November 1998

<<< Sunday, 1 November 1998

Spent more time with Ray and Prue reminiscing about travel adventures, after which it was out for an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet at $3.99 per head - unbelievable value!

Monday, 2 November 1998

As time is running out, today had to be a decision day as to whether we should sell or ship the RV home. Mesa is a snowbird haven so not only are there numerous campgrounds and golf courses in the vicinity, but also lots of RV dealers. We visited about five dealers and it was confirmed very quickly that we would not even get close to our target price. Later, after a lot of discussions, we concluded that we would ship the RV home. George has always fancied the idea of using it to tour parts of Europe and Valerie liked the financial aspect. As it so happens Roy Nipper has shipped an RV to England in the past and is knowledgeable about converting RVs to UK standards. His views of the UK selling prices helped confirm our thinking. By the end of the day, we started to wonder about how many of the items we sold a week ago, would we now need!

Tuesday, 3 November 1988

The decision to ship meant we had to get several things organised quickly, in particular obtaining information about shipping arrangements and buying critical spares for the RV, which may be difficult to obtain in the UK. As luck would have it there is a Newmar dealer nearby, where we were able to get an immediate appointment to have a defective slide-out roller replaced.

Wednesday, 4 November 1998

Time to start heading for the east coast. The only problem is, we have not yet decided whether to ship the RV home from Jacksonville, Florida or Baltimore, Maryland. Our initial journey took us through vast cotton fields, where it is now harvest time. Picking is carried out by large and fairly wasteful machines, which leave large quantities of cotton remaining on the bushes, or blowing across the roadway making it look like it has snowed. Excellent roads and light traffic enabled us to travel 340 miles in six hours and then camp for the night at the SKP park in Demming, NM.

Thursday, 5 November 1998

After several phone calls, we were pleased to obtain confirmation that we could indeed ship the RV from Jacksonville, FL and at the same cost as Baltimore, even though it is a long sea route. Jacksonville is nearer and should mean we avoid the possibly much cooler weather in the middle states. Today we travelled about 110 miles and camped in El Paso, TX which is a vast industrial city we had only driven through in the past. What little we saw of the city still did not impress us. We had a slim hope we could meet up with a friend of George’s, but it was not to be.

Friday, 6 November 1998

Texas seems to go on forever. Today we travelled 350 miles and the scenery hardly changed. The journey would not be so monotonous if the scenery changed occasionally or was interesting. Dark barren hills are always on the skyline, but never seem to get any closer. Little rain falls so the vegetation is sparse, supporting hardly any life. As we moved east thick clouds gathered and the temperature dropped, making it even more depressing. At 5.15 p.m. we pulled into a campground at Ozona, where we learnt that a nearby monument commemorates the legendary David Crockett (1786 - 1836). He died fighting the Mexicans at the Alamo, attempting to obtain Independence for Texas.

Saturday, 07 November 1998

We awoke to a cool grey morning, which remained so throughout the 210 miles to San Antonio. During the last two years, we have heard several good reports about San Antonio, which we nearly visited earlier this year, but on that occasion, continuous rain put us off. Today the weather was indifferent, but we were determined to see a little of the downtown area. Most of the inner roads are in a poor state of repair, matching most of the housing, which was mainly occupied by Mexicans. Once in Market Square, one could be forgiven for thinking you were in Mexico since virtually everything for sale had been made in Mexico and was being sold by mostly Mexicans. The atmosphere was lively and fun, with no pressure to buy anything, which somehow encouraged Valerie to buy more of this and that.

Sunday, 08 November 1998

Almost immediately after leaving San Antonio, the scenery changed to fertile farmland, and the traffic became much heavier. Wishing to avoid the congestion in Houston, we cut across the country, taking us through rich ranch areas. Many of the ranches were surrounded by miles of white wooden fences, leaving us to conjecture that the Ewings probably lived somewhere in the area! Late afternoon we arrived in Livingston where tomorrow we plan to have a day off from travelling. Talk about taking all your toys with you. Our neighbour has an American Eagle motor home (read as big and expensive). He is towing a two-level trailer, on the top level is a 16-foot speed boat and on the lower level are two Harley Davidson motorbikes as well as a car!

Monday, 09 November 1998

Our travel timetable is now driven by ship departure dates, which means we are hurrying across 2,200 miles of the southern US, for sailing on the 22 November. The RV must be at the port at least four clear business days earlier, being the 16 November. This does not give us much time to get there as well as doing lots of other essential things. There is another sailing two weeks later but this means we will not get home until early December and we are now both of mind that we need that time to move back into Eastfield and prepare for Xmas.

What are these essential things that need to be done, you say? Well the RV needs a major service which will take a complete day. A solid partition must be built between the driving area and the living section since the RV driver's area has to be left unlocked at all times, and pilfering is common at the dockside. Organising the paperwork for the sailing will take another half day. Some of the RV equipment will not work in the UK e.g. TV, satellite receiver which we would like to sell or give to charity. Spares for the RV may be very expensive or difficult to obtain in the UK, so we are making a list and then we need to buy them. After all of this, we can then turn our attention to selling the car and booking our flights!

Out of the blue, we received an Email saying that Barbara & Leo whom we travelled to Mexico and Alaska with, had both been taken seriously ill, at almost the same time. We would like to visit them but they are 1,000 miles to the north. Fortunately, they both seem to be in very good spirits and have lots of support from nearby friends. We wanted to say goodbye to Virgie & Sterling as we travelled through Louisiana, but they appear to be away.

Tuesday, 10 November 1998

Grey clouds accompanied us all day, which we have now learnt, is the edge of the biggest winter storm to hit the midwest in thirty years. East of Texas Interstate 10 becomes very tiring. The road is concrete sections, which have all been carefully positioned such that each section is misaligned with the next section. Mile after mile the suspension keeps thumping, shaking everything in the RV. It sure makes one glad to get to the campground, which tonight was in Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Wednesday, 11 November 1998

We travelled 370 miles today, leaving no time to do anything else other than make a booking to have the RV serviced when we arrive at our destination in Jacksonville, FL. We were in four states today, which for us is a bit of a record. Starting in Louisiana, we drove through Mississippi and Alabama without hardly a stop and then camped for the night in the Florida panhandle near Marianna.

Thursday, 12 November 1998

Today was the last leg of our journey to the east coast and by early afternoon and another 230 miles, we arrived on the outskirts of Jacksonville, where we will stay until we take the RV to the port on the 17th.

Friday, 13 November 1998

Having taken the RV in for its major service, we spent most of the day on the phone and fax machine arranging the paperwork to ship the RV home. In between phone calls and faxing, George was desperately trying to locate replacement tyres for the RV which would be more expensive to replace at home. Most of the tyre dealers claimed they had the perfect tyre available, and at a good price. Despite these positive reassurances by the dealers. George was not convinced that the proposed alternatives were suitable. After contacting the Michelin HQ, it was clear that none of the dealers' suggested tyres was suitable for motor homes. The whole situation was made worst as it appeared that there is no stock of suitable tyres in Florida! It confirmed to us, that they will try to sell you anything, so buyer beware! After contacting numerous dealers and wholesalers, we eventually traced a stock of suitable tyres, which we hope will be fitted tomorrow.

Saturday, 14 November 1998

The one-hour job of fitting the tyres took nearly three hours. As requested we arrived at 8.00 a.m. but the tyres did not arrive for another hour when it was then found they did not have the computer code for the balancing machine. Later it was off to Home Depot (gigantic DIY store) to obtain materials to board up the driving area.

Sunday, 15 November 1998

Most of the day was spent sorting out everything in the motor home and car. We are both amazed at how much stuff we have accumulated. Personnel possessions cannot be shipped in the RV, which we understand is an insurance or possibly a customs issue. As a consequence some things have been dumped, most we will have to take with us and some items will go with the RV as essential equipment!

Monday, 16 November 1998

After spending the morning boarding up the driving area, we decided to drive to the port to check that our paperwork was in good order. The Jacksonville dock area is vast. We were issued with a pass and directed to a section containing acres and acres of cars and trucks, all waiting for shipment. We were somewhat surprised and a little relieved to find that several other couples were also shipping their RVs to Southampton on the same sailing. Even more surprising was the Belgium couple who were shipping an enormous 5th-wheel trailer pulled by a $150,000 tow truck! Feeling much happier after our port visit, we went to a travel agent and booked our return flight for the 23rd, working on the basis that selling the car should be straightforward!

Tuesday 17, November 1998

After final packing and emptying the holding tanks and refrigerator etc. we took the RV to the port where we meet an English couple who now live in Florida. He runs a truck export business which is mainly shipped to Europe. If nothing else we learnt where we could sell the car in an auction if we have no luck through a dealer. We then drove the 140 miles to Orlando where we found a reasonable hotel to stay the six nights before flying home on Monday.

Wednesday 18, November 1998

Car dealers seem to fall into two distinct groups. The bulk of cars is sold by very large manufacturer dealerships, selling new cars and recent model part exchanges. The other group are the much smaller independent dealers who generally sell much older cars. Unfortunately, it turns out that few dealers are covering the middle section in which our car falls. Most sellers would typically trade such a car in part exchange or sell privately to obtain the best price. However, this would take us too long and is likely to present problems with buyer financing. Anyway, after some difficulty, we managed to find a dealer who not only offered an acceptable price but also agreed to us keeping the car until we fly home on Monday. The only condition being we have to keep the mileage down, so we are now limited to the locality around the hotel.

Thursday, 19 November 1998

Mall window shopping was the order of the day. Christmas has arrived with a vengeance. The centrepiece of the mall is a huge artificial tree almost completely covered in a blaze of brilliantly coloured balls and the like.

Friday, 20 - Sunday, 22 November 1998

Local phone calls are free in most parts of the US, which George, using the hotel phone made the most of, by surfing the Internet for hours at a time. It was also an excellent opportunity to learn HTML and create our web page, the initial results look encouraging.

Monday, 23 November 1998

Our flight home was not until 7.15 p.m. so we spent most of the morning in the hotel. We then passed a few interesting hours in Borders, which is a chain of huge bookshops. As well as a large, impressive collection of books, music and videos, they also have a good restaurant with comfortable lounge chairs which we put to good use.

At 2.00 p.m. we took the car to the dealer who it turns out had lost the car title (log book). This caused some confusion and delay but finally, we received our cheque, which sent us rushing off to the nearest bank. Here more confusion arose since not only was the signature on the cheque unknown to the bank, but the bank did not have the facility to wire money to our account. George had to laugh when they seriously suggested that we take cash in a sack, across the road to the Wells Fargo counter in the supermarket, who would be able to wire the money.

The flight home was uneventful, aided by a strong tail wind we arrive at Gatwick on time despite a late takeoff. Upon arrival, we could not help but compare Gatwick’s 10-foot, 100-light Christmas tree with the 63,000-light 50-foot tree at Orlando airport. The 0rlando tree had taken 2 people one month to put together. Somehow it summed up the differences between the two countries perfectly.

The adventure is over

Our wandering around North America has come to an end. In many ways, it is a sad moment but in other ways, we look forward to being back home. Originally we planned to tour the USA in a year! However, even after three excellent years touring, during which we visited 44 states as well as spending some time in Mexico and Canada, we have not seen it all by a long, long way, even though we travelled 39,320 miles in the car and 51,148 miles in the RV. We camped for 855 nights at an average cost of £9.90 a night, in a wide variety of locations, many with the most spectacular scenery just at the end of our garden!

Having been to so many wonderful places it is impossible to say what we enjoyed the most. However, the memories of the glaciers and bears of Alaska, the wilderness of Canada and the rich culture, friendliness and poverty of the Mexicans will remain with us forever.

We enjoyed it so much that who knows, we may go back and do it all over again!! [End]

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