24/7 Chat About Anything

[VanFan]

I have been saving all receipts and am scared to total them up.

Consider whether it would help you choose the way forward.  If not, I'd skip it.

 

[VanFan]

I will never drive it back up there. Many culverts on a cliff, nearly completely washed out.

I drove up one on a cliff (river below) with deep ruts in NM against my better judgment.  It was late afternoon, with a thunderhead looming.  The trick to turning Moby around (yep), was giving it enough gas to get out of the ruts without going over the edge.  Definitely a two-foot operation!  Once I got down and across the river, the sky opened up big time.  Never, never will I succumb to that kind of pressure again.

 

[VanFan]

Here's the mountain I went up last summer... my son gave me a tour of an old fire lookout....  My van is in the video.

Awesome view!  (Very nice van, too.)

 

[desert_sailing]

Awesome view!  (Very nice van, too.)

Mountain scene of Long Long Trailer.

Hilarious.. I think I will stay away from too many mountain tops.

 

[Qxxx]

It's a lot more fun coming down hill. Trust me. (at least a guard rail).


I still remember this road from some years ago, see 1:40-3:30. (but you won't be taking an RV on it).

 

[VanFan]

Mountain scene of Long Long Trailer.

What a hoot!

 

[VanFan]

It's a lot more fun coming down hill. Trust me. (at least a guard rail).


I still remember this road from some years ago, see 1:40-3:30. (but you won't be taking an RV on it).

The first clip opened my heart (sound off).  The second reminds me of roads my dad or my grandmother seemed to favor.

 

[maki2]

More issues with my workshop mates son. He was mad about having to return my Engel fridge because I cleared out half the space in the big workshop fridge for them. So now he has removed the Comcast router from the workshop to punish me. His father will take care of that since he needs wifi connection when he is running equipment. Of course he was also back to the verbal abuse mode.
I will figure out how to connect to the free Xfinit WIFI business router next door at the Elks club. It is free to everyone through the end of the year
Because they want to help out with Covid 19 for school kids and people who cant use the library or senior center for access.

I also need to learn how to tether my computer and cell phone together.  Too much to do, too much annoyance slowing down my build. I dont know how often I will log on, so dont worry if I am not posting often.  Depends on my mate getting the router back in place.

 

[VanFan]

A year ago today, we left Luna Lake and headed to Manzano Mountains SP near Mountain Air, NM.  (We stayed there earlier, too.)  Enroute in Quemado, there's a Horse and Buggy restaurant.  You'll know it because it'll be busy--maybe two or three cars out front.  The food is excellent!!  Heading east, we had to stop in Pie Town (again) to snag dessert for later.  Yum.

 

[VanFan]

More issues with my workshop mates son...

Your attitude of using challenges as opportunities to build skills is inspiring, and your resourcefulness impressive (to say the least).  I am sorry, though, that you are having to deal with this.  Thanks for letting us know your online time might be affected, because we would worry.

 

[travelaround]

The Long Long Trailer - that's great... I identify.
Yarnell, I'm probably not going to, after seeing that.
And the last video looks like a lot of the Forest Service roads around here.

 

[travelaround]

@Maki - hope that router situation gets resolved soon. Sounds like the man has serious problems. That was so immature of him to retaliate over a refrigerator that belongs to you.

 

[Malamute]

Makes me think of an old van friend, now departed.  Will your dog ride along?  His loved it!

 I didnt know if it was a practical idea, but googled it,...and theres absolutely scads of pictures of dogs in sidecars. When seeking sidecar info, pretty much everyone said to go to the adventrure rider forum, they have an entire sidecar section with a lot of very experienced people there. I discovered a 13 year old thread with 116 pages of discussion and pictures of dogs in sidecars, the majority saying their dogs absolutely love it, and many saying they wish theyd got one years sooner.
 
 My dog loves hanging out the window talking to the world while were driving, I think she'll be fine.

One of my biggest worries is someone will want to steal my dog and come along and say "hey dog, want to go for a ride? Jump in the car.", and shed be "What? sure! Who are you,.oh who cares, lets go!". She always wants to go for a ride.

 

[wayne49]

"tether my computer and cell phone together"

Note that when tethered, an incoming call MAY knock the internet connection off during the call.

This happens to me with a 4G phone used as a hot spot, the internet connection uses the 4G band, but voice calls use the limited 1xRTT band, and the phone can only use one band at a time.

Your phone may not be affected.

 

[Qxxx]

The Long Long Trailer - that's great... I identify.
Yarnell, I'm probably not going to, after seeing that.
And the last video looks like a lot of the Forest Service roads around here.

Going through Yarnell is the most direct route from Quartzsite to Prescott. The road was a bit airy there, but there's a bypass to the north, Rte 10. 
Back to the usual weather here now, into the mid 90s, but down the way in the valley, they're close to 105. Elevation is good.

 

[Malamute]

Yarnell isnt particularly sporty to drive. If going up take breaks if your motor gets hot. If going down, remember to gear down, yes, even with an automatic transmission. Thats why they have lower gears you can manually shift into. Its semi-common to hear of some hapless motor home users who bad a brake failure on some steep long mountain road (far larger hills than Yarnell) and crashed. If they geared down they would likely not have cooked the brakes, and would have had to have a transmission failure first to end up with a brake failure. If the trans goes out on a downhill run while engine braking, its time to use the brakes to STOP, not continue down the hill.

Coming back from a sawmill in the mts with a 6x16 flatbed trailer stacked deep with lumber and firewood, I gear down and drive about 20 mph for about 5 or 6 miles on the main downgrade with my suburban. One guy that was with me once asked, apparently somewhat perturbed, if i was going to drive that slow all the way down, to which I replied yes. He didnt have anything to say after that/ No idea why its important to drive as fast as you can barely keep a vehicle on the road and cooking the brakes all the way. Ive smelled seriously cooked brakes on many vehicles that just came off a long downhill grade in the mountains.

 

[Qxxx]

Yeah, it really depends on your load. Those cars coming down Yarnell Hill were going so fast one of them go pulled over by the fuzz. Of course the west is full of steep mountain roads. All of the roads going into the high campgrounds along US 395 in the eastern Sierra, where I visited 2 years ago, have big airy dropoffs. My Savana van has a manual range on the 6-speed transmission so I can select the proper gear when going both up and down hills.

Driving the west is great fun. I drove a Budget rent a truck through Wyoming a few years back, and on I-80 northwest of the Medicine Bow mountains were 20 or so wrecked semis and trailers at the bottom of the big hill.

 

[crofter]

Yeah, it really depends on your load. Those cars coming down Yarnell Hill.....

Here is the drive on a bike, lots of corners. 
~crofter

Description: link to you tube video.

 

[Qxxx]

Description: link to you tube video.

Nice, crofter, was that you on the back of the bike, filming?

Prior to my trip to Montana last summer I found this website, and these guys have gone all over the place on their bikes. I was especially interested in their set of 9 or so videos where they went on the narrow windy road from Pine Crk to Joseph OR. 

 

[travelaround]

Here's a bike video for you.
One of my favorites... and glad my son didn't participate.

[video=youtube]