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Sep 25-Oct 13, 2007:

KY, AR, TX, OK, IN State Capitols and the Alamo in San Antonio, Texas
by Chris (w/additions from Ed)

Our trip was like a good novel, better than the movie. If you have seen "RV" with Robin Williams you can only begin to imagine how our trip went as we more than topped their mishaps. We had a fair amount of routine checks and work done on the motorhome as preparation for the trip. But alas, a number of needs were not to reveal themselves until they were put to the test. Read more below the photo gallery.

(Tip: Hover your mouse over photos to read caption)

THE FULL STORY:
We left our house Tuesday Sept. 25, about 7:15 pm, ideally our goal was to cross most of Ohio before stopping to sleep. We wanted to visit the capitol of Kentucky the next day. We encountered a terrible thunder storm early on. The lightning was striking so close that we saw the flash and heard the sound immediately just in front of us on I-80 and the rain dumped. (If we had been more discerning maybe we would have recognized this as a sign of the trials that lay ahead!)  But we made it through.  After about 130 miles into Ohio (near Wooster and Ashland) Ed could tell the battery was not charging signaling alternator problems. We pulled into a Love's truck stop and we were beached. Ed went inside to ask if it was OK for us to stay in the parking lot all night. They were fine with that and the cashier (named Dave) said he had a cousin (named Will) who did car repairs and would come to us. The Lord was providing for our needs. The next morning (Weds.) Will came, found a problem got us on the road and we were off to an Auto Zone in Ashland for a part to sure up the fix. We made it to Auto Zone but found the problem still existed. We spent about 5 hours at the Auto Zone, Will came back to us and replaced the alternator and regulator and we were off to Kentucky thinking that all was well.

Wed. the 26th we crossed into Kentucky but the same problem still existed so we beached the Behemoth (our affectionate name for our motorhome) in a BP station parking lot in Glencoe, KY and were given gracious approval to stay all night there and he even gave us his left over pizza when he closed for the night. Very kind! The owner had a number for a repair garage, Glencoe Towing and Repair, and they came to our aid the next morning (Thurs. 27th). They jumped us and charged the battery enough to drive to their shop. They ran tests and found the alternator's field wire was broken inside the insulation so you couldn't tell that it was broken and explains why it only worked intermittently.  The mechanic repaired the wire and now it was finally fixed. The girls did school work in the waiting area. Later that day we made it to Frankfort, the capital of Kentucky, and toured a nice history museum and the capitol building. Whew. Later we got gas and Ed had the battery checked just to be sure it was holding a charge as he was finding it hard to believe it was really fixed but it was OK. Ed realized at that stop that we had some faulty running lights so we hung out while he repaired those in the parking lot of the Advance Auto Parts. We drove through Tennessee and just into Arkansas and slept again.

Day four (Friday 28th) we were to meet another family, the Nunemakers, in Conroe, Texas on Friday night. They left PA Thursday evening and caught up with us Friday morning in the rest stop in Arkansas. We traveled together for a while then we detoured to Little Rock to see the state capital. We drove through Texarkana, AR/TX and Henderson, TX on the way.  We stayed in the Walmart in Marshall, Texas that night and then went onto Conroe Saturday. We met up again with our friends, the Nunemakers, who were staying at a resort along Lake Conroe North of Houston. We enjoyed the next several days with them. We were able to come and go and use the resort facilities freely. We just could not sleep on the grounds so we left each night and camped out in Walmart a few nights, an RV park a couple nights, and one night along the road near the resort.  (Ed got no sleep that night as every passing car woke him up and a big logging truck around 7am got us all up as we thought we were in trouble but it was just a scare.  The gypsy life is hard.) Using the resort facilities during the day worked so nice. Ed was able to work some in the clubhouse with WIFI while the girls and I got to swim, ride horses, and do archery, mini golf... It was fun.  One other highlight was the church we visited on Sunday in Spring, TX.  It is called Grace Family Baptist (www.gracefamilybaptist.net) and is a family integrated church.  A real treat for us all to experience.

We left Conroe Thursday afternoon (Oct. 4). Our first stop was to see the Johnson Space Center. We did not tour it as it was expensive and we were headed to San Antonio. Traffic was heavy so it took us a long time to get around Houston and in the process the generator that runs the AC units quit working! Did I mention it was very hot in Texas? I was glum with the thought that problems were starting again. We stopped for dinner later and Ed and Herbie N. diagnosed the problem and got the generator running again by adding oil - it was just low on oil and the automatic shutoff was keeping it from running. WHEW - we were grateful as we very much needed the AC!

We were on I-10 about an hour from San Antonio when Ed was sensing a new problem (there was a vibration in the middle of the motorhome and Ed recalled clunking when going in reverse earlier in the day) so we stopped and he and Herbie went under the Behemoth again and found a problem with the rear drive shaft - the U-joint was about to fall apart. We encouraged the Nunemakers to go on as they had to meet friends the next day and we spent the night at the Shell truck stop (with a McDonalds) in Flatonia, TX. The amazing thing was that just on the other side of the truck stop was a NAPA auto parts store that had everything Ed needed to do the repair. The store opened at 8am so Ed got up about 7am and had the drive shaft out and was at their door when they opened.  The NAPA clerk said to Ed "You know a man is having a bad day when he comes in carrying his drive shaft." YEP! Ed had trouble getting the bearing cups in the yoke so he went back to NAPA and they sent him to a local mechanic just down the road about 1/2 mile. So Ed starts hoofing it down the road carrying the drive shaft!  It was a comical site.  Some generous fellow did stop and give Ed a ride and was grinning the whole time. The mechanic fixed the drive shaft and gave Ed a ride back. The girls did school work inside McDs during this time. Repair completed by 10:30am, we made it to San Antonio around noon and met up with the Nunemakers at the San Jose Mission.

The San Jose Mission was a good place to start our tour of San Antonio as it gave a great history behind the Spanish missions and their purpose to the Spanish empire. In a nutshell: the missions were established by the Spanish church to bring the light of the gospel to the heathen. Over a period of time (about 70 years) as the locals were converted, civilized, and became "capable of reason" and thus able to function as good Spanish citizens the mission would be turned into the local government center under Spanish rule.  The San Jose Mission is one of five missions in the San Antonio area which includes the Alamo.  Four of the five still function as churches today. On Saturday we went to a Mexican market (El Mercado) and heard some beautiful Mexican/Aztec music, saw the Alamo and the San Antonio Riverwalk. The staff at the Alamo put on a presentation every 30 minutes which explained the Alamo and Texas history.  Very inspiring!  The San Antonio Riverwalk is a beautiful walk along the San Antonio river with open cafes and restaurants and cypress trees lining the banks.  Very beautiful.

We spent the weekend in San Antonio, at a nice RV park that allowed us to swim after touring Friday and Saturday and have a nice pleasant rest. Fri evening we ate at a local Mexican restaurant called "Ninas". It was excellent authentic Mexican food right in the middle of a middle class Mexican American community where all of the business signs were in Spanish and most of the people we saw were Mexican Americans.  We were the minority and we enjoyed it.  It felt like we were across the border and gave us a little taste of Mexico.  We left Sunday morning in hopes of finding the church Doug Phillips (of Vision Forum) attends in Boerne, TX. We never found that church but attended another. We enjoyed the ranches and scenery along a state highway through real Texas territory (called the "hill country") as we drove on to Austin later that afternoon.  We discovered a real treat near Austin called McKinney Falls State Park.  Beautiful water falls and bald cypress trees and walking trails.  Very beautiful!  We stayed the night in a local Austin Walmart.

Monday (Oct. 8) we toured the Texas capitol then spent the afternoon working in the Austin library. One observation: Austin had a lot of homeless and most of them camped out near the library. But the entire time in San Antonio we had seen none. Quite a contrast.  Later that evening we headed for Oklahoma with the goal of crossing the OK border and staying at the first rest stop in OK.

During the drive, around Dallas, Ed sensed a problem with the brakes (by this point you may been lulled into thinking "the mechanical troubles must be behind them" but not so!) actually there was little brakes!  We did make it to the first rest stop in OK (Ed noted that there was now dew in the grass which we had not had for awhile in TX).  Tuesday morning we drove on to Oklahoma City and stopped at the first Loves Truck Stop and saw an auto parts store behind it.  Ed asked if they knew anyone who could fix our brakes. They said that just behind them was a mechanic (whose name was Gary Knapp who turned out to be a believer as Ed had time to talk with him while waiting for parts).  He was able to take us right away and found the problem quickly. The right, rear brake line had vibrated loose and was leaking fluid. Once again, we found a repairman (as the Lord was ahead of us) and that was fixed.  In the meantime a manifold exhaust leak was also diagnosed. Ed was talking to the mechanic who fixed the brakes and said "Boy, the muffler in this motorhome is getting loud. Can you replace that too?"  The mechanic said "It ain't a muffler problem. It's a manifold exhaust leak".  Then he said something even scarier "I can't fix that". But he did send us to the local "Muffler King" whom he figured could fix the problem.  When they diagnosed it they said they couldn't fix it either but they sent us on to "Price RV Repair"  (Note: The guy and gal at Muffler King gave us a ride to pickup our rental van and treated us really nice even though they could not help our RV.  He also found the next mechanic for us and made sure we got there. They would take no money. Great people.).  This time we found the right place as they had dealt with this sort of problem all of the time: goofy, naive RV'ers who buy old motorhomes and think they can drive half way across the country with them!  No, actually the problem was that the manifold bolts would most likely break when trying to remove them and neither of the first two shops had the right tools if that happened. (Note that our septic tanks were to capacity at this point and every time we moved from garage to garage they did slosh out a little bit and the temp was warm - you get the picture. So before we showed up at the last garage we found a Flying-J truck stop and emptied them. Yuk!) The exhaust leak did take Price RV two days to remedy and we had to stay in a hotel and rent a mini-van (Ed drove the van too fast. He said it was like driving a sports car since he had driven the Behemoth the last couple weeks).

Being sidelined for a couple days did give us lots of time to see Oklahoma City for which we are now grateful. We toured the capitol and then the memorial for the Murrah Federal Bldg. bombing. We walked along Bricktown, Oklahoma City's version of a river walk, and had dinner in the evening at what Ed called "the most expensive pizza joint in the nation". The very Italian owner saw Ed's reaction to the price when checking out and said something like "I have two boys and a girl and they have eaten like grown men since they born" - very funny at the time. Wed. we visited The National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum which we all thoroughly enjoyed.

Thursday (Oct 11) around noon all repairs were complete and we were off to Missouri.  We made it just across the border into Missouri at sunset and stopped at a Cracker Barrel parking lot in Joplin, Missouri. Ed played tag with the girls in the parking lot while I got dinner ready.  We ate our meal and watched the sunset.  We enjoyed and appreciated the coolness of the evening as we were no longer in the Texas heat.  We also watched another RV setup a fence for two dogs that were travelling with them. They stopped and within minutes had everything setup. They had a system!  Later we drove to Springfield and stayed at a local Walmart for the night.

Friday (Oct. 12) we toured the home of Laura Ingalls Wilder in Mansfield, MO. This was a real treat, the house was deeded to the historical group just after Laura died so it remains as it was when she lived there. After this we headed for St. Louis and stopped for gas (lowest price on the trip at $2.349) but at the stop Ed discovered a radiator leak. Lo and behold a diesel mechanic was pumping gas next to us and offered Ed advice on what to do.  He was able to use Stop Leak and that got us through. WHEW! God provided that fellow at the right time. We felt so safe and cared for when that happened. We made it to St. Louis just as the sun was setting and ran through the arch to get some snapshots as the light was fading.  Pretty awesome structure made of what looked like sheets of stainless steel welded together.  Later we stopped at a Steak-n-Shake outside of St. Louis and had a fun time before driving on to Indiana.

We drove onto Indiana and stayed in the first rest stop in IN after crossing the border.  This rest stop had a special section just for RV'ers so we didn't have to sleep with the big trucks which run all night and are constantly making all sorts of noises.  We toured the capitol in Indianapolis on Saturday (Oct. 13) morning.  Everyone felt that the inside of the IN capital building was the most beautiful of any of the buildings we had visited thus far (but maybe we were influenced by the special RV'ers section in their rest stops). About 2pm we left for home and arrived 9pm. Some glad girls were looking forward to sleeping in their own beds.

Traveling in the motorhome was great. During long drives there was lots of space for all to spread out, do school work, read and listen to books. We could fix our meals and the girls went to bed the nights we drove late. I liked having a place for and access to everything. Even with all of the unexpected stops we had we never lacked for anything, we were able to work, sleep and eat wherever we were. A few of our repairs were a test of emotions but for the most part everyone took them in stride. The girls videotaped most all of our repair stops and that has been fun to watch. Not to be forgotten, we were also able to see a lot of new territory and some significant historical places. We saw the Lord make provision for all of our unexpected repairs. We always broke down at the right place and saw that the Lord was going before us.  It was a real adventure with faith lessons for all. If the Lord is willing we will go another direction soon. Until then...

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