High fiving......

 7:56 am - Saturday - November 14th - TWW - 43° F, humidity 69%, cloud cover 57%, wind 15 mph out of the west by southwest....very cloudy right now with clearing later this morning with a forecast high of 52° F.  On this date in 2023 TLE and I were at Glamis North Hot Springs, CA.....

.....soaking in a hot springs tub watching the sun set.  The view this morning....

.....rained last night, but it it beginning to clear.

I was sitting at my laptop composing yesterday's blogosphere offering wondering what we would be doing workwise Friday when I got a call from Charles about a hose on the washer which was leaking at one of the fittings to which it was attached.  When he first said 'there was a leak' my mind immediately thought of the pump house where we had numerous leak issues last winter, but we solved those leak issues a long time ago, and there has not been one leak out there since last January, or February.  I said I would come over to the house after my blog was published.

As it turned out the leak was where the cold water supply hose connected to the back of the washer, and it was just a matter of replacing the old, brittle washer in the female end of the hose, then removing the old Teflon tape, and applying new tape.  Within minutes the leak was fixed, so I returned to the Newell to get dressed and ready to assist Charles in getting the Champion 7.5 kilowatt generator connected to the Solark Inverter in the battery room, so it could be used to recharge the house batteries on rainy, or cloudy days.  

We've attempted to get this done on at least two other occasions during the past two winters, but failed.  This time Charles called the Solark help line for assistance.  It took a while waiting in the 'call que' to get a live person, but we did, and was he ever on top of his game.  Within 15 minutes he had connected to the Solark Inverter via the Interweb, and made three changes in the default generator parameters so the inverter would recognize, and allow the power from the Champion to enter the system.  We then started the generator, and within another 2-3 minutes power was flowing into the two Cloud Energy LifePo4 batteries from the Champion 7.5 kw generator.  We've been trying to solve this issue since we first arrived here back in October of 2024.

Next up we began removing the hydraulic cylinder which lifts and lowers the 'rake' on the Gannon scraper.  It was actually a pretty simple job, and withing 15-20 minutes we had it removed, and in the back of Charles' Ford pickup.....

....he found a place down in Phoenix which rebuilds and/or services hydraulic cylinders who will check it out too see if it rebuildable.  I'm sure it is, but that is not my field of expertise.  Hopefully, within a few weeks, we'll have a functioning hydraulic cylinder!

When Charles and Phyllis arrived Thursday they had twenty, or more, 200+ watt solar panels Charles had bought to supplement the house system.  One of them was designated to be installed on the roof system to replace one panel that was damaged in the summer of 2025 during a severe wind storm.....

The old, damaged panel

Waiting for the replacement

.....leaving an open spot for the new panel.  These panels Charles bought are older ones, predating the use of MC4 connectors, so we had to remove the old connectors, and install the MC4's.  It took a while to figure out which of the two wires on the back of the panel was the positive one.  A call to the manufacturer cleared that up quickly.  Next it was just a matter of installing the MC4's, then boosting the new panel up to the barn roof.....

Order is finally installed

.....and installing the 'new' panel.  With the damaged panel replaced the wattage being generated by the entire solar array jumped to over 4,300 watts.  By the time we finished it was well into the afternoon, but we were done, and exchanging 'high fives' all around.

The weather guessers had forecast rain around 5 pm in the afternoon, so I spent time putting away things we don't want to get wet before heading indoors to take a rest before dinner.  As it happened, the rain came at 4 pm, and continued on and off most the night, finally abating around 6 am this morning.

We, once again, joined Charles and Phyllis for dinner in the house which consisted of Clam Chowder, and garlic toast....the perfect cold, and now rainy day dinner.  We ate and talked until after 5:30 pm when we bid our adieus for the evening.  It was a very good day at TWW with a lot of long languishing projects crossed off the list!

It is now 9 am Saturday morning, and the rain we thought was gone, has returned.....😊

Thanks for stopping by!

Just two things....

 7:51 am - Friday - November 13th - TWW - 45° F, humidity 59%, cloud cover 71%, wind 19 mph out of the south.....cloudy today with a forecast high of 56° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were just north of Ventura, CA.....

.....at Rincon Parkway.  We've been there many times since around 2004 dry camping right next to the Pacific Ocean.  Being able to lookout your back window and see the surf, or walk down the beach 50' away is the coolest thing ever.  A million dollar view for $38/night!  The view this morning.....

.....heavy cloud cover this morning.  Will we get rain?  Hope not.

I'm trying to limit myself to accomplishing two things each day I work.  Two things that can be begun, and completed in the same day; within a few hours.  Thursday I decided to fix the glider which sits next to Phyllis' Newell.  When we had the bad windstorm two months ago it was flipped over, and from a short distance it appeared the wood slats which form the seat had shattered, however, upon closer inspection some of the carriage bolts affixing the slats to the seat area had come out due to a lack of nuts holding them tight.  Phyllis left the glider lying face down in case we had another windstorm, but now that we are here fulltime it was time to turn it right side up, and refasten the seat slats.....

.....when it tipped over some of the original brass carriage bolts fell into the dirt, and could not be found, so I had to find suitable replacements in the CONEX along with proper nuts to tighten everything down.  Beginning to end it took a little over an hour to get her fixed.

Next up I've been meaning to shorten the photo voltaic cables which transfer the 12 volt power generated by our EcoWorthy dual axis solar tracker to our Bluetti battery bank for two years.  Originally I bought 100' long cables (black and red) to make the run, but only needed about 50', so there has been an extra 50' coiled up on the ground behind the shed since I installed everything back in our first winter here.  The same is true for the new EcoWorthy 790 watt solar array we recently installed.  I wasn't sure where exactly we would be placing the new array, so I bought another 100' of black and red cable.  As it turned out we only needed 50' to make the run to the Newell.....

No more unsightly coils of extra photo voltaic cable

Now we've got over 100' of cable to use for another project, should one arise.

.....it really didn't take long to cut out the unneeded cable, install the MC4 connectors, and reconnect everything.  I cannot explain why it took me two years to shorten the solar voltaic cables.  I'm hoping the shorter lengths of cable to each solar array will result in an increase in the wattage reaching each battery bank.  Theoretically, that should be the result.

A couple of weeks ago Charles decided he wanted to get the hydraulic cylinder which raises and lowers the 'rake' on the Ford diesel gannon.  We both thought we had removed it a couple of years ago intending to get it repaired some day, but we could not find it anywhere.  Not in the CONEX, not in the barn, and not in the garage.  We both knew we had seen it, but could not find it.  While I was locating the replacement carriage bolts for the glider I walked over to the tractor, which is parked next to the barn, to see where the cylinder would be attached whenever we found it, and had it repaired, and discovered, much to our chagrin, that it was still attached to the gannon....

.....laughing out loud!  We both thought we had removed it two years ago.  Getting old is not for the faint of heart....lol!  Well, now that we've found it we can actually remove it and get it fixed.

In order to shorten the photo voltaic cables I needed to find my supply of MC4 connectors, which I was pretty sure  were in the garage, but where I did not know.  Before I could shorten those cables I needed those MC4 connectors, so I spent about 45 minutes in the garage removing containers from the shelving, and finally found them, but created a big mess in the interim, so later in the afternoon just before dinner I returned to the garage to put everything away.  As I put things away I gave myself a 'pat on the back' for beginning and finishing two tasks in the same day, including putting everything away.

We had dinner with Charles and Phyllis, as is our custom when they are here, around 4 pm.  For our dining pleasure Phyllis made Cowboy Chicken Chili.  I've never had this before, but I want it again, and soon!  It was so good!  I wish I had taken a picture of the presentation.

Thanks for stopping by!

Westside Lilo's.....

 8:28 am - Thursday - November 12th - TWW - 46° F, humidity 37%, cloud cover 10%, wind 9 mph out of the southeast......crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 65° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were north of Ventura, CA.....

There area few sites which will fit our 62' of rolling stock, but not many

The best sweet potato fries ever!

.....dry camping along Rincon Parkway, having lunch at Anacapa Brewing Company, and watching the sunset over the Pacific Ocean, with Anacapa Island (on of the Channel Islands) in the background.  The view this morning....

.....just saw a coyote walk by....couldn't get my camera out fast enough.

It's been over a week since we were in Seligman, and we needed to check our mail box, so we decided we would drive into town around 1 pm giving us time to do a few things around the property.  For me the one thing I wanted to get accomplished Wednesday was to straighten up the workbench area in the CONEX.  It's been a mess for quite a while, but I hadn't had time to focus on it until Thursday.  In all I spent about 2 hours organizing fasteners, tools, and other items until it looked like this....

....there is still more to to, but that will be left for another day.

We were on the road into town a little after 1 pm in the VW.  Yup, we drove the Beetle into town, which we usually do not do.  Why? Well, the north/south arterial is still in great shape over a month after it was last scraped.  The road is still mostly smooth, which is very surprising, because the prior two winters we were here it would be scraped every 6-8 weeks, and be nice for about 10 days, then return to its rough, washboardy norm.  We are able to comfortably drive the Beetle at 20-25 mph all the way to US-66.

Our first order of business was to have lunch at Westside Lilo's, which we have not done since last Spring.....

.....TLE and I split their Santa Fe Chicken sandwich with seasoned waffle cut fries.....

.....when we split an entree, which comes with fries, TLE always gives me most of the fries, and then picks more from my plate when she runs out.....lol.  They were very busy Wednesday afternoon, and we didn't get our food for about 30 minutes, but good food is always worth the wait, plus I enjoyed a couple of cups of their amazing coffee in the interval.  The servers at Lilo's are all women, and you can tell they love their job.  It is really a very special eatery.

After making a Post Office stop, and buying a few things at Family Dollar, and Seligman Market we were on our way home by 3:15 pm, arriving home without incident just before 4 pm.  While TLE put away the groceries I went around closing up the greenhouse, and the CONEX for the night.

Thanks for stopping by!

Only three weeks?

 7:35 am - Wednesday - November 11th - TWW - 42° F, humidity 38%, cloud cover 0%, wind 11 mph out of the east by northeast......crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 66° F.  On this date in 2013 TLE and I were near Lee Vining, CA.....

......enjoying the view of Mono Lake from the Conway Summit vista point.  We had not been back to California since we left February 1, 2012 on our nomadic journey....we had been gone for close to 2 years.  The view this morning.....

......notice anything different?  Yeah, you're right, the weeds are gone!  Contrast this with yesterday's morning view.....

....I was determined that Tuesday would be the last day the 'morning view' picture would have a lot of long weeds in it.

I had two things I wished to accomplish Tuesday.....1) Connect the concrete piers to the new EcoWorthy solar rack, and 2) cut down some more weeds with my Echo SRM-266T string trimmer.  The first task required TLE's assistance.  While she lifted one end of the solar rack I would slide two of the concrete piers under the 4 x 4's to which the solar rack was attached.  It didn't take long before all 5 were in place, then it was just a matter of using lag screws to affix each pier to the 4 x 4's.....

....each of those piers weighs at least 50 pounds, so times 5 that means we've at least 250 pounds plus of weight keeping them from being blown over in a big wind.  I think, beginning to end, it took about an hour for the entire job.

Later in the day I got out my Echo SRM-266T string trimmer to trim the weeds around the ten 400 watt solar panels behind the barn which supply solar energy to the two large house batteries for the 3 bedroom, 2 bath house.  Due to the heavy monsoon rains we had in the last two months the weeds, which rarely get more than 6" high, had grown to 2, or 3 feet high around the panels partially obstructing the sun.....

....and, as I mentioned above, I trimmed around Phyllis' Newell, and the area in between her Newell and our Newell.

In between all that I took time to run both the Yamaha and Cushing utility carts out to the access road, and back, plus TLE and I ran a hose from one of the greenhouse totes into the interior so she can water her plants more easily.  I even took time to relax on the 'lido deck' eating a snack, and drinking some ice tea before heading back into the trailer to finish removing my old stereo system, which I used to broadcast Sirius/XM Radio.  I've had that stereo system since 2004, and it has worked well all these years.  Since I've reduced the number of Sirius/XM Radio receivers from three down to the one in the car, and now use a Bluetooth speaker to stream Sirius/XM Radio in the trailer, I don't need the stereo anymore.  I also moved the three battery chargers for the various cordless tools I own from the wall on the right side of the work bench to the tool table where the cordless tools are kept when not in use.  Since we are now permanently parked I don't need to have them on the wall anymore....

The old TEAC stereo with a woofer, and 2 speakers

Where the battery chargers, and one of the stereo speakers were hung

Where the stereo and the other speaker hung

The 3 battery chargers

......by the time I finished cutting down the weeds around the 10 solar panels behind the barn it was almost 4 pm, and time for dinner.  I think that's the longest I've worked in one day since we returned 3 weeks ago.  Wait, has it only been 3 weeks since we returned?  Seems like longer, but in a good way.

The weather trends for the next two weeks are what we would expect as we move deeper into November here at The Wilson Wilderness.  For the next couple of days we'll have temps in the 60's, then quickly slide into the 40's and 50's by by Saturday when it is supposed to rain (66% chance of rain), and by Tuesday of next week we'll see lows in the high 20's overnight.....winter is on its way!

Thanks for stopping by!

Making it up as we go.....

 8:06 am - Tuesday - November 10th - TWW - 38° F, humidity 43%, cloud cover 29%, wind 8 mph out of the north.....slightly cloudy today with a forecast high of 66° F.  On this date in 2023 TLE and I were at Glamis North Hot Springs, CA.....

.....enjoying a spectacular sunset.  We were working for Colorado Outback Adventures, and enjoying the hot springs on a regular basis. The view this morning.....

....unusual cloud formations today.

We've been waking up around 6:30 am since we arrived at TWW a few weeks ago, but not getting out of bed for another 30 to 45 minutes....sometimes even later....at least that's my story.  I really do not like getting up before the sun reciprocates, and right now that is a little after 7 am.  Our EcoWorthy dual axis solar tracker usually tilts toward the rising sun around 7:35 am on mostly sunny days.  I'm sure there will be future occasions when getting up before the sun is required, but those mornings will be few, and very far between.  Fortunately, I am married to a woman who is like minded.  In my former workaday life I was often up, even on the weekends, well before sunrise, and even years after we began our nomadic life I was almost always out of bed well before TLE, but not anymore.

Monday, as has been our modus operandi since we returned to TWW, we were out of bed by 7:45 am....well after sunrise, and neither of us felt an ounce of guilt.  TLE is back into her daily routine of spending time in the greenhouse tending to her flora, and I just kind of make up the day as I go along.  I moved a few more things out of the trailer and over to the garage, deployed our solar rope lights around the Newell (FINALLY), deployed some new solar torch lights, blew a lot of detritus off the artificial turf Charles and Phyllis brought up to TWW,  and with TLE's help moved the picnic table out of its summer cubbyhole, along with the market umbrella, placing them on the artificial turf.....

New solar torch lights

.....additionally, I successfully repaired a couple of our older solar yard lights, started and ran the 1969 Jeep CJ-5, started and ran the old Ford diesel loader/gannon tractor, did a little straightening in the CONEX (it needs a lot more), fiddled around with the new mounting brackets I'll be using the mount the two 330 watt solar panels we used to charge the Bluetti AC200P batter which powers the trailer.  Later in the day I finally vacuumed out the VW Beetle, which has needed a good vacuuming since before we left LPG&RVR.....lol!

We had the Newell windows open for much of the day, but the warmth begins to leave the air around 2:30 pm, at which time we close them.  Speaking of windows, TLE bought some felt tape off Amazon that when applied to the window sills, and lower portions of the windows is supposed to absorb, and reduce the amount of moisture which tends to gather on the windows overnight in the winter.....

.....the picture above is the driver side Salon window.  She's installed the felt tape on about 80% of the windows so far, and it seems to be working.  Soon we'll deploy our two RV dehumidifiers to help abate the overnight moisture inside the Newell.

Around 7:15 pm we went outside to take a video of our current yard light arrangements.....

.....for our evening entertainment we watched the MNF game (Monday Night Football) between the Buffalo Bills and the Minnesota Vikings.  Both teams came into the game with 6-1 records, so we thought it would be a close game, and it was well into the 3rd quarter, but the Bills ever so slowly pulled away to post a final score of 23-6.

Thanks for stopping by!

Day of rest....mostly....

 8:28 am - Monday - November 9th - TWW - 44° F, humidity 42%, cloud cover 1%, wind 6 mph out of the north.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 66° F.  On this date in 2014 TLE and I were in Sparks, NV.....

....staying at Sparks Marina RV Park while we commuted to Fernley, NV to work at Amazon.  I caught this beautiful sunset that day using my panorama option....click on the picture to see it properly.  The view this morning....

....I never get tired of seeing clear, blue skies.

Charles and Phyllis left for Phoenix sometime before 9 am; I wasn't paying attention to the time, but I'm pretty sure that is correct.  TLE and I are trying to be consistent at not working much on Sundays, and we managed to do that this Sunday.  I spent a few minutes adjusting, and straightening the gate latch on the north side of the greenhouse, and was successful.  I replaced the extension cord we use to keep Phyllis' Newell batteries charged with a heavier gauge one as the one we were using was overheating, and that took just a few minutes.  

You may, or may not recall that the past two winters we have had to turn off three of our electrical breaker switches when the temperatures inside the Newell, and in the water bay get down to 40° F, or lower, at night as the electric heaters would come on during those nights, and run our Bluetti battery bank down to zero.  The #1, 2 and 3 breakers in the service panel control both AC's and the three electric heaters, and one of them also provided power to our Salon TV, so I had to turn it on every night, and remember to turn it off again when we went to bed.  Needless to say, I forgot a few times.  TLE suggested I open up the thermostats which control the heaters, and see if I could disconnect the wires, so I did.  Sure enough, by disconnecting one of the wires the thermostat was no longer telling the electric heaters when to run.  It took me less than 15 minutes to disable all three thermostats!

And for the finale of our meager work Sunday we pulled everything out of the VW hatch, reorganized it, and put it back; and that was it.  We keep 'go bags' in our hatch in case we are ever stranded in the VW and have to walk home.  Being stranded to the degree we would have to walk home from wherever we might be at the time would be a doomsday scenario, obviously, and we hope that never happens, but we keep the 'go bags' stocked with water, clothing and food as a precaution.   

We were back indoors watching NFL football by 11 am.  With the recent return of California to standard time, along with the rest of the nation's time zones, everything we watch on TV comes on an hour later now (Arizona does not participate in DST; thank you very much).  When California is on DST NFL football begins at 10 am here in Arizona.  In a way having them come on at 11 am actually works better for us as if we want to get something done early Sunday before football begins we usually can, and that was the case this Sunday.

There were a number of good NFL games Sunday, but most of them were not available in the Phoenix market, which is where YouTubeTV says we are, so we get what we get.  With YouTubeTV your programming is based on the nearest major market, which is Phoenix, in our case.  When we were still in Likely the nearest major market was San Francisco, and we got a lot of good games.  There were two games available for our viewing Sunday morning......Seahawks vs Cardinals which ended, predictably, 17-3 in favor of the Seahawks.  The other morning game between the Chiefs and Jets was supposed to be one sided, and it was...Chiefs over the hapless Jets 35-12.  The afternoon game between the Cowboys and Colts was not supposed to be interesting, and it should not have been, but you know the Cowboys....they make a habit of coming from ahead to lose, and almost did again Sunday, but pulled it out with a last minute field goal.  Now, the evening game between the Bears and Buccaneers ended up being the best game of the day with both defenses causing multiple turnovers.  In the end, the favored Bears won on a last second field goal 27-24.

Thanks for stopping by!

Let's wrap it up!

 7:48 am - Sunday - November 8th - TWW - 39° F, humidity 45%, cloud cover 0%, wind 7 mph out of the east by northeast....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 65° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were in Bishop, CA.....

....at Schat's Bakery having some coffee, and for moi a chocolate eclair.  The view this morning....

The EcoWorthy dual axis solar tracker already tilted 

before 8 am and doing its job

....another cloudless day!

Friday night over dinner we had decided that our priority for Saturday would be to rewrap the east and south sides of the greenhouse which suffered damaged to the Visqueen during a severe windstorm this past summer.  You never know how things like this will go, but in this case they actually went pretty smoothly.  Following are pictures of our work on the east wall, however, we also rewrapped the south side.....

Before...lot's of missing Visqueen

Working on it

Finished

.....Charles, Phyllis and TLE began working about 30, or 40 minutes before I arrived and managed to get all of the furring strips, plus old Visqueen removed on both sides before my arrival at 9:30 am.  Then it was just a matter of rolling out the Visqueen, stapling it to the frame, then reattaching the furring strips to firmly hold the Visqueen in place.  In all we spent 3 hours beginning to end (after I arrived) wrapping the east and south ends.  There was a lot of climbing up and down ladders, and kneeling on the ground during that time, and by the time we were done, I was done.  It was only 12:30 pm, but my body was sure it was more like 5 pm....lol!

I spent the afternoon watching NCAA College Football, and true to form, there were a number of upsets, primarily #1, undefeated Miami being defeated by #11 Notre Dame.  Additionally, unranked Oklahoma convincingly defeated #24 Florida, #13 Tennessee defeated #6 Kentucky, and #23 Oregon defeated #12 Ohio State.  #8 UCLA is now 9-0 for the first time since the 80's after defeating unranked Minnesota, and #3 Utah also remains undefeated at 9-0 after beating #9 BYU.

We had dinner around 4 pm in the house with Charles and Phyllis.....

Phyllis preparing Chili Lime Chicken for our dinner, to which TLE added some sliced avocados, and pickled tomatoes/cucumbers....yum!

.....it is always a pleasure to end the day with a communal meal!  Life is good!

Thanks for stopping by!