However, a passing storm that had passed over Little Rock on the night before, was ahead of us, and heading toward Alabama. We chose to drive slower, and waste a little time along the way to Red Bay to miss catching up with it. We were also contacted on Sunday night by Terry and Susan Toye, (friends and members of the Lone Star Allegro Club in Houston) who had read the last blog posting, and found out that we were heading to Red Bay. They had already been there for a couple of weeks getting several repairs made, and advised us of the storm, and warned us of the lack of RV spaces currently available in town.
Along the way, I was watching weather reports on TV and checking with Terry. We found out that the Red Bay area was subject to 'tennis ball' size hail and tornadoes. The hail and a tornado was actually reported in Belmont, MS.........about 8 miles west of Red Bay. That was about 4:30pm and we were in Fulton, MS which was about 30 miles south of Red Bay!! We turned south out of Fulton, and put another 25 miles between us and the storm. About 30 minutes, later, we heard on TV (thanks to DISH and an in-motion satellite dish) that the storm front had passed the area. We drove back to Fulton, and spent the night at the local Walmart.
We heard from Terry that the guy next to him was leaving Red Bay about 9:00am on Tuesday morning, and he had secured the site for us. There was nothing else open in town! At 8:00am, we left Fulton and got to the RV park in Red Bay about 8:30am, and found the guy dumping his tanks, and getting ready to leave. He had already had to tell two people who asked if he was leaving, that the site was already paid for!!!
After we got parked and set up, Patsy and I went to the Tiffin Service Center to register to get a second problem fixed. We had a leveler that was not allowing the system to level the coach. I filled out the paper work to get in line for the work, and then went to the supervisor of the area to let him know what was going up. I told him that I would be leaving on Friday afternoon, and would like for his crew to fix it. He said he would try!!
Next we went to Deaton's shop, and let them know that we were in town, and flexible about time!! They said that at best, they could get us in sometime during the day of our appointment......... the whole RV business in town was busy due to the fact that all the snowbirds were leaving Florida and other winter points, and heading back to homes in the north! Good news, they called us to show up at 10:00am on our appointment day, and they did stay on it! Good service as always!
Later in the day, I contacted the local RV a/c guy, who is an independent RV HAVC guy. On the way to Red Bay, we had tried to use the MH dash air, and it did not cool! As it happens, the outside temperature in Red Bay this day was below 30 degrees, and not a good day to work on an a/c unit!! Bruce Deaton has a good working relationship with other service providers in town, and he let the a/c guy work on the dash air in his paint booth while the paint was drying. It wasn't warm enough until Friday morning after the final clear coat had been applied. Turned out to be a relay on the a/c compressor, and the guy was not even going to charge me anything, not even for the new relay. I paid him anyway because I want him to be there the next time I need him!
Here are pictures of the damage to the DS back corner of the Bus......
And here are the "being repaired' photos..........
As normal, the Bus looked like new when we left........ I just did not get any pictures!! Friday morning was busy, but all good news. Bruce told me we would be out right after lunch, The a/c guy showed up right after Bruce told me they were about to put the Bus back together, and diagnosed the problem, and the Tiffin Service Center called and asked if we could show up for the leveler right after lunch. They a/c guy finished the diagnosis, and told me he had to go get the new relay, so I settled with him and Patsy and I went to get some lunch.
When we got back, the Bus was ready to go, and we found the old relay on the door step. We settled with Bruce, and headed to Tiffin. Tiffin decided that we had a bad motor on the leveler, but did not have one in stock. So, I had them put the old motor and leveler back on, and we left town about 3:00pm. We drove about 75 miles into Arkansas and over-nighted at an Arkansas rest area, leaving about 100 miles to drive on Saturday morning.
Our plan was to spend Saturday with Rachel and her parents, and then begin back to Texas on Saturday night.
More about our visit in Little Rock on the next blog!!
1 comment:
Glad to hear things went smoothly once you got to Red Bay. Our visit to RB last year was equally quick.
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