As we expected, the cool night in Sunset Crater National Monument’s “Bonita” campground was excellent for sleeping.  The first night in the Airstream is sometimes a little hectic, since we are adjusting to life in 200 square feet again, and we are usually still figuring out where things should go.  That tends to keep us up late, but this time I was so exhausted I collapsed at about 8:45, and E&E were not far behind.

We didn’t have time on this trip to go to the companion park, Wupatki National Monument (connected by about 20 miles of loop road), so we made a note to come again sometime.  Wupatki offers five ancient pueblos and some box canyon dwellings, all of which we’d like to see.  We packed up and headed out at 8:30 with the intention of making some serious miles—but also covering some seriously scenic territory.

The route we planned was sort of a Arizona/Utah dream trip, up Rt 89A and then Rt 160 deep into the Navajo Nation, then up through the incredibly beautiful red cliffs and buttes of Monument Valley, and then up the edge of Utah past some great parks we’ve visited before (Hovenweep, Natural Bridges, Canyonlands), through Moab, and finally into Colorado.

The route goes up and down quite a lot, but I never saw us below 4,400 feet and never much about 7,000.  The important thing is to bring three items:  a camera, a bucket of time so you can stop frequently, and a full tank of fuel.  There are fuel stations but of course prices tend to run high in the more remote areas.  We had the cameras and fuel but not as much time as we would have liked, so for us it was primarily a driving tour (and a fine one).

I am happy to report all systems are functioning well on the Airstream and Mercedes.  The Merc did an odd thing yesterday during a steep climb, giving us a Check Engine light.  It wasn’t overheated and the light cleared itself overnight.  I can’t detect any issues with the car, so I’m not going to sweat it for now.  The car’s computer will store the fault code and we can get it read out later if we want.  The Airstream seems perfect. The fridge is cold, the tires needed no air at all (after five months of storage!), the hitch is silent, etc.  At this point we’ve run up about 700 miles and everything is fine, although I’m noting a few things I’d like to update soon.

We stopped at a rest area south of Moab where there’s a great sandstone arch that you can easily climb to.  If you are in this area and missed Arches National Park, this is a nice consolation prize.  In the photo you can see two specks, which are Eleanor and Emma.  You can also get a nice shot of your Airstream down below in the parking lot if you want (and of course, I did).

We decided to make our overnight stop at Colorado National Monument, in Grand Junction CO.  Faithful blog readers Jay & Cherie suggested we stop at the James Rob Colorado River State Park, which is just off I-70 at the same exit as the National Monument.  We checked it out and it does look very nice, but this we had our hearts set on driving up to the monument.  We’ve been here twice before and never managed to camp in the monument’s Saddlehorn campground, so it was nearly a mandate for us.

There was another reason for coming up the extra few miles to the monument.  We’ve recently acquired a GoPro Hero2 sports video camera for use at Alumapalooza, and I wanted to try it out shooting a video of the Airstream climbing the hairpins and tunnels that lead up to Colorado National Monument.  We shot video looking forward on the way up, and we’ll shoot video looking backward tomorrow morning, on the way down.  I’ll have the video edited and uploaded to YouTube in the next few days, and I’ll post when it is available.  Should be very interesting!

We’re off … and blogging again.

This time of year the sun comes early into the east window of our bedroom. It may have been the bright light, or just the anticipation of finally taking off in the Airstream that got Eleanor and I up and working on the final prep at 6 a.m. We needed to start that early if only to avoid the heat that quickly builds each morning in Tucson in May. I let the air conditioner run in the carport as long as possible just to offset a little of the heat that the Airstream was destined to absorb today. Around 9:30 a.m. we were ready to go, so I unplugged the trailer, pulled it out into the sun, gave it a quick rinse to get the worst of the storage dust off, and then we were off.

Our drive today brought us west on I-10 to Phoenix, then I-17 north all the way to Flagstaff. I-17 heading north has a couple of tough climbs, the type where signs warn “Turn off air conditioner to avoid overheating”. They mean it. It was about 95 when we hit the first steep grade north of Phoenix. I watched the engine temperature and mostly it was stable, but there was one point at which it started to rise and so we went without a/c for a few minutes.

The GL320 is a good tow vehicle in most circumstances, but its weak spot is climbing steep grades. Anything over 8% with our 7,000 pound trailer in tow means slow going. We usually end up with the 18-wheelers, moaning up the hill at 35 MPH with flashers on, while cars zip by at 65. That’s the result of having 400 ft-lbs of torque, but only 210 horsepower. It’s kind of like having a diesel tractor. We always get there, but we don’t get there fast. I don’t sweat this, because the slow part ends up being five or ten minutes out of an eight-hour drive, which hardly seems worth getting excited about. The rest of the time we can tow at any speed we care to.

After a few hours the brown desert began to give way to the pine forests and cooler temperatures of high altitude. Flagstaff is at about 7,000 feet, only a part-day drive from Tucson but worlds away in terms of climate and geography. We stopped here to pick up 20 gallons of diesel and then headed north on Rt 89 towards Page, with the intention of continuing on to Navajo National Monument, a place we’ve visited and enjoyed before.

And then something great happened. We passed by a sign for Sunset Crater National Monument, and Eleanor said, “Why don’t we stop here instead?” It was only 3:30 in the afternoon and we hadn’t covered the miles I had hoped for. I wanted our first day out to be a big one, so we’d have less pressure in the next two days to get to Denver. But I was feeling tired, and we’d never visited Sunset Crater before, and there was a little blue symbol by the road indicating that it had a campground. We considered the pros and cons, and then turned around and drove a mile back to Sunset Crater.

This turned out to be a good choice. Sunset Crater offered much more than we expected. As you drive in a few miles along the entrance road, there’s a spectacular view of the dormant volcano, and you can immediately see from the red and purple cinders along the crater’s edge how it got its name. It is just beautiful.

The campground is very nice (no hookups, $18), with sites set among tall Ponderosa pines and well spaced. We parked the Airstream in site #13 and headed to the Visitor Center, which was small but well-done. Then we drove a short distance to the one-mile Lava Trail and took a walk to get a better view of the volcano and shake off the hours of travel.

It was a stunningly beautiful afternoon, with temperatures in the 70s, beautiful sunshine, dry air, and a pleasant breeze. You couldn’t ask for a better day to visit this great National Park, and yet the campground was half empty (on a Friday night) and the trails were uncrowded.

We had all changed into long pants and grabbed sweatshirts for the trail, and as the afternoon began to fade we were glad we had them. It seems like the heat of Tucson was weeks ago, but we have a souvenir in the Airstream—it’s 80 degrees inside from the heat accumulated during towing. That will fade quickly. Tonight we are expecting a low of 37 degrees in the campground. Eleanor and I added blankets to our bed and we expect to sleep well and rise early. Our roadtrip is well and truly begun.

The Airstream is loaded and we are aiming to depart at 8 a.m. tomorrow morning.

Of course, that won’t happen —it never does, because there’s always 55 last-minute things that need attention, and Emma is groggy if woken before noon, etc.  But at least the intention of leaving at eight means that Eleanor is feeling fairly optimistic about our packing process this year. If we actually get out at 9, it will still be a reasonable start by our lax standards, for a multi-month trip. It means we started early enough on the packing process and weren’t left with a lot of last-minute things to do.

You’ll note I said Eleanor was feeling optimistic.  I emphasize her because she’s really the Chief Packer in our family.  I pack my personal gear and all the stuff I need for business, plus I take care of the Airstream and car.  If I hurry, I can have all of this done in a couple of days, otherwise four or five days.  Eleanor has the harder job: packing her stuff, all the household gear, and (most challenging of all) Emma’s stuff.  This takes at least a week every year.

The major problem is that darned children keep growing and changing.  So the toys, books, crafts, clothes, shoes, sundries, and even foods that were perfectly suited to a kid in 2011 have little to do with what she’ll require in 2012.  And that’s in addition to figuring out a multi-functional, all-weather wardrobe that fits into a couple of plastic bins and four tiny drawers.  Inevitably this means shopping for all kinds of things: clothes that fit, replacement batteries, foods that pack well, new games (lately on the iPad, another sign of change).

I’ve struggled a little this time with packing as well, but not nearly as much.  These days I’m packing for magazine publishing, Alumapalooza, a brief visit in Vermont (possible lake activities), and (Dr C, avert your eyes!) a motorcycle tour through upstate New York.  That translates to roughly 50 pounds of books (Newbies, Tin Hut, Wally Byam), 30 pounds of technological gadgetry such as computers and cameras, a Dutch Oven, quite a bit of bulkiness in the form of apparel that will be for sale, plus one high-visibility armored motorcycle jacket and full-face helmet.  Eleanor is also doing two cooking demonstrations at Alumapalooza, which means she’s toting extra ingredients and tools too.  All of this has to go somewhere in the confined storage of our 216 square foot home.

This is what really makes it tricky.  When faced with this sort of problem, most people either get a bigger RV or a bigger truck, which explains the popularity of massive Class A motorhomes and sky-scraping fifth wheels.  We could make life much easier on ourselves if we traded the Mercedes GL320 for a 3/4 ton pickup truck with a fiberglass bed cap, but that’s not our style, so we instead we spend extra time meticulously deciding what can come with us, and where it will fit.  This forces us to be ruthless about leaving behind things we really don’t need.  Eventually all the important stuff gets in there, even things one might not expect.  Two years ago we made the trip with a four-foot fiberglass greyhound on the bed, destined for a friend in Chicago.

We tend to pack like submariners.  As we depart, the trailer is stuffed to the gills with food and supplies.  As we travel, the space gradually clears out.  I’ll sell the t-shirts and books, we’ll drop off gifts and deliveries to friends along the way, we’ll eat the food, and thereafter we’ll be more careful about what we acquire so that the interior remains liveable.  We try to buy very little that is not consumable, and tend to come home with a freezer full of interesting foods, but not much else in the way of souvenirs.  These are habits that come from years of full-time living, and I see no reason to break them.  We just have never been “weekenders,” and I doubt we ever will be.  So we try to take only what we need.

At times I am a bit jealous of the weekenders, because they only have to pack for a few days and they can bring all kinds of fun stuff.  We often camp with people who have brought their plastic pink flamingos, awning mats, Weber grills, paper lanterns, table decorations, bicycles, even outdoor kitchens.  They make wonderful presentations, even to the point of having holiday-specific decorations.  By comparison, we look rather stingy—we don’t even bring folding chairs!  That’s a part of compromise of traveling for long times.  When others are spreading out their stuff and preparing for a cookout, I am usually rummaging around in the toolkit so I can fix something.

In recognition of the fun displays that people like to put out, we are once again going to give someone at Alumapalooza the coveted Airstream Life “Wally” award for Best Open House Presentation.  I am hoping to see some really great setups while we are parked on the grass at Airstream.  A few people have already made it known that they plan to really go nuts this year.  The only limitations we impose are (a) no ground fires; and (b) no big light displays (since each trailer only gets 3 amps of power).  That leaves a lot of room for creativity.

We don’t have a traditional last meal before we leave, but it is always something dead simple.  I sometimes have to restrain Eleanor from trying to cook something elaborate, because it’s her nature to feed us well, but this year she has come up with a convenient choice of lobster ravioli from the freezer and sushi from the grocery store.  Usually our last night in the house is a little frantic, as the final tasks end up getting done in the dark of night, so it’s best to have an easy meal.

At this point I’m feeling that we are already well set.  Tonight Eleanor will move over the last of the food from the house refrigerator to the Airstream refrigerator, and pack up the last items that are strewn around the Airstream.  In the morning I’ll dump the water that we used to clean the interior, hitch up, and pull the trailer out of the carport and into the sun for final walk-around.

It will be a great feeling to be driving the big rig again.  There’s always a moment when I feel sad to be leaving the house in Tucson, but in just a matter of hours the Airstream will become our home again and we won’t look back.  We will experience that exhilarating combination of freedom and uncertainty, as we drive on Friday to a destination we haven’t planned.  We’ll know it when we get there.  See you on the road.

You can tell we’re serious about a trip when the checklists come out.  Long ago we began compiling checklists to make our packing easier, and each spring we pull those lists out and start checking off items and updating them for current circumstances.  I don’t know how else to do it, since there are way too many things to remember to do when we’re anticipating being away from home base for months.

Our checklists have been in play for a couple of weeks now. In addition to the normal things needed for daily life in an Airstream, Eleanor is going to be doing two cooking demonstrations at Alumapalooza this year, and that means she needs to carry a lot of food ingredients.  She also has to do two separate rehearsals before we depart.

Her first presentation will be about sauces.  She will make ten different and delicious multi-purpose sauces in about 40 minutes, right in front of everyone at Alumapalooza, using an actual Airstream stove & oven.  Afterward, everyone in the audience will get a chance to taste each sauce.  I’ll have the recipes posted on the Alumapalooza website on the days of her presentations.

So we did a run-through last night in our kitchen and worked out a few small issues with the sauces, and today she’ll do another run-through in the Airstream of her second demonstration.  That one will be a full meal featuring salmon and risotto.

Meanwhile, I’m trying to wrap up projects and loose ends so that I can be on the road without too much work pressure.  The Fall issue would normally have an editorial deadline of June 1, but since I’m always at Alumapalooza at that time I ask all the writers to get me their Fall articles by May 15 or sooner.  That helps me get the bulk of the issue in hand before I’m on the road. Most of the writers have been very cooperative with that, which I appreciate.

Once we start traveling, it’s much harder to carve out enough hours to get serious work done.  On driving days I’m lucky to get three useful hours of time in front of the computer, which is sometimes just enough to keep the fires stoked at work, but at that rate I’ll gradually fall behind.  When we were full-timing it was easier; I’d just declare a “destination” and spend a few days in the Airstream getting work done. But now we’re on a schedule to get to Denver and Jackson Center, and I can’t just pull over for a few days when things get busy.

Our route is partially set, at least as far as Denver.  This time, to make the drive more interesting we’ll go up through Arizona to Flagstaff, then cut through the Navajo Nation and possibly stop at Navajo National Monument.  Our next stop is undetermined but will be somewhere between Moab UT and Grand Junction CO, I’d guess.  Our destination for this leg of the trip is Denver CO, where we will inspect the site of this year’s Alumafandango and do a little advance work.  After that we’ll continue on to Jackson Center OH with probably 3-4 short stops along the way.  As is normal for us, we aren’t making any reservations.

I’ll have to return to Tucson fairly soon after Alumapalooza is over.  I’ve got some appointments here, and I’ll need to get back to work in a serious way.  My time in the Airstream will be almost exactly one month, then probably about another month from August to September when we go to Alumafandango. But the Airstream won’t be back to home base for close to four months.

The Airstream is nearly ready for its voyage.  Most of our clothes are packed, Eleanor has worked out the food arrangements, and I’ve verified that all of the systems are in good operating condition. I need to check for a possible propane leak around the flexible hose that connects the propane bottles to the regulator (called a pigtail), which I’ll do today with a spray bottle and some soapy water. Those hoses don’t last forever, but replacing one is a simple task if needed.  [Update:  I found the leak and will be replacing both of the pigtail lines today.]  I also need to check the tires.  I’m not expecting any problems from the Michelins just because they’ve been so bulletproof over the past couple of years, so at worst I expect I might need to add a little air.

Our tow vehicle has been getting more attention lately than the Airstream.  I’ve been driving it around town to confirm that the recent repair to the urea injection system has really done the job, and it seems to be fine.  It’ll be due for an oil change and tire rotation in 2,000 miles, which means I’ll have to do it somewhere around Indiana or Ohio. I don’t really want to make that stop because the timing will be inconvenient, so I may just take it in before we leave Tucson.  (The oil change interval is every 10,000 miles on this car.)

My neighbor Mike came over Sunday morning to finally force me to do an exterior detail on the GL320.  It really needed it.  Together we washed the car, then hand-dried it, then used clay bars to pull all the contaminants out of the paint, and finally used Mike’s buffer to wax the body.  The result was fantastic, better than new.  The paint is so glossy and slick that it feels like glass.  In the process I found two dings on the body that I hadn’t noticed before.  Oh well.

The Airstream, on the other hand, is filthy on the outside.  It’s covered with dust from a winter of storage—and we have a lot of dust here.  I’m sure the solar panels won’t be generating much power until I can wash them off, but cleaning will have to wait until I can get the trailer out of the carport and over to a truck wash.  I’ve tried cleaning the trailer by hand with brushes and ladders, and since it’s 30 feet long and 10 feet tall, it takes hours.  Long ago I decided that paying $38 at the Blue Beacon was definitely my choice.

One of the more pleasant tasks of our annual departure is putting things in “vacation mode.”  That’s because it’s a huge money-saving opportunity.  It turns out that a lot of things have some form of vacation mode.  The water heater has one, or we can just shut it off completely ($10/month saved).  The local water/sewer authority allows us to put our sewer bill on vacation mode, which amazes me ($20/month saved). USAA allows us to put our other cars in “storage” while we’re gone, which reduces the insurance coverages we won’t need (about $120 per month saved).  (They even provide a little warning sheet to print out and place on the driver’s seat so that we remember to “un-store” the car before driving it.)  CenturyLink allows us to put our household DSL service on hold too (about $50/month).  Between all of that and turning off the air conditioning (up to $250 per month in the summer), we can save $350-450 per month while we are gone, which of course can go directly to our travel expenses.   If only we could put our real estate taxes on hold too.

We’re very nearly the time to launch for the season, and that means it’s time to get busy. Under the best of circumstances prepping the Airstream for a multi-month voyage is a fair bit of work, but this year it’s even a little harder because it hasn’t gone anywhere since October.  Readers of this blog will recall that our mid-winter trip to Anza-Borrego was nixed by a faulty disc brake actuator, and then just last month the hitch receiver on the Mercedes had to be sliced apart, removed, and re-installed and welded.

So we’ve messed with arguably the two most important parts of our towing setup:  the thing that lets us pull the trailer, and the thing that makes the trailer stop.  Knowing this has made me keen to do a test run well in advance of our trip, to ensure we won’t have any rude surprises when time comes to pull out in May.

Alumapalooza now dictates our departure date, at least a little.  Every May we need to drive from Tucson AZ to Jackson Center OH.  It’s about 1,900 miles on the straightest possible route.  We vary the route each time, so this year we are going via Denver and the total will be over 2,000 miles.  It’s no fun barreling across the country without time to stop and see things, so our bare minimum travel time is nine days and even that’s really pushing it. I would rather take a couple of weeks to do the trip, but other obligations are preventing that.

That gives us about three weeks to get ready, which is plenty of time for packing.  But it’s hardly any time at all if we had to get into some sort of major repair.  So yesterday afternoon, when the springtime desert heat had declined a little, I hitched up the trailer and recruited my neighbor Mike to come along on a trial run.  I told him I wanted someone with me if the hitch receiver broke, the propane lines split, and the brakes failed.  He gamely hopped into the passenger seat and off we went on a 10 mile test run through Tucson.

The car and trailer felt like a comfortable old pair of shoes.  Everything seemed exactly as it should. I actually had to dial down the brake controller voltage a bit, since the new Dexter disc brake actuator seems a little more aggressive than the old Actibrake it replaced.  Otherwise, braking was perfect.

The hitch receiver was also behaving well.  The new bolted section (where it had been cut, see previous post) seems fine.  I was listening intently for any sort of unusual noise transmitted through the body of the car, and also by opening the driver’s window and listening as we accelerated, braked, turned, and hit bumps.   I’ve long been an advocate of getting to know the sounds your rig makes, as a slightly-off note can be the first indication you get of a serious problem.  On this test drive the hitch was silent, which is exactly what you want.

Now back in the carport, the Airstream faces a couple of weeks of prep.  I will go over every major system to verify that everything is working, and do any routine maintenance.  The Hensley hitch will get closely examined and re-greased, the propane system will be checked for leaks and tanks will be filled, and all of the systems we haven’t been using over the winter will be tested.  Since we leave the trailer in “guest house mode” all winter, we already know the refrigerator, air conditioner, water pump, dump valves, electrical system (including lights), furnace, and plumbing are all fine. Minimal cleaning will be needed as well.

The big job is to clear out stuff from last year that we don’t need in the trailer, and re-pack everything for this summer.  With the cooking Eleanor always does, that means a major task just to figure out the culinary items.  Emma’s constant growth means her clothes will be all-new, and since we are going to be doing some different things this year, I’ll be slightly altering my personal items as well.  Here’s one hint: I’m packing a helmet this year.

There will also be some office equipment changes, as the pace of new technology is relentless, and I like to make the most of it.  For example, we will be packing an iPad, which will serve as Emma’s personal computer, a registration/check-in device for Alumapalooza & Alumafandango, and our in-Airstream family game system.  Last week Leigh and Brian, good Airstream friends, parked their Airstream in the carport for 6 days and tipped me off about how well the iPad does at standard board games.  It’s perfect for the Airstream, as it can store dozens of different games for us to play together those quiet nights on the road, and frees up a lot of space we had previously used for storing “travel size” versions of games.

Leigh is particularly keen on this concept, since she has recently launched a free service that reviews the best board game apps.  I had no idea that the iPad was so good at games until Leigh brought hers into the house after dinner and we started playing.  For some games we could even network our iPhones so that each of us had our own little play station.  She’s currently writing an article about it, which I hope to publish in the Fall issue of Airstream Life.

Other technology has changed as well.  I’ll have a new (“4G”) cellular connection for our Internet service on the road, and a whole slew of handy apps on the iPhone to allow me to do many routine tasks even when away from my computer.  The trick is to make sure that every piece of technology allows you to do things more easily, rather than just complicating life.  I’ve been testing work-related apps all winter and quite a few of them haven’t made the cut.

I’ve noticed quite a bit of chatter about high fuel prices. This happens every year in the springtime, as fuel prices traditionally rise in the weeks leading up to Memorial Day.  Sign-ups for Alumapalooza were a little slower this year because fuel price fears, but I’ve been interested to note that as we get closer to the event (and fuel prices begin to decline a little) people are changing their mind and signing up to drive across the country anyway.  One guy even cancelled his registration in February because of fuel prices, then re-registered for Alumapalooza in April when he realized that he’d been snookered by media hype.  In reality, US average gas prices are lower this year than last year. The average retail price of unleaded on 4/28/2011 was $3.89, and today (4/28/2012) it’s $3.82.  You can check this yourself at GasBuddy.com.

Even if fuel rose by a buck a gallon, it would only increase the cost of a 2,000 mile Airstream trip by $200 (assuming 10 MPG towing).  That’s not enough to make us stay at home.  If we were really concerned, we’d look for shorter trips rather than just giving up.  My Airstream is not yet ready to become a permanent guest house.

This week we are really going to dig into the preparation process.  It should be interesting, and even a little fun.  That little test tow I did yesterday has gotten me anxious to re-bond with the Airstream and get it out on the road for real.  Everyone knows that the anticipation of a trip can be half the excitement, and once we start our work I think we’ll get psyched for the adventures that lie ahead.

This time of year our tow vehicle, the Mercedes GL320, generally rests in the carport. We log about 14,000 miles each summer between May and October, mostly towing, and that’s a lot of use. So in the off-season I try to give it a break, except for occasional cross-country trips. This allows the car’s years to catch up with the miles somewhat. It’s a 2009 and already it has 56,000 miles on it. By the time we get back from travel this summer, it will have about 70,000 miles.

A few weeks ago I had the car out for a little trip and the Check Engine light popped on. This is becoming a familiar sight, unfortunately. We’ve had about five incidents of Check Engine lights since the car was new, and all of them have been related to the Adblue (a.k.a. Diesel Exhaust Fluid, or DEF) system. This system is a big part of why the car’s emissions are legal in in all 50 states. It injects a spray of DEF into the exhaust stream, which combines with the exhaust gasses in a special type of catalytic converter and results in the nasty smog-causing oxides of nitrogen turning into harmless water vapor and carbon dioxide.

It’s a brilliant system when it all works, but our 2009 model was the first year for Mercedes to install this technology, and there have been a few bugs. Mercedes seems to have worked them out with a combination of software updates (yes, like everything else on modern cars, this process is entirely controlled by computers) and upgraded components.

This time the Check Engine light was indicating that a heater for the Adblue (DEF) was failing. The heater is needed so that the fluid doesn’t freeze at low temperatures. Replacing the heater is a labor-intensive job that requires complete removal of the Adblue tank. And this is where the nightmare began …

You see, back when we first bought the car, we had to do some extensive modification of the factory receiver hitch, in order to make it suitable for our Airstream Safari. The key modification was the addition of a “third leg” that spread out the tongue weight of the trailer. You can see this “leg”, made of 2-inch square tubing, in the photo at left. It was welded to the rear suspension crossmember and to the factory receiver.

When this solution was proposed, I had two misgivings. First, that this would take up too much ground clearance. This turned out not to be an issue, as the car still has 10″ of ground clearance at this point even with the tube installed. My second concern was that it was blocking access to the black tank you see above, which is the holding tank for the Adblue fluid.

After considering for a while, we decided that replacement of the Adblue tank was highly unlikely, so we went ahead and installed the third leg. It has functioned perfectly ever since, taking up stress from the receiver so that we can get good weight distribution without overstressing the rear end of the GL’s frame.

So when I got the call from the dealership’s Service Advisor telling me that the tank had to be removed, my heart sank. We had to cut the third leg of the hitch off (where indicated with the orange line in the photo above). I dragged the decision out a few days by asking the dealership to do an individual component test on the Adblue heater to double-check that it really had failed, and to try to rule out the possibility of another software problem. They did that, but the news was unchanged: we have to remove the entire tank in order to replace the heater.

I feel very protective of my receiver hitch. We went through a lot of trouble to get it modified just so, to suit our particular needs. We first had reinforcements (not visible in the photo) welded on here in Tucson, and then drove 2,000 miles to Can-Am RV in London ON (Canada) to have the final reinforcement added. I inspect the receiver at least monthly, and do an annual crawl-around-on the-ground-with-a-flashlight inspection at least annually, along with wire brushing and repainting. Any receiver can fail, and since a failure can result in your death, it’s a piece of equipment worth taking seriously. So I didn’t want anyone touching it, and I especially didn’t want anyone coming near it with the intention of cutting it off.

But in this case there was no choice. Andy Thomson at Can-Am was very helpful in marking up the photo above, which I gave to the dealership’s body shop to show them exactly what to do. The hitch was cut, the Adblue tank and some other components were replaced, and I got the car back a week later with the hitch re-installed—but sliced right through the third leg. I drove it 50 miles and the Check Engine light stayed off, so the next step was to get the hitch repaired.

Obviously we didn’t want to weld it back, since there’s always the possibility that we’ll need to remove the hitch again, so after discussions with Andy and other consultants we came up with a plan to add some heavy plates and bolt the two ends of the cut tube together. This was done locally at a qualified welding shop. You can see the result below. Sorry for the lousy iPhone photos.

The bottom line was $49 to the dealership body shop, and $200 to the welding shop that installed the bolt-up re-attachment. The Adblue tank was covered under warranty, which was good since the estimate for that job was a whopping $2,200. I do like the Mercedes as a tow vehicle, but the cost of parts and repairs can be astronomical. I’ve already started a maintenance fund for repairs after the 100,000 miles warranty has expired. As I tell people these days, it’s the best tow vehicle I’ve ever owned, and it’s also the least reliable tow vehicle I’ve ever owned.

But I’ll cut it some slack since we really use the heck out of it. There’s a chance that this replacement of much of the Adblue system will resolve the persistent issues we’ve had with it in the past. Discounting the Check Engine lights, it has done well for us. We bought the GL320 because we wanted a long-term tow vehicle with a durable diesel engine, and overall it has worked out well.

Realistically, there are no perfectly reliable vehicles, just different compromises. At this point the car still feels and drives like new, so my original goal to get 250,000 miles out of it has not wavered. In that long-term context, this little bit of receiver work seems well worth the expense. It is just part of a long-term investment in safe and happy traveling.

I occasionally think that we have too many Airstreams, but sometimes we don’t have enough.  This is the time of year when people tend to come visit  (guess why) and the Airstreams become very useful as guest houses.

We live in a three bedroom house that is in a perpetual state of construction and has only two usable bedrooms, and 1.5 usable baths.  I don’t even have an office that I can use, just a desk in the corner of the living room.  So we aren’t well set up for having overnight guests, at least not indoors.

This has never been a problem for the dozen or so houseguests who visit each season, because the Airstream makes a far better place for them to stay.  We tell prospective visitors that they will be welcome to stay “in the Airstream in the carport.”  This is a sort of test.  Those who are intimidated by the idea of sleeping in a trailer, parked next to the car and tool shed, would probably be happier in a hotel.  Most of our friends have the opposite response.  They say, “Oh cool, I get to sleep in the Airstream?” and then we know that they’ll be great house guests.

This week we have a full house.  Lou & Larry have arrived in their 30-foot Airstream and are parked in front of the house. We have courtesy-parked at their place in Ohio many times, and this is the first chance we’ve had to reciprocate.  They will be here a couple of nights and then head to California to visit Bert & Janie at their boondock site in Anza-Borrego (and Michael Depraida at his spot at “The Slabs” near the Salton Sea), and then come back here for a few more nights.

Tomorrow, a long-time friend of Eleanor’s will fly in from the northeast, and she’ll be accommodated in the Safari. That trailer is like having your own apartment, since it is roomy, stocked with everything you could possibly need, and fully hooked up to utilities.  The same day, Brett will fly in from Florida, and he’ll be set up in the smaller Caravel.  So we’ll have four guests at once, across three Airstreams.

This works out really well.  Everyone has a space to call their own.  We don’t have to worry about whose towel is whose, or when people like to get out of bed.  Everyone has their own refrigerator, stocked with the things they like to eat.  Everyone has their own bathroom, and can set the temperature where they like it.  Lots of those opportunities for friction (even between good friends) are eliminated, and we all get to focus on the good parts of visiting.

It’s financially very practical too.  We don’t need a big house just for those occasions when people visit. There are no unnecessary rooms to dust or pay taxes on.  When our guests are gone, the “guest houses” revert to being our vacation and business vehicles, or I can use one of them as a private office when I need a quiet space to work.  The Airstreams make our little house much more flexible and affordable.

I may someday get a plaque for our Airstream Safari’s bedroom that lists all the people who slept there.  (That ought to freak a few people out during tours.) I think a few of them stayed specifically because they could sleep in the Airstream.  It is an attraction, to some folks.

Long term I would like to buy a few more Airstreams, set them up luxuriously, and place them on a piece of property, for rental to the general public when visiting Tucson.  This is a popular idea, which we’ve documented several times in the magazine.  There are spots all over the world where you can spend the night in an Airstream “hotel room.”  I feel like I’m nearly in the business already, especially this week, so it would probably be fun to do for real someday …

I’ve been down in the trenches lately, working hard to try to pull off a few long-term projects.  The Spring 2012 issue of Airstream Life finally got off to the printer too, but neither of these things are responsible for the lack of blog posts lately.  The real cause has been that I hate to say anything about the stuff I’m working on until I know it’s real.

But Friday night, after some intense negotiations and late-night conference calls, Brett and I finally resolved the last remaining issues for a major project.  And that makes it possible to announce “Alumafandango,” our new event to be held in Denver CO this coming August, 2012.

We’ve been working on this for about a year.  For a long time we’ve been hearing from people out west that they’d like something like Alumapalooza.  We looked at potential sites in Palm Springs, northern Arizona, Texas, and Colorado, but we kept running into barriers that made it impossible to hold the kind of event we wanted.  Finally, we found Lakeside Amusement Park in Denver, and started actively working on a deal with the park ownership so that we could camp right in the park next to the lake and the old-school rides.

This wasn’t easy at all.  The area we wanted to camp in was overrun with bushes, littered with decades of debris, and overshadowed by an abandoned race stadium and a half dozen decrepit mobile homes.  The park owners agreed to clean up the area, install water and power stands, and level & seed the ground so that it would be transformed into a nice place to camp for a few days.  This work started last fall and has been ongoing through the winter.  It probably won’t be done for a few months, but when it is, it will be a unique opportunity to camp where no one has camped before—and that’s one of the keys we were seeking.

Timeless Travel Trailers (Wheat Ridge, CO) has been instrumental in helping us put this deal together.  They will be the key sponsor, and as part of the event they are planning to provide on-site service and tours of their workshop.  They’re also supplying the fencing, water, and electrical infrastructure.  Our plan is to make this an annual event if it turns out to be popular, so we are all looking to the long term.  Obviously all of this investment in the site wouldn’t make sense for just one year.

Brad Cornelius designed the new logo, which you can see above.  A version of this will appear on the t-shirts, too.

Our goal is to have something just as fun as Alumapalooza, but not the same.  So we are looking for all new seminars and presenters, new entertainment, and different games.  That way you can go to both “APZ” and “AFD” and have a great time at both without feeling deja vu.

We selected the headline entertainment with the intent of carrying over the “carnival” theme, and we’re very excited to have the Lucky Daredevil Thrillshow featuring Tyler Fyre and Thrill Kill Jill for two nights of performances. They’re Airstreamers, of course.

We’ve also secured a night of free unlimited rides for all participants.  The classic rides at Lakeside are really fun.  You’ll remember most of them, and want to ride them all.  My favorite is the old-school wooden roller coaster.  It’s just fantastic excitement packed in a 1-minute ride.

Registration for Alumafandango opened on Sunday and already the first three trailers are signed up, which is encouraging.  We think we can accommodate 150 trailers on site, maybe more, but it won’t be clear until the site work is complete.

Of course, now that we’ve pulled the trigger I’m wondering nervously if we’ll be able to get 100+ trailers signed up in six months.  Right now the website doesn’t have much detail about what we are planning, but hopefully the reputation of Alumapalooza will carry over, and people will know that we guarantee a great time.  (We’ll get more detail up on the Alumafandango website as the plans begin to firm up.)  We’re working on a “vintage showcase,” some interesting tours, lots of seminars, and a pretty radical trailer makeover demonstration that happens in five days while you watch, among many other things.

At last!  The new brake actuator arrived yesterday and with the help of friends it was installed today.  We’re back in action!

Those of you who followed the saga of our aborted trip to California know that our third Actibrake disc brake actuator quit without notice recently.  I’ve had a long and painful history with that product, which you can read about in the Tour of America archives and the Man In The Maze archives.  Suffice to say that this time we chose to switch brands, and after some research into the various products I chose to go with Dexter’s brake actuator, model K71-651-00.  It’s a 1600 psi unit designed specifically for disc brakes.

When the new actuator arrived I was immediately impressed with its design.  It’s a bit smaller than the one it replaced, and has a less-complicated 4-wire installation process (12v+, ground, brake controller, breakaway switch).  The previous one required five wires and I’ve seen some competitors that need six or more.

The mounting feet are integrated into the cast aluminum case, so I was able to toss the funky hold-down straps that we’d used before.  The whole thing seems tougher and neater, and from what I’ve read this Dexter unit has a good reputation for reliability, which is of course the highest priority in your braking system.

Removing the old dead unit was simple. The first step is to disconnect the trailer’s power, which means unplugging the trailer from shore power and removing the negative terminal on the battery.  Then I unscrewed the straps that held the brake actuator down, snipped the wires, and unscrewed the flexible hydraulic line.  It was out in five minutes, and it would have been quicker if I wasn’t working the confines of a closet.  I haven’t decided what to do with the old one yet.  My friend Rob suggested I send it to the Smithsonian.  I suppose it could be refurbished with a new circuit board but I don’t feel very good about passing on a proven unreliable product to someone else, given that I’ve had three of them fail.

Most of the job would have been fairly easy if it weren’t for that closet.  Having the actuator inside the trailer eliminates possible future problems from weather exposure, but it also means it ends up in some really awkward spot.  To get into the closet I had to lie on my side and wedge myself in, which was uncomfortable to say the least.  Fortunately, Rob came by and shared the joy by taking turns with me crimping wires in that tiny space (and he’s bigger than me).

The only other attachments needed were the hydraulic line, which just screws on with low torque (22 ft-lbs), and four wood screws to attach the Dexter to the floor. I pre-drilled the floor holes with a 1/16″ bit, screwed the actuator down, and we were basically done inside.

The next step is to fill the reservoir up with brake fluid, which required about a quart.  We reconnected the power, pulled the breakaway switch, and heard the reassuring hum of the actuator’s pump in full operation.

Once we knew it was working, we needed to bleed the air out of the brake lines.  This is the part I hate, because I have never managed to find a way to get a hose tightly on the bleeder valves so that it doesn’t leak.  I always end up with an armful of brake fluid, and this time was no exception.  But the bleeding went fairly quickly (there wasn’t a lot of air to be removed).  It definitely is crucial to have a buddy standing by at the breakaway switch to activate and deactivate the unit while you’re underneath getting doused with brake fluid.  We kept an eye on the fluid level but didn’t need to top it up until the bleeding job was done.  All told, we used about 1.5 quarts of DOT3 brake fluid to fill the reservoir and bleed the lines.

After that, the next task was to clean up the wires, which are a bit haphazard with different colors and multiple butt splices left from prior re-installations. The photo shows it before I wrapped things up.  I may also install a shelf so I have a flat surface above to store things, later.

At this point I lost my assistant, but the hard work was done.  All I need to do now is hitch up and go for a test tow.  When I do that, I’ll be checking that my previous brake controller settings still feel right for this controller (they probably will) and that I’ve gotten all the air out of the lines.  I’ll know if there’s air because it will take longer for the actuator to build up pressure and hence cause a delay in braking action.  Hopefully I got that part right.

If you are contemplating this job yourself, you’ll need these tools:

• 2-3 qts of brake fluid
• open-end wrenches to remove and re-attach the hydraulic line
• brake bleeder wrench (5/16″ or 1/4″ —check your brake calipers for correct size)
• yellow and blue butt splices
• wire cutter/stripper/crimper
• drill & small bits (to put new mounting holes in the floor)
• clear tubing & bottle for draining brake fluid
• rags or paper towels
• headlamp (very useful in small spaces)
• an assistant for the bleeding process
• mounting screws
• screwdrivers
• a test light or multi-meter
• wire loom and/or electrical tape

What a great feeling it is to have this done.  Not only are we ready to get back on the road, but I no longer have to worry about a random failure of the brakes. Dexter is a major company with a lot of experience, and they have a good product, so my confidence level in my disc brakes is high—for the first time in years.

Alas, it didn’t work out.  We are staying put for now.

It’s hard to explain fully why the option of taking the Caravel to California didn’t work for us.  Mostly it was because our trip was very ambitious.  We were going to meet friends in three locations, sharing some fairly elaborate meals each time, and traverse from desert to ocean climate.  This meant a huge amount of carefully packed food (some prepared in advance, others in the form of ingredients), clothing and gear.  We planned to hike, picnic, grill, cook in the Dutch oven, photograph, swim, courtesy park, write/blog, and entertain.  It just didn’t all fit into the Caravel, and culling down the gear meant culling down the plan, to the point that big chunks of our itinerary didn’t make sense.

Plus, Emma’s cold seemed to be draining the spark out of her, and Eleanor was showing symptoms of having caught it too.  They weren’t going to be ready to do the hikes I had in mind in Borrego Springs.  And then there was the curse of reservations—we were fairly locked into an itinerary by the reservations, and changing it to fit our new circumstances meant a slew of fees and lost deposits.  We couldn’t extend the trip to make up for the lost day because of appointments back at home, so we’d have to rush something, and that wasn’t going to be fun given the number of miles we had planned (1,200 roundtrip).

We finally recognized the situation.  By losing 36 hours and having to downsize, the trip we had planned no longer made sense.  We needed to invent something entirely new rather than try to save an unsalvageable plan.  It was a tough call to give up a vacation I’d been anticipating for weeks, but I think it was the right one.

A key to happiness is to be satisfied with what you’ve got.  So, what did we have?  Well, beautiful weather in Tucson (upper 70s by day, sunny), plenty of time, and lots of good food to be eaten.  I broke out the Dutch oven and made my first-ever dish over charcoal in the back yard: “cowboy” potatoes with onions and bacon.  I also grilled up some of Eleanor’s spiced chicken on the Weber, and some huge portobello mushrooms with olive oil and Kosher salt.

Eleanor started cooking up the perishable food that she was planning to serve during the trip, including a really fantastic Indian chicken with rogan josh and cream (which we will eat tomorrow—it’s always better after sitting a day to let the flavors meld).  We opened up the windows and the sliding glass door and let the unusually balmy air flow through the house, tantalizing the neighbors with the smell of good things cooking.  And we talked about future plans.  I think we will go to Anza-Borrego in April to make up for this lost trip.

The rest of the time we spent unwinding all of the things we’d set in motion.  The Caravel was unpacked and sent back to storage.  “I think it’s disappointed,” Eleanor said. “It was all psyched to go out.”  We left as much packed in the Safari as we could, hoping that we’ll be able to use it in a week or two for a shorter trip, but all of the stuff we’ll need this week has been removed.  In the process we found some things in both trailers that needed attention, like flashlights with dead batteries, compartments carrying stuff we wouldn’t need, expired food, outdated paperwork, etc., so it was good to get all of that stuff addressed.

I cancelled the reservations, losing a total of about $180 in reservation fees and non-refundable charges.  We still have one valid & non-refundable reservation in California for next weekend, but I doubt we’ll use it.  We’ve offered it to a few friends.

The biggest hassle is that I had previously directed some mail to California, where I was going to pick it up during the week.  That mail includes some checks.  Now I’ve got to get it re-directed again, back to my usual address, and I can’t do that until the Post Offices open on Tuesday.

Today our “staycation” continues.  I’m going to bake apple crisp in the Dutch oven, and Eleanor is going to cook up more of the goodies from the Airstream.  I expect to get a quote from a local dealer on a replacement brake actuator, but until I hear what he wants to charge, it’s not decided whether I’ll buy locally or mail-order it.  So it may be a while before I get on the job of replacing it.  I’ll document that process when it happens.