We're starting early morning kayaking trips and we did a trial run this morning. We saw deer, herring, swans, ducks, eagles, fish, and kayaked through rapids big enough fill the kayak with water and soak anyone sitting in the front seat!
Eagle!!!!!
You would never thing that an oil refinery sits right on the Allegheny river in Warren, Pa.
Hi everyone! We realized it had been awhile since we last posted so we wanted to do an update for those of you still watching our blog. We're still working in PA. It's been painfully HOT this past week. Luckily there's a river just steps away so when we can't stand the heat we just jump in the water! All of us took a 10 mile kayaking trip downriver earlier this week and we saw 3 eagles (and fish and turtles)! It was very cool to see an eagle up close and in the wild. Wish we could have gotten pictures but everything happened so fast, didn't want the camera to get wet. Most of us got sunburned pretty good too so we've been recovering from that the past few days. The feeling of our skin on fire subsided after the first 24-48 hrs. LOL. Josh and I have been living in a nice tent with an air mattress and it's surprisingly pretty comfy so we're going to camp out for as long as we can, probably through the summer. Our friends Josh and Piper let us use their house for showers, etc. Along with working for Josh and Piper at their canoe business we've been aquiring equipment to start making our own t-shirts & start a screen printing business here in town. Our 6 color 6 station press arrived this week from Sanford, Maine. I'll take some pictures to post. We're all really excited and having a great time so far!
About half a dozen hummingbirds are battling for food throughout the day right above our heads. Here are a few photo's....
We arrived in PA two days ago and are so glad to have finally made it. We'll be working here through the summer and will continue posting blogs and lots of pictures each week. The RV wasn't able to make the trip unfortunately so we're saving money to have it repaired at the end of the summer. Our RV adventure is probably over but new adventures are just beginning! Stay tuned!!!
We sold the RV! Well, almost. After posting it on ebay a second time and lowering the price again we got several emails and sold it this afternoon. It should all be finalized on Thursday. Its exciting that we're done with the RV yet sad to let the fulltiming dream go. But we need to move on and figure things out. Heading to PA is still a top priority and we'll probably take Amtrak out next Monday if all goes according to plan.
UPDATE: The buyer pulled out of the sale so we're having the mechanic diagnose the problem and go from there. Figures.
We came back to Loveland after having Chevy look into why the RV was running on the hotter side. They did a pressure test and found an air pocket in the coolant lines but it didn't fix the issue. The RV is running fine around town but warmer on the highways. It could be as simple as the radiator needing cleaning or not. We posted it on ebay for $20,000 with no reserve for 5 days to see if anyone is interested. Now we're just waiting. If we don't get any interest we'll post in for 21 days and then head to PA.
Josh and I are going to give driving to Pennsylvania another try today. No luck trading the RV in for a truck and trailer, the dealer would only offer us $10,000! which was an insult and josh told them so. Needless to say we haven't heard back from them. We've had a lot of interest in the veggie oil aspect of the RV and have had a great time showing people how it works and taking them to get oil from restaurants. When people have seen how easy it is, and FREE!, they've started seriously talking about getting conversions done for themselves! I just think it's the coolest thing when you talk to someone who never even knew a diesel could run on plant oils and then next day they're totally into it. Our route to PA will take us thru Nebraska on HWY 80 (we're only taking the highways from now on), into iowa, thru chicago area, cleveland OH, and then onto Tidioute, PA. We'll be working at www.alleghenyindianwaters.com for the summer. It's a great place in the middle of the beautiful Allegheny National Forest and would love to hang out with some fellow RVers. I believe there is an RV park in the next town over and lots of tent camping. Give us a shout!
Yes, we're still in Loveland, CO and currently looking to trade the RV in on a new dodge ram 2500. We should know sometime today whether or not it's a deal that the dealership can work or not. When we're not playing Mario Kart Josh and I are planning out different business ideas. As soon as we know what's going on we'll post.
It's Sunday and we haven't left yet. We had someone interested in the RV just last night so we stayed today and took them for a test drive. Not sure if it's going to work out but we're willing to stay a few extra days to wait and see. We found some oil and are going to take them to fill up the RV later. We'll keep you posted.
Well we're still in Loveland, CO but the good news is we got our RV back finally! The service place that had it was pretty ridiculous and we probably could of had it back two weeks ago but they were ordering parts which came in yesterday and were the wrong size!!! We said forget it and just paid for what they had done so far and now we're prepping it for the long trip to Pennsylvania. So the plan as of right now is to leave Sunday, drive across Nebraska, Iowa towards PA. As for what we've been doing for 3 weeks?? A whole lot of nothing. With the wind we've had in Colorado lately we've been flying kites, spending time with our niece Lucy, and up until the Pennsylvania Primary we were consumed by politics. We're excited to start our new adventure back east and we hope, for our sanity, that we get there quickly and in one piece.
Kite flying is our new hobby.
Cheetah at the Denver Zoo.
Kelly and Lucy
Josh and Lucy
We're currently staying at Josh's parents in Loveland, CO. We posted the RV for sale and have had some real interest so we're waiting to see where it goes. In the meantime we've looked at different 5th wheels but haven't made any decisions yet. We'll still be working in PA this summer and will go from there. Just wanted to let everyone know we're we are at.
Driving down the road the awning, that we haven't been able to figure out, decided to unroll. Now we know how it works!
Sunset in Stratford, TX.
We camped overnight at this beautiful state park near Quitaque, TX. It was quiet, well maintained, and RV friendly. At night you could hear packs of real coyotes howling in the distance, moving closer and closer to where we were. It was truly amazing.
Our friend Jason placed 3rd at the motocross races in quitaque, tx this week! It was a quaint little town nestled in the heart of the texas panhandle. We spent a few days feeling like real full-timers, relaxing in the warmth of the sun and hanging out with our friend Jason. It was just what we needed.
Our first night in Amarillo, TX we enjoyed a meal and some live music at "the big texan". These two nice gentlemen played Johnny Cash's "folsom prison" for us while we ate and watched a young kid try and eat the 72oz steak (but "lost his dinner" at 16min to go).
"The Big Texan; home of the 72oz Steak!" .... if you can eat it within 60 min.....
Instead of driving north thru Wichita and west to Denver we thought we'd take a risk and head to TX to catch our friends motocross race this weekend. Our luck may have turned around, no problems the whole way to Amarillo. The rig even seemed to drive really smooth. We even found veggie oil at Arby's and were able to fill up half a tank. Hopefully we'll have lots of pictures and good news to post after this weekend!
We don't need to replace the motor! Whoo! There were a few different things that could have caused the coolant to spray out, nothing major, but major cost. We've gotten so much support from fellow RVers which helped get us through these past few days. Not wanting to give up the lifestyle we've come to the conclusion that living in a Class A motorhome maybe wasn't the right choice for us. We're looking into putting the RV back up for sale and purchasing a diesel truck and tow a trailer. That would give us the ability to have a vehicle to drive around town and a place to live. We'll probably pick up the motorhome tomorrow morning and then start heading back to Denver to start selling the RV. Even with all the maintenance it's still a great RV, just not for us. If this didn't work out Josh and I figure we could travel writing reviews on hotels for a living! lol
Yes you guessed it, another problem. We were on our way to Oklahoma City yesterday and the coach overheated spraying coolant everywhere. We got a tow, for free, to town and it's being looked at today. We don't think there's any damage to the engine but we wanted to be sure. This is getting old very quickly and we're debating on whether or not to just pack it in, sell the coach, and try something new. It's all just too much when we can only drive 50 miles before another problem arises, and they're not major problems thank goodness but problems none the less. We were pondering whether or not all these are 'signs' trying to tell us something....
UPDATE: Josh got his tooth fixed today! whoo! We went for a walk to find something to eat for lunch and saw a place called "My Dentist" that looked promising. We went inside to inquire about costs, etc and they were able to take Josh in right away to do an xray and see if an extraction was necessary. Come to find out all they needed to do was a little work on the tooth and put in a resin filling (which basically made him a new tooth) and it only took 30 min. We also got a call from Chevy and the preliminary diagnosis may be a temp gauge but they'll know more later when they have a chance to really look it over. We've been able to talk to many of our fellow Rvers thru the escapees forum and it seems like we're not alone with our recent mishaps. I think we'll keep moving and see where life takes us....
Yesterday we just about decided to give up this lifestyle, sell the RV, and try something else. After experiencing one problem after another it was just too much. When Josh cracked one of his molar's last night and was pulling out pieces of tooth it was the last straw. (Josh is ok but will have to get a tooth pulled here shortly.) We felt like we were being kicked when we were down. This morning we had an appointment to have the refrigerator looked at in Bartlesville, OK. It wasn't working on Propane. They ended up being the nicest people around. They troubleshot the problem but didn't have the part in stock. They also load tested our battery's and said they where all ok. Then they sent us off showing how to replace the part and didn't charge us a thing. We where so great full for all there help. Next we stopped at a shell gas station to see if they'd donate some of their grease for our adventure. They where happy to help and we managed to filter about a quarter of a tank before we hit sludge. Meeting such nice people this morning definitely made us feel better about our situation and that it seems as though things might just turn around. We are currently stopped in Tulsa, OK taking advantage of Internet access before we continue on to Oklahoma City. Thanks to all of you that are sending positive thoughts are way, they are much appreciated!!
Spring is in bloom in Oklahoma!
Our second grease fill up.
How cute are these guys!!
The RV is finally getting worked on! Whoohoo! It's been a frustrating and stressful couple of days but hopefully they can take care of the problem today and we'll be on our way. Our refrigerator quit running on propane while we've been here too, thankfully we hadn't bought any groceries, and we're pretty sure it's just an ignitor sensor that's gone bad so we'll have to take care of that too in the next couple of days. We just want to get out of Missouri!
1:44pm: We're finally back in the RV and headed to Bartlesville, OK. It should take a couple of hours, we'll stay overnight at the walmart and in the morning go have the fridge looked at.
We made it about 70 miles outside springfield mo today and parked at a flying J to dump our tanks and fill up on water when the inevitable happened, I spotted diesel leaking from the engine. Not a good sign. After doing some trouble shooting we know that it's coming from the return line hose but josh isn't able to access that area with the tools he has. So now we're trying to find some place that can just do the work for us, I don't think it should take long or be an expensive fix...we hope. These inconvieniences are getting old very quickly. On the other hand we ran on vegetable oil all day today!! Whoohoo!! What an awesome experience, we've been waiting for this for what seemed like an eternity. And no, the exhaust did not smell like french fries...it smelled like tortillas! Ole! Hopefully tomorrow sometime we can get back on the road and continue heading towards Fritch, TX where we plan to stay at Lake Meredith for a few days.
Today we got the call that our veggie oil conversion would be done so we spent part of the day hunting for grease at restaurants up and down the strip by our hotel with no luck. We found bad oil, no oil, oil that was locked up, and nasty nasty oil. Feeling a little dismayed we went to pickup the RV and learned how the new system worked. We then decided to stop at a restaurant for dinner and check out their oil. Score! They had some promising looking hot oil so we went in and ordered dinner and told the manager what we were doing and asked if we could have their waste oil. She was hesitant at first but once we told her we'd pull up and pump it out ourselves in about 20 minutes she said ok. We then began the task of pumping our first oil. (Hopefully one day we'll be able to look back and laugh because it was such a hectic event.) We have a filtration system that comes in a black box on wheels that makes it easy to transport. In the box there is an electric filtration system, a hose that runs from the dumpster to the filter and a second hose takes filtered oil to the RV or containers. We popped open the box and set everything up and flipped the switch, the result was gorgeous clean oil! The oil we're looking for can be light or dark in color as long as it's clear. We were able to fill the RV 3/4 of the way and 2 containers. Josh turned his back for a second and the hose slipped out of the filler. We soaked up the mess and wrapped up our equipment and headed back to the hotel for our final night in Springfield. Now that we've had our first experience we will be more prepared. Yes it's a little messy and takes some time to find, but by using waste vegetable oil as fuel we are being environmentally friendly, saving hundreds of dollars a week AND drastically reducing our dependence on domestic and foreign oil. 
