Friday 1 October 2010

Lake Powell, Arizona

This maybe my last blog.  Or I may just do a quickie now and then on our way home just to keep you updated as to our progress home.  We have left the Caravan.  When we arrived at Lake Powell campground I noticed that under the engine part of the rig was a puddle, a large puddle.  I felt it and noticed that is was slightly oily.  It appeared to be coming out of the engine coolant jug.  Engine coolant isn’t oily.  Asked our tail gunner to take a look at it and he said that it appeared that (not sure if I have this right) transmission fluid had gotten into the coolant.  Could be wrong about that, but some fluid that gotten into our engine coolant and this is a definite NO NO.  Anyway, long story short, our Wagon Master phoned a few contacts, we phoned Coach Net, they wanted to tow the rig to Flagstaff.  All the owners of rigs in the caravan said that if you can avoid having your rig towed, then do so, not good for the chassis.   One of the mechanics we spoke to said it could be driven, if we did this and that.  So we did this and that and drove it to Flagstaff, where a part has been ordered and should be in beginning of next week or is that this week?  Our tail gunner stayed behind us all the way here, 134 miles, to make sure we were ok and finally went on their way to the rest of the caravan after they saw us safely into the KOA campground here.  What a super bunch of people they all have been. 
The farewell dinner is Sunday night and they are only 57 miles from us, so we are going to drive the car down for the dinner.  Have to say a proper goodbye. 

All of these problems has really gotten me down.  There were others in the caravan that had problems too.  Not quite as major as ours, but problems, an alternator went, a blow out, a fridge down, chipped windshields a couple other minor things.  Hopefully ours can be fixed in 6 hours as they promised.  But I’m not going to write that in stone.  We are going to book into a pet friendly motel for the day, cause what do you do with 3 animals for at least 6 hours. 

On a brighter note.  We took a 6 hour boat cruise up Lake Powell.  It was created by the damming of the river and creating Glen Canyon Dam.  We wanted to take a tour of the dam but of course we were tied up all day with figuring out what to do about our problem.  Parts of the river are 400 – 500 feet deep.  Makes me sad to think that under all that water are buried homes, artefacts etc.  But I know that electricity is important and water.  It used to be just a small river prior to the dam being built.   The tour took us up to Rainbow Bridge, a natural arch in the stone.  This is considered an spiritual place by the Indians, and when the dam was built this was preserved.  It is now a national monument.  It is 275 feet across and 290 feet high.  It is nearly as tall as the Statue of Liberty.  The Indians believed that they should not walk under the bridge and the park asked that you respect their beliefs and also not walk under the bridge.  I didn’t see anyone walk under it.  Also one of the big tourist attractions in Arches National Park, an arch, just collapsed one day.  Imagine if you were under that.  Surprised

Until later…take care.

Put mouse over picture for a description, click to enlarge picture.

A very wet Maggie Maggie and Jack take a swim

Behind the boat Canyon in Lake Powell Houseboat on Lake Powell Lake Powell Rainbow Bridge Ruth and Ken The Boat Tower Butte -1 mile high End of the day

Here is our whole Caravan

Grand Circle 2010 259

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