Resident critters

Welcome to our new Follower, Bud Russman, whose blog is Arizona RV Guy!  It's funny, when I checked out his blog, his current post has info about Forest River, which is the manufacturer of The Palms.  He's talking specifically about their travel trailers and fifth wheels, but I recognized some of the things he was talking about that are part of The Palms.  This is a new blog, and I hope it continues along the same lines, because it looks like it will be interesting and helpful.  Welcome aboard, Bud, we're happy to have you along on our adventures!

Whew, was it cold last night.  When I woke up at 8:30 it was 38 degrees inside, and little Katie hadn't moved from under her little nest inside a small down comforter.   It was warm inside The Palms yesterday evening due to the two space heaters we have (I'll forever love all of you who suggested I get electric space heaters!!!), so I didn't put her jacket or sweater on her when we went to bed.

When I woke up, right away I thought about Katie, and looked down to see a bump still under the quilt.  Usually she will come out during the night, but not last night!  I got up and spread a quilt over her, too, and she didn't move.  I peeked to see if she was okay:

 "Hey, Mom, let me sleep.  It' so nice and warm in here."

I looked out the kitchen window and saw this little guy:

A little past noon we were at 73 degrees in here, up from 38 degrees.  It was time to take off the warm clothes and turn off the heaters.  :)

I was sitting here watching TV on my laptop when I heard some rattling outside my screen door.  I looked over my shoulder....... right into the eyes of a squirrel climbing up my screen. I don't know who was more surprised!   I, of course, got up for the camera while he scurried away and Katie went over to the door to see what she'd missed.

On our early afternoon walk, we were just about to turn into our driveway when I noticed something out of the corner of my eye:

 Anyone out there - is it safe?

 Hello...

 Food...

Yum!

He was so funny - he kept popping in and out of his hole, grabbing a little greens, back into the hole, looking back and forth.   We stood right next to him watching and snapping photos for a long time.  I can't believe how good Katie is when I stop to take pictures.  She'll sit for quite a while, completely quiet.

Later this afternoon there were lots of little birds in the bushes and on the ground behind The Palms, picking things out of the soil right near another hole - there are lots of animal holes here.  All of a sudden a head pops up, looks around at the birds, and goes back in again.  I wanted to get a picture of him looking out at the birds, but he didn't come back out.

Here are some shots of local flora.  These are from the front of the little shop area right outside the park:

The grounds are landscaped beautifully.

 The sun was setting across the valley.

From Me and My Dog, have a great Wednesday evening, everyone!   : )

The continuing saga... new converter and batteries

The other night my CO2 alarm went off, and it wouldn't stop until I had both large windows open for a while.  I haven't had a problem since.

I woke up this morning, and had absolutely no power, even though the wall unit said there was still 1/3 power in the house batteries, which was normal, but I got nothing.  Well I did get something when I tried to turn on the water pump and a light - a high pitched, continuous screeching beep.  That was a new sound! :( 

So...   I packed up The Palms, and left the campground.  On the way out I asked the ranger at the ranger station if he knew of any RV repair places in the area.  He gave me two business cards, one really close, but he mainly did emergency repairs, and the other was back in the town of Hurricane and is a full repair shop which hopefully would have parts, if needed.  It's called Main Street RV and Marine.  I called and they said they could see me today, so I went down.  I stopped and filled the gas tank and headed down the hill to Hurricane. 

Here's the power center - with the black cover - the converter is under the drawer on the bottom right.

The owner came out to diagnose the problem, and he seemed to know what he was doing.  He thought it was probably a bad breaker, and seemed surprised when they were all okay.

 Power Center

Then he checked my converter and it was dead.

Old converter - D.O.A.  :(

He said the batteries weren't getting charged except when I drove the truck or started the engine.  In fact, when he pulled out the drawer over the old converter, he said, "Wow, do you smell that?"  It was like a burnt match - brimstone.  That might be what set off the CO2 alarm.  And it might have eventually caused a fire? 

I haven't been able to turn on any of the lights in the coach and have been using a small LED Coleman lantern - hard on the eyes, and it didn't give out much real light.  Not so cozy.  :(   So I was really glad he found something that could be fixed or replaced.  The new Converter is bigger than the old one.  The old one is a 45 amp and the new one is an 80 amp.

New Converter - My Hero!

He said I shouldn't have any issues now.  Also, I'll be able to dry camp much easier, but he did recommend that if I'm going to do a lot of boon docking, I should still get some solar.  That is still my plan when I'm in Arizona.

And while he was at it, I had him pull the two new 12V batteries I bought in August and install two new 6V deep cycle batteries.  He gave me a price break on the new ones and kept the old ones.  So now I have better batteries and a new, bigger converter that works.  

I knew the 6V batteries had to be wired in "series," and the 12V batteries were wired in "parallel."  When the owner turned on the system, it didn't work, and he went outside to check the batteries. The technician who was installing the batteries hooked them up wrong.  The owner explained to him that they had to be wired in series because they were 6V and showed him.  Thank goodness he caught that before I left.  When I need new batteries, I'll make sure to mention it, you never know.

I'm sorry I didn't get their names, but Main Street RV and Marine is a husband and wife run business, with the wife in the office and the husband and his crew running the shop part.  

They were both very nice and they had two large dogs there, one was a black Great Dane, a beautiful, sweet girl, and the other was an older black dog with a grey muzzle and white feet.  The dogs kept coming over to say hi, and were very curious about Katie.  The older one tried to come home with us. 

 Here's another shot - this looks like a really nice converter!  :)

I'd recommend this repair shop if anyone is ever in the area of Zion and needs RV help.

When I turned on the lights over the dinette tonight, I almost had to put on sunglasses!  I didn't realize how dim the lights have been in The Palms, but they are sure brighter now.

 

I took photo this on the way down to Hurricane - so interesting.

I love all the different shapes of these hills and mountains.  The one above looks like something out of Egypt.

 Pedestrian entrance to the park.

 Sunset the other night

   

Moon rising over the mountains last night from the campground.

Well, it's been more than four hours and the lights are still bright - YES!  And I still have full batteries according to the wall display.  That's a first.  I'm usually very optimistic, but I have to admit this issue has had me a bit worried.  I'm soooo hoping this is the end of it.  Keep your fingers crossed.

From Me and My Dog, have a great Tuesday night, everyone!  :)

Watchman Campground, Zion UT

WOW, we have five new followers to mention today!  That might be a record.  A big WELCOME to you all!

Allen and Lolita, who already have a nice looking Class A rig and Jeep and plan to retire in 573 days.  You guys are going to love retirement, especially with an RV to travel to new places whenever you want.  Check out their brand new blog!

Collier Carlton,who doesn't seem to have a blog, but his description says, "Avid Harley rider with 20 foot toyhauler to keep it with me for local touring. Going full time January, 2013 (if I can wait that long!).  Don't worry, Collier, it'll be here before you know it!

Scrappin Stampers - this is not an RV site, but a site for scrapbookers and rubber stampers. Those have been passions of mine in the past.  I sold a lot of my supplies in my estate sale, but brought some with me to "play" when I'm in the mood, so I totally understand your passion, Jamie!

Dayton C, who also doesn't have a blog, but has joined some RV sites as a follower, so...   he already may be an RVer, or... maybe RVing is in his future?

Jool, who is works from home, has many dogs as her "family" and is considering full time RVing in the future - trying to figure out if this is the path she wants to take!  Well, Jool, following and reading RVing blogs will give you a lot of insight into this lifestyle. 

Welcome Aboard to you all, I hope you enjoy following along with Katie and me on our adventures. :)

Saturday morning we packed up, dumped, filled our on-board water and moved a short distance to the Watchman Campground here in Zion.

I was immediately ecstatic about our new campsite.  It's big, open, lots of bushes for a beautiful campsite, but no large trees near us.  During the hot summers this would be the worst campsite, but in the cooler weather, it's the best!  The sun shines on The Palms all day, keeping us warm.  Not hot.  Just perfectly warm.   The electric hookup is heaven after being without electricity for three days.  It was a long three days.  (I've become such a wuss!)  I think my dreams of becoming Senior Pioneer Woman are fading....

Here's our campsite:

 View toward the front

 View toward the rear, out the kitchen window

View toward the couch window side

 Restrooms

 Clean, up-to-date restrooms, no showers

 Dish washing station outside restroom

So, anyway, this campground and campsite are more comfortable, and I'm glad we're here.  The views are fabulous in every direction and we're closer to the Visitor Center and the Park Exit, which means we are closer to a small store and other shops. 

The park has FREE shuttle buses that take people through the park on roads that are only for the buses during summer; starting today cars are allowed and the shuttle is done until next May.  There aren't many parking spaces, though, so people wanting to drive through there and park better get there early.  I was lucky to catch the shuttle the last day of the year for these bus tours.   They have various stops along the way, and another bus will be by within seven minutes.  They were available from 9 am to 9 pm.  Really nice for park visitors and campers, and keeps the traffic down.

Katie stayed home; I closed all the curtains and turned on the TV low and she was a good girl while I was gone.

Here are some photos from that tour - I took a ton of photos, as you can imagine.

 

 Condor in it's favorite tree high up on the mountaintop.

  

 Right in the middle of the photo is a tree - that's where the Condor hangs out.

 Photo the Ranger had of one of the Condors in the park.

The Condors in the park are tagged like Condor #50 in the Ranger's photo above.  The Ranger said Condors like to hang out in a regular spot, just like people do, and she had her telescope set up to view the Condor on the mountain top tree.  I was able to see it stretching it's wings; according to the Ranger they do that to cool down.  Then he brought his wings in and turned his head so I could see it.  Really cool.  They have such large bodies and wide wingspans and tiny bald heads.  The heads just don't seem to go with their bodies, do they?

The photo above of the Condor in the tree was taken with the zoom lens of my new camera.  Can you believe it?  In the photo below it, you can hardly even see the tree.

The Ranger's telescope, though, brought it so close you could see every feature.  They think it's Condor #99.

 One of the rock climbing mountains.  In one of the crevasses, which you 

can barely see if you click on the photo, are three rock climbers.

Close up of three rock climbers

The young woman sitting next to me on the shuttle was a rock climber, she and her husband are from Switzerland and are here on a two month vacation.  They've visited Joshua Tree, Yosemite, The Giant Sequoias and other parks, I assume doing some rock climbing along the way.  They got off at one point, where there was a mountain they were going to climb. 

 Virgin River

Virgin River

 "This is my Halloween costume - I'm a Ballplayer - outfield because I run fast!"

(The best I could do...)

  Sunset from the park entrance - too many trees and 

mountains to get a good sunset shot from the campground.

From Me and My Dog, have a Spooky Halloween, everyone!  :)

Our last night in Southern Campground

WELCOME to our newest Follower, Steve!   Steve just started blogging, when I checked in today he had written his first post, and he is thinking again about RVing.  He has three dogs, two bassets and a bloodhound, and wonders if he can travel in an RV with them.  If you want to offer advice, check out his blog and let him know what you think. I love brand new blogs where people are just starting on their RVing adventures, like I did last year.  Welcome aboard, Steve!

This is our last day in the Southern Campground in Zion, tomorrow we move to the Watchman Campground. I'm looking forward to that!!!  Electricity!!!

I was talking to my neighbor this morning about my battery issues.   Last night I kept the heat on, but set the temps very low, just so Katie wouldn't be frozen in the morning.  No Popsicle pups allowed in my rig!  When I got up at 8:00 and tried to start the generator, there was ZERO function, all I got was a CLICK.

I started the truck engine, thank goodness it started, yesterday I needed the generator to get the truck to start, hence our little trip into town to get things working again.  I turned the cab heat to high and took Katie outside to go potty.  That's when I saw my neighbor and told him what was going on.  He said I might have a short somewhere, this shouldn't be happening.  He has a portable generator and said he'd hook it up to my batteries this evening if I needed it.  That was really nice of him.

He also said that when I left the propane heater on, I was draining the battery, because the batteries operate the fans used to push out the heat.  I didn't know that - so now I won't do that again. But still... should that completely drain two batteries?

When we got back inside, it was nice and toasty, and my battery panel said they were charged full (because the truck engine was running), so I was able to start the generator.  And plug in my two space heaters - so now we're warm again, and it is going to be nice and warm again today, so we'll be good until this evening, when we can run the generator again for two hours.

I'll never be able to boon dock if I don't get this figured out, or fixed if something is wrong.  When I'm in Arizona, I'm going to have things checked out and see if there IS something wrong.  I'm also going to check again on solar - I think I'm going to go ahead with that. 

I don't want to need to be hooked up to electricity all the time to live the way I like, and my original plan of doing a lot of dry camping won't work the way I'm set up now.  I like to use my computer on and off all day, and I like the TV on a lot.  If I were on vacation, this would be fine, but this is my home now, and I want to live comfortably. 

Of course, Katie thinks this setup is just fine:

From Me and Katie, have a great Friday, everyone!  :)