docked the boat at the yacht club and went ashore. We walked up to the Buck’s Harbor Market where Russ bought a sandwich while Donna and I looked around.

Russ and Donna at Buck’s Harbor Market

There are binoculars mounted on a metal post in front of the yacht club. I scanned the bay and watched the sailboats while Russ had his sandwich on the porch and Donna kept him company.

View of Buck’s Harbor from the yacht club

Russ steered the boat past the west side of Harbor Island into bigger water. It wasn’t as smooth of a ride as we had in the reach and harbor.

Another float with lobster pots stored in the harbor

We headed out to look for seals. We found them on Thrumcap Ledge – a small rocky island. The seals here are wary of humans and become skittish if you approach too closely. We kept our distance but a few of them dove into the water as we went by.

It’s hard to see, but there are seals on the rocks

From there, we came back toward the west end of Little Deer Island and cruised past the lighthouse on Pumpkin Island. This lighthouse is no longer used for navigation and is a privately owned home now.

Pumpkin Island lighthouse from the west

Lighthouse from the back side

We made our way back through the reach on the northside of Little Deer Isle. There are some beautiful waterfront properties along the way.

Waterfront home on LDI

Our coach is nestled in some trees facing the reach.

Can you spot our coach in the lower center? Our trailer is between the coach and house,

It was fun boat tour – thanks, Russ!

We had a quick lunch, then Donna and I headed out in Roger’s car. We drove to the town of Castine. It’s about 10 miles from where we are as the crow flies, but around here none of the roads will take you straight to your destination. The jagged coastline means most roads arc in loops around inlets. Our route took us north and west to Penobscot, then we headed south to Castine – about 25 miles and a 40-minute drive.

Castine, Maine is one of the oldest communities in North America – continuously occupied since the early 1600s. It was a settlement of France, Holland and England. It’s now the home of the Maine Maritime Academy, established in 1941. The Maine Maritime Academy is a public college of engineering and one of six maritime training colleges in the USA – around 900 students are enrolled.

We walked through the waterfront and around the old downtown district. A sailing ship came into the dock while we were there. It was the Guildive – a 56-foot vintage wooden yacht that’s now an excursion boat that takes up to six passengers out for two-hour cruises .

Guildive

We drove to the southwest point of Castine where the Dyce Head Lighthouse is located. This is an active navigation point that was built in 1828. The town of Castine owns the property, but they rent the home out at the lighthouse. We aren’t sure if the tenants are lighthouse groundskeepers or not, but it is a private residence.

Dyce Head lighthouse

Last evening, we joined Georgia on the patio for hors d’oeuvres and a drink. I grilled green chile turkey burgers that Donna made up for our dinner and we all had a small bowl of fish chowder we picked up on our outing. It was a pleasant way to end a great day.

Today we expect the temperature to reach the low 70s. We plan to drive over to Bar Harbor on Mount Desert Island – the locals pronounce it dessert like a post meal goody, not desert like it’s spelled. Although Bar Harbor is about 20 miles due east of us as the crow flies, we’re not crows and will have to follow another looping route to get there – about 48 miles and over an hour’s drive. The forecast calls for a 100% chance of rain tomorrow, so we haven’t made any further plans.

The Real Maine Thing

We enjoyed our week at Donna’s parents’ place in Bennington, Vermont. I was able to complete a couple of projects while we were there and also enjoy time with family. We pulled out on Thursday around 10am. We went east across the state on route 9 through Brattleboro into New Hampshire. Route 9 took us through Keene and on to Concord where we picked up US202/4. The terrain was hilly with short, steep climbs and descents.

When we crossed the southern tier of New York, it was rural with small towns – some of them thriving on tourism, especially in the Finger Lakes wine country while other small towns showed economic struggle. In between was mostly farm land. Vermont and New Hampshire were more of the same but instead of farm land, the small towns are separated by heavily forested hills. It was mostly pleasant scenery to drive through. We paid one toll in New Hampshire – I think it was three dollars. On the toll roads, the rest areas are plazas with a food court, fuel stations and some shopping. We stopped for a late lunch at a plaza before we left New Hampshire – it also had a large discount liquor store.

We entered Maine at Kittery, east of Portsmouth and made our way up I-95 to Scarborough. This was another toll road and I paid $10.50 on this leg. We stopped at Cabela’s in Scarborough. I was dismayed to see signs warning that local ordinance prohibits overnight parking. We pulled to the end of the lot and parked near a Dutch Star motorhome that had the bedroom slide out.
Their door was open so I walked over to say hello and see what the deal was. The couple in the coach told me they were full-timers and had been on the road for five years – just like us. They were originally from Scarborough and returned every year. They said the city tries to make noise about overnight parking, but Cabela’s didn’t care and they had never been hassled in this parking lot.

We set up for the night. Donna had been in touch with our friend Kris Downey who was in the area visiting kids and they got together to walk a portion of the Eastern Trail. Then Donna and I walked over to Famous Dave’s for a cold one and then across the parking lot to a Thai restaurant where we got takeout. By the time we returned to the coach there were five other RVs in the lot.

We used the Cabela’s dump station before we hit the road Friday morning. There was a sign advising a $5 dump fee would be charged in the future, but for now it was free. We drove up I-295 and stopped for fuel in Gardiner. We paid another toll of $4, bringing our total toll-road fee to $17.50. Near Augusta, we left the Interstate and followed Route 3 to Belfast. The road was freshly paved and very smooth. Past Bucksport, we turned on route 175 and found the road surface to be terrible. It was bumpy and had potholes. It was slow going.

Our destination was Roger Eaton’s property on Little Deer Isle. We met Roger in Albuquerque – he owns a summer residence on the island right on the waterfront. Donna was texting back and forth with Roger while I drove. He mentioned something about crossing the bridge over Eggemoggin Reach to the island being a bit of a challenge.

Suspension bridge to Little Deer Isle

It was a steep climb up the narrow lane on the bridge, but it wasn’t too bad. The next challenge was entering the private road to Roger’s place. It had brick monuments at the sides of the entry, trees and low branches.

Narrow entry to Roger’s place

We made it in without scraping anything other than a few small tree branches. Getting the coach positioned on his property was much harder than I anticipated. I ended up
dropping the trailer in a temporary location, then struggled to get the coach in place between two stumps on the left and bushes and trees on the right. Once we had it in place, we found the 30-amp pedestal didn’t work. Roger called his cousin’s son and he came out with another guy and rewired the pedestal in a matter of minutes. We were in business! I repositioned the trailer with Roger’s pickup truck.

After settling in, we joined Roger and his wife Georgia along with their neighbor, Russ and his friend Darelynne for happy hour on the porch. We weren’t expecting dinner, but Georgia had prepared a chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy, stuffing, roasted carrots and cornbread!

View of bridge from Russ’ pier

Roger’s sailboat

Our windshield view of Eggemoggin Reach

Sunset over Penobscot Bay

On Saturday morning, we joined Roger and Georgia for a drive up to Blue Hill for the farmers’ market. Donna bought a few things while I enjoyed the bluegrass band. They did an excellent
rendition of the Byrds’ Mr. Spaceman.

Farmers’ market band

Later Donna and I rode the Spyder over the causeway to the next island – Deer Isle. Of course Deer Isle is larger area-wise than Little Deer Isle. We rode down to Stonington on the southern tip of the island. Stonington is the largest lobster port in Maine. The town only has about 1,100 residents, but more lobsters are landed there than anywhere else in Maine.

Lots of fishing boats and lobstermen in Stonington

On Saturday evening, we were in for a treat. Roger bought four lobsters that were about a pound and a half each. He boiled the lobsters over a wood fire in the yard while
Georgia prepared baby red potatoes and corn on the cob. It was a feast fit for a king!

Home cooked lobstah – the real Maine thing

I paired the lobstah with barrel-aged old ale I bought a few months ago in Tombstone

While we were in Blue Hill yesterday, I bought two racks of babyback ribs. I prepared them this morning and I plan to smoke them Memphis-style this afternoon on the Traeger wood pellet-fired grill.

Please excuse any formatting errors in this post. Our Internet connectivity is spotty and I’ve been working for a couple of hours to put this post up. I also had to reduce the photo quality to a smaller file size.

All Work, No Play

We’ve been enjoying our stay with Donna’s parents near Old Bennington, Vermont. That’s not to say we haven’t had to handle a few projects – I’ll get to that in a moment. We’re parked on their property with a view of Mount Anthony from our door step.

View of Mount Anthony from our door step on the Connor’s property

Before we came here, I needed to replace our bank of four 6-volt house batteries. I ordered four Lifeline AGM batteries on Tuesday, June 5th, in Watkins Glen. I was told by the seller, Powerstride Sales, that I would have the batteries by the end of the week. Well, that didn’t happen and we had to change the shipping address to Donna’s parents’ house. I was told they would arrive there by Thursday, the 14th. At that time, I was in Binghamton fixing the overheating issue, so it didn’t really matter when they didn’t show up. I tracked them and they were in the Estes Distribution Center in nearby Glenmont, NY just outside of Albany. I figured they would be out for delivery on Friday.

When I arrived Friday night, they hadn’t showed up. On Saturday, I received an e-mail from Estes telling me that since the shipment was going to a residential address, they needed to set an appointment time to be sure I was there to receive it. It went on to say they would contact me in one or two business days to set the appointment! They were closed on the weekend, so I couldn’t do anything until Monday.

I rode the Spyder to Bennington Saturday and bought a brisket at Price Chopper. This grocery store had butchers in the meat department. I asked the butcher if he had a brisket flat that was about five pounds. He said he thought so and went into the back. A few minutes later, he came out and put a hunk of flat (HOF) on the scale – 4.97 lbs! How’s that for close to five pounds!

I set up the Traeger wood pellet fired smoker grill next to the garage. On Sunday morning at 5:30am, I had the HOF on the grill smoking. I smoked it for two hours before I raised the temperature setting to 200 degrees for the next four hours. I spritzed it with a spray bottle filled with a can of beer, two ounces of apple cider vinegar and two tablespoons of Worcestershire sauce every hour. When the internal temperature of the HOF held at 160 degrees, I wrapped it in foil and put it back on the grill.

A couple of hours later, it was at an internal temperature of 198 degrees so I took it off the grill. I left it tightly wrapped in the foil, wrapped two towels around it and stuffed it into the microwave oven. Keeping it insulated in a tightly confined space held the heat and the meat continued to cook as it slowly cooled. A few hours later it was ready to serve. It came out tender. I think it could have been juicier, but it was good.

Donna’s sister Linda and her husband Tommy came over. The six of us plus Tommy and Linda’s grandson Michael dined al fresco. It was great way to celebrate Father’s Day.

I know it looks like a charred piece of meat, but it’s tender smoked brisket hunk of flat

On Monday morning, I called Estes Freight. They had the batteries in Glenmont. I arranged to pick up the batteries there at 12:30pm. Tommy offered to drive me there in his truck to retrieve them. The woman I talked to said they would be ready at the loading dock.

When we arrived, I checked in at the dispatch desk. The guy told me it would take a few minutes and he told me where they would load the shipment. Tommy and I waited outside by the loading ramp. And waited. About 20 minutes later, a guy came out and said they had to move a trailer that the batteries were in, then he could bring them out on a forklift, but it would take a few more minutes before he could do that. Meanwhile Tommy and I watched the way they moved trailers around the distribution center with a specially equipped truck.

The truck was designed to quickly connect and disconnect from the trailers. It had a rear entry that allowed the driver to step out on the rear deck to connect the air lines. The coupler plate was hydraulically actuated so he could raise the front of the trailer, bringing the front jacks off the ground. Once he moved the trailer to the dock or wherever, he lowered the coupler plate until the trailer rested on the jacks and quickly disconnected and drove away to the next move.

Our wait of a few minutes turned into nearly 40 minutes, but the guy finally came out with 300 pounds of batteries on the forklift and gently lowered the skid into the back of Tommy’s truck and we were on our way.

I got started on the battery change around 2:30pm. First I had to pull the old wet cell lead-acid batteries. These are heavy.

Old battery bank – the house batteries are the ones with the black tops – the blue batteries are the chassis batteries for starting the motor

The new batteries weighed 66 pounds each. I took them off the shipping skid one at a time and then removed them from the shipping box and put them straight into the battery bay. Luckily, the new Lifeline batteries came with handles secured to the battery top with rope. This helped, but getting them into the bay involved bending over and extending my arms with the 66-pound load. Whew!

Lifeline AGM battery with lifting handles

The new batteries are AGM technology – advanced Absorbed Glass Mat. They don’t require any maintenance – no more adding distilled water and no more cleaning with baking soda as the acid accumulates on the batteries.

I also had ordered new 1/0 wire gauge foot-long cables with 5/16″ ring connectors to link the batteries. The bank is made up by wiring two batteries in series. This makes them into a 12-volt battery – it sums the voltage while the amp-hour rating remains at 220. With two sets of batteries wired in series, they are then joined in a parallel circuit. This keeps the voltage at 12-volts but it sums the amp-hour rating. Now I had a 12-volt battery bank with 440 amp-hours.

New battery bank

I was feverishly working to beat a thunderstorm that was coming. Once I had everything wired together, I double checked the connections. Then I went to start the generator to charge the batteries. No go. The generator wouldn’t crank and the start button LED began flashing. It would flash three times, then pause and flash three times again. Code three. There are three basic or first level codes. One flash means overheat. Two flashes means low oil pressure. Three flashes for all other faults – not much to go on there. By momentarily pressing the stop button, you can read the advanced or second level code. Now it flashed four times, paused and flashed six times. Code 46. This means low voltage at the generator.

I went back to the battery bank and started checking my connections again. By then the storm hit, but I was determined to solve the problem and got soaked over the next hour. Eventually I found that two ring connectors on the 2/0 gauge positive leads to the inverter and generator were corroded and had excessive voltage drop – I didn’t replace these longer cables when I changed the batteries. I figured removing the connectors from the old battery and installing them on the new had disturbed the internal bond between the cable and connector. I needed to cut the cable which is made of hundreds if not thousands of strands of copper covered with a heavy plastic insulator. Once I cut the cable back, I would expose clean copper and I could crimp a new ring connector on. The problem was, I didn’t have anything to cleanly cut the cable or crimp such a heavy connector. Now we were in worse shape than before – I couldn’t even run the generator!

2/0 ring connector – a quarter is in the photo for size comparison

On Tuesday morning, I went to Tractor Supply and bought an 18-inch bolt cutter, perfect for cutting the heavy cables. The bolt cutter also had a dimpled stop behind the pivot that I could use to crimp the ring connector. The heavy copper ring connectors were really stiff and hard to crimp. Once I had that done on the cables in question, the generator fired up and the Xantrex Freedom 458 inverter began charging the battery bank. I had to change the three-stage charging profile to match the AGM batteries. The Xantrex has four charging programs – one for standard wet cell batteries, two for gel type batteries and the fourth was for AGM. There are small differences in each charging profile that optimize the charge.

After a few hours, the batteries were good to go. We had good 12-volt power and the inverter was providing steady 120-volt AC power. I felt pretty good about it.

Later that evening, Donna and I were sitting the living room talking when we heard a whoosh and what sounded to me like ice cubes hitting the floor. It was water gushing from the fresh water supply to the toilet! I jumped up and shut down the water pump as Donna threw towels on the floor and began sopping the water up.

I found the water supply cut-off valve had failed. It’s a plastic 90-degree elbow with a quarter turn valve in it. The plastic separated at the valve and it blew apart! Well, now we had electricity but no water. I had a stiff drink and went to bed.

This morning, I rode the Spyder to Home Depot in Bennington and searched their PEX plumbing hardware. I couldn’t find the replacement shut-off valve, but I found a brass 90-degree elbow with 1/2″ PEX fittings on both ends. This would do. It was an easy fix and all is good now. PEX is really easy to work with.

We met up with Donna’s parents, Duke and Lorraine, and Tommy and Linda at TJ’s Fish Fry for lunch. We sat together and enjoyed the meal. Tomorrow we’ll pull out and continue our trek to Maine. I think we’ll make it to Cabela’s in Scarborough, Maine and spend the night there.

I’ll close this post with a picture of the front of the Father’s Day card from my mother-in-law, Lorraine.

 

Roadside Assistance

I closed my last post saying we were waiting for Coach-Net Roadside Assistance to send a tow truck Wednesday morning. They were on top of it – they called me to first say they had found a qualified shop for the repair. Later they called and told me a tow truck was dispatched and should arrive in about 90 minutes. Actually two trucks were coming – one for the coach and one for the trailer.

The tow truck driver phoned and said he was delayed slightly and would be about 30 minutes late. They showed up and set to work. First I had to unhook the trailer, then I needed to get the coach turned around. The road had curves coming from both directions, so they stationed their trucks with emergency lights flashing in the road, blocking traffic from either direction while I turned us around.

The tow truck for the coach was a big heavy-duty Peterbilt. Once they had the front wheels secured in the cradles and lifted to the coach, they had to get underneath to disconnect the drive shaft. You can’t tow with the rear wheels down with the shaft connected. If you do, the transmission output shaft will spin but it won’t be lubricated because the pump works off of the input shaft which only turns when the engine is running.

On the tow truck – the guys are disconnecting the drive shaft

It was a long, slow ride to Binghamton. We retraced our route for several miles, then got on I-81. Traveling on highway 206, we came down some of the grades we climbed the day before. I rode with the driver in the big tow truck while Donna rode in the pickup truck towing our trailer.  Ozark the cat stayed in the coach in her crate. Later, I told Donna she was lucky to ride in the comfort of the pickup truck. The Peterbilt tow truck rode rough and the big Caterpillar engine was so noisy, it was hard to carry on any conversation. The jake brake on that thing rattled my eardrums.

The nice thing about roadside assistance is they find the provider and pay for the tow. This was a very expensive tow since we were so far out in the countryside. I won’t complain about paying the annual Coach-Net membership fee – they covered the bill to the tune of $1900. It was $1300 for the coach and $600 for the trailer!

Coach-Net determines who the nearest qualified shop is and that’s where they take you. If you want to go somewhere else, get your wallet out. They took us to Stadium International in Binghamton. I went inside and met Dave, our service guy. It didn’t go too well. Right off the bat, he said he couldn’t look at our coach until Friday, possibly Thursday. He advised me to rent a car and find a hotel. Not what I wanted to hear. The bad thing about roadside assistance is they choose the nearest qualified shop!

After a while I talked to another guy, Richard. He runs the night shift – they’re open until midnight. He agreed to order the hydraulic oil filters – I asked if they could change those first as it may solve the problem and it’s not a difficult or time-consuming task.

Donna found us a room at the Red Roof Inn. One of the go-fers from the shop drove her there with Ozark the cat and all of the stuff we thought we would need for the next few days. I followed on the Spyder. At the hotel, we met an interesting bunch of guys that had been staying there Monday through Friday for the last five years! They’re part of a construction crew working on the interstate bridge project and have a couple more years to go before completion.

The shop got the filters and they set about changing them Thursday morning. The mechanic was unfamiliar with the system and I had to tell him where the filters are located – they’re in the bottom of the fluid reservoir.

After filter change, I was out of luck. The fan still didn’t operate correctly. The service guy, Dave, said they could diagnose further, but he wouldn’t be able to get to it until next Tuesday! I explained to him that if we needed parts, such as a hydraulic motor for the fan, they were difficult to find. I found a place in England called White House Products, LTD that had seven units in stock. For a fee, they could have them here in three business days. That meant that if we had to wait until Tuesday to see if that’s what I needed, it would be a full week before we had our hands on the part. He said I could take it up with Jim. I asked who Jim was and he said he was the manager.

I had a short meeting with Jim. He was non-committal, but said he would see what he could work out. I left before noon. Later I rode the Spyder back to the shop – I had forgotten my blood pressure meds. Jim told me they found the problem. He said the thermostat for the fan located in the radiator was bad and he didn’t think he could find one. I knew what he was talking about – I told him it was called a wax valve and I thought I might be able to find one online.

The wax valve in this system controls the fan speed without the use of electronic controls. It’s strictly a mechanical system and usually very reliable. The hydraulic fluid flows through an orifice in the wax valve. There’s a tapered rod with a piston on the end inside the valve – shaped somewhat like a nail with a thick head. The piston resides in a cylinder filled with wax in a closed chamber. A spring on the opposite side forces the piston against the wax. In this position, the orifice is open and fluid bypasses the fan motor through the wax valve.

When the wax  valve is heated by the coolant, the wax begins to melt and expand. It pushes the piston forcing the tapered needle into the orifice.   As the orifice becomes restricted, it bypasses less and more fluid flows through the fan motor and it speeds up. When the orifice is completely closed, the fan is running at high speed.

Around 2005 or 2006, most motorhome manufacturers went away from this simple and usually reliable system and went to an electrical/mechanical valve with an electronic controller. These have proven to be troublesome.

Back to my story. I searched online and found the wax valve was back ordered at White House Products, LTD. They had 55 units coming, but couldn’t say for sure when they would have them. I contacted another place in Oregon called Source Engineering. They sell a kit for Monaco  coaches to retrofit the newer electronic system back to the wax valve system when it inevitably fails. He had kits and told me he could probably supply a valve in a week or two. His recommendation was to disconnect the hydraulic lines from the valve and cap them, stopping all bypass flow and the fan would run on high speed continuously.

I knew this would work, but I wondered if we would run too cool on level roads when the load wasn’t very high. Of course the coolant thermostat wouldn’t open until the coolant hit 180 degrees, so theoretically we should run at least 180 degrees which is acceptable.

I relayed this information to Jim at Stadium International. He agreed that capping the lines would work. He said that was how they determined for sure the wax valve was bad – they capped the lines temporarily and the fan ran at high speed. He used brass fittings for this and said if he was going to send me down the road with a makeshift repair, he had to find stainless steel fittings because he didn’t think the brass would hold up. I asked him to go ahead and he said he would have it done by noon.

Meanwhile, Donna’s sister had to go to Albany for a meeting on Thursday. She offered to drive down to Binghamton and take her to Bennington, Vermont to their parents’ house. We were thinking at that time that we were looking at a full week or more in the hotel room. I figured there was no need for us both to share that misery. But then, it looked like I could be on the road Friday afternoon. This left me with a logistical problem. I had more stuff in the hotel room than I could transport on the Spyder.

I talked to the hotel owner and settled on a late checkout time of 2pm. I figured I would take what I could on the Spyder and once the coach was ready, drive it back to the hotel to load Ozark the cat and her litter box along with my suitcase.

It turned out the coach wasn’t done at noon. They had trouble finding the fittings needed, but they had them around 12:30pm and were working on it. Dave helped me solve the hotel dilemma. He had their go-fer drive me to the hotel in their parts van and I loaded everything from the room right at 2pm and he drove me back.

They had finished the work by then. I had already loaded the Spyder in the trailer and transferred the stuff from the van. Dave told me I should take the coach for a test drive while he finished the paperwork. I knew it would be fine – the fan kicked in at high speed as soon as I started it up. I drove it and the coolant temperature hit 182 degrees and held. There were no leaks. I was good to go.

I headed out around 3pm. The traffic wasn’t bad but the road surface on I-88 in New York is atrocious. When I hit Albany, the traffic thickened. Going through Troy was bumper-to-bumper misery. The coolant temperature stayed cool the whole way. On a long grade near Central Bridge, it only went up to 184 degrees. It was a cool day, but I think even on a hot day, I won’t see over 190 degrees. As soon as I can, I’ll get a new wax valve and complete the repair myself.

I pulled into the yard at Donna’s parents house around 7pm. I was exhausted. Her parents, Duke and Lorraine, have three acres just outside of Old Bennington, Vermont. We’ll moochdock in their yard. I have to change out our house batteries here, but that’s a story for another time.

 

 

Good Times…Bad Times

Donna and I rode the Spyder into town on Monday. We parked by the Department of Public Safety across from Watkins Glen State Park. Everyone told us we had to hike the Gorge Trail there.

The Gorge at Watkins Glen State Park was created through erosion of the mostly soft shale stone. There are some areas of harder limestone and sandstone, but the geology is mostly shale. Glen Creek cut the shale and formed the 400-foot deep gorge. The gorge is narrow and the trail takes you along the creek. This is the famous Gorge Trail. We hiked it from bottom to top and back – the bottom entrance is right in the village while the top entrance is in a forested area. You can hike it either direction. There are more than 800 steps made up of stone stairways on the trail.

The trail crosses the creek at a few points

There are 19 waterfalls along the trail

The trail runs underneath and behind the cascading waterfall here

Abstract view looking up from behind the waterfall

Water seeps through the shale along the trail – here it made a cut in the wall of the gorge

Pools formed in areas of harder rock – also the vegetation varies from sun-loving plants on the north side and shade-loving plants along the south wall

Stone staircase

And more steps going up

A deep pool

We came back on another trail – the Indian Trail along the north rim. Then we crossed over to the south rim on a pedestrian suspension bridge and went down Couch’s Staircase to take us back to the lower entrance. Water seeps through the shale at many areas. The trail is wet with standing water along the way. Good shoes are a must and plan to get spray in a couple of places.

View of the entrance from the top of Couch’s Staircase

Me and Donna at the bottom of Couch’s Staircase

We had hiked for about an hour and a half. There are other trails and you can certainly walk a lot longer, but we had enough. I knew my legs would feel all of the stair climbing.

Donna took the kayak out for one more run before we started packing the trailer in the afternoon. On Sunday, she had made beans and greens with the beet greens she bought at the farmers’ market and crabcakes with the lump blue crab meat she bought in Abbeville, Louisiana. On Monday night, she served the leftover crabcakes on a toasted ciabatta roll with tartar sauce.

Beans and greens with crabcake

That was the good time. We pulled out of Watkins Glen around 10:45am Tuesday morning.

We weren’t in much of a hurry. We only planned to go as far as Cobleskill and spend the night at the Elks Lodge there. Coming out of Watkins Glen on highway 79, we immediately pulled up a long, steep grade to the village of Burdett. Our coolant temperature ran up to 200 degrees on the climb. It’s not unusual to see temperatures of 195-200 on a hard climb. What was unusual was how long it took to cool back to a more normal operating temperature.

Soon I found the temperature climbing alarmingly on some of the grades. The Finger Lakes region is very hilly. It got progressively worse as we went. FInally, on one grade, I had to pull onto the shoulder and stop to let the engine cool. I checked the coolant level and radiator but didn’t see anything out of sorts.

I began to think maybe we had a stuck thermostat that was restricting the flow of coolant. We limped our way up the grades moving slowly on the shoulder of the highway to avoid overheating.

We were in the rural southern tier of New York. I managed to find a truck repair shop off the beaten path. I was concerned about turning down the street the GPS showed as the location – it was a narrow farm road. I called the shop on the phone and they told me I was on the right street and I could get turned around at their place.

It turned out be a small shop where the proprietor mostly worked on farm equipment. After checking things over, he told me my radiator fan was the problem. After shutting the engine off, the fan didn’t run when I restarted the engine. He crawled underneath and gave the fan blades a push. The fan started running, but I was pretty sure it was running too slowly. He pinched off the bypass line to see if fluid was bypassing the motor – it wasn’t.

The fan is turned by a hydraulic motor. A hydraulic pump on the engine forces fluid through the turbine of the hydraulic motor, spinning the fan blades. He thought the problem was either the pump or the motor. I didn’t think it was the pump. The pump provides hydraulic pressure for three lines –  the fan motor, the power steering and the ABS brakes. I didn’t have any trouble with the steering or brakes, only the fan.

Each of the three systems supplied by the hydraulic pump have a filter in the line. It’s possible the filter for the fan motor line is plugged or I have a bad fan motor.

After he got the fan turning, he thought we’d be okay to go. But if I shut off the engine I would probably have to go underneath and prod the fan to get it going again. We got back on the road.

We went east on Highway 206 through the village of Greene, New York. Then we climbed again and immediately overheated. The fan was turning too slowly. I limped along on the narrow shoulder – it wasn’t wide enough for the coach and there wasn’t any place where we could safely stop. Eventually we saw a sign for a roadside parking area. It turned out to be on the north side of the highway and was little more than a long turnout. It was 4pm by then.

We decided to sit tight and spend the night. A county Sheriff’s Deputy stopped next to us after a while. Donna talked to him and he said it was fine for us to stay overnight. This morning, we weighed our options. I started the engine and checked the fan – no go. It wasn’t turning and I had no reason to believe it would be any better than yesterday. We decided it was too dangerous to carry on.

We’re now waiting for Coach-Net to arrange a tow of our rig and trailer to Binghamton where there’s a truck repair shop. Yesterday was the bad time.