Sunday arrived at 3:30 am local time for this Midwesterner.  We packed up and headed to the bus around 9 am.  I had the perfect timeline laid out.  Take rental car to the bus(35 minutes), move bus to the campground (1 hour), meet Joel’s cousin Bob to get the car (20 minutes), pick up pizza (45 min-1 hour away), host reunion with Joel’s family at cousin Pat’s at 1 pm.  Really??   Who is so optimistic that they plan to do all of that in 4 hours time?  Seriously flawed planning.

We arrived at the storage facility, couldn’t remember the code.  There’s snow on the ground and the bus won’t start.  Good thing we winterized.  Couldn’t find the jumper cables.  Must be in the car.  Call Cousin Bob.  Cousin Bob let’s us know there’s ice inside the battery, car won’t start and there’s no cables in the car.  Great news.

Joel returns to the search and finds the cables along with moldy lawn furniture in bus basement.  Tried to jump RV – no luck.  It starts drizzling.  It’s Seattle, remember?

Here we are,  the bus won’t start.  Everything is wet, cold and soggy.  We spy an outlet and  plug in the bus to get the heat on.  The storage people materialize to check things out.  Probably saw us on their closed circuit TV.  They are gracious and sympathetic.

We call road service… could be a bit.  Did we want a jump or a mechanic?  Not again.  Sounded like our Glacier Park breakdown experience.  I don’t fall for it.  Bring on the jump.  No way did we need a mechanic.  I have a resident handy man. They suggest we use the back up power button.  Cool!  We have a backup power button!

I give the phone to Joel.  He’s not enthusiastic.  Doesn’t work if all batteries are dead.  You see, I insisted on a sonic critter control device after my experience storing the bus in Arizona.  Joel designed a system and hooked up our auxiliary batteries to power the device.  He set up a solar panel to recharge the batteries.  Worked like a charm except without sun the batteries didn’t charge.  The solar collector needs sun to collect energy.  No critters though.

RV lesson of the day – Paranoia of past problems is not good logic for present conditions.  Check local climate . i.e. Seattle is not Arizona.

In the meantime, we trickle charged the battery from the rental car and hoped to get things going from there. Oops,  heat out.  Furnace no longer firing.  Ugggh.  No problem.  We have an electric heater.  Electric steps not working, neither is the control panel.  Get out owner’s manual.  Check the switch for auxiliary power.

Joel starts running around, calls his cousin and seeks help from his friend Mike.  It rains harder.  I start unloading my 5 suitcases.  Joel starts wondering about pizza orders and details on our Eagle viewing trip amidst concerns on tow dolly prep, misplaced keys and loss of power.  He jumped from the jumping of the RV, to fixing the furnace to why wasn’t the power step working?   It was quite chaotic.

I start saying things like, ” focus”, “get a grip”, “who doesn’t plan for issues?”, “your family won’t care if we’re late”.  Not very helpful.  He got frustrated. I got out the owner’s manual.  We checked the fuses and tried to decipher the problem.  I managed to reset something, somehow and the furnace kicked on, the steps started working.  Loose wires.

We eventually got the bus started and moved to the campground.  Joel was able to traverse the ice covered roof and get the solar critter system detached.  We ordered the pizza.  Turns out the pizza place was located next to an auto parts store.  We bought a battery for the car.  It continued to rain.

We had a delightful visit with Joel’s Uncle Paul and his west coast cousins.  Interesting conversation and camaraderie.  Fascinating to see the differences and similarities between the Midwest and west coast family.  We picked up the car, dropped off our rental and made it back to the camp.  Of course the car is running badly but Joel has a plan for tomorrow.  Better stop at Safeway and get milk, coffee and beer.

We did it.  We kept our sense of humor and look forward to the Great Circle Tour.  Interestingly enough we left Seattle in the fall during the storm of the 1/2 century and returned in January to the West Coasts storm of the century.  Strange coincidence.

RV Lesson  – Don’t plan too much on the restart day.  You might have complications.