Retrieving the Motor Home

Travel is glamorous only in retrospect.
-- Paul Theroux

Tuesday, January 22, 2002
Three years ago: Potlatch 8, Day 1

We'd decided not to drive to Bellingham yesterday, because Jack didn't want to leave his daughter H---- home alone the whole day. She'd declared strongly that she did not want to go, and we couldn't make her! Sheesh. So we changed our plan to making the drive today, when she'll be busy at school.

So we got on the road this morning around ten thirty. Jack needed coffee, so we detoured through the drive-thru at Burger King. Ninety-nine cent breakfast sandwiches! The coffee was very bad, though. We'd have gone to McDonalds (they have good coffee here in the coffee-aware Northwest) but it's totally the wrong direction, not near the highway at all.

The object of the trip was to finally try to retrieve Jack's motor home. It's been parked north of Bellingham, in the backyard of a house formerly occupied by one of Jack's former co-workers. Luckily, the person now living in the house, a nice single mom, was happy to get a bit of cash each month for the privilege of storing this beast of a machine. We've made several trips up to make monthly payments to our host. We'd mail the money, but Jack lost the address and phone number and name!

*     *     *     *     *     *     *    *

We stopped at Costco in Mount Vernon for gasoline and a snack for me. I should have had a breakfast sandwich when we were just starting out, but I didn't feel hungry then. We needed batteries for our family-band radios, too. These proved useful when we were traveling in two vehicles.

There was snow on the trees as we drove over the pass (but it's not that high a pass) into Bellingham. If the weather turned bad or the roads were slushy, we'd just pay our money and not even try to move the motor home. But when we were into town at a lower elevation, it was warmer and there was no snow visible. I asked Jack if he felt nostalgic when seeing B'ham, but he scoffed as if such a thing never occurred to him. He lived here two years! But I suppose the things that are important to him (me, his friends) are still with him in Seattle.

The motorhome's temporary home is several exits north of Bellingham, near Ferndale. It's close to the highway, on a small strip of houses in the middle of farmland. The mom was home, with a bunch of kids and a big pitbull who was gentle.

Jack went around to the back to try and start the behemoth, while I handed over two months' worth of storage fees -- this month, and next month. I told her if we did actually get the thing moving today, the extra money was a bonus for her kindness and flexibility. We traded info again, too.

Then, since the motor home didn't get started, I drove around back and we tried to jump the big beast from my volvo. In between attempts, Jack unloaded some stuff that had been stored in the motor home that I want to use for Potlatch 11 hospitality. We've got some of those folding chairs that are so popular now, and a big water jug.

After about half an hour, we actually got the thing running! Would we actually be able to drive it to Seattle? Jack tested the transmission fluid (there's a known leak) and the oil (looked ok). I proposed that I drive to the convenience store by the highway and buy some fluids. This was agreed to, I made the trip and was back soon. He added the magic juice and we actually got this thing rolling! Bye-bye, little house on Grandview Place.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *    *

We drove to Ferndale and got a replacement set of license tabs. Turned out that Jack had renewed them on time, after all, but we certainly didn't know where the orginal tabs might be now. The battery was completely shot, so every time we parked somewhere we had to use my car to jump-start the beast. Gas and a new, extry-big, marine/RV battery at Costco.

Jack didn't want to drive home in the dark (the headlights are problematic on this beast), but someone needed to get back to Seattle to stay with H-----! So I left Jack to spend the night with our friend Rusty, not far from Jack's old house (the motorhome parked in a grocery store parking lot) and continued south. H---- was surprised her dad wasn't there, but took it all in stride.