I'm not the kind of guy to jump the gun, but in the case of The Great Wyoming RV Adventure of 2020, I'm wrapping things up a day early. Currently, it's the morning of Day 3 of the 3.5-day return trip home. The truth is, I should have saved this slice of prose to write tomorrow. However, who knows what tomorrow will bring? I certainly won't have time after I arrive back in Greenville to pen a final summary.
My intention was to do a much more thorough job chronicling this boondoggle with video and blogging. The best-laid plans....
My enthusiasm for videoing was stunted by the realization that Eatons' Ranch is a technological black hole. Nearly nothing gets in or out. It's as though the property is encased in a dome resistant to cell phone, Internet or TV communication. Although some may welcome the loss of touch with the outside world as they rough it in the wilderness, it's never been a big selling point with me. No matter where or when I am, as a freelance writer, I must always do at least a modicum of work. That's tough when isolated in a no Wi-Fly zone.
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| Some of the boys at an after-ride happy hour at the Magnificent Bastard. |
This was my 11th Eatons' outing and its familiarity hindered my enthusiasm for noting every little aspect of daily routine there. Compounding my lackluster attitude, I didn't ride this year. Nope. I've looked my mortality in the eye and I blinked. After 10 years of trail rides there, I didn't feel the odds were in my favor. When you ride with any regularity, the question isn't will you get turfed, but when will you get turfed? I have had friends tossed from their saddles there – some with alarming results.
There were only another 20 or so guests at the ranch while we were there. Yet, a lady managed to get bounced off her steed, resulting in a multifracture-shoulder injury. No thank-you. Uncle Russ is precious cargo not to be dropped, thrown, bounced or heaved. Ten fingers, ten toes, right?
Food at the ranch is always a roll of the dice. My first couple of years going there (Beginning in 2003, I think.), a married couple wrangled the kitchen. He cooked and she baked. For our money, it was a marriage made in heaven. The meals were exceptional, accented by homemade rolls, bread and breakfast pastries. The third year was a bit of a disappointment. The couple had moved on to open a restaurant in Surprise, Arizona. The food was fair, at best. Then came the Dark Years.
We always go to Eatons' in September beginning the weekend or so after Labor Day. We arrived that year to learn the ranch had fired its dining room chef two weeks before. Manning the kitchen fell to the lady who tended the garden. If you have even once operated a microwave oven, your skill level is equal to hers. Often having described the food scene there as that of a cruise ship, we were horrified by the gruel being dished out three times a day. On the next visit, the food was marginally better. This year we were greeted with some seriously good grub prepared by a twenty-something guy. There wasn't a miss among the 11 meals we consumed this visit.
Our days were punctuated with after-dinner sessions on the porch. With 10 bottles of bourbon and single malt scotches, as well as a variety of craft beers and a tequila, at our disposal, our evening bull sessions were well lubricated. I turned the main room of our cabin into a video studio and a few of us shot two bourbon and a craft-beer videos over the course of our stay.
Our trip home got underway after breakfast on Saturday. One of the brothers had to ferry us and our gear to the RV, which was parked in a field roughly half a mile from our cabins. As we spooled up the RV's many systems, Hal discovered the power driver's seat, which was positioned as near to the steering wheel as possible, wasn't operating. Hal stands at 6 ft 6 in.
In the early planning stages of this trip, we thought Ports and I would spell Hal behind the wheel. This was before Hal had driven the Magnificent Bastard for the first time. Once that happened, we all realized he would be the only driver. I could have managed to drive this beast with the seat in the full forward position, but I'm nearly a foot shorter than Hal. So, here we were, parked in an open field with a 15-minute walk to the ranch office and no phone service. We couldn't search for solutions on the Internet because we had no service.
Hal opted to squeeze behind the wheel and drive us off the ranch. Because I was streaming video when we arrived a few days earlier, we knew there was Internet mere feet outside the ranch entrance. So, with his knees nearly touching his chin, Hal coaxed the Magnificent Bastard down the 3-mile driveway to roughly 50 yards beyond the gate. Bingo! We had a connection. Hal put in calls to everyone he had contact with at the RV dealership, as well as the driving instructor he spent two days with and the technicians at a 1-800 number he had. He left messages all around.
We then discovered the power passenger seat was also dead. After checking the circuit breakers, Hal began checking the wiring under the passenger seat and found a connection that wasn't secure. Both front seats rotate to face the rear of the RV. We had rotated them around upon our arrival at the ranch and then back to their driving positions when preparing to leave. Apparently, that had disturbed the wiring. Making that adjustment made both seats operational, but we had lost nearly 45 minutes.
Rolling into our overnight RV-park accommodations in North Platte, Nebraska at 9:30 that night, we were tired, frustrated and cranky. Here's a tip about RV parks: They aren't designed for after-dark arrivals. No lights, site locations with no rhyme nor reason, unintuitive hookups and so forth don't make 9:30 setups optimum. When we finally found our appointed site, the surface was a thick layer of gravel. The RV's automatic leveler doesn't cotton to gravel. Twenty minutes, several attempts to level and two repositionings of the RV later, we were able to level it and extend the slideouts.
Oh, but there's more. Where the RV finally came to rest was farther away from the electrical hookup than our power cord was long. Hal has read every piece of literature on the infinite situations one might face when RVing. He accumulated several lists of the must-have things for every RV and purchased them all. “We do have an extension cord somewhere, boys,” he exclaimed. “I just have to find it.”
A quick search through two or three of the storage bins under the RV was rewarded with a 25-foot 50-amp extension cord still in its unopened box. It says “50 amp” right on the box and on a tag attached to the cord. It is, however, not a 50-amp cord configured for extending the reach between the RV's power cord and the hookup. It has some sort of bastardized fitting on the female end that is neither 50 amp, 30 amp or any other amp we have been able to identify. It's a mystery amp. There we were leveled, but sitting six feet short of the power source. Now it's after 10 p.m. and we can't run the generator out of respect for our neighbors.
What transpired next is just one of those episodes of serendipity leaving you both grateful and scratching your head. As we stood there considering our next action, the door to the RV next door to us opened and out stepped an older guy in his bathrobe with a dog on a leash. “You guys all right?” he asked. Hal explained our situation. “What you need is an extension cord,” he responded. Hal noted we had an extension cord, but it had the wrong female connection. “I have one,” he offered, “but I'm leaving tomorrow.” We told him we were as well. Thirty seconds later he handed us a 10-foot extension cord and we were in business. Not exactly loaves and fishes, but a miracle in our eyes, nonetheless.
Fierce and relentless, the 15- to 20-mph crosswind through most of Nebraska challenged Hal for hours. A Class A RV presents a similar target for the wind as a mizzen sail on a boat. It is one large, light slab that a strong wind pushes all over the road. Conspiring with the wind was the legion of 18-wheelers whizzing by at 70 miles per hour. That was our Sunday.
This three-man squad, though, has transformed into a well-oiled pit crew. Whether it's refueling where one of us, armed with a walkie-talkie hops out and provides real-time directions when positioning at the pump, to the actual act of fueling where one of us goes inside to purchase snacks as another pumps the fuel and the third finds an extended length squeegee and washes the windshield, or its setting up at an RV park, things unfold much more smoothly than they did a few days ago. We rolled into our campground in Columbia, Missouri at 7:30 on Sunday evening, by 7:50, we were plopped down in the RV munching on popcorn and watching TV. Setting up, once parked, took no more than 10 minutes to level, as well as hooking up power and water. A high-five-worthy accomplishment.
Saturday and Sunday were 500-plus miles days. Today, however, is mapped out at fewer than 400 miles. Tuesday will be a 200-mile as we make the final leg into Knoxville. Time to relax.
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