Life

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Hit the road again headed to Zion National Park. The song, "We're marching to Zion, beautiful, beautiful Zion" kept playing in my head. Now, it is again.

We did absolutely nothing on Monday. Sammy needed to rest. He has yet to hand over the reins to anybody else. Don't get me wrong, this isn't a complaint. The way the wind keeps blowing, I don't necessarily want to have to hold this RV on the road. But, because of this, Sammy gets tired and needed to chill. The kids played in the pool, in the playground and even rented these bicycle things.

We had a slight breakdown scare on the way to Zion. Just before making a left turn towards the park, the engine cut off and wouldn't start. While the nose of our vehicle stuck just slightly out in the intersection, Sammy was able to determine the problem. Wanna guess? The fuel pump wasn't working. Yes, you read it right, the fuel pump. Without uttering a word, we both scanned the town wondering where we would be spending the next couple days. We weren't there but a minute or two when someone from the city determined we needed help and less than two minutes later we were being pulled with a log chain behind a city truck to a service center a block away. Somehow they managed to squeeze our RV between the parked cars and a car wash. I assume our presence was a little overwhelming in this small spot because one of the mechanics came out immediately to access the situation. Sammy informed J.T., our newest mechanic, the fuel pump wasn't hitting a lick and J.T. informed us they had no way of helping us with this huge contraption in their shop. He did say it very nicely, though. I then asked if possibly he had a match we might use to set it ablaze. J.T. smiled. Fearing for the safety of his business, J.T. retreated into the mechanics lair and returned posthaste with some kind of meter. With this meter, it was determined we had a blown fuse. Sammy almost cried tears of joy when the engine roared with life after replacing the fuse. He still has slight concern that there is still a bigger problem that caused the fuel pump fuse to blow. Sammy crawled under the RV to verify all connections were tight, and they were. Now armed with a collection of replacement fuses, we continue on our journey.

Zion National Park was beautiful, but there were bunches of people. The trail we chose to hike was crowded. We should have known if you choose a handicapp accessible trail there might be a lot of people. But at the end of this trail you have to walk upstream to get to the final destination. Craig and Jake took on the challenge and Craig even decided to cool off in the park waters. When exiting the park, we chose to travel through the tunnel. Because we were in a RV, we had to pay extra for this privilege. The tunnel was built in 1930 and wasn't designed to accommodate bigger vehicles, therefore, they have to stop traffic coming from the other side and we travel through straddling the center line. It is a 1.1 mile journey through the tunnel. We head to the big canyon tomorrow. The north rim is our ambition. It is supposed to be less crowded than the south rim. We'll see.

New Rule: When marching to Zion, carry extra fuses.