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Ahead of the Weather
Jan. 30th, 2016 06:06 pmTo my surprise, the storm that dumped a pile of rain on me as I came west yesterday did not drop enough snow on Donner Summit to cause chain conditions to be imposed, although looking at the next 24 hours' forecast, I still expect that had I waited until Sunday (my usual departure day) to make the trip, I would have gotten stuck on the wrong side of the mountains.
Having come down two days early and thus having 2 1/2 days to make a trip that usually takes me about 8 hours meant a lot less travel stress. I slept in this morning by my standards. Any residual fears I might have had about being rousted from the Yuba City Walmart parking lot (not all Walmarts allow overnight RV parking; it's a store-by-store policy, contrary to popular notions) were laid to rest when I got up this morning and saw five other RVs nearby, one of which that had deployed the slide-out on their fifth-wheel travel trailer.
As seems typical for me, I forgot a couple of small toiletry items (I left the bag in which they were stored behind), but they were all things I could replace easily in the store, and I thus again paid a fair-by-my-lights price to Walmart for them allowing me the use of their parking lot overnight. Alas, no Bay Area Walmarts are this generous; however, there are on-street parking locations in several places where I feel generally good about parking overnight, especially if I don't spend consecutive nights there.
Having arrived with plenty of time this afternoon, I took the opportunity to get the oil changed in the Rolling Stone this afternoon. It had been 5000 miles since the last oil change and about 17,000 miles since we bought the RV. I initially estimated that I'd log about 15,000 miles/year in the Rolling Stone, but it's working out to less than that. I probably should go talk to our insurance agent about that and probably simultaneously increase the miles traveled on the Astro on account of we seem to be making at least one long road trip per year.
I've taken advantage of the wi-fi at Suju's Coffee in Fremont this evening, and feel no guilt at all about it, inasmuch as besides the coffee and scone I just had, I bought a pound of their coffee beans for use when I get home next week.
Having come down two days early and thus having 2 1/2 days to make a trip that usually takes me about 8 hours meant a lot less travel stress. I slept in this morning by my standards. Any residual fears I might have had about being rousted from the Yuba City Walmart parking lot (not all Walmarts allow overnight RV parking; it's a store-by-store policy, contrary to popular notions) were laid to rest when I got up this morning and saw five other RVs nearby, one of which that had deployed the slide-out on their fifth-wheel travel trailer.
As seems typical for me, I forgot a couple of small toiletry items (I left the bag in which they were stored behind), but they were all things I could replace easily in the store, and I thus again paid a fair-by-my-lights price to Walmart for them allowing me the use of their parking lot overnight. Alas, no Bay Area Walmarts are this generous; however, there are on-street parking locations in several places where I feel generally good about parking overnight, especially if I don't spend consecutive nights there.
Having arrived with plenty of time this afternoon, I took the opportunity to get the oil changed in the Rolling Stone this afternoon. It had been 5000 miles since the last oil change and about 17,000 miles since we bought the RV. I initially estimated that I'd log about 15,000 miles/year in the Rolling Stone, but it's working out to less than that. I probably should go talk to our insurance agent about that and probably simultaneously increase the miles traveled on the Astro on account of we seem to be making at least one long road trip per year.
I've taken advantage of the wi-fi at Suju's Coffee in Fremont this evening, and feel no guilt at all about it, inasmuch as besides the coffee and scone I just had, I bought a pound of their coffee beans for use when I get home next week.
