Our Repairs Are Done

Boy, it has been a crazy three weeks!  We left Lancaster, PA and drove to Elkhart, IN to get our hail damage fixed.  We had some mechanical issues on that trip and our tow bar broke, too. Dad had it rebuilt for $350 instead of buying a new one for $800.  We stayed in a hotel for ten days.  I experienced elevators, stairs and other strange things.  Then, we drove to Entegra in Middlebury, IN for more repairs.  Mom thought it was going to be terrible, but once she found out that I could go into the lounge, it wasn't bad at all.  No one actually said it was okay for me to be in the lounge, but no one told me to leave either.  The folks are very pleased with all the work that was done.  53 items were repaired or explained to us.  That is a lot for four and a half days. We left Elkhart around 11 a.m. on Friday.

We are now in our new location.  Any guesses where we are?

We passed through St. Louis.

We experienced a freezing morning on Sunday.  Our waterlines froze. No showers for the folks.

This rest area in Missouri is interesting.  It looks like a little town.

We stayed at a campground in Oklahoma City that we stayed at a few years ago.  It was demolished by a tornado and has been re-built.  Mom said it was eerie to be there knowing a tornado had destroyed it.

Okay, this is a big clue.  BOL!

We have been to this area before but the last time we stayed at the campground with the alpacas.  We are about an hour from Dad's work, so we are trying to get a place closer.  We are on wait lists because everything is booked up.  This is not really a winter destination, but there are a lot of claim adjusters dealing with storm damage from earlier this year.  We were in this area when we had our hail damage.

Our driveway is long.  Most are not level. 

Mom and I enjoyed the warm weather this morning.

I even enjoyed the sun for a while.

The campground is okay.  It is a pretty basic place.  No cable.  😞  We have our satellite but Mom likes to watch cable in the bedroom while Dad watches his violent movies.  There is a fenced dog area that is the perfect size for me.  The fishing pond is nice.  Mom will not be riding Buddy because there are not any side roads for her to take.  She would have to get on the feeder road and the speed limit is 55.  Buddy only goes 45 mph unless he is going downhill and then he goes faster.  We are about 10 miles away from shopping.  It seems like a very quiet place.  We were told they had one spot left, but there are quite a few empty spaces.  Hopefully, we will be able to move closer to Dad's work soon.

It is nice to be parked for a while.  It looks like we will all be together for the holidays and winter this year.  😄

Joey,
The Greyhound Who Is Happy To Be Parked Again

Just Lounging Around

We have been at Entegra since Friday night.  The sign on the door said I wasn't allowed, but another customer said I should just walk in and lay down.  That is what I did.  We have a rep that schedules all our work and keeps track of the progress. She came out and met me and didn't say anything about me being in the lounge.  On Tuesday, they held a class in the lounge and since it was a rainy day, I went to class. Donuts were served.  Yum!  There has been a lab here, so I am not the only dog violating the rules. The head of customer service used to have a greyhound and she has said "Hi" to me each day, so I guess it is not an issue since I am so good.  I get talked to by most of the customers. They are amazed that I am so quiet.

We sat outside for a while on Monday since it was nice out.

 Each morning, we have to be ready for the tech.  We have to have all the slides in and ready for him to drive it away at 6:30 a.m.  That means that each morning we put everything away and at night, we put everything back out.  The days are long, but it has been fun being in the lounge.  It is not as boring as you would think since most of the customers are here for a week and we just sit around and talk and watch TV.  We go to lunch each day.  I really like this type of living.

The parking lot looks sad with all the motor homes gone.

 We have been very happy with everything that has been fixed.  Our Samsung microwave/convection oven has had problems since almost the beginning.  It had trouble heating up. So, they gave us a new Whirlpool microwave/convection oven.  We had thirty things on our list that needed to be fixed.  I can't remember them all, but I will try to list what has been fixed.  The screen door, the front door now will stay open when we want it to do so, radio antenna (didn't know it was broke), three new windows were installed (we didn't know they were a problem), shower trim replaced, washing machine fixed, cabinets sanded and touched up, new windshield wipers and arms, cracked floor tiles replaced, aqua hot pump replaced (we now have heat!), big slide was adjusted, outside lights replaced, shade motors replaced and shades adjusted so they are even when up and some other mechanical things that Mom and I don't understand.  I know there are other things that have been fixed but I can't remember.  Today, they are working on our toilet, bedroom slide, our couch. The couch is "L" shaped and when we travel, the "L" part has to be pushed in. The lock broke, so it doesn't stay in.  Our chairs are getting new fabric.  We were taught how to use our remote for the slides and our auto door lock is being programmed for us.

The rigs are brought back to their sites after 3 p.m. each day. Sometimes it is after 4 p.m. We usually talk to our tech to see what has been accomplished.  Our rep meets with us in the morning to go over what is scheduled for the day.  It is very organized.

Our new microwave.

Tuesday, listening to the class.

I moved off the rug.

Back on the rug.

The customer lounge is really nice.

There I am. See me?

Joey,
The Greyhound Who Likes Living At Entegra

From Hotel Living To Parking Lot Living

Sometimes you have to look up.

It can be very interesting.

Any guesses what had my attention for five minutes and made my body tremble?

Yep, it is a squirrel.

Yesterday was moving day!!!!

Do you think Mom over packed?

Checking to make sure my stuff has been packed.

We drove to the body shop and waited inside while they put the finishing touches on our home.

I was a perfect guest, don't you think?

Precision Painting did a great job on our rig.  They were able to finish it on time even though we arrived two days late.  They kept us informed and were very nice.

Finally, it was time to head to Entegra.  We will be there for a week getting other repairs made. I am a little disappointed as I thought we would be in a campground.  There are other rigs here. We are actually in a parking lot!  Mom and Dad knew, but I didn't.

Ahhh....it is nice to be home again.

Here I am checking out my site.

Boring!

Here are the other campers.

 Actually, there is a nice dog park here.  This morning at 4 a.m., I ran and ran and ran.  BOL!

My couch!!!!  I love my couch!

They start working on our rig on Monday.  It will be a long week as we have to be out of the rig at 6:30 a.m. each day.  There is a sign on Entegra's door saying "For the enjoyment of all our customers, no dogs OVER 30 POUNDS are allowed in the lounge." Well, we are customers and it definitely doesn't add to enjoyment if I am not allowed in the lounge.  A guy that Mom talked to at the body shop said he had just left Entegra and they allowed a lady with a lab and a boxer in the lounge, so maybe they will allow me.  Stay tuned.

Joey,
The Greyhound Who Is Happy To Have His Couch Back

Sunday Was NOT A Relaxing Drive

Saturday we left Lancaster for Elkhart, IN.  It was a windy, rainy day.  We thought Sunday would be an easy drive.  It was not.  We stopped about 30 minutes into our drive at a truck stop.  It looked like a really easy place to get propane.  It would have been, but a warning light came on the RV when we arrived.  We parked and tried to find out what the warning light meant.  Dad looked in the manual and Mom looked online.  Mom looked up what Dad thought it was and found something very upsetting on a forum.  It said to turn off the engine because a fire could start.  Dad didn't want to turn off the engine and Mom got scared because we were parked in the middle of tractor trailers.  Mom then called the emergency helpline for Entegra.  Dad told them the problem and we were told to continue on our trip.  There was not a repair place nearby and if we couldn't drive it in, we would need to be towed. We had 297 miles to go.  We went about 30 miles and then our engine light came on.  We stopped at the next available rest area and called the emergency line again.  Again, we were told to keep going.

Very happy to cross the border into Indiana.  We still had a long drive ahead of us though.

 We were told the only reason to stop driving was if the stop engine light came on.  We decided not to stop for lunch. Mom fixed Dad a sandwich and he ate it while driving.  We were starting to get hopeful that we would make it and then 30 miles from the campground, the DEF light starting flashing.  We figured that was a signal that we would start loosing power soon and would be stuck along the road.  We knew that eventually the DEF issue would reduce our speed to about 10 miles an hour.   Finally, we arrived at our campground. Dad decided to leave the engine running while he registered at the campground.  He thought if he turned it off, we would get the stop engine light. We finally arrived at our site.  That was a HUGE relief.

We camped here in April for the Entegra rally.  There is a ton of walking places.

After we got settled in the site. The folks left to see how far the Cummins repair place was because that is where we needed to go for repairs.  It was ten miles away.  They then drove to the body shop to see how far that was and it was 30 miles.

Dad called the tech that had been helping us on the road and let him know we made it.  He said that we should just go on to the body shop on Monday and then as long as the stop engine light was not on, we could take it to Entegra when we go for other repairs in two weeks and they would be able to fix it.

Sunday night, we packed the car with everything we needed for our hotel stay since we would not be staying in the RV while it was at the body shop.  Our big outdoor chairs were brought into the bathroom because they normally ride in the Jeep and there wasn't room for them, me and our luggage. We were all ready to go. Dad started the engine and the stop engine light came on.  Grrrr!   Dad called Entegra who talked to him for a while. They put him on a conference call with the Cummins place, but that guy was on the phone, so he wasn't available.  We waited for him to call us back, but he didn't.  Dad then just drove the Jeep there to try and get things moving along.  Well, the news was not good.  They could not get us in until November 14th!   More phone calls and more waiting. There was talk that maybe we should just drive it to Entegra.  We finally heard that a mobile tech could come out to us, but it would not be until Tuesday. It was possible that he might come Monday afternoon. We had to pay for another day of rent at the campground and change our hotel reservation.  We were hoping it could be fixed and that our body work could still be completed on time.  Lots of stress.  We had to unpack some of the things we had packed in the Jeep.

Monday night ended up being a very cold night. It was 31.  Our main furnace is broke.  We can use our heat pump as long as it is over 42 degrees. We used our fireplace, but it was still quite chilly.  Brrr!!!  Mom was wishing we were in a warm hotel room.

Tuesday morning we were hoping the tech would arrive early.  Dad called around 10 a.m. to see if there was an ETA.  We were told they would check but thought he would be there in the afternoon.  How could we be told it might be Monday afternoon and then pushed back to Tuesday afternoon?  We figured we would be spending another night in the campground and then, THE TECH ARRIVED!  Now the question was if he could actually fix it.  He said we would have ended up on the side of the road if we had driven it.  He said we would have been able to go 5-10 miles an hour.  He hooked up a computer and found a few issues.  Remember back in April when we had an engine light on?  We took it to a place in downtown St. Louis and they said our software just needed to be updated.  Dad never did like that answer. Anyway, our problem was part of that problem.  The tech kept checking things.  He said it could be the pump or a hose.  Mom hoped he had the necessary parts with him.  He drove an hour and a half to reach us. If he had to order parts or pick them up, that was more time we couldn't afford to loose.  Mom and I went for a long walk through the woods so that we were out of the way.  When we returned, it was fixed!  It was the pump!

We were already late checking out of the campsite.  Dad ran to the office to tell them we were leaving and to see if they were going to charge us. They did not answer the door, so we got ready and packed. They are not very friendly there.  They do not like to chit chat at all.

Dad called the body shop to make sure they could still do the work.  They said they could!  We packed up the Jeep again and took off.  I rode with Mom and we followed Dad in the RV.

The RV looks pretty sad without us.

 The body shop guy came out and talked to us.  He talked to me and he even guessed my weight correctly.  He must like to do that.  He just said "What are you? About 74 pounds?"  He seems like a nice guy and said he will have it ready for us by the middle of next week.  We need it by next Friday, so hopefully he is correct.

We then headed for the hotel.  Normally, I enter the Jeep from the rear, but since Buddy is on the Jeep, I had to use the passenger door.  It was super easy.  Mom said I may just start doing that from now on.  She is always worried I will get hurt jumping in and out.

Hotel, here we come.

Somehow I ended up with five toys. I was only supposed to have two. I think that was due to the unpacking and repacking.  

I rode the elevator like a pro and settled in quickly to hotel living.

We went out for Chinese food last night.  We brought it back to the room.  Mom and I took a few long walks around the place. There is a lot of green space.

It is a rainy day today, so I am mainly staying inside. I did get really scared on the elevator today, so I think I will do steps from now on.  The first room they gave us was on the first floor.  It was right next to a door to the outside and Mom was concerned that I might escape if an employee came in the room while I was alone. There are also automatic doors that would let me out.  We moved to the second floor where an escape is harder.  It is not like I try to escape, but you never know.  In some ways Mom wishes we were in the first room, but I know she would have worried about it the whole time.

We have a small kitchen in our room. The kitchen does not have an oven. Mom thought there might be a microwave/convection oven like we have in the RV.  There is a microwave, but she is not used to cooking meals with it.  She is going to go shopping later today and see what meals she can figure out. We will eat out quite a bit.  The microwave and cook top seem to cook faster than ours.

It sounds like I am going to be going with the folks on some adventures, so I will have more to say later.

Joey,
The Greyhound Who Slept Good Last Night