Tomorrow's project

I noticed this morning that there is a flap of some sort that goes along the front of Lucy.  This flap needs to screwed in again.  It must have been unscrewed when the shop put in the new stabilizers.   It certainly wouldn't help with gas mileage to have it scooping up the air as we go down the road.  A project for tomorrow

We ordered cards to hand out along the way on the trip.  We get asked a lot at campgrounds and such for our web site or who we are and this hopefully will help.




[I ran out of business cards I had with me last time because I was asked for the blog site address so many times.  I was so glad I had them.  We had lots of people taking pictures of our vans just for all the info written on them......# of mosquito bites, # of times lost, etc.  It was pretty funny.  The kids started to count the number of thumbs up from drivers while on the road.  And we really enjoyed the comments on the blog.
signed,
Grandma]
 

The Van Map

This is the stencil for the map we used on Slice of America 1 trip to paint the map on the Van.  I found a large map of the USA online, printed it out, taped the pages together and cut out the borders.  

Slice of America 2 trip will be from coast to coast.  You don't realize just how tiny some of those East Coast states are as you do when you are doing a project such as this.  I have the stencil ready but have it on a board, covered with freezer paper to keep it from getting bent and out of shape...I hope!  We will be painting the maps a few days before we leave with CarArt Paint. 

The CarArt paint is difficult to find but we bought it off the internet.  The cans are small and not the regular size of spray paint cans so don't be disappointed.

Weather!

Out here in our part of California weather is rarely exciting.  We live near the San Francisco Bay and when we have one of our rare lightening storms teenagers can be found forming "lightening watch" parties down at the end of the road.  And a tiny rain shower is called a "storm".  It took me a long time to accept that after experiencing REAL storms in the Plains States.  So........

While we were planning this trip,  Texas was in the middle of SUPER HOT temps!  Joplin, Missouri was hit with that huge tornado, and those tornadoes kept going on and on!  And then there were floods, one of our planned campsites is still closed from the damage of them.  We knew we didn't have to worry about snow and sleet, we dealt with those in Grand Canyon last trip.  Hail could be a problem though, they are always showing those golfball-sized hail on the TV news.  But despite these fears we soldier on.....


Notice this information we found on the internet.  When it comes down to it tornadoes can be around 6 months of the year! 


One of the first things I did was to get a NOAA Weather Radio.  Of course, since we live in "boring weather area" I don't know if the "Alert"  function really works.


Our best wishes go out to all those caught in all that weather this past year.  We have earthquakes but compared to those tornadoes at least big earthquakes don't happen often.

Comments on Our Trips

It always is quite interesting that there seems to be only two kinds of reactions when people hear about our vacation trip.

1.  You're crazy.

2.  I've always wanted to do that!  or I love doing that!

These are the states we visited on Slice of America 1(SliceOfAmericaTrip.Blogspot.com)
 On Slice of America 2 we will be going all the way to the East Coast and back!

The Cigarette lighter now works.

I took off the plastic front on the dashboard and managed to get it all off despite the radio and air conditioner.  With the back of the cigarette lighter exposed I checked it out, it had power to there but not when something was plugged in.  Dearest Hubby suggested it might be corroded on the inside contact, so I took out my handy dandy Dremel with a wire brush attachment and gave it a bit of a cleaning.  Works fine now!

Since the GPS needed the dash cigarette lighter I am really happy it now works!

After a lot of research, I finally purchased my new camera for the trip. A Sony Cybershot. Very lightweight. I test it out and works great. It cost $239 through Amazon.com. A little pricy for me but to have really good pictures and video and for it be really light weight, I am happy. I'm so excited about all the places I will get to share through the pictures and videos. Eeeee 50 more days till blast off!!!!

E-Z Pass on the East Coast

We are trying to set up our E-Z Pass accounts for the toll roads on the East Coast.  We are trying to figure out how must $ to put in the accounts since we will be traveling on a lot of sections of toll roads.  It is not easy to figure out the miles on them by using Google Maps.  Toll roads will be new to us.

Signed,

 Grandma

The Itinerary!

The  final itinerary for Lucy has been printed and is ready to go!

Each vehicle has their own itinerary - 40 days and 40 nights! The navigator keeps these itineraries up front.  They have directions in them.

Cathy spent many hours finding all sorts of interesting sites for us to see.  And reservations for each night!

Another set of itinerary is posted day by day on the wall next to Lucy's door for everyone to checkl

Also the check list for arriving and leaving camp is posted.

Gas prices down?

I am thankful I planned on $5 per gal on gas!  If gas prices go down in time for our trip that would be nice.  As it is, I think gas is the highest always here.  Anyhow, it was nice to hear on the radio this morning that gas prices are expected to go down for the next couple months.  Hope springs eternal!!

Rear and Side Camera System, Part 7

Dearest Hubbie did the honors for me by hooking up the power for both the Pyle and the RearViewSafety cameras.  We decided to hooked it up so that it can be even when the engine is turned off. That way for security we can have it on at night for security if we like.  We added a switch to turn it off wither the engine is on or not.   It all works perfectly!

This is the view the Rear View Safety Camera gives from the upper side of Lucy.  You can see our car, the front patio and the garage door.  The front of the car is where the huge blind spot is.  It will make such a difference not driving by feel when changing lanes and turning to the left.  How many times when just driving your car when the guy behind you decides to rush into right where you are in the process of going.  One of my pet peeves!  Heaven help them when they try it with a big rig or an rv with a blind spot.

This is the view from the cheapie Pyle license plate camera.  A very good view of the garage door and side of the house.  A really good quality picture considering how inexpensive it was, too bad the monitor wasn't good.

This is a view of the area under the steering wheel and the switch we added is on the right side of the steering column.

I had to bring the cable from the upper side camera inside Lucy through one of the dining area capboards.

This project is done!

Rear and Side Camera system, part 6

 The Lucy's 1990 counsel was not designed for all the gadgets we have now.  It has cup holders on each side but they are very shallow.  Then there is the ash tray, which has never been used and a small coin tray.  The rectangle on the front right side is where an old tape deck was.  It was a bear removing because it was glued in.

 I decided we really had to have more room for the camera monitor and GPS.  I cut the new counsel from a nice piece of plastic my husband donated to the cause.

Installed it gives a bit more depth to the cup holders.

This shows some of the work completed today:  See the power pak attached under the new counsel.  And the video cords are hooked up.  The monitor is on the counsel.  The wires under Lucy have all been cable tied.  The power cords still need to be hooked up.

Rear and Side Camera System Part 5

 The Side Camera is now installed on the passenger side of Miss Lucy!  I got enough courage to drill a 3/4" hole in her side for the wires to go through.

After it was installed I positioned it to the view I need and tested it with the monitor.  It works perfectly!

















The little white dots are the infra red lights for seeing in the dark.

After that I loosely strung the wires under Lucy from the back camera to the front.  I drilled the hole to bring the wires in side the cab.   Next steps, I have to get several gromets and cable tie the wires underneath Lucy.  Then the installation inside will be worked on.

Rear & Side Camera System, Part 4

This morning I enclosed the video co-axel cable and the power cable from the rear camera in a sheathing cable.  It took a while, Lucy is 27 ft long.  I pulled back the rug in front of the drivers seat to figure out just where I am going to come up from underneath into the cab.  There are several possibilities.  First I have to go under and explore the best option from there.  I have this little issue that I don't like to do that kind of thing with any guys around, being a gal and all.  So I just might wait until Monday when all males are gone before I do that part of the job, plus secure the cable all the way from the back to the front.

ProFlex RV

The ProFlex arrived today so when I am all done with the camera installation I will caulk ProFlex into the holes where the wires go in and out of Lucy.  The idea is to protect the wires from wear and keep out the weather. There are a few other places for the ProFlex also.

When I bought Lucy I knew absolutely nothing about RVs at all.  So I spent a lot of time on the internet researching so I could understand all the different systems involved.  I first looked into rubber roof repairs.  There were several areas on the roof that had been sealed with silicone, a BIG no-no with rvs.  Silicone does not stick to rubber roofs or fiberglass, two big ingredients in rvs.

ProFlex is just like silicone caulk but sticks to materials silicone doesn't.   It was developed for RVs.  I get it from CampingWorld.com.  It's about $15 a tube and it comes in clear.    I ended up putting a new Liquid Roof on Ms. Lucy, but caulked all the windows, etc with ProFlex. 

Signed,

 Grandma

Rear View Camera System, part 3

This afternoon DH and I did a temporary hook up of the camera system.  With all the tweaking of the wires yesterday we needed to know if everything still worked.  Unfortunately I didn't think of taking pictures, but the bottom line is.....Rear camera still works!  And it comes in in color....an added bonus.

I didn't tell you about the side camera.  After the cheapie monitor didn't work I splurged and bought a more expensive system with a 7" monitor and really nice camera from Rear View Safety Co.  Cheapie camera just happens to work on this system also so I will have both rear and side views!

I went up on the ladder with the side camera on the passenger side near the front leg of the awning.  I had the monitor where I could see it and marked where the camera needs to be mounted.  It can see the whole side of Lucy, nice and clear.  The  hole for the camera wire will go through the wall into a cabinet just behind the passenger seat area.  I plan to run that wire through the cabinet, down the corner of the wall to the floor and under the carpet to the power pak.  Surely didn't want to run it under the motorhome side to side because it would have to go past some hot things under there. 

Side Note 1:  The previous owner of Lucy, aka The Motorhome, and The Beast by Grandson Luke, had installed a Tekonsha Voyager Brake Control.  It had been installed using 2 of the fuse spots, right where I want to install the camera power.  So after much stewing about it I decided jut to unplug and remove the thing.  I will keep it and the wires will be there but it is out of my sight for now.  I intend to put the camera power pak there instead. 

Side Note 2:  Unfortunately the cigarette lighter doesn't work.  The fuse was blown and we replaced it but that didn't fix the problem.  So that will have to be looked into. If we get it working I will use it for the GPS.  If we don't get it working I have a work-around for the GPS.

Slice Traditions!

We have a few little traditions and rituals on our Slice trips.

We have to have a trip flag!  Cathy usually is in charge of making the flag with the kids help.

(I must explain the "Tree Huggers"....I know in some circles "Tree Huggers" conjures up flaming liberal hippies.  In our case, no flaming hippies, but we all love our beautiful California redwoods and have camped there often.  And on our camping trips we have always had a tradition of all of us hugging  a tree when we finally get to camp.  Some of the redwoods are so large it takes all of us holding hands to barely make it around a tree!  So, the kids have no history of "Tree Huggers" other than a big family hug! and they are the ones that came up with our slogan!"

Slice of America 1's flag






All participants sign the flag and along the way we pick up badges we include on the trip.  We display this flag at all our campsites.






Our Slice of America 2 flag!

Gnomes!

We have gnomes that travel with us.......last year the gnomes met undignified ends.  Hopefully this year they will have a stronger sense of committment and stay with us to the end!

This one is Gnome-E, also known as No, ME!

Roses and Thorns

We start off our mornings with "Roses and Thorns":  Thoughts and prayer on what we have enjoyed so far (Roses) and those things that have been rough (Thorns) plus prayer to keep us through the day.  It took Ben a while before he could really get into the Roses thing on Slice 1......He had to warm up to this travel thing.


                                                                            Trip Maps
Maps on the sides of the vehicles and the kids keep them up to date with our progress.  We use a paint called CarArt.  It wipes right off.  The maps stencils are already made and ready to go when we get to the final days before take off.








Trip Ribbon
We add a ribbon or flag to our antenna so we will know each other's vehicles.....don't think we will need it on Lucy though , can't miss her!

 The Dutch Oven
When the celestial beings are aligned, Cathy whips up a wonderful treat in her trusty Dutch Oven!!

Weather Report

Cathy gives the morning weather report as we leave camp in the morning over the WalkieTalkie.  Also a bit of the special events for that day.  Sort of reminds you of the Principal's morning announcements when you were in school.

Remarkable weather events may even hit the charts on the van.  (See, the 70 mile an hour wind at Mount Rushmore was recorded on the back of the van with such events as # of misquito bites!)

Speaking of Weather Reports, Miss Lucy has a special weather radio to get any alerts in the many areas we will be traveling this time.

Lucy's Rear & Side View Camera System, Part 2

Today I pushed all the wires through from the outside into the back closet and attached the camera (which is attached to the license plate holder), the license plate holder and license plate back on to Ms. Lucy, my motorhome.    The camera is just below the license light and on the top of the license plate holder.

I spent about an hour trying to decide just where I wanted to drill a hole to get the wires under Lucy.  I was hoping that I could run the wires along other wires already going through the flooring.  No such luck.  You can't believe all the stuff that is under a motorhome!  I certainly didn't want to drill into the gas tank or brake lines or other things so I took my time choosing just the right place.  Since the camera is on the driver side back and the wires go into the closet I decided on a nice location in the floor of the closet but away from everything else underneath.  But a motorhome is very economical with space and everything is tiny, hard to get at or just decorative and not solid. It was very cramped but I managed to drill the hole!

The picture is from underneath Ms. Lucy.

So now all the wires are pulled through and tomorrows afternoon job will be to put the wires in a plastic protective sleeve and install the 27' under Lucy.  Then I have to figure just exactly how I am going to get it up inside the cab to the fuse box.  There are wires already from the trailer hitch so I plan to just follow them up.  So nice to be retired and don't have to worry how long this Grandma takes to get this done!

 Signed,

 Grandma

Lucy's Rear & Side View Camera System, Part 1

I actually started the installation of Lucy's rear/side view camera system.  Lucy has a rather large blind spot on the passenger side.  Because I don't want to wipe anyone out I decided a side camera was rather essential.  I didn't want to spend a lot so bought the cheapest Amazon offered-$50.

The camera does work, the monitor doesn't.

So I bought another a system a bit more expensive and it works fine, (so far.  It isn't installed yet.)  This system is built by Rear Veiw Safety Company.  You can tell by looking it is well built  Everything seems very solid and well engineered.  Also, I alway figure the instructions always tells a lot about a product.  Their Owner's Manual is well written with a nice diagram.  They also have videos on installing it.

Actually the Pyle camera will actually work with this Rear View system so I will put it in the back on the license plate holder and the rear view camera on the side.




So....today I tried it all out before installing.  Both systems work together...so far so good.
  The pyle camera has two plugs, one for the camera and one for the power.  The cords that come with pyle are only a few feet long.  Usually the rear cameras are powered only when the backup lights are on.  I decided I want it on whenever the ignition is on.

So, after shopping at 3 stores, including Frys Electronics and not finding the power plug and cord we needed for this camera, Dearest Hubby and I deliberated all our options.  We decided we would skip the special plug, instead splice the power wire to a long wire, running that wire in cable protector under Lucy all the way to the front, coming out near the fuse box under the dash.

I had already received the video cable I ordered from Amazon.com.

I took off the license,  license plate holder and the license lamp holder.
After a couple of tries to get the correct size hole for the wires and camera plug to fit into Lucy,  I had to adapt the license plate holder to have a cut out for the wires to get to the hole behind the holder.

Signed,

 Grandma

"Beauty"

Since we are calling the RV "Lucy the Beast" I thought it was only appropriate to call the van "Beauty". :-) The Van is pretty much ready for the trip. We will take it in for one last tune up before the trip. She needs to have a window repaired and the air conditioning recharged. A week before the trip, we will be painting the new map on her side. This time we will need to carry most of the United States on her side, last time it was just half of the USA.

(Grandma says " you had better be nice to Miss Lucy!  She has the refrigerator and the bathroom!!!)

Getting "Lucy" ready

On Slice of America 1, (SliceOfAmericaTrip.blogspot.com)  I had my own little tent.  It was a pain trying to get in and out of that short little thing.  And...trying to get this old body out of a sleeping bag that is on an air mattress in a little tent .....not very dignified among other things (not to mention my aching hips!).

Miss Lucy
Anyhow, I threw caution to the wind (and hope it doesn't come back and hit me in the face!) and I found Miss Lucy.  She is an young old thing.  She is a 27' Tioga motorhome.  She came into existence in 1990 and didn't have that many experiences in life.  She only had 36,500 miles on her and everything is in pretty good shape.  For those that know cars and such: Ford Econoline 7.5 liter efi v8 E350  235 hp and 390 lb-ft of torque.....

Roof Repair

Her roofline was receeding  though so I spent several days cleaning the rubber roof and patching with Eternabond tape where it looked like there might be possible leakage.  That Eternabond stuff is amazing stuff.  You just need to have a dry, clean surface and pressure when you put it down. 

Then George, Luke and I spent a day last summer fixing her roof up with a lovely coat of Liquid Roof.  Liquid Roof is made just for motorhome and trailer roofs.  That stuff is great and not bad to apply.  It can be pretty messsy though!  We did a good job of not being too messy but if it was one person going up and down to mix a new bucketfull it could be really bad!  The roof has done fine all this winter.  And it looks so nice and white AND I don't have to clean it every 3-6 months like you are supposed to with a rubber roof!

Heat!

I know we are going to hit the heat on this trip so I have done what I could to help the situation as much as possible.

1. The new Liquid Roof is supposed to reflect a good amount of the sun's heat and insulate somewhat.
2.  I applied Gila Platinum Thermal Energy Film on all windows except the cab.
















In this picture I am trying to show the difference with and without the film on the windows.  The far side of the window shows with the film, the window is open so where it is darkest is 2 layers of the film (where both windows overlap) and the side on the right of the picture there is no film.  I was afraid it would make it too dark to see out the windows but it doesn't.





3. I replaced decorative curtains (about 6" wide) with thermal insulated curtains that pull across the windows.  I included velcro to close them tight for night.  (I am tying to make up my mind to get rid of the aluminum blinds or not.   They were noisy but thought maybe they would help keeping the heat out somewhat too.  So I made velcro straps to keep them from rattling and that took care of the noise.  But the question is do we need them with the curtains.  If I ditch them it would save some weight...)


 4. I haven't gotten this yet but I am going to get a Thermal curtain to go across the hall so the air conditioners don't have to cool off the back part of the motorhome

 5.  When the rain is done, I will paint the vent covers white and add some insulating styrofoam inside the lids.  Can't think of anything else for insulation.

Other things to get ready to go

>  The closets came with a rod for hanging clothes, which we are NOT going to be doing!  So I installed shelves to pack folded clothes.  The bottom shelf is where our few pots, electric skillet and toaster will be stored while on the road.  They each have their padded bag so they won't rattle.


>  The master bed has a brand new mattress.










>  The kitchen has a new clock.


>  The kitchen has a new microwave


> The living room area has a new tv with dvd player


> New steering stabilizer

> 2 new front tires


> A rear and side camera system

Signed,

 Grandma

Planning Slice of America 2!

Cathy and I have been in the process of planning our next roadtrip: Slice of America 2.  It will have been 2 years since we planned the first one and an historic trip it was!!  You can visit our First Slice of America blog at:   www.SliceOfAmericaTrip.blogspot.com

We had quite the adventures on Slice One:  The Dreaded Hot Dog Conspiracy, The Grand Canyon June snow storm, The Total Tent Wipe-out at Mount Rushmore and more!

This time will be a little different as far as transportation goes.  Slice 1 consisted of 2 vans, Slice 2 will include Cathy and George's van and my rv "Lucy".

The participants will include 4 adults, 2 teens, 2 pre-teens.  This time we will not have any intrepid friends brave enough to start out with us like last time!  We will miss them as we trace some of Slice 1's path.

We will be visiting lots of states we didn't see last time and have lots of new adventures!

Signed,

 Grandma

The Crusade of the Tree Huggers!

Our trip name is the Slice of America 2 but our group name is "The Crusade of the Tree Huggers"  Our mission is to hug a tree every state all the way across the United States and considering we will be hitting 26 states, we will be doing a lot of hugging of trees :-)

Cathy made the Tree Huggers camping shirts.