Padre to Livingston, TX

Let me see if I can remember all the things that went wrong packing up to leave Padre Island National Seashore after volunteering there for three months. Salt air is not kind to anything.

Woke up to torrential rain showers. Oh joy. Practically no rain for months and then on the day I want to leave the skies open up. Go figure.

The day started out with me putting my Murphy bed up and trying to lock it for the trip. Left side was lined up. Right side lock was so high it would not go in the hole. How could the bed get that messed up while parked and only one person sleeping in it. I ended up hammering a 2 x 4 in as a wedge to force the right side down so I could slide the lock in.

Pouring rain when my help, Ken and Bobbie, came over to help me get backed up and hooked up before they had to go do a bird tour. They came early. I wasn’t ready — which really upset me since they were standing in a downpour. They had full length rain gear so they were dry and completely unperturbed. I had a rain jacket and was drenched.

I got the key for the lock on the trailer tongue. I had lubed the lock the whole time in the salty environment, but it was frozen and wouldn’t open. We tried WD40 and T-9 to no avail. Ken got a heat gun and that made no difference. I sent them back to dry off in their motorhome sort of hoping the lube would sit for a while and make a difference. Tried again and it was still frozen. Neither of us carried a bolt cutter.

Ken shows up a while later, beats the lock a few times with a hammer and voila! It opened! One crisis averted. He went to volunteer.

I go inside to finish prepping for travel. I hit the switch to bring in the slide and nothing. No sound, no movement, no nothing. No kidding. I check the fuse on the electrical panel and it’s fine. It’s almost 9:00 (I wanted to be on the road from Padre by 8:00) so I wait and call the dealer. After getting a message to call my roadside assistance (seriously) I called back and spoke to a tech who directed me to a fuse out on the tongue of the trailer. He was really helpful and nice. 

The fuse wouldn’t come out. Of course my arthritic hands were already suffering from all the other things that gone wrong. I got a plier to pull it and the top of the fuse broke off leaving parts inside the fuse holder. Really. I dug all the pieces out. For the life of me I remembered I’d packed a bunch of fuses but had no idea where they were. After checking many places I finally found a stash in the glove compartment of the truck. Put one in, tried the slide and it came in. Another problem solved.

I enlisted the help of a new volunteer who arrived the night before and got backed up and hooked up to the trailer.

Everything on the trailer was a greasy mess from the rust preventative that I had put on and that I touched up liberally. I was continually washing my hands to get the grease off. The remainder of the packing and detaching went relatively well — then I got to the electrical cord. I could not turn the locking ring to release the cord from the trailer. My hands were shot. Same volunteer who helped me hook up came over and loosened the ring.

Finally got on the road at 10:45. The rain had stopped, the skies had cleared, the road out of the park was horrible. The road construction had not fared well from the deluge and there were pot holes and deep puddles so slog through.

Best part of the trip was Port Aransas, which reaffirmed my affection for it. I pulled up and immediately got put on the only ferry that can takes motor homes. I got out to make sure the rear end of the trailer was all the way on — sorry but it was my first time taking it on a ferry.

The sun was out. A cormorant was hillariously bathing itself. And three dolphin popped up playing. What a show. It was a cool goodbye from a town I really like.

That ended the good part of the day.

I drove back into the rain and stayed with it for almost the remainder of the drive.

Between Port A and Houston a car passed me (speed limit was 75 and people were flying by even though it was pouring rain) and threw a rock into my windshield that created a crack right smack dab in my line of vision. It scared the life out of me since it sounded like a rifle shot. But all in all I felt it held with how the rest of the day had gone.

I had created a route swinging me way, way around Houston since I had experienced the joys of downtown Houston previously. Unknown to me my GPS decided to recalculate and routed me straight through downtown. Six lanes, left exits and right exits, heavy congested traffic, and me trying to change lanes repeatedly with my truck and trailer. I was NOT a happy camper. I WAS downright terrified.

God, my guardian angels, and everybody else must have been looking out for me because I made it through safely. Thank you to the kind souls who saw my turn signal and allowed me to change lanes. Curses to you people who were in such a hurry you couldn’t cut me a break.

The rain let up just as I reached my stop at Escapees in Livingston, TX so I was able to set up without getting soaked again. The rain wasn’t that bad since I chose to view it as the best rinse to get salt water off that I could have hoped for. Both the truck and trailer were liberally sprayed down for hours. 

Lots of little bad luck, but any day that ends with me and all my stuff arriving safe and in one piece is a good day. This was the first leg of my 2800 mile trip to Bar Harbor, Maine to volunteer at Acadia National Park this summer. I hope I got a lot of bad luck out of the way.

It was just a really trying, frustrating, and exhausting day. I went to bed early. Today I went for a long walk and enjoyed trees, birds singing, cool temperatures, and sunshine. Tomorrow I do the Escapees Smart Weight to check my trailer and truck and then on to DFW. Gusty winds out of the north forecast for the afternoon. I should get great gas mileage…