Wet Vacation

The other day a buddy of mine mentioned he had an offer on his house.  If his counter worked, he was gonna sell the thing and move to San Antonio, TX.  I turned around and RAN for the Ibuprofen bottle to cure the immediate headache caused from the mere mention of that town.  Why is that?  It's because we were in the general vicinity, taking in the sights including the Riverwalk, Alamo, and other interesting places for the better part of a week, and suffered through  a vacation filled with the worst water woes on record.  I'll tell you about it, but first a little background information is in order.

Carolyn's Mom used to spend the cool summer months found at an elevation of 7200 feet in the Jemez Mountains of New Mexico with us.  To make her three month long stays a little more comfortable, we bought an inexpensive 29 foot long travel trailer so she would have a place all to herself, with a kitchen she could fill with as many crumbs as she wished without upsetting her daughter, and where she could crank up the volume on the TV loud enough for her impaired ears without forcing me to retire to the hanger at the airport.  We bought the longest, biggest model we could find that would fit comfortably in our drive. 

At the time, I drove a half ton GMC Suburban, and Carolyn had a Q-45.  The trailer was much too heavy for either of the vehicles, even if we could have somehow been able to hook them together.  But, we only had to move the dang thing twice a year, once from the storage lot to our drive, and then once again to return it.  The Suburban could handle that with ease.

In fact, it handled it with such ease, I was lulled into thinking my half ton vehicle was capable of towing it around on a camping vacation.  So, one bright summer day, a gorgeous electric blue New Mexico day without a cloud in the sky for a hundred miles, we hooked the trailer to the back of the Suburban and headed out to Texas.  We were going to see that place, and, by Golly, we were going to do it in style. 

Our first stop was made while still in New Mexico because we had left after working all day and could only get as far as Fort Sumner.  I am a pilot, and because during an earlier period in my life I had traveled extensively with a very small tear drop trailer, I knew it was alright to pull into any small local airport and set up for the night.  Every body does it.  So, we pulled into the airport, lowered the jacks, and started to fix dinner.

The first sign of the water woes to follow came when I flipped the switch that turns on the water pump. It worked, I could hear the pump run as it tried to pressurize the lines.  It ran.  And it ran.  And it ran some more.  Suspecting some sort of problem after it had not shut itself off, I turned it off.   Then I walked out the door and started a walk around the outside of our mobile hotel, looking for evidence of a leak.  Of course I found it.  Actually, I slipped in it.  Water was dripping everywhere, and most of it was coming from the area close to the vent for the water heater.

Being, for the most part, an unflappable guy, I opened the water heater cover, pulled off the removable access cover, and saw that the three gallon water heater tank was leaking water as fast as it could through a three inch long fracture along one side of it.  Next, I shut the valves that isolate the heater from the rest of the water system, buttoned every thing up, and went inside to give Carolyn the bad news.  "No shower tonight, sweetheart.  The heater's leaking.  Maybe we can stop at my sister's place in San Angelo tomorrow and grab one there."

Next morning the Sun rose, and so did we.  But, before we could comtinue on our jovial way, we had to argue with a Much Too Serious Air Force Lieutenant who thought we must be some sort of commie spies out to sabotage the weather reporting capability of the United States Air Force.  I had forgotten this was 2002, a little less than a year after 9/11, and there was an Air Force balloon weather reporting station located on the Ft. Sumner airport.  Folks were very sensitive about what goes on at airports back then; they still are today.   This pompous representative of our USAF, who was old enough only to be my grandchild, actually threatened to "call the Airport Manager and report you." 

With as serious a face as I could muster at the time, I replied "Oh no!  Please not that!  Can't you just shoot us instead?"  He stormed off and about twenty minutes later a real grown up arrived on the scene.  He introduced himself as the airport manager, told us the Air Force was a major tenant on the airport, and let us know they were unhappy we were there. I told him we had just stopped for the night, as had been my custom for years, and apologized to him for not having sense enough to realize things had changed since 9/11.

Knowing that such informal camping had been allowed to fellow pilots for a little over a century, he asked how much longer we needed before we could be on our way.  I told him my wife was putting on her face, and asked for an additional thirty minutes.  He wished us luck and offered to unruffle the good Lieutenant's feathers.  All in all, he was a pretty decent guy who really wished he could have been enjoying his morning coffee.  Several weeks later, I flew in with a bunch of guys just to legally share a cup with him.  Unlike crazy campers, pilots who arrive at the airport in a for real airplane are always welcome.  Even after 9/11.

We made it to my sisters house that day and showered.  Refreshed, we visited for a while and then continued on to our intended destination of Kerrville.  I wanted to visit the Mooney aircraft facilities there, and had heard the camping along the Guadalupe River, which runs through the place, was the best.  Sure enough, I was not misinformed.  We set up our trailer right by the edge of a really beautiful river, in a RV park with hot showers, (our heater was broken, remember?) and I started to cook dinner. 

Soon as I hooked up to the water supply, every one of the faucets started leaking.  Turns out the town water supply is located about four miles up a mountain and the water pressure at river elevation is somewhere in the vicinity of 100 pounds per square inch.  No way would any of my ancient, seldom used, faucets hold back that kind of pressure.  All the washers in the faucets needed to be replaced with new ones.  If you're keeping track, that's woe # two, three, four, five and six.

So, that first night was spent at the local Wal*Mart, where I bought new washers, and then I played with wrenches and pliers, replacing the old ones.  Some vacation this was turning out to be.  I was secretly starting to hate anything at all to do with water.  Except that beautiful river.  You really should see it.  Spend some time in Kerrville and walk along it for several hours.  You won't regret a minute of it - as long as you are camping in a tent without running water. 

The next day was a lot of  fun.  We saw the sights, looked for property, in case we decided to retire there, and returned to our RV.  Ya know, the one with faucets that no longer leaked?  Just before we were ready to retire for the night, it started to rain.  Then it started to hail.  After that, it HAILED.  Big, Texas thunderstorm sized hail, an inch and a half in diameter.  In case you're wondering, that's the size that goes right through the three cheap plastic skylights on the roof of our RV.  And, in case you're STILL keeping track, that's woe # seven, eight and nine.

One of the skylights was above the shower, so it caused no real problem.  The water from the melting hailstones just drained into the holding tank.  But the other two - one in the kitchen and the other in the bedroom above the bed - those two were a real concern.  Don't know about you, but I hate sleeping in a bed with a couple of inches of melting hailstones on it.  We went to a nice, dry, hotel room for the night.

After a while, even the most unflappable of guys starts to flap. I'd had it.  Three days of a nine day vacation had passed.  That meant we still needed to enjoy another six days of water in every place it was not welcome.  By now you guys know me well enough to have guessed that was the point where I chickened out and called an end to all the fun.  Wet tails between our legs, we headed back to my sisters place.  She provided clean towels, fed us, dried our wet clothing, and showed us to a dry bed.

The next morning, we were told the pool was out of commission - the pump was leaking water in the pump house every time it was turned on and her husband had been too busy at work to repair it.  Yep.  Water woe # ten.  The woes followed every where I went.  I know water is needed for life to exist, but by now I was starting to look for alternatives.  There must be something else we can use to sustain life.  Where was Eddie when I needed him? Surely, the world's best chemist could have found a "solution" to my problem.  I fixed the pump.

We managed to find Luckenbach and spent a day waiting for Willie, Waylon and the Boys to show, but they never did.  We also took in some of the other great places in the area.  After a couple of days, we hooked up our RV; the bed was now dry, and headed home.  We stopped for the night at Sumner Lake.  Usually, I stop at any small local airport when I'm on the.............forget it.

The next morning I emptied the fresh water and holding tanks in the RV dump pit there.  No need to lug eight hundred pounds of water up a 6000 foot change in elevation.  That's when I found out the water tap there didn't work, and there was no way to rinse our holding tank.  All the icky stuff left in the tank would dry right where it was.  Now, instead of too much water where it wasn't needed, there was not enough where it was needed.  Oh well, it was easy to forget woe # eleven and we continued home.

That vacation cost us a bundle.  We had to buy a new water heater, skylights, and a bunch of washers for the trailer.  After hauling the way too heavy, for a half ton vehicle, trailer back up the mountain to Los Alamos, we needed a new transmission in the Suburban.  We averaged eight miles per gallon downhill on the way to Texas, and six MPG on the way back up. 

I learned a lesson.  Compared to roughing it in an RV, five star hotels are cheap   And, there's a lot to be said for maid service.  If my friend does manage to close the deal and move, I think I'll stay in one when I visit. 

And, I'll come prepared with a brand new bottle of headache pills just in case.