I spent Tuesday morning at the house waiting for the appraiser to arrive. I finally got tired of waiting and left at 1 PM. I found out later the appraiser used the electronic lockbox at 1:18 PM to get in the house… oh well, I’m sure it went well. I’m told we should get the report in a couple days, so we just have to wait again. Everything else is still on track though, we should close on the 1st of June 🙂
Here’s a (very wet) front-view of the house…
And the (very wet) front yard. the mountains are hidden in the low-hanging wet clouds.
View from the back deck overlooking (very wet) downtown Colorado Springs.
Are you seeing the theme here? It’s been a gloomy and very wet April so far. I don’t think we’ve seen the sun for more than a few minutes the last several days.
Here’s a couple pics of nearby Fountain creek, which is definitely getting close to overflowing. Hope this weather gets better soon.
I stopped by my old high school buddies shop, Chuck’s Auto, located on the west-side of Colorado Springs, just off 21st St. I you ever need quality work done on your car… this is the place.
I often hang out here when my buddy Mike (the owner) isn’t too busy. Unfortunately for me, he’s always busy… which is good for him (business-wise) anyway.
High school buddy, Mike… Hard at work.
On Wednesday, we hung out at the Coach and waited for long-time friends and blog-readers; Daniel and Monika Malmquist to arrive. We had made arrangements earlier in the week to go out for dinner together. We ended up at a local bar/restaurant for a decent meal and good conversation. Of course the girls chattered together in German while Dan and I got caught up.
Friends; Danny & Monika Malmquist.
Afterwards, we went back to the Elks Lodge and continued chatting in the downstairs bar. It was good to catch up with them – see you again soon Danny and Monika!
Then I drove Stilla over to our youngest daughters’ house for the night. She’s going to dog-sit for a couple days while they go out of town. Meanwhile, I will play the bachelor until Friday, which really means; I can watch whatever I want on TV 🙂
On Sunday morning we joined my Dad and stepmom Elaine at a church service in the Morgan County Fairgrounds main building with the other FCRV members.
Afterwards, a small group of us carpooled into town for a hearty breakfast. Then it was time to pack up and head out since our fun-time here has come to an end 🙁 We were supposed to be out of the fairgrounds before noon.
My Dad was hooking up his Jeep to tow as I pulled up beside him. We planned to convoy back to Colorado Springs together.
He hooked up his (new to him) Blue Ox™ towbar that he got a good deal on thru Craigslist.
And then he hooked up his RVi™ supplemental braking system. I have an older Brake Buddy™ version, this one is pretty nice, but I’d still like to get one of those Roadmaster InvisiBrake™ systems that I’ve seen at recent rallies. Maybe one of these days…
For those that are interested; here’s my Blue OX™ Aventa LX (10,000 lb) towbar hiding underneath the Roadmaster mesh tow defender that I purchased and had installed while at the FMCA Rally in Pomona. (Link HERE). I think the tow defender is doing its job protecting the front of the Silverado, but only time will tell…
My Dad followed us from the fairgrounds until we stopped for fuel at the Flying J in Limon. He was running low and needed to fill up. We had already filled up here on the way to the rally, but I used the opportunity to fit another 25 gallons into the 115 gallon tank. It’s always best to keep the tank as full as possible to head off condensation issues in the fuel tank. We know that we’ll have to spend at least another few weeks parked while we (hopefully) close on the house.
We switched it up and my Dad took over the lead after our fuel stop. We followed along behind until we got to Colorado Springs.
Pikes Peak grew larger and larger as we ticked down the miles and got closer to the Springs.
And here’s another pic of the Urban Escape Vehicle that my stepmom sent me on her phone after we took over the lead again once we were in town. Yup… it’s starting to rain again 🙁
We stayed in touch with walkie-talkies while we were on our mini-convoy; we said our farewells once we got back on I-25 and I exited on Nevada Avenue. We made it back to the Elks Lodge in Colorado Springs and were able to dump our tanks just before it started to rain hard. We then relaxed for the evening and hid out from the infrequent rain.
On Monday, I spent time at the house working off some of the minor deficiencies as a result of the home inspection that the potential buyer had conducted last Friday. We received an Inspection Objection Notice with a list of items that the buyer would either like to have fixed or he would like to receive compensation for. After working off some of the items on the list, i.e., sticking door, loose door knob, caulking and insulation on central A/C lines, etc., I consulted with my realtor and we reached a decision to give the buyer some smaller $ amount in concessions. We’re pretty sure it was the buyer’s intent all along to nit-pick on the inspection so he could get help with his closing costs. So, we submitted a response to that effect, got positive feedback from the buyers realtor, and therefore hope to be closing on or about the 1st of June 🙂
This morning (Tuesday), we are expecting an appraiser to be at the house. So I intend to brave the constant rain (it rained all night too) and go over to the house to answer any questions or do whatever might help things along… The appraisal is the last hurdle to get through on this home selling (mis)adventure. Wish us luck…
On Saturday, we joined most of the 100+ FCRV attendees here at the Morgan County Fairgrounds for a flag-raising ceremony. The flags arrived in a parade of old John Deere tractors.
After the flag-raising ceremony and accompanying musical tribute(s); we were able to peruse some of the classic agricultural-engineering-vehicles; aka “tractors”.
Checking out tractors was almost as fun as a classic car show 🙂
Then we joined the smaller group for our morning 2-mile walk again:
As we rounded the park on our walk-about, we came upon a rather large group of local boy scouts:
They were shooting up their Estes Rockets…
Several of our walking group stayed to watch some of the rocket-launching activities. We saw one go into a tree; and one got hung on a telephone cable; and another one or two, plummeted down like missiles when their parachutes didn’t open. It brought back memories of childhood… ahhh, to be young again.
Later in the day, around noon-time, we took part in the raffle and vendor sale activities in the event building. They served hot-dogs, brats, and ice-cream. We also joined many others in wandering around the grounds on a scavenger hunt. We had to find hidden flags with a flamingo on them to mark our scorecards… when complete, we turned them in for a chance to win prizes.
Then it was time for another “happy-hour”:
Just before dinnertime, we watched another storm front move into the area.
Luckily, the heavy rain passed us by and we were able to stay somewhat dry.
After another fine dinner at the events building we gathered again for announcements and door prizes. I won one of the 50/50 drawings from earlier, Yoo Hoo!… $65 dollars!
Our friend Linda, (below) won a $25 gift certificate from the previous days’ downtown scavenger hunt. Unfortunately, the certificate is only good at local establishments… and guess what? They’re all closed on Sunday and the certificate expires in a few months. Sorry Linda.
And then Stilla won the drawing for the Flamingo scavenger hunt! A $30 dollar Visa gift card. Yoo Hoo again!
Today (Sunday), we head on back to Colorado Springs. It’s been a great time with family (Dad & Stepmom Elaine), and our other friends in the FCRV group.
In other news from the home-selling front: We got the results of the home inspection that was conducted on Friday by the buyer. I was pleasantly surprised, but we have a few things to work out with the buyer. More on that in my next posting… stay tuned…
Our first full day (Friday) at the FCRV “Spring-Fling” Rally started out with a 2-mile walk for those members that wanted to go.
A rather nice, scenic route was marked for us by Rally volunteers. It went around a pond and the local park. The weather was cool but dry.
Here’s our friend Linda walking Porter… or is Porter walking Linda?
We walked past the Brush Area Museum and Cultural Center, which is a former schoolhouse built in 1912. Maybe we will find time later to check it out since it’s right next to the fairgrounds where we’re parked.
We returned to the fairgrounds after our walk-about. We logged in our miles at the events building… the miles are converted into “Brush-Bucks” that can be used to purchase FCRV related items.
We hung out at the fairgrounds most of the day except for the girls who went on a scavenger hunt of sorts, to get stamps from local businesses downtown. A drawing for prizes will be held later this weekend for those that participated.
And, then we had a little excitement just before dinnertime. We got tornado warnings on our iPhones and could see the clouds heading our way:
Pretty ominous looking, eh?
The local police even stopped by to make sure we were all aware.
We watched the whirling clouds as they got closer and closer… luckily (for us) they passed over without incident.
We put away all the chairs and tables and hunkered down to hide from the rain that we could still see coming our way after the tornado-like clouds passed. The rain, mixed with a brief hail-storm passed quickly.
We then went to the events building to enjoy a catered meal of BBQ pulled-pork.
There was also a section of “flea-market” type items for sale that we perused. Members donate the items and the proceeds go to the club. There was even a kitchen sink for sale there 🙂
We finished off our first evening with entertainment from a Father/Daughter team. They were really good, and had CDs for sale after the show.
It’s was a good morning Thursday. First-of-all; it wasn’t raining for a change. And second-of-all; we finally got a good offer on the house! I got the email from my Uncle (the realtor) as we were packing up to meet our group so we could convoy to the FCRV “Spring-Fling” Rally in Brush, CO.
We delayed our departure a little bit while I brought up the contract via email and applied our digital signatures. We got very close to our asking price with no seller concessions. Now, the only thing to worry about is the home inspection scheduled for this morning (Friday). Hopefully it appraises appropriately and the inspector doesn’t find anything expensive for me to fix that I wasn’t aware of. Our expected closing date will be the first week of June contingent on the buyer getting his existing house sold. He’s scheduled to close on his house in Canon City at the end of this month.
We were about 15 minutes late joining our convoy at the designated place (E Woodmen Rd and I-24). After hugs and greetings we all headed east on I-24 to Limon where I left the convoy to fuel up at the Flying J. Since we were going to be dry-camping (no electric or water) at the upcoming rally, I need to have at least 1/4 tank of diesel in the fuel tank or the generator won’t run. This is a built-in safety feature to prevent folks from using all their fuel while boondocking and then not being able to drive to a gas station. It’s no easy task to get a diesel engine started again after it runs out of fuel due to air in the injector lines.
After Limon, we took Hwy 71 north to Brush. We never caught back up with the group on the road, but they were still setting up when we joined them again at the Morgan County Fairgrounds.
So, about 150 miles later… we parked the Urban Escape Vehicle and joined everyone for “Happy Hour”…
Even little Coach enjoys “Happy Hour”!
After “happy hour”, we all (eight of us) went out for dinner in downtown Brush and made it back in time for Stilla to join the other girls for card bingo at the event building. No, she didn’t win big 😐
Here’s my Dad and stepmom Elaine in front of their Jeep. They towed the Jeep for the first time since he got the baseplate installed and found a good deal on a used Blue Ox tow bar.
My Dad and Stepmom Elaine.
So stay tuned… we’ll enjoy activities and the company of the FCRV group this weekend and then probably head back to Colorado Springs on Sunday. Our spot at the Elks Lodge is already paid-up until the 1st of June.
We’ve been hunkered down at the Elks Lodge in Colorado Springs hiding from the rain and hail over the last several days. Looks like we came back to Colorado a little too early 😐 Luckily, any hail we got at the Coach was only pea-sized, – no damage so far; ‘knock-on-wood’. There have been reports of damaging hail and some flooding in outlying areas… I hope our luck continues to hold out and springtime gets here soon.
Pikes Peak in the background over the Urban Escape Vehicle.
We haven’t even been able to do much at the house due to the crummy weather. Everything I need (or want) to do, requires good weather, i.e., pull dandelions/weeds; spray weed & grass killer on the landscape rocks; spread grass seed on bare spots, etc.,
At least Stilla has had plenty of opportunity to hang out with our daughters and grandson. The grandson even got to sleep-over which is always a treat for him until he gets bored and realizes that we don’ t have an X-Box 360 or Playstation 🙂
News on the home-selling front; We got an offer! However, the potential buyer has to sell his present house which (I’m told) isn’t scheduled to close until mid-June. As a matter-of-fact, we countered his offer but haven’t got a formal response yet… apparently the potential buyer wants to get through an inspection on his present house first. Meanwhile, the potential buyer has scheduled an inspection on our house for this Friday, which (I assume) is a good sign that he’s serious. While waiting; we continue to have showings; four more this past weekend. All we can do is wait and see…
In other news: We plan on joining my Dad and Stepmom this coming weekend for “Spring-Fling” with the Family Campers & RV’ers (FCRV) in Brush, CO. This is supposed to be the “kickoff to summer”… we’ll see if the summer really “kicks off” 🙂 I’ll keep you posted.
Also – a ‘shout-out’ to Daniel Malmquist who stopped by for a quick visit recently. Daniel is a long-time reader of the blog and friend. Stop by anytime Danny…
I know my readers will be disappointed; but sorry, no pictures today 😐
We’re still parked at the Colorado Springs Elks Lodge. We paid for a month-long stay here so we can; 1) Work on curb appeal at the house to help it sell, 2) visit with family, and 3) maybe save a little money until the house sells.
We spent the first couple days after arriving last Wednesday evening catching up with friends and family, which is always nice. This weekend was spent over at the house pulling weeds and mowing the lawn. Many thanks to my Dad and Stepmom Elaine, who sacrificed their Saturday helping out… ♥
We had a couple of showings at the house while we were working on the yard; one couple had nothing but good things to say, but are looking for more rooms on a single level and since two of our bedrooms are on the walkout basement level, I don’t expect an offer. However, at the risk of jinxing myself; another guy came by without his realtor, so I gave him a personal tour. I heard from my realtor last night, who told me he was contacted by that guy’s realtor, and apparently an offer is forthcoming! Sure hope it’s a reasonable offer… I’ll keep you posted.
The last couple days have been pretty wet. Good thing I got the mowing done before this latest storm cell dropped in. It rained all night and more is expected throughout today. The burn scars in our area (Waldo Canyon and Black Forest) are especially prone to flooding and are under a flood watch right now.
When the weather clears, I hope to get some ‘Weed-b-Gone’ on the lawn, and some ‘Grass & Weed’ killer on the rock areas. Otherwise, I don’t know what else I can do to help the house look any more desirable without spending big bucks on things like; granite counter tops, stainless steel appliances, or “real” hardwood flooring, etc.,
So, I’m sorry – but there’s only boring stuff going on right now with the Urban Escape Vehicle blog… hopefully the house will sell and things will pick up soon… stay tuned 🙂
It was a loonngg travel day today (Wednesday) and it didn’t get off to a good start…
I don’t know what it is about the truck tires; they must have nail magnets inside 🙁 I did my morning PMCS, (that’s Preventive Maintenance Checks and Services), for you non-military types, and found the right rear tire pressure at 28 psi. The tire pressure should be at 35-40 psi.
When we arrived yesterday evening at the Roswell Elks Lodge, we were able to pull right into a site without disconnecting the truck. So this morning; after we pressed buttons to raise the jacks and pull-in the slides; we just towed it over to the local Discount Tire in Roswell, NM.
The technician pulled off the tire and immediately identified a nail stuck through the tread. This is the third time we’ve picked up a nail! Luckily, they didn’t charge us for the repair. Discount Tires will continue to have our business 🙂
After the ~hour long delay to get the tire fixed; we continued north on the shortest route towards Colorado Springs. We have 439 miles to travel today! Stilla is anxious to get back to see our daughters and grandson, plus we need to do something to help get the house sold. The house has been on the market now for over 90 days, and now that the weather is getting nicer, we are finally starting to see more showings. So, we probably need to work on the lawn; maybe fill the hot tub; de-winterize the sprinkler system, etc.,
Here’s some pics of the seemingly endless highway…
Once we got on I-25, Stilla took over the drivers seat for a while.
Yah… this is the life, I should let her drive more often 🙂
Of course as soon as she took over, we had to go through a long construction zone. She hates this… and it always seems to happen when she drives, which isn’t too often, but she did just fine. No cones were killed in the making of this blog post 🙂
Little Coach didn’t even seem to mind Mom’s driving too much.
We stopped for fuel at Russell’s Truck Stop near Springer, NM. I always like stopping here because they have classic cars on display. They switch them out every so often so there’s always something new.
I took back over the driving duties and little Coach took his usual spot on Mommy’s lap again.
We started to see some snow as we got close to Raton Pass.
It looked like the winter weather has been doing a number on the highway… we had to dodge quite a few potholes and notice the fallen rocks:
Yup… that’s snow on the side of the highway… haven’t seen that in a few months 😐
Leaving New Mexico sign…
and the Welcome to Colorado sign.
Then we got another “Welcome to Colorado” in the form of a rock hitting the windshield! A little red pickup sans mud flaps passed us shortly after crossing into Colorado, and “Wham” we have something new to fix now…
New rock chip in the lower left side of the passenger windshield.
We pressed on.
Nice rearview mirror pic. There’s snow in ‘them-there’ mountains.
And we finally rolled into Colorado Springs just as the sun was going down over Pikes Peak. Whew… 440 miles today!
I had called ahead to reserve a spot at the Colorado Springs Elks Lodge #309. We were able to get one of the more desirable spots along the inner fence-line facing the pool. The Elks 309 website says the following about their RV Parking: “13 Hook-ups on a black top surface. Electric (30 & 20 A) available to all. Water available during non-freezing weather. Water faucet always available at the lodge building. Dump station on site. $15 per night ($5-dry camping) No reservations, first come first serve. Plenty of dry camping area.”
Our spot has 30-Amp electric, water, and a small diameter (PVC) sewer line that runs above ground. We’ll have to use a macerator to use the sewer, unless we drive over to the on-site dump station. For those that may not know; a macerator chops up the waste and reduces it to allow flow through a standard-size garden hose.
View of Pikes Peak this morning over the Coach.
And here’s another picture of the windshield rock chip. I put one of those round protective stickers on it that we got from RV Glass Solutions when we had new windshields put in a couple years ago while at the FMCA Rally in Gillette WY. I suppose we’ll try to live with it for now as long as it doesn’t get any bigger or start to crack.
Here’s our view of the pool area out the front window, it’s still covered of course… we’re not in Arizona anymore 😐
So, we’re baack! We’ll find the camp-host this morning (Thursday) and pay for a month in advance, which I hope is still a reasonable $350.
We’ve put over 4000 new miles on the Urban Escape Vehicle since we left in January. We put the house on the market (January 10th) and departed Colorado for the SouthWest.
Some of you that read this blog may recall that we last came back here in October 2014 after our ~6000 mile tour of the Pacific NorthWest. Click HERE for my blog post from the 1st of October 2014. We came back then for two reasons: 1) Our son William was coming to visit from Germany, and 2) Our renters had stopped making payments. So we spent the first couple weeks enjoying time with our son and the next couple/few months dealing with the renters and working on the house to get it on the market. Hopefully we can get it sold here soon.
Regardless of the house situation – we look forward to catching up with family and friends while we’re here. It’ll be nice to see the kids, grandson, my Dad/Stepmom, etc.,
We did over 200 miles yesterday (Tuesday) after leaving Las Cruces. Stilla is anxious to get back to the kids and grandson 😐
We stopped by the White Sands National Monument for a couple hours, We were last here in January 2012, some of you may know that the picture of the Coach on my “non-business” business cards was taken here.
Here’s our first view of the dunes heading north on 70. You can see snow on the peak in the background., ugh…
Of course, we had to go through yet another border control checkpoint, we’ve been through a lot of these in recent months.
Sign on 70 for the White Sands National Monument.
Turn-off on 70 to the dunes.
The Visitor Center.
The Entrance Fee Station. This is a “National” park/monument, so I was able to use my disabled veteran pass. Total cost $0. 🙂
The road into the dunes starts to get covered with sand. I wonder how often they have to clean this road. We passed a road grader on the way in.
We pulled over at one of the larger turn-outs where they have a boardwalk.
Little Coach enjoyed the sand and quickly found a bone that we had to take away from him 🙁
I took a picture of the Urban Escape Vehicle at exactly the same spot as the picture I have on my business cards from 2012.
We continued on into the dunes. The road becomes completely covered by sand at this point.
Picture of the dash GPS and rear-view camera:
Even the parking areas are hard-packed sand.
Nice dune background for a couple more Urban Escape Vehicle pics… I do need to get more business cards made soon.
We continued north until we got to Roswell, NM. We used our iPhone app to find the local Elks Lodge. They’re usually the best thing going for overnight stays unless you want to boondock.
This is Elks Lodge 969. Very nice RV spots (full hook-up w/50-Amp service) that are set back a little ways from the lodge. There’s only one other RV here.
We went into the lodge, very nice! Here’s a side-view (below). I never got around to the front parking lot for a better picture of the front, besides, the sun was going down behind the lodge, it probably wouldn’t have come out very good.
We paid $15 for the night and enjoyed a couple adult beverages.
That’s all for now folks… my next post will probably be coming to you from Colorado Springs. Since the house still hasn’t sold… we might have to hunker down and save some money. Maybe we can work on the yard and curb-appeal. I hear the weeds are already growing 🙁
We landed in Las Cruces, NM after a 228-mile drive from the Saguaro SKP RV Park in Benson, AZ on Monday. We consulted our iPhone App for PassPort America parks and it turned us on to the Coachlight Inn & RV Park located just off I-10.
The Coachlight Inn was a reasonable $18.65 for one night with the Passport America discount applied.
As usual, we also checked for a local Elks Lodge, but their website didn’t mention RV hookups and they didn’t answer when we called the phone number. We noticed that there are a couple Military FamCamps in the area, (White Sands Missile Range, and Holloman AFB), but they are outside the Las Cruces area… and we were hoping to get in touch with an old Army buddy that lives here.
Earlier in the day, after we decided to take this particular route, we attempted to contact my old Army buddy to let him and his wife know we were passing through. We were hoping to at least see them briefly to catch up. Unfortunately, we only have Facebook and an email address as the means to contact them. We never got around to putting a phone number in our contacts list. So, we hoped they might get the Facebook message and subsequent email, but alas – it wasn’t to be, they didn’t contact us back… our short-notice and poor timing resulted in us not getting to see them 🙁 Hopefully we’ll get to see our old friends the next time we come back south.
However, we did get to meet some new friends on the way here…
we pulled into a rest-area for a quick break somewhere near Lordsburg NM and saw another Alpine Coach! What are the odds, with only ~1,700 Coaches ever built between’98 and ’08?
We pulled up next to Karen & Reg Bodeux in their ’06 Alpine. If I remember correctly, they have owned their coach for about a year and are full-timing. So, naturally, Reg and I talked for a bit while the wives walked our respective dogs. We exchanged information and said our farewells, hopefully we’ll see them again in the future. I encouraged Reg to join the Alpine Coach Association to benefit in the awesome rallies and comraderie. Safe travels, Karen & Reg!
After we got settled in at the Coachlight Inn, and since we hadn’t heard back from my old Army buddy, and hunger was setting in… I consulted one of our iPhone Apps and noticed that La Mesilla Historic District and the Mesilla Plaza was nearby. My friend Wikipedia tells me that: “During the “Wild West” era, Mesilla was known for its cantinas and festivals. The area attracted such figures as Billy the Kid, Pat Garrett and Pancho Villa. The village was also the crossroads of two major stagecoach lines, Butterfield Stagecoach and the Santa Fe Trail. The village of Mesilla was the most important city of the region until 1881.” Click HERE for more info.
We stopped at the Luna Rossa Winery & Pizzeria for dinner. We lucked out, because they have Monday specials that made it easy on the pocketbook. The pizza was great.
We then went back to the campground and had a pleasant evening in front of the TV.
