West of the Mississippi!

8:16 am - Wednesday - January 16th - Marshall, TX - 48º F, 82% humidity, wind 1 mph out of the north by northeast.......cloudy today with a forecast high of 54º F.

As has been mostly the case for the past 5 days we awoke to steely gray skies and temps in the 30's in Vidalia, LA.  It was the first time I had awakened west of the Mississippi since April 29, 2018.  I had one big task to accomplish before the 11 am checkout time (besides stowing the city water hose, and electrical cord), and that was to check out our non-functioning city water pump.  This water pump is quite important while we are underway, and while we are dry camping/boondocking.  It quit working sometime Monday afternoon on our way into Vidalia.  Since our Jello plan called for us to be dry camping Tuesday evening near Tyler, TX I needed to either get this one working, or remove it and install the backup water pump we have been carrying around for 10 years for just such a situation.

The last time I had to deal with a non-functioning city water pump was almost 11 years ago, before we retired.  We were going away for a long weekend in the Newell and I discovered the water pump was not working.  We were going to dry camp along the Pacific Ocean north of Ventura, CA and needed it to be working.  I was still learning about our new to us 1982 Newell and just assumed the pump was broken and needed to be replaced, so I ran out and bought a brand new one at a local RV store.  Without checking the electrical connections to the current pump I just removed it and installed the new one.  It also did not work.....hmmm.  Must be the electrical connections, right?  I checked both the supply wire and the ground wire and found the ground wire was bad, so I replaced it and the new pump began working.  Since, apparently, the old pump was, indeed, working I decided to save it and keep it for an emergency.  Well, 10+ years later that emergency had reared its ugly head.

This time I checked the ground and the supply wires first, and found them to be fine, so I just removed the old 'new' pump and reinstalled the original pump.....

 The now non-functioning Shurflo water pump removed, and back in its original box from 10 years ago

The original Shurflo water pump reinstalled after a 10 year hiatus.......it still works!

.....in all it took me about hour to reinstall the original Shurflo pump, and we were good to go.  It was now after 10 am and time to get rolling!

We still had some 50+ miles left to travel on US-425 north to I-20, and then another 170+ to our destination for the day.....Marshall, TX.  The last time we were in Texas was back in late April when we passed through Amarillo, TX......

 The birthplace of my brother-in-law, Glenn Parker

......when we had covered about half the distance TLE received a call from her sister, Laureen, advising we would be passing through the birthplace of her husband, Glenn....Mangham, LA.....TLE made sure to snap a picture of the town welcoming sign for posterity's sake.

US-425 is a divided highway all the way to I-20.....very nice highway!

Just before 12 pm we merged on to I-20 westbound, and within 30 miles came to a very nice Rest Area where we decided to take an extended break, including a 1 mile walk around the Rest Area.  We needed to take on some propane as our 60 gallon propane tank was down to 1/4 full.  That's probably good for another few weeks, but I am all about taking advantage of opportunities when they present themselves, and there was a Flying 'J' truck stop about 20 miles before Marshall, TX that had a propane station, so we exited the Interstate around 3:15 pm to do just that.  We received good service and were quickly back on the road after taking on 33.2 gallons of propane......hmmm....we had way more left than I thought....those rascally analog gauges can be so inaccurate!  

By 4 pm we had exited the Interstate just east of Marshall, TX to avail ourselves of another Passport America park.  We had planned to dry camp at a Cracker Barrel, but the temps were going to be very cold Tuesday night, so we opted to 'plug in' for $20.  In all we covered just over 235 miles and had a very good driving day.....flat and straight!  We finally got sun late in the day, but by the time the sun set it was to a steely gray sky once again.  

Thanks for stopping by!

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