After an
early start we got onto Interstate 40 West at Ash Fork. Things were going
pretty well but a vibration led us to pull into a tire shop at a Loves just
short of Kingman, AZ. We had the front tires balanced and the air corrected all
around. We found a right front tire that is out of round. So much so that it
would take more than the allowed amount of weight to correct it. Well, they
mounted 22 oz. and we were off. But not for long.
Just ten minutes later we
pulled into a WalMart in Kingman to fix lunch and make repairs. We wound up
getting a bunch of kitchen stuff. But the big delay was trying to get the
kitchen cabinet to lock the drawers. I don’t know if we sustained damage at the
unloading or if the vibration of over the road travel was just too much for the
locking mechanism. At any rate, we wound up spending four hours in the parking
lot. The temperature was hovering about the 100 mark inside the bus. We found
out that the engine powered AC unit does not work at all.
One of the
differences between a bus and a motor home is that a bus is meant to have
self-contained climate control. All of the comfort function is provided by the
engine powered AC unit or the onboard Webasto heater. There is no other system
for air intake or venting. The windows are supposed to be opened only in an
emergency as an escape hatch. There are no powered intake/exhaust vents as
there are in a motorhome. We have a 13,500 btu Coleman air conditioner recently
installed in the roof but a motorhome this size would normally have two 15,000
btu units. And we have no ready generator to fire up to power the ac, only a
portable Honda generator, which, while a very good piece of equipment, is
really only useful if we are set up in camp.
So, the bus
got hot. We got hot and it was about to get worse. We left the parking lot and
headed North toward Las Vegas. The temps kept slowly climbing and by the time
we made Tinsel Town it was 114. Inside and out. With no air. We had ice in the
freezer so we kept handing out ice water. There’s nothing to do but keep going
and hang in there and hope for better temps as we get further North. But the
temperature just refused to back off and we just sweltered. The dogs were
really suffering and the old folks weren’t much better. We kept going and going
and going and finally would up in Ely, Nevada, about 450 miles later. That’s
a long day in the heat considering that we really didn’t get started on the day
until about noon.
We weren’t
the only ones to get hot. Somewhere North of Vegas, the engine and transmission
decided getting up the hill in 5th gear was more than they wanted to
do and went on strike. All power in the bus quit and we slowly coasted to a
stop. It’s 114, we are in the middle of nowhere, looking at hours of down time
for a repair. Dark clouds of doom are following us. But, after a short rest,
the engine cranked right up and into gear and away we go. It hasn’t burped
since but it rides in the back of our mind.
We did manage a rest stop at a pleasant roadside. We sat and had more drinks and let the dogs romp but it was still over 100 in the shade.
Our rest stop
But now the
good news.
Our fearless
leader, John, is a private pilot and he landed us at the Ely airport, a private
facility on the North edge of town. After explaining who he was and our need, he
secured permission to park in the lot for the night. What’s so great about that
you say? Well, one of the courtesies extended to visiting pilots is the use of
the hanger facilities, which included a full kitchen and wonderful bathroom
facilities complete with showers. So we jumped into the shower (in turn) and cleaned up
and cooled down and relaxed. To top that off, we had brought a couple dozen
ears of fresh sweet corn from a farm in Camp Verde and John used the kitchen to
cook them for us and the other folks sharing the facilities. And it was just
scrumptious, the best I’ve had in a long time. I even managed to down one of
the beers I had brought along. The fridge, like most RV fridges, had struggled
with the high temps but recovered overnight.
The sunset view over the runway from the bus that night
The nice
thing about the dry desert is that is really cools off at night. By the time we
awoke in the morning it was in the high 50’s and everybody was in good shape
and ready to go.
A word about
the Ely, Nevada airport. It turns out that this little airport is situated in a
long valley surrounded on both sides by really good sized hills. The particular
geography makes this one of the premier soaring destinations in the world.
There were pilot visiting there from around the world, including Poland,
Germany and New Zealand. Most had self-powered gliders and had towed them in
special trailers to the field. They were there for a week or a month and lived
on site in motorhomes. One also had a Gold Wing motorcycle that he carried on a
lift on the back of his motorhome. And they were the nicest people you could
hope to meet.
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