Road Kill

I guess it had to happen somewhere.  The story wouldn’t be complete without a tale of an RV breakdown in the middle of nowhere.  When you drive an earthquake down the road, something is bound to break.  Although this particular breakdown is not a uniquely RV-type thing.  I’ve had one of these break on nearly every vehicle I have owned.

We got up on time this morning, hoping to make it to Panama City by early afternoon.  After breakfast, we got everything flight-ready and I started the engine.  Everything sounded normal but the battery light was on.  I checked the battery voltage: 11.9.  Too low.  Should be close to 14.  So the battery wasn’t charging.  Probably a bad alternator.

Here is where God’s providence was very evident.  We were parked in a campground with full hookups, not along some freeway somewhere.  The weather was a balmy 70 degrees and sunny.  Most of our friends that we had camped here with over the last few weeks were still here.  So we got to hang out with our friends for a while. And those friends for the most part had every imaginable tool along with them.

Denny was the first to notice the hood up.  He came over and after talking with him a bit, he agreed that it probably was the alternator.  It’s good to have confirmation from a former mechanic.  I called around to a couple auto parts stores.  I found one that could have the part in by 11am.  Jim offered to give me a ride there.  Bob brought over a mat so I could crawl under the RV and remove the old alternator.  Since I’ve worked on this engine before, taking the alternator out didn’t take long.  I had Deb take a picture of me holding the bad part with a nod to a similar picture, taken nearly 24 years ago, of me holding a starter that I had just removed from a 1978 Winnebago.

January, 2023, Mascotte, Florida, alternator failure, 2008 Itasca

July, 1999, Dubois, Wyoming, starter failure, 1978 Winnebago

Jim drove me to Advance Auto Parts in Clermont, just over a half-hour drive away.  It took all of two minutes to pay for the part and we were out the door, driving back.  It took probably 15 minutes to install the new part.

This time, when I started the engine, the idiot light was off.  I love it when a plan comes together.

So now we’re about four hours behind schedule, but there was still time to make it to Panama City.  We had lunch in the campground, said goodbye to our friends again, and took off.

We were planning on taking a couple of the more minor roads, as I really would rather not take the Interstates, but because of our unplanned service job, we took the Interstate.  It does save some time.

We only made one stop, and that was in Tallahassee for fuel and to make dinner in a supermarket parking lot.  Otherwise it was pedal-to-the-metal for the entire six-hour trip.  We arrived here at St Andrews State Park at just after 8pm, happy to shut it down and walk out side for a while.

This campground is right along one of the waterways adjoining St Andrews Bay and many sites back right up to the water.  Ours is not one of them, but it is close.  We walked the campground, enjoying the lights across the bay and coolness of the evening after the heat of the day. 

On our walk, we ran across one of the campground hosts and we chatted with them for a while.  They had lots of suggestions on what to do right in this area so we have a rather big list for tomorrow.