Feb 5, 2021—We head to Manteca, Ca to our Aunt Betty and Uncle Dave’s.  We are shocked that in traffic people refuse to make room for big rigs.  They clearly forget that we are bigger than them and will squash them like a bug.  This brings me to our next lesson, when fueling up always clean the windshield and front of RV even if only a few bug splats are on there.  They act like magnets and you from only having a few to not being able to see at all because there’s so many bug splatters covering it.  Also if you have a choice to fuel up at a truck stop versus the car side of the gas station always use the truck side, as the last time we tried to fill up on the car side it took us over an hour to fill up half a tank because the nozzles are so much smaller on the car side.

We are praying about the electrical fix and finally are able to get the RV into a shop in Tracy, CA.  We tell them to call us after 1 hour of work to update us so we can keep control of costs and not lose our food in the freezer.  We find a nearby park and find a place to get some exercise for the RV security and wait for the call.  When we don’t hear after 2 hours, we call them only to find out the mechanic is at lunch.  So we decide to go grab some as well.  Now 4 hours has come and gone and we call back.  They inform us it’s ready and come on in.  We went “walking and leaping and praising God,” the bill was only $300.  Apparently there was some breakers back in a hidden compartment of the engine that doesn’t show up in any manual or forum and it had a couple tripped breakers.  The mechanic tested everything after and it worked like a charm.  He also fixed an awning problem we were having.  

You see Kurt is mechanically inclined and was fairly confident it was a blown fuse or tripped breaker but without knowing where else to look was at a loss.  We felt like we had a brand new RV.  Since we had owned it the generator and inverter had not run the way it was supposed to, translation, several very cold nights while in Washington and Oregon when we were boon docking, dry camping.  

Our fridge is a residential one only which means it is just like a house fridge and always has to have electricity to keep working.  So it doesn’t use propane.  With our ongoing electrical issue we kept very little in it because we were worried it would spoil.  We were so happy!!

We stayed a few more days with our Aunt and Uncle as we had a conference to attend and wanted to make sure we had a good signal.  Thank you to our nephew who explained the cell tower situation throughout California and what we could expect and boy was he right.  Basically he said that you’ll have signal near large cities and a little bit in smaller cities, but nothing in rural areas, there’s just not enough cell towers and too many mountain ranges blocking to get a good signal throughout the large state of Califoria.  We said our goodbyes after great visits with our Aunt and Uncle and cousin Ron.  We were blessed to be able to see his new place and attend worship together.  

Now it’s on to the great unknown.