Moving Along After 2 Weeks of Boondocking

My past two weeks of boondocking went quite well, although I did have to charge my battery every day with my little Honda generator. I am researching solar panels and hope to get a smallish one on a frame that I can take out and aim at the sun when boondocking. I may get a small inverter, but don't expect to get one large enough to run the microwave or television. I have learned to live quite well without either, although I use them when I'm in a place with hookups. I never had either of them on the boat and I survived for years without them.

One Rver who has been coming down to this area for the past 10 years or so showed me his system – with lithium batteries and two solar controllers and large inverter, he has 1000 watts of solar panels on the roof of his Class A. He obviously has power for everything he has in there – probably all at once for hours on end.  It's a very expensive system, way out of my budget - and needs.  This is a very reasonable place to stay for the season, but I wouldn't want to stay any longer than I did. I need a change of scenery.  The desert areas in Arizona and New Mexico are much more interesting than here in southern California - there's no cacti here!

My first stop today was an RV fixit place since one of my 5^th wheel hubs got quite warm coming over to my boondocking campsite. I had them greased a few months ago, but I wanted to have that one wheel checked out to see what the problem was. They checked both bearings and found them good, it was still full of clean looking grease.  The only thing he found was the washer that had the tabs that go in the castle nut didn't have the tabs in it.  Of course, that got me wondering if it was just a fluke - the guy who put it on he got interrupted or he just didn't know it worked that way.  So, I had them pull the other wheel on that side.  The tab was inserted into the castle nut, but it was a bit loose, so he tightened it up and put the tab back in.  For a full hour with three of them consulting each other, he charged me $40.  He forgot to charge me for the new seal in the one hub until I reminded him - and then he gave me a cash discount for it.  It's great doing business in these small towns.  After driving for an hour and a half, the hub wasn't warm when I finally got here. 

The photo above is the pond in the middle of the park I'm in - with full hookups.  I arrived in enough time today to do two loads of laundry, get into the spa and take a hot shower with unlimited water!  There are orange trees all over the park and we are allowed to pick all we want - I already picked a few and got a glass of really good tasting juice.  

 

There is some good hiking around here, so I'll be doing that in the next few days, although it's supposed to rain this weekend.