Around the campground

We enjoy walking around the campground.

When we arrived on Monday, the ranger at the entrance said that it was good that we were planning to leave on 9/30, as that was the date that they would be closing some areas for the season -- so we would have free access to any site in the campground for our stay.

When we were walking on Thursday, we saw a sign that indicated which roads (and thus sites) would be closed starting 9/30 -- roads F-L will be closed for the season.

We are on A (site A7) -- so this area will remain open. But the road that goes across east-to-west about midway in the campground marks the sections that will be closed -- all those north of that road -- well over half the sites in the campground.

Based on how many open sites there are in the campground, we don't think there will be any issue for people wanting to camp here to fit into the remaining sites. It also removes 3 bathhouses which will reduce the campground's daily maintenance requirements. There are two dump stations -- one up at the top of the campground, and the other at the bottom. The one at the bottom is currently not functional, so I don't know if they will have it working by Monday or whether they will continue to allow access to the dump station at the top.

We've also been trying to figure out a couple of issues on Gracie. 

Neither of our front large slides are working correctly. The passenger side (which was "fixed" in Elkhart, Indiana in May) was not completely fixed at that time and we knew that we'd need further work on it -- the front locking mechanism sounds like it is deploying, but it does not. The back lock on that slide works successfully, so we feel that the slide is secure as we travel.

In June, as we were leaving Elgin, Illinois, the locking paddle at the rear end of the driver side slide made a long grinding noise when it finished coming in, which we figured was not good. We waited as we drove across country making one night stays until we got to Liberty Lake (where we would be for a few days) to see if it would go back out. We figured if it went out and wouldn't come back in, we would have a few days to deal with it. Well, the front locking paddle unlocked when we activated the slide, but the back one did not unlock and the slide did not go out. Good news: getting it back in was not a consideration; Bad news: we couldn't use our big slide. We've been living without our big slide (the one that gives us most floor space) since June. 

Another problem started just since we got back into Washington state -- the electric burner on our Oasis (hydronic heater) stopped working. Last year, we had just one of the two elements working, and we got that worked on in Nappanee, Indiana at the Newmar Factory Service Center. They found that a connection had worked loose and arced, causing a burned up wire so one element was not working. The technician was able to find the issue (it took a lot of time -- a couple of days -- for him to dig into it and diagnose it) and fixed it.

Carl has run a number of tests on the system -- it appears to be getting electric power - the breakers are fine. He cannot test all the way to the unit because that would require emptying the bay with all his tools, so we haven't done it.

We have an appointment at Freedom RV in Tucson for them to work on both of these issues. 

We feel pretty sure that there is an actuator problem on both of the slide locks. We actually had the rear one on the driver side replaced in 2020 (at the same place we took Gracie in May this year which was unable to get the passenger side one completely fixed). The fellow who worked on it in 2020 (who appears to no longer work there) said that these actuators were a component on Newmars that frequently fail. We are concerned that, if the actuator needs to be replaced, that it will take a while for a shop to get the part, so we have ordered one from Amazon to have it on-hand "just in case".

We are *hoping* that the problem on the Oasis is relatively simple for someone who is knowledgeable to work on them and that Freedom RV will be able to get everything fixed in just a couple of days.