We have again set up in the Thousand Trails facility called Pio Pico,located beyond Jamul on the east side of the San Diego and Chula Vista areas. Up until Thursday last week we were toughing it out in Cabo San Lucas for a couple weeks.

Like an idiot, I left for Cabo with a tooth that had forewarned me for a long time that it may go gunnybag at any time. It did. About halfway through our two weeks I chomped down on an ice cube and detected a sensation that was not reassuring. At the beginning of the fun it didn’t seem like it was going to be too bad but reality soon set in and I started hunting through Mexican pharmacies in a mostly fruitless search for pain killers that would get me through to my return to the States. I found many pills that alleged, in my tortured and erroneous translations of their labels printed in Spanish, that they were effective at reducing pain. Either the labels lie or my translations could be suspect. In any event, I found some pills called paracetamol that were slightly effective if you double the dosage and multiply the frequency at which you are supposed to take them by two.

When we got back to Pio Pico to release our fifth wheel from storage, we encountered some strange issues. Nobody had broken into our trailer but a vole or field mouse had snuck into our cheesy home only to drown in the toilet. We now know that the rubber gasket in our terlet is good because it held enough water for over two weeks that was sufficient to drown a rat. Getting our trailer out of the storage lot was a problem. When we put the trailer into the lot, the dirt road was bone dry due to years of drought here in Southern California.When we tried to remove it, however, it had rained a couple inches in a couple hours the night before and the formerly adequate road was under gooey mud and blocked with some crud left behind by flash flood conditions. After some shaky progress trying to pass through the goo,we backed out and got campground maintenance to show up with some equipment. Two hours later, our muddy truck and trailer emerged from the storage area leaving only about a half ton of muck on the newly rain-washed road. The fun was not over yet.

Once back in the campground and properly installed in our new camp spot for the immediately foreseeable future, I did a clumsy and broke off the site water supply below all valves, releasing another torrent of water across the campground. The same maintenance guys who had cleared the road came to fix the pipe. They asked if I missed them in the 20 minutes we had been separated.

Now we have been back in the States for a few days and we returned to Mexico, specifically the town of Tecate, to visit Veronica Hernandez, our new dentist now that my nifty former employer provided dental insurance is a thing of the past. A cost for a root canal and crown in our hometown of San Diego exceeds $2000. In Doc Hernandez’s practice in Tecate it costs $605. And to make things better, Tecate is closer.

After two days of miserable, filthy toil in high velocity Santa Ana winds, we believe we have finished the repairs to our trailer. There was considerable damage to the underside of our fifth wheel trailer from two tire tread separations; one low-speed variety near San Antonio, Texas, last February and a high-speed rip & shred east of Salt Lake City on I-80. The Texas version clobbered the rear electric jacks, some flimsy aluminum body parts, the left side tandem wheel fender, an alloy wheel, the living room slide-out lighting electrical power and some weather stripping designed to keep water from the wheels from the inside when traveling on wet roads. The right side catastrophe likewise dinged up some body panels, rearranged the right side fender profile into junk parts, stripped out the under-trailer waterproofing and ripped out some floor insulation. Little did we know that the right side waterproofing and insulation repair would be the worst task we encountered.
We started the right side repairs by purchasing a polyisocyanurate foam board, a length of peel-n-stick waterproofing window flashing, some steel strapping material, some wood cleat stock and a wide assortment of screws and washers. Then we climbed under the trailer to start the work. To make things interesting, there were Santa Ana winds gusting to about 40 mph for both days required to complete the repair and we finished each day exhausted, gritty and quite filthy from our worming around on the ground under our home while being sandblasted. Our repair was certainly better than the cheesy work installed at the factory but the location under the trailer but above the tandem wheels made for some interesting contortionist moves to get repair parts installed. Exotic cuts in the rigid repair materials were required to slip over flanges and around water piping that needed to be inside the insulation envelope. We were able to work together although the challenges almost forced the eruption of harsh language. There was considerable grunting, moaning, swearing and lacerations required to complete the work.
However, we are now finished with the major repairs to damage incurred during this year’s journey. I am almost at a loss as to what to do now but I promptly spotted my vaporizer and bottle of Jack Daniel’s which will help me get through the lull. We can now go back to our old to-do list of peeling the ugly decals from the exterior trailer walls, scraping colorful dead bug carcasses from the front of the trailer and fooling around. We are both glad the major repairs have been completed.

Today we climbed under the left side trailer wheelwell and slideout and repaired the electrical wiring destroyed by our tire tread separation back in the spring of 2018. I anticipated a complete nightmare while exposing the wiring harness, finding the wiring break and repairing it. As usual, I was incorrect.
Exposing the wiring was a pain in the butt and finding a comfortable place to recline on the sharp and jagged stones was fruitless but, surprisingly, we found the broken wiring and replaced it with a non-OEM wiring assembly. We used a coiled, heavy-duty 10′ tool extension cord which I cut the regular plugs off of and wired the bare ends into the remaining wiring harness ends. Surprisingly, it worked perfectly. We are quite amazed but very bruised due to the funky location we were obliged to use for our feeble efforts. Peggy bruises more than I do so she now appears almost speckled with purple dots which I can spot when leering at her nakedness.
Since we fixed the demolished cheesy plastic fender on the left side back in October, I believe the left side repairs are done and we can continue on into other stuff we really don’t know how to fix on the right side. We don’t think any wiring is involved but there are water piping insulation, wood deck and waterproofing issues we will need to address before we do any substantial driving on wet or damp roads. We already fixed the right side cheesy plastic fender that was shredded when the right side rear tandem wheel took a shit in Utah in September. We can now make out the light at the end of the tunnel.

We have now been in San Diego County for about a month. It is nice traveling less but the scenery doesn’t change very much. We initially returned from our 2018 journey and checked into Pio Pico but our Thousand Trails membership requires we stay in any of their campgrounds for not more than 21 days per stay. We did our 21 days and then moved into Sweetwater Summit County Park not far from Pio Pico. The county campground has full hookups, a superb view from site 115 where we stayed and great phone service but no wifi. Pio Pico has pay wifi and full hookups but no phone service. It seems that California, hotbed of things electronic and data-ish, would have digital communications up the wazoo but they don’t.
After a week at the county park we were eligible to move back into Pio Pico for another three weeks so we did although we won’t be here three weeks. The trailer will go into storage around the 21st for a rest while we do two weeks outside our home-on-wheels. During our month here we have been to see the kids and dogs a few times, we replaced the cheesy plastic fenders destroyed during our two tire tread separations we suffered during this year’s journey, we got the oil changed in our F-250, did some research about fixing the rest of the damage from the tire failures and got some parts on the way, bought comfy boots for me and did considerable research into socks. We will be obliged to do additional clothes shopping for me, forays I detest worse than diarrhea. My spouse hints that my old, but very comfortable, duds may need replacement but I think she has an unrealistic view of the situation. I am already going into mourning over the pending discard of my current, holey and threadbare attire. Clothes just ain’t proper unless they have holes where body hairs can breathe.
We still need to fix the wheel well over the trailer right side tandem wheels where the blowout ripped all the insulation and waterproof barrier from the trailer deck. The left side slideout still needs me to go underneath and find the broken wiring for interior lighting torn away by the left side trailer tire blowout. I noted that Pio Pico has an abundance of large, jagged stones on the ground where I will be obliged to lay when doing these repairs. Discomfort, coming up! My only consolation is that if I can’t fix the issues, the mobile RV mechanic will get to recline on the stony bed.

Today we left Wilderness Lakes Thousand Trails and headed south into San Diego County. We have now finished our grand tour ’18 in which we passed through Arizona, New Mexico, Texas (where we had a nasty tire and trailer damage issue due to a tire tread separation), Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, Wyoming, Utah (with another destructive tire tread separation and more trailer damage), Nevada and back into California – a bit over 20,000 miles.
I’m old and we will probably stay in southern California for a while because I have to sign up for Medicare, go to a doctor and a dentist, we need to fix the trailer damage from the tread separations, we can visit our kids and hobnob with old friends. Unfortunately, due to some restrictions on our lengths of stays in Thousand Trails RV parks, we will be moving around large expanses of southern CA to stay in compliance with the stay regulations. The weather today when we arrived was great – about 78 degrees and less than 50% humidity – and a long stay in this part of the world doesn’t sound too bad. We know we will never again make the mistakes of being in the south during summer, being in the desert southwest in the early autumn or being in Mississippi in the spring. We had more than our share of torrential rainstorms, tornado warnings, spectacular lightning, sky-cracking thunder, oppresive, humidity-infused environments and broiling deserts on this year’s trip so we have vowed to plan better in the future.
This blog will become somewhat intermittent for the next few months since I am positive nobody wants to read about colonoscopy, crown reattachment, trailer maintenance or a visit to the Ford dealership. If anything interesting happens, however, I’ll try to write a compelling story with my old guy’s not necessary truthful but possibly entertaining point of view. Thank you very much.
Viejo Geezero

We are still hanging out in the Wilderness Lakes TT facility in Menifee although it seems Hemet is closer. We have spent the last couple days watching the birds, going to Fart & Smile and dumping the tanks. We have had excellent satellite reception, pretty good wifi and pleasant weather so we did not feel compelled to do a lot of exploring, particularly since we have few places to go around here.
But today was a bit different. Back when we were on our way out of San Diego early in 2018, we stopped for a few days near Borrego Springs which is kitty-corner across the county from metro San Diego. Borrego is a strange oasis in an otherwise unforgiving desert environment by having large estates with acres of bright green lawns, emerald golf courses and fountains. They also have some amazing public art alongside the roads.
The art consists of large metal sculptures of animals, dinosaurs and, in one massive case, a dragon that looks like it is half-buried with half of it above the ground. All of this sculpture art is made by a guy named Ricardo Breceda who has a facility/welding shop/residence in nearby Aguanga. We elected to pop in at his crib to check out the stock on hand.
After stopping for fuel and getting our initial experience with current California exorbitant prices, we headed southeast on CA-79 until we made it to Aguanga. Breceda’s place is along this road and it is plainly evident since there is a concentration of fanciful metal sculptures on both sides of the highway. We pulled in past a stagecoach with a 4-horse team sculpture, a 30′ long gigantic rattlesnake sculpture and a myriad of metal dinosaurs. We caught the welder/cashier as he was sitting down to lunch but he was very nice and turned us loose in their outdoor studio.
This place is full of the creative efforts of the Breceda clan and is also free to visit. When we were there another visitor came up and asked if they had some small barrel cactus sculptures and, sure enough, they did. They also had two gorgeous puppies who seemed quite happy licking us, chewing on loose parts of my shoes, taking back rubs in stride and wrestling in the dirt. They had teeth like needles.
On the way back to No Wilderness Nor Lakes RV Park, we found some back roads that took us through this section of Riverside County. It is a bleak environment although they do have some nifty rocks.
We got some heavy metal pix. Click the asterisk *

We took a day off today. Peggy took a stroll around the RV park and I went over to one of the fetid canals to feed the ducks and coots. There are lots of birds here. We know because we are baiting them in with two bird feeders and a hummingbird feeder. It was great.

Today was another travel day. We left the absolute butthole and cultural wasteland of Barstow and hopped on I-15 to continue our westward trek to the coast. The road from Barffo, at about 2000′ elevation, starts a long, slow climb to the 4200’+ Tejon Pass above Riverside and San Bernardino. From that point we began the 6% drop into metro area east of the San Gabriel Valley. Strangely, descending from the pass we must have gone by an idiot stockpile because for the rest of our drive we were accompanied by wild-eyed swervers and lane changers, hotrodders changing into our lane before clearing our vehicle, high-speed freeway racers, screaming crotch rocket riders doing no less than 100 mph between cars in the well-designated but crowded traffic lanes and bored truckers with gutless tractors unable to climb even the slightest inclines.
We took I-215 around the Riverside metro area and the number of lunatics subsided somewhat. We eventually pulled off I-215 in Menifee and into the Wilderness Lakes Thousand Trails where we will take a break from travel for a week or so. Since we are members, we get to stay free. Strangely, there is no wilderness nor lakes within or near Wilderness Lakes RV Park. We have full hookups, good satellite TV reception, a great spot and much cooler temperatures than the desert inferno where we have spent the last 2 weeks. We even got a space at the end of a row which is quite large and, so far, very quiet. There is an unexpected bonus – due to the location of our RV space and its proximity to a large pasture area, there are lots of birds here. We already spotted a Cassin’s kingbird, a couple black phoebes, a ruby-throated hummingbird and some yellow warblers fooling around in the shrubbery near our trailer. And in the canal-sized trenches with highly suspicious-looking water in them within the RV park, we noted a flock of Canadian geese, a bunch of ducks, numerous coots and a two black crowned night herons. I had no idea when I was younger that I would take such an interest in birds in my dotage.
There’s a few bird photos. Click the asterisk *

Today we drove around the Barstow area looking for Americana. This area is rich in strange and wacky desert folks and, accordingly, rich in Americana. Quite a bit of it seems to have been created by the truly nutty so we were delighted to search the local area for examples of bizarre stuff created by the…uhhh…shall we say, profoundly eccentric.
Before we even got on the way, I glanced up at our RV park’s electrical pole and noted they may have some wiring not in strict compliance with the National Electrical Code. It seems they have violated sections on wiring, festoon lighting, insulation, electrical box wiring fill, low voltage/line voltage separation, electrical enclosures, wire rating, safety and reason. Since our trailer is not located directly below nor in close proximity to the naked conductors, we figured we were safe while on a short trip to see all Barstow’s beautiful parts.
It turns out that Barstow does not have any beautiful parts. However, right near our RV park there is a parched dirt lot filled with wacky, Road Warrior type yard art or vehicles created by a local welder. We know this because while we were looking at these vehicles, a strange man in an old mini-van skidded off the road and started explaining all there was to know about the vehicles, Barstow, his grandmother, a store somewhere and a big bridge. He had very few teeth and even fewer white ones. He talked incessantly and we found it was quite difficult to even get in any words, particularly words like, “We’re outta here!” We eventually escaped but we now have knowledge of many disconnected Barstow facts.
Barstow’s downtown, at least that section called Main Street, is a unique assortment of pawn shops, ancient abandoned motels, empty storefronts for rent, many traffic signals although there are few cars, some gas stations and many locals scurrying about on the sidewalks attempting to find shade. Today the temperatures have dropped to a balmy 102 degrees so some of the pedestrians found shade before they were incinerated. Pity.
Barstow is hard to admire. It is ugly, dusty, unbearably hot, windy and absolutely without any redeeming features but some folks seem to like it here, particularly the dentally-challenged. Go somewhere else. We have not seen any towns more miserable than Barffo since we left West Virginia.
Check out Barstow stuff. Click the asterisk *

We are still in the Barstow inferno although it was cooler today than yesterday. Yesterday the temperature was around 111 but today it was a much-improved 106. We hung pretty close to our air conditioned trailer for most of the day but serious boredom set in late in the afternoon. We decided to go for a spin around the local area in search of a liquor store.
We left our very rural digs at Shady Lane RV Camp and got on Old Highway 58 (there doesn’t seem to be a New Highway 58 anywhere near) for a short foray into town or what we thought was town. Like other similar municipalities we have been to like Barstow, we noted many types of strange Americana due to the nature of people that live in places like this, large yards full of wrecked or possibly operable but ugly cars and trucks, many abandoned trailer houses dissolving into the desert landscape, burned out residences with considerable vegetation in the former living rooms, yards almost completely filled with old trash and virtually no landscaping anywhere. Landscape areas we did find are landscaped with rocks of many different sizes. Other than some Palo Verde and mesquite shrubs, there appears to be no planting of green stuff. Flowers are right out.
We found a liquor store so we were able to consider our trip a success.