Tuesday, December 2, 2014

The More Things Change...

As many of you know, Pam and I lived on Drift Away, our 46 foot trawler, for several years.  We now spend half the year living on Harvey the RV here in Florida.  Yesterday, it was time.  Time to dump the black water holding tanks, just like we had to do on Drift Away.

It is a big production.  We have fencing in front of the RV to keep the dogs in, and I need to move it.  All the awnings need to be rolled up, and the big awning that Alpin Haus in Amsterdam supposedly fixed was not, and it took some doing to get it rolled up.  Unhook the electric and water and we were on our way.

We decided to stop at the Wilderness RV Park in Silver Springs, since they both sell propane (for our furnace) and have a dump station.  18.8 gallons of propane later, and many gallons of waste dumped, and we were on our way.

You would think this would be uneventful, much more so than moving a 46 foot trawler in wind and current to a dock dump station and back.  Well, it was not.  I pulled back onto Judi's lawn a different way, over a shallow ditch by the road, and promptly hung Harvey up.  The trailer hitch carved a groove in the road, the bumper was sitting on the shoulder, and the rear wheels were spinning.  We were most definitely stuck.

Pam asked if I had a jack.  No.

Harvey's wheels were sinking in the soft Florida sand.  I needed to act quickly.  I decided to use my upstate New York winter driving skills in snow.  I could move Harvey a couple of inches in forward, and then a couple of inches in reverse.  Then a few more inches in forward, and a couple of more in reverse.  After a dozen repetitions, I was luckily able to rock Harvey out of the ditch.  Barely.

So we got the RV back where it belongs, and in unrolling the awnings, we struggled with the big one "fixed" by Alpin Haus.  I was on the aft end tugging on the support strut struggling to unroll it, and Pam was on the forward one.  Suddenly she started hollering "OW OW OW OW OW!!  FINGERS FINGERS FINGERS!!  OW OW OW OW OW!! FINGERS FINGERS FINGERS!!!".  She had gotten the forward strut out a bit, but being spring loaded, it snapped back and clamped onto her fingers.  I raced over and jumped up on the milk crate she was standing on, reaching up as high as I could.  I pulled for all I was worth, but with my nerve damaged right arm, it wasn't much.  "OW OW OW OW OW!!  FINGERS FINGERS FINGERS!!  OW OW OW OW OW!! FINGERS FINGERS FINGERS!!!".   Adrenaline kicked in and I was able to pull the strut out just enough for Pam to yank her fingers out.  No broken bones, but certainly crushed.  She might lose some fingernails.  She wrapped them in ice to ease the pain.

Yep.  Boats... RV...  the more things change, the more they remain the same.

1 comment:

  1. Yup, just like a boat, RV's can go aground too!!
    Bob & Lynda

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