Well that was .... interesting.

Got to the guy's place, Taylor took me over there, couldn't find the keys. He had parked it off his property on the side of the street.  No worries there, it's all country and country roads, not much traffic.

After locating the keys, it fired right up, albeit running rough. Took off hoping it would make the 20 mile trip and get this over with.  Well, first off, the brakes were working but not all that great.  I'm guessing a master cylinder leak from the way it was acting. 

But, they worked enough to stop it, just had to make sure you had plenty of room before any stop signs.  

Then, the roughness got worse. Sounds like a bad exhaust manifold gasket.  Unlike new vehicles, I'm pretty good with determining what's wrong with old stuff.  It probably had bad fuel in it as well.  

Any little hill? And I mean even the slightest upgrade?  It would start bogging down.  Like, bad. 30 mph on a 55 mph, 2-lane highway.  Fortunately, no traffic besides Taylor was behind us.  The situation got worse and worse, tho, to the point I was lightly feathering the gas pedal to try and get it to keep going.  My thoughts turned towards: Gee, I hope I won't have to be calling a tow truck out here.  

I dunno, but i was committed, there was no turning around. Some cars car up to us on that 2 lane highway but not until we were near the end of the road. They were stuck maybe a mile and a half and then it spread out to 4 lanes.  No one flipped me off or honked so I guess we were all good there, lmao.

Originally going to take it home, I decided against that.  Every time I had to stop the thing wanted to die.  Way too many turns and lights to go home, I just drove it straight to the property, parked it behind the shed and left for home.  

I think whichever route I take - selling it or renting it - it's going to get parked behind the shed.  I'll just need to run a water line closer than what the nearest one is. Not a huge deal, dig out where it's buried and there is a valve underground, add a short stick of pipe, a T, 2 sticks out of the T, cap off one end and run a 90 up above ground and get a spigot on it.  I'm going to try to situate it tomorrow, I'm done for today, that adventure took it out of me, I was quite apprehensive about it breaking down and having to deal with the aftermath.

It does, however, handle quite well.  And the power steering works quite well on it too.  I certainly wouldn't take it on a road trip without fixing the power and braking issues, obviously, but driving it wasn't bad.  

The only other thing that = got me = was the steps.  I pushed and shoved on them and I couldn't get them to go in.  I had no idea that these were/are automatic steps. When I opened the door at the park to get out, the steps came out by themselves.  I don't know what triggered them to go in? Perhaps the ignition? 

I feel like I want to try renting it first after I make sure everything works and the thing is cleaned out.  It needs aired out badly.  A musty smell in there from being closed up all the time, it needs a good dose of fresh air and maybe some air fresheners in it.  I'll have to measure the area for the couch area and see how long of a couch I can put in there.  

That was my excitement for the day.  I will reposition it tomorrow, hook up the electricity and start trying to turn things on.  The AC came on, need to run it and see if it's going to blow ice cold or just cool.  Just cool?  I can either have a pro come look at it or, with those old ones, you can just pump freon in it through fittings they used to put on the things. Put a can in it and see if it gets colder. If it does, then just run the ac for a few days and see if it holds.  

As for the rest of the day? Well, I was going to talk to the tent guy but Taylor had to go home - I wasn't going to try to make her wait anyway.  She's going with a friend to the movies this afternoon.  I actually might go back over there and hook it up to electric today. I know the ac comes on and the refrigerator and freezer works.  

I just needed to sit here in my room for a bit and recompose. It was extremely hot in that thing, I don't know if the coach ac works and I was too busy trying to keep it running to find out.  But even if it did work, I wouldn't have turned it on anyway for as bad as the thing was running.  It would just drag it down even more.  Plus I couldn't get a temporary tag for it - I tried.  And I was just afraid I was going to have to go through an  afternoon long ordeal trying to get it to the park.  

It kind of messed with my head a bit. But, whew! It's over with, I've got it there, I don't have to worry about it now.  Yeah, I think I will go back over there. I'd take Addler but it's way too hot to be going for a walk. 

__________________

She is occupying the shed again. This time over 2 hours.  I went to meet the brother. He's in his 60's from his appearance.  The tent wasn't actually in direct sunlight, it just appeared that way from the angle I was at the other day.  There's a breeze blowing today so with the breeze and start sweating it's tolerable. Not optimal, but a person can deal with it if they have to.

Except her, apparently.  So, now I'm going to have to get even more blunt.  I spoke to the brother that we are going to have to discuss this situation because she is driving away people who want to do laundry. It doesn't take that long to charge batteries.  If after what I said to him doesn't do anything, then it's just going to be face to face either stop hanging out in there or you can just find another place to go to.  

The AC. I plugged in the RV, the ac came on, I felt cool air coming out, figured I'd leave it on and come back later. 
Which is what I did, probably spoke with the brother for 45 minutes - yes out in the heat. Came back, the ac was off. Blown circuit breaker? Not on the shed.  It was still on.  So, either the AC is bad and needs repaired or replaced or who knows what.  I am going to have a service guy come out and take a look.  If it needs replaced, that will be a bummer. If it can be repaired, that would be ok.  Those things aren't cheap and it wasn't part of this plan.  I was looking at everything. Carpet and a couch.  Figure out why some of the 12 volt lights aren't coming on.  The refrigerator works, the toilet works, there isn't much to it to have to work. I didn't try out the stove, I don't know if it has propane in the bottle and I was boiling hot by that point.  

Plus it's getting late in the day.  Which reminds me, I forgot to bring the card home of the guy that is mobile RV repair. He fixes/replaces ac units.  He really fixes anything if it's fixable.  I don't know what he charges for a service call or hourly but a few people in the park have had him out, well 3 now that I think of it.  

Whatever the case, I'm going to get AC in there one way or the other. I could always put a large window unit in. People do it all the time, one of my guests has 2 of them on his rig.  Again, not optimal but it will cool an RV down nicely if you get a big enough one and can place it where it can blow throughout the rv.  The other guy has one in the rear window and in the front side window.  They run all day long.  I don't know how much that is costing me in electricity, but it's probably jacking that bill up nicely. 

They aren't as efficient as the newer roof mounted AC's.  

They have a huge tent out there.  They have their own beds in it but they are not sleeping in separate tents.  That must get a little - strange.  I mean, it's getting down into the mid 70's at night, that's not terrible. Not great, but not terrible.