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July 2009 - Grand Canyon and Utah | | This year's major trip was planned back in April. We made reservations for the week of July 6-13 at the North Rim Campground at the Grand Canyon. This year the RV Stuffmobile has been working hard, trekking to a series of reining horse shows two to three times a month from April through June. As such the rig was packed to the brim with horse showing necessities as well as vending equipment and merchandise. The week before the trip the RV was transformed from a horse show/vending vehicle to a camping setup. In addition, my husband put a lift on our 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee and bought some new off road tires. And thus our traveling home came together on the morning of our departure. >We pulled out the tow dolly and connected everything up. What a difference to see the Jeep and not the horse trailer behind us. The first discovery my husband made as we pulled out onto the freeway was that the new tires on the Jeep "grab" the road and initially the towing was less than ideal. I have already traveled a couple thousand miles towing the trailer and was happy as a lark to sit as a passenger and not have to fight the road. I-90 was our plan, then down to I-84 into Utah. The first day we left at 1pm and drove 12 1/2 hours.
At a rest stop the first day.
We made good time, and our only adventure was hitting something at about 10pm that made us pull over and verify everything was still in working order.
I love, love, love sleeping at rest stops. The sounds of semis running their generators, coming and going is my reassurance that I am on vacation! I sleep like a log and my husband does too. The next morning we ate and were on our way before 8am. The next little adventure we had was later in the day, we had just pulled out from a rest stop and out brake system warned us that thae battery was low. We could not pull over until the next exit, but unfortunately it was too late, the Jeep's battery was drained. My husband recalled that we had to start and run the Jeep periodically while towing, but alas he had forgotten. We drove another hour or so to a Flying J, and found a good spot to disconnect, to jump the Jeep. I have a good set of jumper cables stowed away should the need arise to use them, and use them we did. Across the freeway was a Walmart and we had a short list of some forgotten items that needed to be picked up.
Since this was going to be a dry camping trip, we needed a lantern, a small table and somehow none of our sharp knives had been returned to the RV after being washed. We didn't lose too much time, less than an hour, and we were back on the road. Somwhere south of Salt Lake City we turned on I-15, it was early still and we needed an evening plan. It was a bit late to pull into a campground, so we pulled off at a rest area for about 4 hours and napped. Then drove another 3 hours and stopped for the night at the rest area just south of highway 20. Again, another great night's sleep and we were on our way by 7:30. heading across 20 and then down 89. It was a good 4 hours drive to the Park entrance. Our only fun story for this leg of the journey was that we pulled over to snap a pick of a herd of buffalo and with both windows down, one of our camp reservation papers flew off my lap, across the cab and out my husband's window. I had to chase it down the road, because a. it was one of our instruction sheets and b. you can't litter in the park. The campground let us check in early. Evidentally Arizona is on Pacific Time and Utah is mountain time so we were confused. The nice thing about our camp spot was the shade! It was mid 80's and we hid under the awning. After 2 full days of driving, we were perfectly content to do "nothing".
After dinner that night I noticed the refere's lights were flashing. Uh oh... I dug out the manuals, found the sealed up virgin Norcold operator's manual and read through it. I did its recommended troubleshooting steps and the unit started working again. But by early morning, it was flashing again, I reset it and again it worked. We got up, ate and went for a 3.5 mile stroll along the Canyon edge (you really need to do this sometime in your life) and upon our return, the refer was on the fritz again. We opened up the outside panel, turned the propane knob, just a hair clockwise and I called RV Town (awesome people, great service) and confirmed that we could keep restarting the unit without fearing we would blow ourselves up or anything. Our turning up of the propane a tad would not harm anything either, but the issue was likely inconsistent power to the rig since we were boon docking. The fridge had been on for 4 days at that point. We would muddle through the trip as best we could and get it to the shop once home.
The dual golf cart batteries and our inverter are awesome additions. We can run our laptops, and My husband even used the toaster to toast his bread using the inverter. We charge our cell phones on it. We have hardly used the generator at all.
I often purposefully boon dock at horse shows to test out the systems and did so for 2 nights the weekend before our departure. I was disappointed when the fridge started acting up as I always want everything in good working order.
So another tip to keep in mind. If you need more table/storage space, you can empty the under bed exterior compartment and fill it with outside things. I put a garbage bag, A cooler and some reading/craft things out there within easy reach while we sit under the awning. I only needed more space because I bought a very small table, having forgotten our larger roll up camp table at home.
Our week in GC was pleasant, with the only lingering issue being the fridge on the fritz. It was barely pumping out any cold at all, however the freezer was faring slightly better. If you have an off road vehicle and want a fun excursion, take the 18 mile road to Point Sublime. We thought the views were the best at the North Rim. The location is so remote that the outhouse, is, well, outside, with NO walls:) it has a privacy screen on the road side. Ladies enter to the left and Men to the right...TP is in 5 gallon buckets in a cabinet mounted on the screen. Neither the potty nor the supplies had been tampered with, so only good people must come to this spot:)
The Jeep at the very edge of Pt. Sublime.
Day 6 of our trip to Grand Canyon was time to move on. When we left home we filled the 40 gallon water tank and 9 gallon propane. At the start of day 6 we still had 2/3 propane and 2/5 water according to our not so accurate systems check. I wasn't sure how long either would last, but was pleasantly surprised that we didn't have to budge our home once during our stay. Our TP supply looked like it was barely going to make the whole journey, but the Country Store in the park wanted $8.35 for a 4 pack. We passed on that! Next on the journey was to find full hookups for our desert stay up in Utah. The temperatures were all around 100 degrees and for that both of us wanted the AC. Our fridge was barely limping along on propane, hardly even keeping the food cold so we also wanted to check if the problem continued while on shore power. We drove through Arizona on 89a to 89 to 163 and camped at Goulding's in Monument Valley.
it was 97 and we could not get the RV cool enough to be comfortable so we went to the Monument Valley National Monument. We were disappointed that our National Parks pass will not work and we forked over $10 to get in. It was a fun 4x4 sand road, 18 miles long. It is Navajo tribal land so along the road you find vendors and horse rides. I was quite shocked to go see how much a ride was. $45 for 1/2 hour and $55 for 1 hour, PER PERSON. WOW. I was glad I had no desire to ride on an indian pony. Our Jeep and my husband had a blast. |
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