Nashville to Portland OR Trip
Hello Vegas and Axis owners,
Just completed a 6,400 mile voyage over a 6 week time period. Diane and I had a great time and quickly explored many cities taking in the highlights.
Our main route to the west included interstate 40 to Bakersfield, CA then headed north on interstate 5 to Portland. The trip on the way out was preplanned and all RV campgrounds notified of our arrival, very structured. The return trip was created on the fly, we would get suggestions from other campers and apps of things to do. Roadtrippers was our main planning tool and is a free app for Android users. On the way back we drove highway 101 down closer to the coast, we would then use our tow and take day trips down the coast using highway 1. When we reached San Diego we made our way east to Phoenix then interstate 10, then North back to Little Rock and 40 again.
Along with the great time we had we also had several things go a rye. on the second stop I noticed my windshield washer reservoir was hanging under the front fascia, found out one of the two screws was missing. The unit was held in with two 1/4-20 bolts without use of lock washers or nylock nuts. Wire ties used until hardware stop. Second, my gray water heating mat fell off during the third day of driving, found the mat rapped round my rear axle and exhaust pipe, wires hanging. Stop at Albuquerque CW to have someone confirm it was mine and to document issue. Tank sits up under driveshaft and is protected, I thought. The black water heater sits just under the frame and was still in place. Third, on the drive back from San Diego my windshield took a hit from what I think was a small stone in the black out band on the drivers side lower quadrant and noticed it only during a gas stop. Crack has now propagated down and to the right about 12 to 14 inches. Not to bad I guess!
Had one issue with the fresh water supply filling up thru the main water inlet. With the water supply hose connected to the supply inlet and the Fresh water supply at about 1/3 full I found the fresh water tank more than 2/3 full the next morning. This happened three times during the 41 days on the road. The water pump switch was off at all times, not needed with dock side water pressure, and tank slowly filled up. We drained the added weight by using Fresh water tank at several campsites. I did explain the situation to CW before our trip (because this happened before on a two week Florida vacation) but they could not duplicate. I am experimenting and trying to make the failure happen on demand by trying to leave pressure on the system after using the pump to see if leakage will occur. Has anyone had the problem?
Pulled a Saturn VUE on a two wheel dollie, I do know it can be pulled on all four, but high mileage vehicle , and the need for brakes required in TN over 1500 lbs. tow. I decided to go the inexpensive way and I can pull almost any front wheel drive car I chose to acquire in the future and have braking.
Never knew I was pulling 4000 lbs. load, the Vegas did a great job. I did leave the rear view camera on all the time just to make sure.
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