Good Grief or, Gee, We Didn't Know that Would Happen

Tonopah, Nevada to Las Vegas, Nevada:

Friday, April 6: Our drive from Sparks, Nevada to Tonopah was relatively uneventful. On the recommendation of other RVers we joined "Passport America," a membership club which offers 50% off select RV parks.

When we were about 30 miles out of Tonopah, I told Bob I would drive ahead to check out Joy Land RV Park, the local "Passport America" park. I drove a short distance east from Tonopah on Hwy 6 toward Ely, turned left on Ketten and followed signs to the park. Ugh. I knew immediately Bob would not like taking the 5er over the large bump between the road and the RV park. I don't know if I was in the wrong location or if my expectations were way too high...it was a big square area with two scraggly trees and it didn't look open. I arrived approximately 5:00 p.m.

There was one trailer there which I thought must belong to the campground host. I turned around, stopped when exiting the driveway, called Bob and said, "Stop at the Rest Area north of Tonopah. It looks much nicer than the RV park."

He stopped and I drove back to meet him there. The Rest Area has an area for overnight camping (18 hour maximum). Very nice, no trucks allowed. By the time I got back to the Rest Area, Bob had the RV set up for the night, slides out, leveled...so nice to have "home" ready for us.

This is the first time we've boondocked for a night. We were careful not to use too much electricity and went to bed early, didn't cook. 

Saturday, April 7: At 3:30 a.m. our carbon monoxide alarm started beeping. The green light was blinking and the red light was blinking. I didn't know what was going on so I opened the window on my side of the bed, not wanting to die in my sleep.

Bob turned on an overhead light, but it was pretty dim so he got a flashlight to read the WARNING label on the alarm. We finally figured out the battery was dying. 

Good grief. How could that be? We didn't use much electricity, we had switched the refrigerator to run on propane. Gee, we didn't know that would happen.

In the middle of the night it dawned on us, how would we retract the supports? How would we close the slides (pop-outs)? 

Not much we could do at 3:30 a.m. except go back to sleep. After thinking of all the things that wouldn't work without a battery, we did go back to sleep, although it got pretty cold because the fan on the furnace didn't work. Luckily, two cats got cold too. Bowie slept on my stomach for a while and Sunnie was by my legs.

At 7:30 we got up, ate oranges and cold cereal. I thought we should call Good Sam Club to come out with a generator to help us close the slides. Bob, not so much. He said, "Let's save Good Sam for a real emergency." (Besides I think he liked the challenge of figuring this out himself.) He was able to retract the supports with what little battery power was left, plus partially retract the kitchen slide.

He took the battery out of the 5er and charged it with my car battery for ten minutes. He was able to finish moving the kitchen slide a few inches. He took the battery out and charged it again. (It should be noted that the bedroom slide does not have a manual slide, so it would have to be done with a battery. The dining room slide required crawling on the ground to insert the tool into the bottom of the slide to crank it. The dining room slide is very heavy and hard to crank when you're lying on the ground.)

After charging the 5er battery for 20 more minutes using my car battery then placing the 5er battery back in the rig, the bedroom slide moved about six inches before it halted. 

Plan B: Take the 5er battery into Tonopah and have it recharged. Use my car battery in the 5er to close the slides. This required taking the battery out of my car. My car battery has only one post; the battery in the 5er has two posts. No problem, says Bob, we'll put your car battery in the 5er, attach the one post and I'll hold the other cable on the place where the post goes.

Guess what?  It worked! We were able to bring in the slides. I have a smart husband.

We were on the road by 10:25 a.m., Bob stopped to pick up the 5er battery which had fully charged and fill up his truck with gas. I filled up my Escape as well. 

We hit the road south and arrived in Las Vegas at Sam's Town RV Park by 4:00 p.m. Tonight we have full hook-ups but no wifi as it is $6 per day extra.

I am at my sister-in-law's house in Henderson writing tonight. Tomorrow night our campsite will be a Camping World parking lot as we have an appointment to get repairs made Monday morning.

It's been a long day. I'm tired. Good night.