TOUR AMERICA, 2021: INLAND HARBOR RV PARK, GEORGIA

Saturday April 3, 2021

Temperature Low 38 Degrees High 65 Degrees

We Went Dark This Morning – And Not By Choice

Ah, a nice cold, crisp morning is what we awoke to. Yet, we were warm and snug inside Elvira. Tiny Tim was doing his thing. I had a blanket on my lap. Just another normal morning for these two nomads. At first. But that was soon to change.

I was up first and messed about on the computer for a bit. Around 8 am Ms. Barbara got up. She got busy preparing some cinnamon rolls for breakfast. Next, she decided to make a pot of coffee. And that is when things took a turn for the worse. That is when we went dark.

Just as soon as she turned the coffee pot on we lost all electric. Now remember it is 38 degrees outside and with no electric heater things were about to get cold real quick. Of course, I never thought of turning the furnace on. After all we still had 12 volt and a full tank of propane.

But we soon came up with a solution. I turned the inverter on to keep our residential refrigerator on. Then I ran an extension cord from the 110 outlet on the power pedestal in through a window to power up Tiny Tim. OK, we had heat and we were not going to loose any food.

Time to figure out what happened. Also, time to figure out if there was a mobile RV tech available on a Saturday morning. I started checking breakers at the pedestal and at the main break box. All were OK. Ms Barbara made a phone call and got an RV tech on the phone, actually she woke him up! Believe it or not he said he would be over to check things out within an hour. True to his word he arrived within the hour.

He quickly determined that we did indeed have power coming in from the pedestal. He also determined we had power inside at the main breaker box. What in the world? It would stand to reason then that we should have power to everything 110 in the rig. Yet, we didn’t. He was just about out of ideas.

The, all of a sudden everything came back on. What? His brother who was outside had figured out that the breaker on the converter had tripped. He reset it and we were back in business.

The big and yet unanswered question is Why did it trip instead of a breaker inside in the main box? Also, Why is that if the converter is not working there is no power in the coach? Well, no one had an answer to either question. Now, some would say, It works so leave it at that. Not good enough for me. I have to know so come Monday I’m going to make a few phone calls to try and discover that happened and why.

As for the culprit that caused the whole issue, we believe it was the coffee pot. It had been acting weird during the last several days.

So we made decision to deep six the old pot.

We made a quick trip to Walmart.

There we purchased a new coffee pot. Tonight, we filled it with water, crossed our fingers, and turned it on to clean it before actually using it. Thankfully, we didn’t have an issue. Which tells me the outlet is good. It had to be the coffee pot. That, at least, for now is what I’m telling myself.

While at Walmart we also purchased two feet warmers. In the morning our tile floor is really, really cold. You don’t want to put your feet on the floor, oh no, no, no! Slippers help a bit. But more was needed when we were sitting in our chairs and couldn’t put our feet up. Ms Barbara found and purchased two really thick place mats, yes place mats. They work like a charm! Amazing isn’t it, the simplest things often turn out to be the biggest problem solvers.

OK, I was going to finish up Jekyll Island tonight but I’ll save that for a bit later. But before I forget,

I could not leave the Island without a new T-shirt and a new turtle. In fact, there is a turtle sanctuary on the Island and we’ll be going back to visit it hopefully on Monday or Tuesday.

That then was our day on The Road of Retirement. It started with a blackout yet ended with all lights back on. Thankfully. Of course given the strain of the morning, before we went to Walmart there was only one thing to do – take a nap! One more thing, have you ever tried to get an RV tech out on a weekend? You know what I mean. Which leads me to say again we are two of the most blessed and fortunate people in the world.

Thanks for taking the time to read our blog.  We always appreciate your company, your comments, and your suggestions. Keep safe, keep healthy, live to the fullest the days that God gives you.

These are the voyages of  Elvira and her two intrepid travelers.  Our continuing mission: to explore as many new states as possible, to seek out new acquaintances and make new friends, to boldly go where we have never been before.

See you on down the road!