Its been almost 6 months now that Cyndy and I have been nesting in San Diego with a few side trips to Yuma, visiting with friends and family, fixing odds and ends on the trailer and truck , getting rid of unnecessary stuff that we had accumulated and enjoying some of the area attractions.
Now it’s time for us to scratch the traveling itch and start our journey across the US to the east coast to spend some time with Cyndy’s daughter and her family in Virginia Beach.
We said our goodbyes and left Yuma on Wednesday April 7th, at 9:30am, headed for Las Vegas our first destination, the truck and trailer all washed, polished and ready for the trip.
Or so we thought. About 17 miles out the transmission started acting funny so I pulled over and realized that the Allison transmission had gone into limp mode which means I had 2 gears, 3rd gear and reverse!
So we turned around drove back to Yuma limping along in third gear at 30mph with the flashers on. We went back to the RV park, got our spot back, unhooked the trailer and took the truck to a shop in Yuma were they found that a small rodent had made a nest underneath my fuse box using insulation and some of my wiring as a nest!!
The shop fixed that problem on Thursday and we were back on the road Friday morning headed up Hwy 95 again. This time we made it as far as the Vidal Junction which is about 150 miles from Yuma and about 95 miles to Needles, Ca. when the transmission went into limp mode again!! Needless to say I was not a happy camper. However we limped 95 miles at 30mph with the flashers on and arrived in Needles late in the afternoon on Friday.
We camped at the Elks Lodge in Needles Friday night. (they have 4 or 5 RV spots) and decided to try and limp the 90 or so miles into Vegas on Saturday.
We left Needles Saturday morning at 9am and arrived in Las Vegas at around 1pm that afternoon.
Normally the trip from Yuma to Vegas takes about 5 hrs. which would have put us in Vegas Wednesday afternoon about 3pm. This time it took 4 days and 11 hours of drive time.
On Monday I called the Shop I use in Vegas called Diesel Specialists and made an appointment for Tuesday morning. They found more wiring that had been damaged did the necessary repairs and the truck is running good again.
I’m hoping the next leg of our journey will go smoother.
We will probably stay in Vegas for about 2 weeks and then move on toward Grand Junction, Colo. to visit some of my cousins.
Even though sometimes there are some pretty upsetting bumps in the road I still love the lifestyle and am looking forward to our next adventure.
