Each year the Londons come out to Palm Desert for February. We look forward to spending time with them when they are here. This year they had a large house with spare bedrooms and bathrooms and we were delighted to drive over the mountain and have two days and an evening with without having to drive back over the mountain in between.

We started with the Palm Beach Air Museum located adjacent to the airport.

We are in front of one of the few remaining B-17 Flying Fortresses from a fleet of over 12,000 built during WW II housed at the Palm Springs Air Museum.

Carol and David in the radio room of the plane

Our next event was a jazz concert by Houston Person at Pete Carlson’s Golf & Tennis. Yes that’s right the venue is a Golf and Tennis shop by day and often after dark a jazz venue.

The Jazz was wonderful as was the venue. We were surrounded by a seemingly endless array of golf accessories not to mention clubs and ball. 

Before that we stopped at Palm Springs Art Museum in Palm Desert. There we fell in love with an exhibit of photography themed around History, Memory and Social Justice. We recognized many of the photographers and enjoyed experiencing work that we had not seen (or didn’t remember seeing).  

The next day, Thursday, brought more interesting  stops. First we went to Sunnyland, built by Walter Annenberg where 8 of the last 9 presidents visited and made use of the house for important conferences and just to relax. We toured the gardens and the visitor center which did not require advance purchase of tour tickets.

After swinging by the house to freshen up and meet David we set out for the Palm Springs Art Museum, where we arrived just in time for a docent tour with Ann Loeb, the same docent we toured with a year ago. wonderful energy and excitement about the art she chooses to feature.

The picture is mostly to provide an overview of the space from the mezzanine looking up to the 2nd floor. We decided to take in a special exhibit where we found this sign:

Carol and I were quite excited as we drive through Anza just about 12 miles from our home park often and are less aware of the Cahuilla Indians than we might be. 

After a light meal in the gallery courtyard cafe, Carol and I said good by to the Londons and headed over the mountain to Jojoba Hills SKP Resort. 

A small story of coincidence: Last May we attended my class of ’64 Reunion and I served as Class Marshall. A photographer  took pictures of all of us in the regalia of top hat and cutaway. I have sort of been waiting to receive the promised print. When we arrived at Toby and David’s in Palm Desert, David handed me an envelope addressed to him, mailed just before they left Providence with my picture and a letter of thanks to David! I sent an email thanking the university alumni association for the unique delivery method, only wondering how they knew we would be together, on the west coast in February.

Its amazing how a retired guy sitting in a motorhome going no place can find so little time to sit and write a blog post. In addition to more committee work to help keep the park a place I want to be there are endless activities. And if none of those are on the agenda for the day there is Bridge most days from 1 PM until 3:30 or so. The other things that are keeping me busy are preparing for our travels to Morocco, Israel and Ethiopia This December and January. 

Carol and I just realized we don’t have any more travel booked after this travel so it is time to plan the return to Panama to complete that trip and  to continue on to Columbia as originally planned. 

Add to that our desire to return to Alaska this coming summer and I will have my hand full with planning. Ordinarily the Alaska trip would be a matter of getting the books and maps out and some minimal prep of the coach and Jeep and done. But we think we want to take the Marine Highway which requires making reservations which requires actual planning. This has not been our strong point in all our years of RV travel. We are more the “wing it” type as anyone who has read these blogs for a while must recognize. 

I have laid out the beginning of the trip using a new, or at least new to me, online package called RV Trip Wizard. My first use of this web site was for traveling from Rochester to Jojoba Hills. This was an easy test since we have driven this several times and could probably do it without a map. It did simplify determining where we would stop each night. This became especially important when our plans were disrupted by the mechanical failure on the Natchez Trace Parkway. Sitting in the coach with the site running I was able to easily reconfigure the trip and plan the visits we still wanted to make.

For Alaska I have put in the big jump from Temecula CA to Prince Rupert Sound, at least a month for us right there, to get us to the initial ferry ride. The Alaska Marine Highway is actually a ferry system in case you didn’t know. Then I started laying out the routes we thought we wanted to take. Oops, can’t book any of that online with a coach over 30 feet long. More oops, they don’e have the schedule online beyond April, yet. That gets us as far as Haines from which we will travel ??? actually haven’t a clue. We know we want to get to Seldovia and Anchorage is an interesting place and so is Fairbanks and Denali NP is between them. But my route planning stops at the last ferry ride to Haines. 

Back to today. The coach and jeep are freshly washed and waxed by Red White & Blue Detailing, I would rather write a check than spend hours pretending I can do as good a job as 2 guys who do it all day long. I have a planning meeting for a project related to Finance Committee and then a meeting to requalify as a tour guide before we go to a Last Friday Dinner being held on the 2nd last Friday of the month because next week is Thanksgiving and we wouldn’t want to miss the opportunity for another reason to get together and eat and dance. 

I have spent altogether too much time listening to hearings, listening to and watching analysis of those hearings, not talking about it with others since we do not necessarily agree and we are a close community. I even read the New York Times mostly “below the fold” to see what else is going on in the country and the world. I doubt our national misery will end any time soon. We are too badly fractured and no one wants to even consider what the other side has to say. 

A lot of road has passed beneath the tires since my last post from Livingston TX. 1,573.1 miles to be precise. We made stops in McKinney Falls SP to visit a former rabbi who has a post in Austin.  Then a stop at Walmart in Fort Stockton TX, if this isn’t the middle of nowhere, you can see it from here. A couple of nights in Las Cruces NM where we had dinner with our friends Leora and Stu and attended , almost by chance a day of the Dead celebration and folklore performance in Mesilla Square. See Carol’s blog at http://cgstudio.net for more details on that. Then  Benson AZ, Saguaro SKP Coop for one night before heading to Catalina SP for 3 nights and dinner with Elly and Kelly from our trip to Thailand and Vietnam. 

From Catalina SP, outside Tucson, we opted to take the southern route on I 8 to El Centro and then into the desert to stop for the night at Peg Leg Smith Monument. I have written about this place a few times in the past. You could google it. Since it was Friday night of Veterans Day we expected the place to be packed. it wasn’t. Actually there was enough space to swing the coach around with the Jeep attached and find a level spot with no one near us and easy egress. The price is always right there – $0.0. From there it was less than 60 miles to Jojoba Hills SKP Resort and by noon we were set up on our site and had arranged for a gang to come over at 4 for Happy Hour.  Parties are always good!

We are still doing the small stuff to make this space home.  I have started connecting with my volunteer activities. Looking forward to bridge, JCATs, and general trouble making as we go forward for the next 6 weeks, until we leave for Morocco.

Make that Livingston. After hassles and unlevel too tight campsites we decided to head for a known place with friendly people – SKPs (that’s Escapees for those who don;t get it).  We paid for a week just to do very little and catch up from our whirlwind start and breakdown. Still some residuals to deal with but no show stoppers so we are sitting. 

Carol started looking into things to do in Houston, a mere 70 minutes away in light traffic and came across a performance of Handel’s Saul. Saul? It’s an oratorio intended to be presented in concert format. To understand why check out British Blasphemy Law from 1605. In 2015 it was first presented as an operatic performance. This performance was being done by Houston Grand Opera with Christopher Purves as Saul and Samuel (interesting since they are singing to each other when on stage).  David is Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen in a contralto role. His vocal range is between alto and soprano! The piece covers the biblical time period from David’s defeat of Goliath to the death of Saul, some 30 ish years with no real dividers. It runs about 3 hours. When it was over we wanted more. Opera in Handel’s day did not use a chorus, oratorios do. This was staged with a large chorus and a  7 member dance corp as well as the principals. 

We started with a lovely lunch at BirraPoretti’s. I found a parking place at the curb for FREE, it was Sunday, next to the restaurant and across the street from the opera house. We arrived in time for the preperformance talk and stayed to hear Purves give a post performance talk with Q&A. The drive back to GeeWhiz was uneventful and swift. It was quite a wonderful day. 

Next stop Austin, Wednesday and Thursday, then Las Cruces with a stop at Monahans Sandhills State Park on route. Here we go again making plans and reservations.

Sunday morning Ricky showed up with his VERY BIG tow truck and towed us about 80 miles back the way we had come to Magnolia Diesel in Columbus MS. We had a pleasant day in Columbus, see Carol’s post at http://cgstudio.net/for our day in Columbus. 

Monday morning Josh brought out his antique diagnostic computer (with current software) and took a look at the codes that had been set. The only active code was failure of the throttle to communicate with the engine! It was decided that a new Throttle Position Sensor was what was needed. However it only comes with the complete throttle assembly, which is no longer available from Freightliner. They had shipped their entire stock of parts to some vintage parts company in Wisconsin. Gregg worked the phone and computer to get one delivered to Tupelo (?) so Tuesday morning Carol and I took the Jeep about 60 miles to Tupelo to pick up the part. 

Thirty minutes after we returned with the part it was installed and appeared to be working. However all sorts of other warnings appeared on the dash. One by one they went away, leaving only an ABS warning light. Josh suggested reinstalling the drive shaft and taking it out for a spin to see how it drove. As soon as we started moving the ABS light went out. We returned to the repair yard, paid our bill and drove almost 4 hours to Vicksburg MS where we are settled in a casino campground.  

Tomorrow, Livingston TX!

Mid afternoon as we drove the Parkway listening to “The Murder of Mary Russell ” just as the story started to resolve a persistent beeping intruded. Looking down at the dash I saw STOP ENGINE and  CHECK TRANSMISSION showing. I immediately  pulled to the verge there being no shoulder. While we waited to get a call through to Coach-net our long time roadside service, I started the engine and resumed driving. About a mile further the engine derated, it would not go above an idle. I rolled along until I saw a stretch of verge that seemed rather level and got about half the coach off the road. I immediately went to a bin where a set of road side emergency triangles have resided, annoying me from time to time, in all three of our coaches since 2001. I set them up at the prescribed  distances and waited for Kelly at Coach- net to do her magic. 

And Waited. . . And waited. 

It is Saturday afternoon and the closest large city is Jackson MI about 70 miles to the south, and we are on The Natchez Trace Parkway. Maximum speed 50 mph. 

Kelly worked hard to find a tow service that could move this beast. While we waited we had visitors. The adminstrator of the French Camp School stopped by twice to make sure we were okay. A family stopped by to offer the names of towing services in the area. Others stopped by to ask if we needed food or water or any things else. The days of true Good Samaritans exist on the local scene.

Hugh, County Sherriff officer, stopped and parked his cruiser with the lights on as twilight approached. Jay, the tow truck driver arrived and determined that indeed there was no way for him to tow GeeWhiz with his equipment. In the process I started the engine and pulled onto the pavement so he could try. Eventually the decision was made to proceed as best we could in a procession with the Sheriff’s car in the lead and the tow truck with all his lights bringing up the rear. I could not get the engine to accelerate above idle. So the procession moved at 5 to 7 mph for maybe 3 miles into a lovely pullout “Hurricane Creek” where we leveled up and made our home for the night with the Sheriff’s blessing – and I guess the NPS as well.

The story will be resumed in the morning with a bigger tow truck and a less wonderful camping spot in a repair yard.

Stay tuned!