Glad everyone is home safe (Jim and Barb were headed to Myakka River SP).

Little Nelson is much improved; he had a quiet night and the bleeding has stopped.

Now I need the rain to stop so I can clean up the coach from the rest of Nelson's "accidents"...

Here's a little peak of the drive into the park.


The open firepit site beside Danny.


Danny's Euro


Jim and Barb's Regency


Deb and Ed's coach with Ed and Rusty


This is what Wayne and BJ replaced the Barth with


DougZ's Airstream with Doug talking to Lenny while smoking a pork butt.


Lenny and Judy's Regency


Steve VW and his Regal


Rusty's Breakaway


Our Trailer with Sherrie holding down the fort



Here's the team photo after dinner Sat. night


Barb getting a little out of hand celebrating their 50th Anniversary. Congrats!

Great pictures.

Thanks
Deb & Ed.

Super pics. I finally got to see the faces of those folks I never got to meet personally. Maybe someday in the future we'll cross trails again....

Many thanks to all at the GTG for all the fun.
Thanks to Dan for starting this event, thanks to Bill for the pictures, a special thanks to ED & Deb, and thanks to all for the toast of wine on our 50th wed. celebration.

We departed Monday at 11:38am for Myakka SP for a five day stay. Weather great, traffic light and driving good.
At 1:00pm turned onto to exit 205 and at 1:10pm we are on Clark road at the first stop light. Eight miles to go and we will be at Myakka SP, the light says go and yet we don't.
OH NO! Upon checking found the left U-joint tube to the axle snapped in half. My thoughts refect back Ed at the GTG when he said it is always better to replace both sides if one side had broken, need I say more.
We call Good Sams towing service, and call the Sheriffs office that we are blocking one lane.
I quickly detach the Jeep and put out my three warning triangles and the Sarasota traffic unit pulls up.
Now 2:48pm and no info from Good Sams.
Now 3:38pm still no tow truck. Talked to Good Sams--look I need a tow truck, she says she may have a provider that can repair your motorhome in Bradenton(I live south of Sarasota. Bradenton is north). For the third or forth time I tell her it cannot be repaired overnight or even in the next week. I need a tow truck to take it to my service center.
She then says well after 47 miles you will have to pay $6 a mile. I tell her again -send me a tow truck. ((I'll have to be honest- I had never had a problem with them before))
Now 4:32pm Sheriff's Office is asking when is the tow truck coming and I tell them I have been on the phone and the girl is getting one.
I called Good Sams again and talked to customer service to have them check on who's coming and he advises, she hasn't found one yet. I tell them to cancell and made contact with Promt Towing in Charlotte County, time is now 4:57pm.
At 7:00pm Prompt Towing arrives and by the time he had to remove the broken parts, then detach the drive shaft and hook up it is now 10:00pm.
Now 11:00pm and we have parked at my service center.
Now 12:00 Midnight and we are home after unloading the frig. and some items from the Barth.

I forgot one thing- about 1:15pm I called Myakka SP and said while I am on Clark road only eight miles away I need to cancell-

It's not the destination- it's the journey and memories made. and Barb sezs YEAH RIGHT! & Champ agrees.

Addition to the above:
This new year is looking good. This week the parts came in for the Regency and it is fixed & ready to be picked up.
Another very great thing happened, Good Sams Road Service called me the other day and said they are sending me a check to cover my tow bill. WOW! what a pleasent surprise. The gentleman that talked to me was so courteous and understood how frustrated I must have been at the time.

Jim & Barb

Jim:

Glad you got home safe.

Sorry to hear about your trouble cause I've been there and done that. Good luck with the repair.

ED.

Ed, like you said I should have replaced both at the same time.

Barb did get some great photos of the canoe trip.
I will be emailing Rusty with one of the pictures to see if Barb sized it correctly. If it is good I think she has 6 photos to add.

Just got back to downstate Mi. 2350 miles round trip, still have to get back to Kalkaska.

An awesome trip! Left here in the 20's, we had 80's in Florida, here tonight it is 18 degrees!

Saturday evening: a fine meal



a fine group







we were all friends until after the gift exchange...



Great place, great times, great people. It was worth the drive.

As usual, some fiddling was involved...
On the way south, in Kentucky, the "check engine" light for the fuel injection went on. Hmm... O2 sensor is fouled. Swapped in new sensor (5 min job) Still too rich so I put in the smaller fuel injectors I had. (1/2 hour job) Now too lean with Chip #2 but I reinstalled the original chip #1 (10 min) and hit the jack pot. Fuel injection is now tweaked in perfectly. (I even get 7 mpg now and then!)

Ran the rest of the way south, no trouble. Decided now that the fuel mixture is correct, put in the new plugs. (confessions: managed to swap #5 and #7 wires, didn't notice till we left the park)
Mon morning, we pulled over, swapped wires back, running good.

Tues: Old reliable left side Thorley header develops a cracked weld... stopped for lunch, had some soup, used soup can and two clamps to cover the crack. Made it home OK!

After our usual 4 hour delay getting through traffic backups in Georgia (both ways!), it was too late to get to Tom and Nancy's place so we took our cracked pipes and rolled on to central Kentucky.

Wed: no problems, just snow and cold. Obligatory salt bath in Ohio...



I can't blame you guys... you told me not to come back.

Thanks to all who made it, we enjoyed meeting everyone. Thanks Danny, for the tradition (hope we're not kicked out by the other Mi people!), Suzy for the excellent breakfast, thanks Deb and Ed for the great seafood!

Great time!

quote:

Tues: Old reliable left side Thorley header develops a cracked weld... stopped for lunch, had some soup, used soup can and two clamps to cover the crack. Made it home OK!

That epitomizes guys like you, Steve -- remarkable!

glad you made it safely back to join your COLD fellow Wolverines (single digits tonight).

Glad everyone Made it home safe, Sorry about the problems. It was great to be at the GTG, now I have to see if Rusty drums us out of the site lol.
Wayne and BJ and the "Barth" Itasca Solei.

quote:

place so we took our cracked pipes and rolled on to central Kentucky.

......better than "crack pipes"

First I am glad everyone made it home safely and Nelson is feeling better. Bloody diarrea is serious, we lost our little Schnauzer Valerie at age of 10 to hemorragic gastroenteritis (within 48 hours and Vet treatment).
Jim and Barb, we sure feel with you. We have Coach Net Road Service and when we broke down due to a fuel sensor on our CAT in the gorge on I40 in NC (on the V split of an exit ramp in the dark and 20sF) we got the silliest girl on the phone you can imagine. She giggled like it was funny, finally managed to send a Road Samaritan truck with blinking lights out there, but it took her hours to find a tow truck. There were two tow truck going right by. She asked me if I knew a towing company. And all was accompanied by laughing and giggling.

I believe they try to trick you into calling your own tow truck. $4/mi is about the going rate. We held out and finally got a truck to tow us to a motel (!!!!) because they cannot drop the MH after hours at a repair facility. The next morning they came back and towed us the rest of the way (1 mile LOL) up the hill to the Kenworth dealer ship in Asheville NC.

We complained about the bad treatment, you sure do not need a silly laughing girl on the phone. And hours (approx. 4 hrs until a truck was found - he said he was not doing anything earlier ....).
We used them two times before (once with Barth, one time with our private pickup and had absolutely no problem).

Barb's Pix