Staying on in Palm Springs

Apologies to our readers. If you are still here you are very patient. We have been busy and at times distracted. We will try to catch up with some brief posts to cover each stop since we last blogged. Then maybe we can get back in the habit to keep up.

We returned to the Palm Springs TT park for the last time this season. We came in on the 7th with a 3 week reservation but we anticipated that we would leave the area a few days before the 3 weeks was up . But on the 8th Barb had a followup visit with her surgeon and he wanted to see her on March 1st. So we started looking for a place to stay here a little longer. We are now planning to be in the area until the 8th of march. In the meantime we have apparently run into a dead end in selling our bus this year. We advertised briefly and have had a few individuals interested but it does not look like we will see it before we leave. We have arranged to store it and plan to return next winter and advertise more aggressively to make a sale.

In the meantime we are having a good time. We went to a play "Menopause the Musical" recently. Even Dennis admitted that it was surprisingly well done and enjoyable. One of us (bet you can't guess which one) even took up the invitation to come up on stage and dance the finale with the cast.

Dennis has been continuing to play a lot of pickleball. He and Oland have gone hiking in the desert a couple of times.

We've been able to work in a little sightseeing. We took a few hours to drive the Palms to Pines Highway up into the mountains to the south. We didn't get near the snow line but there was a definite climate change as we went from a pleasant sunny day around 70 degrees to perhaps 40 degrees with a vicious wind blowing. It gave us a sense of the winter that we have been missing.

Last Thursday we went with Oland and Merilee to visit the Living Desert which is a zoo and botanical gardens in Palm Desert. After several hours there we were tired from the walking and hungry so we adjourned to the Elephant Bar for a great meal.

Who's Fault

On the 26th we made the big move from Desert Hot Pools to Catalina Spa. The distance is only about a mile. So it is the shortest move that we have ever made. Still it turned out to be surprisingly time consuming. It seemed that we spent about half a day packing and getting ready, going to the new park and getting parked and set up. We often get a head start the day before by packing up and putting things away. And we took it slow as we are still getting familiar with the new coach. We almost forgot to put down our rooftop over the air tv antenna, as we didn't have to do this with the MCI which had an omnidirectional antenna that did not need to be raised and lowered. And Dennis took some time to check the air pressure in all of the tires and put a few pounds of air in several of them. By the time we got set up in the new park it was mid afternoon.

When we got to Catalina Spa we were told that that there was an emergency preparedness meeting in the afternoon and that we were welcome to participate. We remembered that they were having something similar to that in December when we were here. What's that about? Well, we were informed that the San Andreas fault runs through the back corner of the park and that this is considered a high risk area for a major earthquake risk area. Well we stayed in the cheap sites in the front of the park, so we are maybe 1/3 mile from the fault. So we guess that we are safe, right?

This park has the most active pickleball program of any park in the area and now has 6 nice courts, up from the 4 that were here on our last visit. Pickleball and the natural hot water spas and swimming pools are the major attractions here. Barbara is frustrated that she is not able to participate in pickleball or use of pools or spas while she is recovering from her surgery. Dennis has been able to take advantage of both on a regular basis. There is a senior games scheduled in Palm Desert including pickleball events. Dennis decided not to attend as he has been having some residual problems with his back. He has found that he can play regularly as long as limits his play each day to a few games but he felt that this type of tournament might be too much for him for now. But he has enjoyed playing with a number of the players practicing for the tournament.

Recovering at Desert Pools

We returned to Desert Pools for a 2 week stay on the 12th. Barb had seen the surgeon for her first followup visit the day before. And he said that she was doing well. She asked if she could drive and he said for short distances as long as she wasn't taking pain medications. So we decided that she would drive here from thousand trails rather than hook the car up and take it off. Our first move in the new motorhome went well. We find ourselves taking our time as we are not familiar with how things work. We have various questions that we are getting answers to from other coach owners, manuals, and the internet. Dennis spent a fair amount of time sorting out the tv cabling which is unfortunately undocumented. He got it so that we can use the "cable" connection to bring the signal to our front tv. But we can't use our second reciever in back through that connection as there is only one co-ax cable to come in, so we are running cable to our bedroom though an engine access port at the back of the bedroom. Inelegant but it works. We replaced the old tv in the bedroom with a flat LCD tv we brought from the bus. We spent a couple of days coming up with a way to install the tv in way that would be functional and reasonably attractive. We are satisfied with the result. It is not bad looking if you don't look too close. We will do something similar replacing the old tv in front with our other, larger LCD tv from the bus. But we will probably have it done professionally as this will be easily seen by anyone coming in and probably not the place to be experimenting. The Monaco has a Trac Vision Dome installed. We assumed that this would be a simple matter of hooking it up to our Direct tv receivers, but no such luck. It was not clear how to do it, even after browsing the manual. So we called the company. After going through a rather complicated voice mail system, we got to tech support who when we told him the model, said "Are you sure, thats a very old system." He said that it could be done but would be difficult. We would have to get an old Direct tv receiver that has a "low speed data port" and a software update would have to be done, but he said that it could not be done by our Vista computers. His advice was to find an installer and have them set it up for us. Of course, we tried ourselves. It turned out that we had an adaptor that would connect a usb from one of our computers to the 9 pin connector from the dome. But the computer would not recognize the hardware and we could not find a way to enter the command. So we called a a local installer who said essentially "that thing is an antique, you would be much better off to buy a new one from us." We thanked him and decided to keep using our tripod for tv for now. We have come across the name of another installer who we will contact for a second opinion.

At the same time we are trying to sell the MCI bus. It is parked at the consignment lot where we bought our new coach. But we have not signed a contract to sell it. The owner has admitted that he does not know how to price it and he clearly is much less familiar with buses as opposed to manufactured rv's. For now, he lets people look at it asks them to make an offer if they are interested. But it is clear we need to try some other approaches. We have listed it on the internet and had a number of requests for pictures and more information. Unfortunately most of these are in distant parts of the country. So we are listing in the Southern California RV Trader magazine with the hopes that we will get someone local and interested. Oland also took some flyers we made up to Quarzite & made them available to some individuals with interests in buses. So far we have not had what we would consider a serious offer. But we have had some deals proposed, perhaps reflecting the quixotic nature of bus conversion fans. The latest is a trade of the bus for a semi tractor and 53 foot flat bed trailer. This may well be a good deal but it seems like it would create more problems than it would solve.

Barb is generally doing well in spite of an allergic reaction to steri-strips. She saw the doctor again and he is happy with her progress. She is generally doing better day by day. She was able to get away from using the pain medications quickly. She finds the decreased activity level difficult to tolerate. She has been going for walks around the park and plays various card games at the activity center.

Rebuilding Barb

For many years Barb has suffered with back pain, shoulder pain and arm pain due to the size of her breasts. For whatever reason she finally decided enough was enough and saw a doctor in Palm Springs and inquired about the possibility of getting this fixed. Dr. Hayduke is a local plastic surgeon. He submitted the pictures and paperwork to our insurance company and after several weeks they approve the procedure.


The morning of Jan 7th 2010, Barb, Dennis and Merralee headed to the hospital when Barb underwent a 4 hour surgery. She did well and didn't look non the worse for wear when she came to room she would be in overnight . Julie was also there to greet her. I is wonderful to have such wonderful friends who would spend that much time for me I truly feel blessed. Before heading into the OR, Dr Hayduke came by and told Dennis and Merrilee he need to spend some time marking my body. After he left the room, Dennis and Merrilee both said that he looked like he was 12 years old. When he returned Barb told him this and he said that he was really 13 and that his mom drove him to work. Barb really felt so much better when he said that. lol He is a really good surgeon.

Barb has been resting and improving in our new motorhome, her recovery will take about 6 weeks. Dennis has been absolutely wonderful (still not much of a cook) he has been taking care of everything, even the laundry.

Thanks to all of you who stopped by at ttn palm springs. Barb is looking forward to seeing all of you really soon.

Sorry no pictures yet of the after, and of course all you know the before.

Our New Home

We got all of the paperwork done and were able to move into our new motorhome on December 30 and 31st. In spite of all of our prep work and we could not complete the process in a day. It was very difficult. Merralee offered to help and we told her that she could probably help best by taking care of Roxie while we moved which she did. That certainly made it easier. But there was a lot to move and a still a lot to throw away. You wouldn't really think that an RV could hold so much as when you try to move it all in a day. But we were taking our time and doing it in an organized fashion. But as the process went on it seemed increasingly disorganized. In any case we had essentially everything moved by late on the morning on the 31st. But we were still putting things away, hopefully where we could find them later. And we were waiting for the dealer to install the a new kitchen faucet that had been promised as part of the deal. Finally, we were ready to go, but the fuel tank was reading low and we thought that we should fill up first. So by the time we drove to a truck stop and put in nearly 90 gallons of diesel fuel, it was after 2 o'clock when we got back to our site at Thousand Trails.

To say the least we were exhausted. There were a few little snags in setting up for the first time. No real problem, just things that we were not familiar with. We had a fast food dinner and very little energy. There was a big New Years Eve party that we had planned to attend. But Barbara was ready for bed by 8 o'clock. Dennis walked up to wish a Happy New Year to Oland and Meralee, John and Debbie, and a few others, then returned to the motorhome to have a glass of wine and watch tv until he was too tired to stay up.

Here are some pics of the new coach.





Our new home.



This is the entry to our new home. We are both very pleased with the coach.

This is the living area and we were able to seat at least eight people and could also seat more.

This is the dinning and kitchen area, love the counter space and the very large with an icemaker fridge.

This is the bedroom, I really love the quilt that was left for us.

Guess this is the best space, Dennis has his own location with a pocket table for his computer. It is really nice to have that.





Some have asked why we decided to get a new motorhome. 'We have long argued that our bus was as sturdy a vehicle as you would see in an RV park. It has been a good and reliable vehicle on the road. But we have seeing a lot of newer RV's with the slideouts that make them seem like more liveable space. That was our primary motivation for looking for something newer. And although we have been able to work things out, we have found that it is often difficult to find someone who is willing and knowledgeable to work on an old bus when on the road. That has been a source of concern for Dennis who is not known for mechanical skills. And there are systems and conveniences that are available on newer RVs. While most can be added to a bus conversion, they can be difficult and costly, especially if you hire someone to do it. So we had been thinking for some time in a tentative way about finding another RV. Our first thought was to buy a fifth wheel as that appears to be the way to get the most living space for the least money. And we looked at a few. But we like traveling in a motorhome and the idea of having a large truck for a daily driving vehicle did not appeal to either of us. And the cost of a new or near new fifth wheel and and new or near new truck to tow it was still expensive. So we looked at the idea of what we could get in a motorhome for something in that price range or less. We were convinced that a new motorhome that would meet our critera as fulltimers could not be found in this price range. So we started looking at older motorhomes that were larger, had good reputations and in our view well built. We believe that we bought at a good time as the market has been down for the last couple of years which has made prices of used units more favorable to buyers. We were a bit surprised to find one as quickly as we did that we both wanted as we had somewhat different criteria in mind.


By the way, is anyone looking for a deal on a used MCI bus? We still have ours and are putting it on the market.

Palm Springs for the Holidays

We returned to the Palm Springs Thousand Trails Park on the 20th of December. This is starting to feel like our home base. We may be spending more time here than originally anticipated. We will be here now through the holidays. Our friends Oland and Meralee came in a couple of days later. Their friends John and Debbie who we met at Catalina Spa came in as their guests. The six of enjoyed good times and a lot of good meals over the holidays.

Dennis had a few head bangers in John and Deb's rig, so Johns gave him some protective head gear.
This was a very nice Christmas dinner the park here had their dinner about 5 days before the holidays. John and Debbie hosted a breakfast for all of us and it was wonderful.

This is my very very best present this year, aren't they great.

During this period Barbara has finally been completing her physical therapy. She finished therapy first on her foot and needed a few more sessions on her shoulder. The good news is that it all has gone well.

The holidays this year are a bit of a hectic time. But not in the usual way. We are buying a new motorhome. And there are a lot of details involved. And the process is complicated by doing things long distance. We are dealing with a bank and credit union in Ohio and vehicle registration in Florida. We have been going through the bus sorting through everything and deciding what we can get rid of and what we need and want to keep. As with any move we are finding things that we had forgotten about.

Our new motorhome is a 2000 Monaco Dynasty. Like the MCI bus the Dynasty is nominally 40 feet in length. More technically the Dynasty is about 6 inches longer, 6 inches wider and 6 inches higher than the MCI. It has more interior living space primarily as a result of 2 slideouts. A trade off is that we have less space in the outside storage compartments under the floor.
This photo is absolutely pre boob job. More about the new motorhome later.


Our planned moving day is December 30. We will go to the dealer and park the coaches side by side and move everything from the old coach to the new one. If we do not complete the process in one day we can stay the night. We will finish and be in the new coach for the New Year.

Catalina Spa

We drove the short drive to Catalina Spa at Desert Hot Springs on the 7th. We are staying in this membership park through RPI. It is a nice park. It is known for being an active pickleball center with a lot of good players. There are 4 and soon to be 6 pickleball courts that are busy most days. Dennis played in the monthly tournament that features cash prizes and brings in players from other parks in the area. He managed to tie for fourth place but only the first three win the cash prizes. Oh well.

There are a lot of activities going on. The park has naturally hot water for the hot tubs and pools that are open 24 hours a day.

Best of all some of our friends are here at the same time. Bob and Julie came in the day before we did. Oland and Meralee came in a few days later and our English friends Jim and Jane came in the day after they did. So we have been spending a lot of time reminiscing and getting reacquainted.

The day we arrived here was the first rainy day in eight months. The weather is mostly pleasant and warm with cool nights. It is nice to be in the warm sunshine and see the snow on the mountains.