The day before yesterday we acquired our new trailer brake controller and plugged it into the existing trailer brake wiring in the truck. As far as we could tell, it seemed to work. We made extensive reservations at RV parks along our northward route in expectation of a trouble-free passage. After all, we had a new brake controller, a very recently serviced F-250 and a trailer that had just departed from its yearly maintenance.

However, once we got out on the highway and actually putting the brakes to the test, cryptic L.E.D. displays would appear on the controller although it worked well enough. Referring to the instructions that came with the controller, we found that the mysterious displays had corresponding messages printed in the instructions that were just as undecipherable, startling and totally useless to common folks like us. Before I get into any challenging driving, I will need to get the trailer to a repair facility so smarter folks can exorcise the demons.

We left Wilderness Lakes in Menifee this morning and drove north through Angeles National Forest lands up I-215 & I-15 until we got pretty close to a place called Cajon Junction. We then turned northwest on CA-138, skirting the San Gabriel Mountains, until we got to Acton and pulled into the Soledad Canyon Thousand Trails facility. It rained quite a bit more than normal in this desert this year and the campground is now two separate campgrounds because runoff lahars took out the campground road. We pulled into a spot and set up in the warm temperatures.

Soledad Canyon TT is sort of run-down and one entire campground loop with about 50 or 75 spaces is closed entirely. Power from the park’s pedestals is iffy and those pedestals without power are not marked so we relied on some neighboring campers who directed us to a spot where someone had just departed and they had been using the park’s power. Lots of pinon pines, oaks and cottonwood trees here but if it wasn’t for irrigation and the adjacent Santa Clara River, this would be a dusty gravel lot with nice restrooms, shower facilities, pools, a pond, adult and kid centers, no Wifi and lots of desert dwellers. Some have teeth.

Yesterday we hooked up the truck to the trailer brakes and our initial assessment that something was awry with the trailer brakes was correct. We suspected something was fishy with the brakes when we pulled into Wilderness Lakes Thousand Trails two days ago and the brakes were non-existent. My belief that I am an electrical Einstein notwithstanding, I started calling around for mobile RV repair guys (it’s Easter Sunday) but was soundly defeated in my attempts to speak with anyone other than recording machines. Goddamn Christians.

However, this morning I called all the mobile RV repair guys and was fortunate to get ahold of Mike Townsend Mobile RV Repair. About 90 minutes after calling, a service tech and helper showed up in a fully loaded tool truck. In about half an hour, the service guy had isolated the problem and ordered the parts. In order that he not be required to return, I will pick up the parts at his shop tomorrow and bring them back here. Since our problems were minor, he showed us how to install the stuff (it is plug-n-play) and I will attempt to show how smart I am by plugging them in.

Peggy also tricked me (she asked) into going over to the enormous Hemet Walmart where we got some food but. more importantly, dissolving RV toilet paper. Sometimes it dissolves when you are using it but it doesn’t clog the finicky and sensitive RV sewer system aboard our fifth wheel.

Recently we have been getting up earlier (for us), awakened by my cell phone’s alarm with a truly obnoxious rooster crowing noise that makes me almost jump up and salute. It works well. Today, here in attraction-free Menifee, CA, we used our early morning hours to pop down to Les Schwab so we could give them 1.4 kilobucks for brand new truck tires and wheel alignment before we get very far into the boonies. We also made it to a small watch repair shop in an extraordinarily large shopping mall. The shopping mall even had a little locomotive operated by a tubby guy in yellow overalls. It was pulling a few small wooden cars filled with kids doing all kinds of kid stuff while riding. After 30 minutes, the watch repair guy handed me back my formerly cheap Casio watch with new parts and pins and stuff.

After much confusion over how to get around in Temecula, we elected to drive to Costco where we got cheap diesel and Irish Cream coffee additive. Peggy was able to get all the way across Costco twice, check out and exit the store before I could finish with filling the fuel tank, partly due to the Temecula locals who see nothing wrong with clogging all roads in all directions while auto-stalking shoppers making their way back to their suburbanite SUVs. Gridlock reigned in the parking lot.

We decided we had already had as much fun as we could stand so we took our loot back to Wilderness Lakes where we set in for some extended malingering. There is also a little train here that chugs around between expensive RVs. It is half again as big as the train in the shopping center so the train cars are larger requiring adults to ride as well as kids. The park also has great birds hanging out near the green water ditches. Canadian geese, some big swans, ducks and night herons can be spotted scooting about between the RVs scavenging bread crumbs from the whole crowd.