Month: June 2016

Happy Doryversary! And also Happy 23rd Anniversary! Our celebration weekend happened to coincide nicely with the release of “Finding Dory” and because I know someone who works at Pixar, I was able to score a very cool promotional decal for Dory. By the way, if you have not yet seen the movie, do it. It is not only very entertaining, but as with most Pixar movies, also quite poignant.

It’s hard to believe it was only one year ago that we met Dory in person for the first time. I can honestly say that getting her was a game changing decision for us. We’ve had a ton of fun this past year and we’re looking forward to many adventures to come. If you are on the fence about doing something crazy and expensive and possibly scary, I say do it. Life is short.

During our last outing, we suffered the traumatic loss of our 12v espresso machine, so you can imagine what the focus has been at home for the past two weeks. Richard has been online and on the phone with a number of different experts, some Italian, some just nerdy. The various consultations resulted in the purchase of a nice new soldering iron and several small electronic components. Upon inspection of the inner workings, it was pretty clear where the smell and smoke were coming from. One of the little circuit boards had a dark black spot directly underneath a square black thingy, apparently called a MOSFET, that does something important. This charring was likely the result of having clipped the alligator clamps onto the wrong terminals of the standalone battery momentarily before Richard was awake enough to notice (to say I’m sure glad it was not me who did that would be an understatement). He was able to fairly easily order a replacement thingy and painstakingly went through the process of removing solder and replacing resistors, until it seemed right. He tested it out before we left and all appears to be well. Still, we did also purchase a Handpresso as our emergency backup plan.

Mt. Diablo is a significant landmark in our neck of the woods. It is the tallest point around and I made the reservations knowing it would be an interesting place to spend our ‘versaries. Back in the day, I actually was one of the crazy bicycle people who rode the entire 50 mile round trip from home, climbing a peak of 3,848 feet, and then shooting back down it while trying not to die. I have no idea anymore why I used to do that. Climbing it with Bruce was awesome and as I passed bikies on the way up, I kept thinking to myself, “Why?” This would not be a good camping destination if you have a large trailer or RV. The roads are quite windy and the sites are really more geared toward tent camping than RVing, at least in the Juniper campground. However, the view is simply stunning.

The sites are not reservable by number, so you just take whatever is available when you get there. We spent a fair amount of time trying to find a site that would work and then maneuver around in it to get as level as we could get. This was not easy and ultimately required some unauthorized uses for things like chocks and step ladders in order to at least bring the downhill side high enough that we wouldn’t feel tippy. We did use the caravan mover in an attempt to find the best angle, and there were no hookups in the park, so we kind of gave up and settled for “close”. Close was ok and we really did enjoy looking out over the whole Bay Area right from our site. Richard made a delicious Shuttle Chef meal of Caribbean Chicken and I had a couple of Laughing Glass margaritas. The sunset was spectacular and seeing the lights come out after dark was amazing.

Saturday we went on a hike around the summit. You can see everything from up there, even SF and the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance. We could see where our house would be and all of the highways we’re used to driving. Very fun, but also hot. So then we went back and napped, spent hanging out together time, and periodically talked about air conditioning. On Sunday morning it really was starting to heat up (like low 90s), so we packed up and started rolling by about 10. There is no dump on the mountain, but we discovered that the RV storage place not too far from us will let you use their dump for $25. This is good to know. This is also the place we would have had to pay $230/mo to store Dory had she not fit into our garage. I can’t say enough about what a difference it makes to have her at home for packing, organizing, and playing in, at all times. I don’t think there’s another option out there like the Alto. Safari Condo really did an exceptional job with this.

We got home around noon, but I completely forgot to take data. It should have been about 23 miles from home, about an hour of a slow, winding drive, and lousy gas mileage going up. I did glance down at some point and it was reading 10.something. That was with a full tank of fresh water. Great cell service for both of us. Espresso machine got measured when we got home and it seems to be fully recovered and operational after being put through its paces. We may be putting together a traveling soldering kit for the road however, just in case.

Site 13 and I’m not sure how many other sites would have worked. No hookups, but water spigots and bathrooms which were fine.

 

We’re ok. Everything is ok.  We have our health. Our kids are safe. It’s going to be fine. We’ll take this one day at a time, breathe in, breathe out. It’s all going to be OK.

You guys. There is something wrong with the 12v espresso machine.

I know.

It’s going to be ok though. We’re going to make it through this and come out stronger on the other side. We can contact Techimpex and they will help us. They only speak Italian, but they will still help us. We should really buy a whole second machine, for parts. We could do that. I’m sure this can be fixed.

But I digress. We went to Brannan Island this weekend, despite the 100 degree forecast. We originally had reservations for a waterfront, non electric, site. I chickened out and changed at the last minute and there was luckily one site left with hookups. I could tell by the map that it was going to be in “Big Rig Land”, but … 100 degrees. So I took it and I have no regrets.

As it turned out, the temps didn’t even cross the 91 degree mark. No sweat! But we were still glad to have AC because we are weather babies. This blog post isn’t going to sound like we had fun this weekend. In print, it doesn’t appear to be that fun. I can’t explain why a weekend of casually cleaning, doing little projects, falling out of a chair, and freaking out over an Italian 12v espresso machine would objectively represent a perfect weekend, but it was.

Brannan Island was hopping with weekend party goers and boaters and there is a nicely accessible boating dock. There is a lot of construction on the bridge to get there however, which causes loooooong backups on Highway 160, so be aware of that.

When we got up Saturday and went through our normal routine, Richard made an alarming comment while making coffee. “What’s that smell?” he said. I looked over and saw wisps of smoke coming out of the back of the Techimpex. Then I could smell it too: the unmistakable odor of something electrical that is just never a good thing. As the shock slowly set in, we had to come up with a way to make emergency coffee. We ended up steeping the ESE pods in hot water. One of them exploded, which made my latte quite … rich, and somewhat chewy. Richard decided to expedite his bike ride preparations so he could go find some less gritty coffee on the road. I researched “Handpresso” hand pump espresso makers. We looked hard at those before getting the Italian 12v machine because they also use ESE pods. You know what? They make one in blue. So much for the camping spending freeze. We will do whatever it takes to repair the Techimpex, but in the meantime, and for emergency backups, we will need to have a solution. This is not discretionary spending here, this is life sustaining.

Richard went on his bike ride (that he is classifying as a “must do”). It’s called the Delta Loop, off of Highway 12. Highly recommended on a bicycle, and very flat. I spent Saturday cleaning Dory, putting up little cargo netting iPhone holders, and experimenting with my new inflatable Lamzac chair. This was a Kickstarter purchase from a few months back, and I was beginning to wonder if it was some kind of scam. But I did eventually get mine delivered. In the videos, there is a happy guy on a beach, who holds this floppy parachute material tube thing up, does two graceful swooshes to put air into the chambers, rolls up the ends and plops down like a boss, all in about 10 seconds. My experience was… different. I leapt right in without reading the 9-step line drawing directions, because duh, and started attempting to swoosh. Huh. So I looked more closely at the line drawing instructions. They seemed to be depicting a guy in motion, so I tried running. Ok, that was funny, I hope no one saw that. There is also a line drawing of a curvy arrow, indicating “don’t do this”. I’m not sure what that means. Maybe don’t try to spin around the way I was. Or don’t make wavy motions while you are running. In any case, the best I ever got was a floppy, barely filled, limp tube (don’t go there). However, if I rolled the closed end enough times, it did in fact force some amount of air into the back, thus allowing for an approximation of what I saw on the video.

So then, with this partially inflated donut thing on the ground, I tried to get in and experience weightless, carefree relaxation. Except I was immediately thrown out, nearly feet over shoulders, off the back. Round 2. This time I went over the side. I fell out of that thing in every conceivable direction, but couldn’t stop laughing, even though I was alone. I await the viral YouTube video that may have been taken by my RV neighbors. By the time I finally got stable and balanced enough to not tip out, I was hot. But that was fun.

Richard arrived back from his ride right about then and I decided to take a little spin around the campground and catalogue potential future sites. It’s a nice campground and there are many sites with views of the delta river. The loop with hookups is, of course, not as nice, in that the sites are close together and there are huge RVs next to you. The awning is handy in these situations. The site we would have gotten was ok, but didn’t have actual water views.

We hung out in air conditioned Dory, but after it cooled down I decided to try the chair again. This time Richard was inside to witness. Things went about the same as they had previously, only this time, I could hear laughter coming from inside Dory. He occasionally opened the window to let me know he was hysterically laughing. But I would not be daunted. I do not have a strategy for getting into this chair yet, but I’m sure there’s got to be one. Richard tried it too and did not fall out as spectacularly as I did, but he did tip way over from side to side before getting stable. I highly recommend these for party games. I’m not so sure about the chair part.

Sunday we had to go out on a morning coffee hunt. This was what we did in our bicycle touring days and not needing to do this was our prime joy factor in having trailer espresso. But we found a place in nearby Rio Vista that had caffeinated hot milk that they were calling a latte and it was ok and we got enough of a fix to keep going. We headed back, packed up, chatted with RV neighbors and gave a tour, then headed home. Richard had an espresso first thing when we pulled in.

This place is super close and quite pleasant. There was a nice bike loop and a breeze coming off the water. Thumbs up.

Total miles: 38.9, 1 hour 44 min because we got absolutely stopped for a long time due to bridge construction, 15.8 mpg (probably because we were stopped)

Sites: Anything along the water would be nice and most of the sites would be good for solar but also have shade trees for sitting. Water views: 97, 96 (no shade though), 94, 47, 45 (no shade) 38, 32. 31. Cell service was great for both ATT and Verizon.