March 11th 2020

Ok, what would you do? You have just loaded up the freezer portion of your refrigerator with enough food to provide us almost enough meals to get us back close to Ontario. Miss Laurie made a big lasagna and portioned it to be frozen, just froze some chicken and chops … like the freezer is real full. And the fridge has quit … oh ya and we are in the desert near Quartzsite Arizona.

Here is how my day unfolded:

08:30 – remove the suspected control board from the refrigerator

08:45 – unhook the towed and head to Quartzsite

09:10 – the RV repair shop doesn’t have a new control board

09:15 – his supplier has six boards in Phoenix

09:20 – I find an ATM because he doesn’t take plastic

09:40 – part paid for, address in hand, off to Phoenix

12:05 – arrive at supplier (traffic was bad – heavy rain)

12:20 – part in hand off to Arizona Land Office for camping permit

12:40 – locate Land office – signing into get visitor pass

12:45 – locate camp permit office – fill out camping form

12:50 – pay fee – receive camping permit

12:55 – sign out of office – return visitor pass

13:00 – headed back to Quartzsite (just have to get back on I-10)

13:10 – back on the interstate ( still raining quite heavy)

14:05 – stopped for fuel for the towed and a sub for me – has quit raining

15:35 – arrive back at our campsite (can see the rain coming)

15:45 – new board installed – fridge has fired up instantly

15:50 – tools all put away – starting to rain

So less that twenty hours after the refrigerator quiting, we are back up and running, no harm no foul. By not opening any refrigerator doors at all, to check on things we reduced the risk of loss of any items. So in reality the repair took less that twenty minutes to remove and reinstall the refrigerator control board. But it took me seven hours to actually get the job done, and it always makes me laugh, as soon as the repair shop realized they didn’t have the board in stock, then they were questioning me as to whether I was sure it was the control board … but if they had the part in stock they would have just sold it to me, and never would have questioned my diagnosis.

Now I have an advantage over most people, with many years of diagnostic work, and many more years learning lessons from the school of hard knocks. So if you had to call a repair shop, you could hope for a repair technician by noon, and if he was good at his trade, he would diagnose the problem order the part, if you were lucky the part would get installed the next day, but depending on shipping it could be the day after. How much would that cost in lost food? The cost of the repair I would expect to cost around $500.00 the part was $250, I would expect the service call, diagnostics, the repair, and possible shipping cost to make up the difference.

You can never be totally prepared for every thing that is going to break or quit, and almost every appliance has a control board that is designed for each specific model and in many cases, specific serial number ranges … so in reality service shops or technicians can not be expected to carry every one. So we have to be willing to wait or expedite the needed part to fill each requirement, in this case it included a five plus hour trip to Phoenix, but each circumstance will be different, and your location one of the biggest factors. Amazon is great but only works when you can receive the item … there are no mail boxes in the desert.

We finished the evening with a pizza from Silly Al’s with the Bannon’s, it was good to catch up on what has been happening, as we will not likely get a chance once we head east. It’s amazing to imagine but five weeks has us crossing the border back into Ontario.

March 10th 2020

Our one month stay in Las Vegas was up today, and of course it had to be the day it rained … like seriously. Luckily we had packed up a lot of our items last night so this morning was pretty much just finishing up, flushing of the black tank, topping off the fresh water, rolling up hoses, you know all the glamorous thing that go with camping.

We had heard a lot of sirens last night when we went to bed at around ten o’clock, but we never thought too much of it, because we hear lots of sirens every night, we are in Vegas, well the sirens were for a fire in the RV park … WOW … so a fifth wheel caught fire and took out the unit beside it. The disadvantage to being packed in so tight, it’s not just about privacy, it’s about safety. Luckily no one was hurt but two units were lost, and I think about how it would devastate us, to loose everything we have because our neighbours unit caught fire.

Well we are safe and well and heading south today, the rain had stopped as we finished packed up and as we headed out of Las Vegas our destination is Plamosa Road BLM area just a few miles north of Quartzsite. Our route this time is straight south on US-95 into California then east on US-62 to Parker Arizona then head south on AZ-95 to our destination. The Nevada portion of US-95 has all been redone, it’s four lanes with a center median, while the California portion is a narrow two lane road with out any passing lanes. And in California’s infinite wisdom they make this a 65 MPH road but restrict autos towing trailers and trucks to 55 MPH, so what could possibly go wrong. Luckily traffic was light and there were a limited amount of crazy Californians willing to risk death to pass us, so all is well.

Thunder ran well, as this was our first day of driving since our last fuel filter change, we fuelled up at Parker and to our delight the price of diesel fuel was two fifty per gallon, haven’t seen prices that low since South Carolina a couple of years ago. For of Canadian family that like paying eighty six point seven cents per litre, which is quite a break from the dollar twenty one we paid in the fall. It was just in January I thought I got a deal when I bought diesel in Yuma at $2.95 a gallon, because we had been paying around $3.25.

So while we travelled 203 miles (327 kilometres) and everything went well got settled in at Plamosa Road by about three o’clock, a little longer day than normal, but other than the rain it was an easy drive … in fact it seemed like a perfect time for a couple of afternoon cocktails, happy hour as you will. So a couple of cocktails in (and we are talking Miss Laurie cocktails) the whole world seems to be making perfect sense … well as perfect as it can be. And the alarm on the fridge starts beeping, well we have been hooked up for 29 days and it worked perfect and it had been running on propane for the last eight hours with no issue, but now it is setting a code for no propane … but the tank gauge reads half, now the gauge could be wrong but I didn’t think it was. So I head outside to check the tank and access the burner on the fridge. After so strange clicking it re-ignites and seem to be ok.

So I had one more cocktail and watched some television and hit the hay at ten o’clock, well apparently the alarm started again at ten thirty, I sleep right through the alarm but when I woke at midnight, Miss Laurie told me she had shut the fridge off, so at twelve thirty I’m outside I’m my PJ’s trying to plug the fridge into the inverter, and to my dismay it was becoming apparent that it was not going to run on the power supply either. Well ain’t that a bitch … nothing is going to happen till tomorrow now … to be continued.