Hi Sweetie!
Finally got back on the road again, YAY!! I feel like I wasted so much time these past few months, but ultimately, I guess I got a lot done in retrospect. The trailer is in much better working order with the slide-out repair, new ramp rubber and new awning, the truck has new suspension and shocks and a new brake booster, and I’ve got a new knee that I hope will eventually work better than the old one, so it’s all good! I got up bright and early, though, in order to try bleeding the power steering fluid, something in the system just doesn’t feel quite right, so I spent an hour doing that, then going for a test drive, and even though the power steering still feels a bit tight, the brake problem I was having seemed to disappear. I’m more worried about brakes right now, I can live with slightly harder steering for now. So I managed to get everything packed up and ready to got by about 11:45, then all I had to do was catch the horses. Flash trotted away from me once, but didn’t go far and I managed to catch him without much trouble and got him loaded, and he did great going up the new ramp, no slipping at all! Apollo was so funny, that after I got Flash tied in and closed the partition, I just stepped out of the way and pointed, and Apollo climbed right in, no halter, no lead, no nothing! I get him tied in then off we went, just before noon. It only took us about an hour and fifteen minutes to reach Sebastian Ranch Camp, and finding the campsite was easy. There are four nice little wooden paddocks, mostly covered, so it didn’t take me long to get hay out for them, but I really had a problem with water. They have one spigot of non-potable water that was so crusted up I couldn’t get the hose off, and the hose was too short to reach any of the paddocks except the nearest one. I had to carry buckets of water over to fill Apollo’s bucket, and took about fifteen minutes maneuvering the trailer close enough to reach it, it could barely reach so I had to bungee it in. I called the office and they managed to get a volunteer, Joe, out about an hour later, and because the hose was so short, the water was getting blocked by an air block of some kind, and it had only gone up from empty to about a third by the time he got there. He saw the problem and went back to his shop and managed to find a longer hose and some channel locks (which I had tried but was afraid I would break it, and didn’t want to destroy it, leave that for them!), but he managed to get the hose off and replace it with one that had a splitter. He said he’d leave it on for the week for me, take it off later. Anyway, that whole deal took me to after 4:00 before I was even able to complete the filling up of the trailer tank, so now I had to move the trailer over. I was hoping there would be some shade, but there wasn’t really, so I focused on getting the best placement to get the most breeze, so I pointed the back end northwest, so I could catch the east wind that’s coming through today and tomorrow, and hopefully wind from just about anywhere else to some degree. Anyway, got out my rug and chairs and my solar panel, then went down and got my permit paid at what they call the “bunkhouse” and was back in camp by 5:00, ready to settle down. I sat out in one of my chairs for a bit, suddenly Lola perked up and I saw her looking at a deer come into view, then a few moments another one, then another, and another! They were a good 100 yards off, but it was nice to see wildlife. Fortunately, it’s far enough from the freeway not to hear any noise, so I expect it to be nice and quiet tonight, apparently there are no other campers here except me and Joe (down at the bunkhouse), and he closes the gates at sunset, so no traffic either. With temps in the low 60’s, should be perfect sleeping weather! Anyway, enough rambling, I’m just so glad to be back on the road, doing my own thing! Lola had a good walkabout, we fetched for a bit, had dinner, now I’m ready for an early night, just a quick shower and off the bed! Love you, my darlin’! Good night!
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