This is a summary of our summer 2018 trip using our newly purchased 5th wheel and Ford 250 truck.
- 1300 July 20 picked up our RV from Fun Town RV. The sales and service could have been better,as the attention to detail was lacking and felt rushed. But nonetheless thankful for the safe start.
- 1500 July 20 stopped at Stripes . We filled up diesel and tried to get something to eat as everyone was famished, we had to make the dude open the grill as the fresh cooked items looked really stale. Handled the pups as the heat was unbearable.
- 1710 July 20 check engine light came on and the power is low to pull, we are just getting on 45. Started calling around to see what options we have. Since it was after hours, most dealers were closed and we were still few hours from Dallas. Finally found one that was open in Fairfield.
- 1800 July 20 pulled into Cedar Grove RV Park I felt sort of unsafe for my family and starting to question if I had made the right call. Stef and the boys were troopers and we pulled into a nice spot. I then went to get groceries in town and to check out the Ford dealers. Purchased groceries from brookshires and family tree
Found out that Tasha who is the daughter of the owner was managing and living on the park land. She had had a tough life, but thankful to God Almighty. Her daughter had died in a car wreck. She was raising her grand-daughter as her own. The sacrifices she had made to ensure that her grand daughter had a better life was good to hear. She was also caring for her mother who was in her 90s, hence couldnt manage the park. The next morning as we began to pull out,the mute lady across from us, who pointed me to the trash area who had to write on her board to tell me how our rv made her night as she stayed up till 2 am staring at the pretty blue lights and enjoying. This she said was a blessing to her.
0630 July 21 got up early enough to see if I can get the Checy dealer who had stated they were open at 7:30 and were Ford certified to help out, but they didnt open till 0800. So drove to Brinson Ford Lincoln of Corsicana
0820 July 21 Took the vehicle to see if check engine light can be fixed and found the issue was intermittent and did diagnostics. The folks at Brinson were not with it. But they were able to clear the light and I drove back. Stef and I made the call to start heading back towards home to see
1200 July 21 left towards home and check engine light comes on again right as we are in Walker county. We pulled into rest area and called around to see what could be done. Will from Church responded with an option to tow the RV over to his parents house and park it there till we took care of the truck. But the challenge was getting a two vehicle on a Sat evening
1720 July 21 tried calling around few RV parks near by as we figured it would be better to tow and then figure the issues. Ended in Sunny Ridge Dave the owner operator was gracious and understood our predicament, basically gave us a free pass to park the RV in the week if needed. We ended up trying to settle in. It was hot in 110s. Everyone was done. We had to stay the sunday
Found this church in Madisonville and attended the 11am service. The experience was interesting as the preaching style and music were very different. Praise God, as we witnessed a 8 year old boy being baptized.
0800 July 23 we took the car to the Ford dealer in town The diagnostic and verdict was that we could be there for 3+ days and it could be upwards of $8K. As we prayed and mulled over the options, we decided to check out the Toyota dealer as Stef spotted a F350
Stef has journaled all of this in her FB post. The key issue was around overal hauling capacity of the truck + the hitch capacity in-bed. The F350 fit the bill. So we traded out 250 for 350. We decided to stay back for the remainder of Monday,try out the vehicle and leave for OKC the next day. We wanted to still give our vacation a shot.
- Its only been 3 days since we left our home, but felt like a month had gone by with truck troubles, heat and the general uncertainity
1030 July24 we ended up heading out of Sunny Ridge towards OKC.
1320 pulled over to Love's to get diesel and grub. The Subway was the most generous giving us a full meal.
1500 July 24 we pulled into Twin Fountains Rv Park. Great RV park, well run, great ameneties, lots to do for the kids, weather got cooler and centrally located.
We ended up watching 3 nights of games at Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark. The games got worse with Wed night being the best and progressively getting worse. We had great tickets and enjoyed all 3 nights. We got to see Puig, Farmer, Tolles on the first night.
Family enjoyed visiting Cowboy museum, checking out other fun spots, while I worked in the nearby Starbucks.
1200 July 28 we left the OKC park to head south
1310 July 28 we stopped at the Fun Town RV in Purcell to get air filled in our goose box. Joshua took care of us and was super professional and kind even though he was backed up with work thru the night.
1400 July 28 we pulled into KOA Sanger. It was neat little park just outside a Walmart Distribution Center. Stef ended up connecting with a HS friend that she hadnt seen in 30+ years. It was also the evening when the boys left the RV and Truck keys in the RV and locked us out. AAA came in handy!
1100 July 29 attended the Sunday church service at Denton Bible Church. Enjoyed the kids program on Esther and the sermon by Tom Nelson. Praise God for his ministry and the sound teaching.
1740 July 29 ended up doing the evening workship service at Denton Bible to see how it was. Josh taught from the same chapter/lesson as Tom did from Rev 3 on the Church of Sardis. Music and workship and service was good.
1100 July 30 drove to The Vineyards and stayed for few nights. The lake was good, but there were not much to do from indoor activities like we had at OKC nor conducive to hanging out in the open as there were no umbrellas on the beach etc.
Some lessons
- You need to have a plan to replan
- You never know who will be brought to your path to be ministered to or to minister to
- Bringing in family closer
- Enjoy with what God provides for you
- You see how bad it could have been
- You take responsibility for your actions
- You enjoy even sultry hot evenings with a good game or card or bible study or debating theological issues from our culture
- Prayer never fails
- When you have believers as friends they all come to your rescue
- Cant trust technology
- Technology has crippled us
- Prayer and trusting in the Lord helps through any issue