November - Resume our travels

Monday - Nov. 3 -  Leaving South Dakota - sad, but exciting.  We traveled just a few hours and arrived in Pender, Nebraska early afternoon.  We have a Blue Ox hitch and brake to pull our car and wanted to have it serviced.  They service them at their plant there and have a nice campground for their customers to stay in.  We got set up and soon had the hitch serviced and back to us.

Camping at Blue Ox

Tuesday - we left Pender and headed down the road to Lincoln.  We pulled in to my cousin, Jon's acreage, south of Bennett.  Jon was still at work, we were to set up and meet him at my aunt and uncle's for supper.  We pulled in to his driveway and unhooked the car so he could back the motorhome in to place.  Unhooking the brake cable on the hitch, the cable (we had just got serviced) broke loose.  What?  Guess we will be calling Blue Ox and get it fixed again.  Okay, park the motorhome and then we could call.  Next - parked and before we put the jacks down, Gary noticed that the front corner of the big living room slide was out a little already - why?  We tried to pull it in, no go.  Next we tried to put it out, whoa!  That corner went out a little farther, but not the other end.  Uh oh!  If finally happened to us - we have heard of many other RV-ers who have had that happen.  What do we do now?  Gary crawled under the rig and found that a hydraulic hose had blown loose from the fitting, losing all the oil to that slide.  We got in the car and drove in to Lincoln to an RV dealer to get a new hose and fitting.  They could not help us, but sent us to a fluid power company.  They put a new end on our hose, Gary thought that would be the solution.  By the time we were done with those errands, it was dusk and time to go to Leroy and Char's for supper.  We cleaned up and then went there, my cousin Jon joined us there.  We were treated to a great supper and enjoyed our visit with all of them.  We slept that night with both bedroom slides in, did not want to take a chance that they might not work.

Stuck slide

Wednesday - praying that we could make the slide work, after breakfast Gary put his coveralls on, crawled under and hooked the hose back on.  He put hydraulic oil in and as we held our breath, pushed the button to pull it in.  It moved, it worked!  What a genius husband I have!  We decided to drive the motorhome over to the nearest dealer before trying to put that slide and the others out and to test the hydraulic jacks. (Just to be where we could get service if they did not work or got stuck out again).  There we ran the big slide out and everything else worked too!  Our prayers were answered.  We drove back to Jon's and then called Blue Ox.  The best solution was for us to take the hitch back to Pender, so we left the motorhome at Jon's, got in the car and drove the two hours north to Pender.  Once there, they took it right in and we were done within an hour.  We grabbed a sandwich at McD's and drove back to Lincoln.  That night we went out for supper with Jon, celebrating and had a great visit with him.

Nebraska sunset at Jon's

Thursday - up early, we said goodbye to Jon and headed west.  Our longest driving day, we went across Nebraska and turned south at Ogalalla.  South, the right direction for a motorhome in November! We arrived in Imperial mid-afternoon, parked the motorhome at Pivot Electric and followed Cedric out of town to he and Sherrie's place.  It would be possible to drive the motorhome out there, but the roads are very dusty and it would filter in to our moving house.  Not necessary, as they have first class accomodations for their guests.  After visiting a little while, Gary helped Cedric with repairs to their golf cart and then we all went on a ride on their Gator rig out into the pastures.  On our ride we saw many deer and then saw a big porcupine sitting up in a tree!  We went back to the house, it got chilly as the sun went down.  Great food and visiting, we are so comfortable with them.

Big porcupine in a tree

Friday - up early, Sherrie and Cedric had appointments in Denver and were leaving early.  We gathered our things and drove in to Imperial to visit my Aunt Iris.  She called my Uncle Marvin and Aunt Arlene, they joined us for a great visit and lunch.  What a special time to have with them.  After lunch, we went and got the motorhome and headed SOUTH!  (By Monday, it was supposed to be in the teens there).  Down Hwy 27 in western Kansas, we drove for a couple hours and found a city park in Syracuse.  We were the only ones there.  The park was around a reclaimed gravel pit, they now have a fishing pond and 8 RV sites with electric and water hookups and a large dry camping area. Gary saw a storm shelter nearby, not needed this time of year but this part of Kansas would have the potential for tornados in the spring and summer.

Sam's Pond - Syracuse, KS

Syracuse campground

Saturday - we took a walk around the park area.  Sam's Pond was nice, there were several people fishing there that morning.  Just up the road was a private RV park by the pond, the road in and out was quite rough, we were glad we did not have to take the motorhome on them. On the road again, we continued on Hwy 27 to the Oklahoma border, then southwest on Hwy 54 past Boise City, then turned south again on Hwy 385 in to Texas.  Reaching Dalhart, we turned southwest again on Hwy 54 to Tucumcari, New Mexico.  Our stop for two nights.  We camped at the Elks Lodge there, they had 12 electric/water sites.  We ran an errand and when we returned found another RV had joined us there.  Inside the lodge, we paid for our site and then met the other RVers.  They were headed back home to California after traveling for a couple months visiting family and friends on the east coast.
We have checked the weather every day, watching the cold system that is moving down from Canada.  Colder and windy, we want to stay ahead of that.

Elks Lodge - Tucumcari, NM