So, in January, I was still staying at my bothers and he and his son had gone to watch the Oregon Ducks in the bowl game. I didn’t have tickets but I was able to watch it on the computer. Anyway, after spending the day drinking & enjoying the game, my brother and nephew were driving back to Paul’s hotel in Dan’s Toyota Prius. Well, Dan was talking to his son, not paying attention, and POW, runs right into the back of someone. Even he is surprised the cop didn’t give him a field sobriety test. No one was injured but the Prius was totaled. Dan had spent many hours on-line trying to find a new car and had found a piece-of-crap Honda he wanted so we headed down to a local dealer and spent hours doing all the paper work, etc. He did, I just wandered around and goofed off.
I couldn’t talk him out of getting a horrible Honda, and a couple weeks later we drove down to the wrecking yard. Poor, poor, Prius. We hardly knew ye.
Doh!
Can’t remember for sure, but I think Dan said that he was going slow enough that the air bags didn’t deploy.
To bad. Liked that car. And 49MPG, too.
While waiting for Dan to finish his business with the wrecking yard, I wandered across the street and found an authentic Mexican restaurant. Had me a damn fine breakfast just like I’d get in Mexico. And only slightly more expensive. Not bad for one of the less traveled areas of LA.
Crappy new Honda.
Then we went off on some adventure to an old Church. I wasn’t much interested so I just hung out in the car.
Old Church. Yawn.
Dan bought the new Honda because of its lightness, mileage, and low cost. Plans to tow it behind his RV when he retires.
Well, it’s his money.
A few days later, after I had a good handle on my finances, got my monthly deposit from my retirement account all set up, knew when my SS would start and how much it would be, etc. I headed off south and Mexico. Rig hadn’t been run much since I’d gotten to Dan’s a couple months earlier but my first day on the road showed that it was probably going to be OK. Tires were fairly new, engine sounded good, my parking brake still wasn’t working but I had a plan for that, and I wanted to get back on the road.
The first day I am heading out of Lancaster and I pulled up to a cross street and stopped. Waited for the light to change, then pulled out. Right in front of a rescue squad truck…yikes, they were blasting away on the siren, and horn, but I just didn’t pay attention…pulled right out there into the street in front of them. Got halfway across the street before I heard or noticed them, I was so intent on getting out of town and into the desert. They were not very happy with me and used their ooogaaa horn to scare the crap out of me. Once I’d finally noticed them, had a decision to make…slam on the brakes and stop, or keep going. Thought ripped through my head that my rig is 37′ long and didn’t want to be right there in the middle of the street, so I pushed on. Then pulled over just past the cross street and waited for what I thought would be a cop soon enough. But although a couple cars passed and honked at me, no cop. Whew. So, on I went.
It blows around here.
Ahh. The open road again.
And finally out of town.
That first day, I made it to Amado, AZ. There’s a little RV park I like there named Mt. View RV Ranch. It’s only 12 miles from Nogales, Mexico and I can straighten out a few things with my RV while I’m there for a couple days. As it turned out, shortly after I arrived and hooked up, I found my water pump leaking. Can’t have that. So I pulled it apart. Doesn’t appear to be broken in any way, just a bunch of crud here and there. After clean up and re-installation, it seems to be working fine. I’ll put a more detailed report with pictures in the RV repair section.
Next time, we head to San Carlos, Mexico.