Often referred to as “the shortest day of the year” the winter solstice is the exact same length as every other day of the year. What’s special about it is that in the northern hemisphere it is the day with the least time from sunrise to sunset and the most time from sunset to sunrise. From here to the Summer Solstice the minutes of daylight increase slightly each day.
As glad as we are to be headed south, there are always reasons to stay home. Family tops the list, especially birthdays and holidays, but we took care of that with the cooperation of our families. We have our friends and clubs, of course, but another reason would be the Winter Solstice Special Release Party at Schramm’s Mead in Ferndale. Since we could not be in two places at once, we will just have to hope that Ken still has some Winter Solstice left when we get back. 🙂 If not, perhaps Ken will have a Vernal Equinox Special Release or a Summer Solstice Special Release. Any excuse to buy Ken’s mead.
What we did instead was pull out of the Oh! Kentucky RV Park/Campground at 8:20 AM and drove 0.3 miles to get back on southbound I-75. It was dry but overcast as we started out, but we were in and out of rain for most of the drive. The rain was generally light, but we did encounter heavier rates from time-to-time. We did not experience much fog, but we did have some areas with ground clouds. We made it past Knoxville, Tennessee without the problems we had back in October. This was the farthest south we have been with the coach, and the first time I have driven I-75 south of Knoxville. We made a brief stop for fuel at the Pilot Travel Center in McDonald, Tennessee and continued south on I-75 into Georgia. This the first time I have driven anything in Georgia and the first time we have had the coach there. Even with the rain it was a relatively easy and uneventful drive, except for the continued, almost random, on/off of the Check Engine Light. The coach ran well with good power and all of the gauges indicated normal operation, so we just pressed on. When we get settled in Arcadia for the rally I will pull out the ProLink and read the codes. That should draw a crowd and might even make for an interesting round-table discussion.
At 1:30 PM we took exit 111 and headed west 0.3 miles to the entrance of the Cartersville/Cassville-White KOA, This was our first time staying overnight in the Georgia in the motorhome. Linda had called ahead when we were near Knoxville, Tennessee, so we knew the office would be closed from 11 AM to 3 PM. The office manager left a map of the campground for us in the night registration station with our spot marked on it and the route to take through the campground to get there. She even put an orange traffic cone at the entrance to our site to mark it as reserved; very thoughtful. The temperature was in the low 60s when we arrived and rose to 69 during the evening. Rain was forecast for the later evening and thunderstorms for the overnight. As we have done since before we left, we kept an eye on the weather.
This is the second KOA we have stayed at in the last three months. We tend to think of them as overpriced with lots of amenities that appeal to families with kids, but that we don’t use. Both parks, however, have been very good places for us to stay, with: convenient access; good gravel interior roads with sufficient width and turning radius for our rig; mature trees trimmed up high enough to not scratch our motorhome; pull through sites with 50 amp full hookups; and clean bathrooms with good showers. The one in Natural Bridge, Virginia was full of kids, but it was a weekend near Halloween and we had fun giving away candy to the trick-or-treaters. The current location appears to be no more than 40% of capacity, with no evidence of kids; definitely off-peak season.
As an update to yesterday’s post, I discovered that I was pushing the wrong button and that both windshield washer pumps do, in fact, work. Duh. L The good news was that both windshield washer pumps work! J When we got to our destination I switched the output hoses back to their correct pumps so everything should work the way it’s supposed to tomorrow; except perhaps for those clogged orifices on the lower wiper arms. It’s always something, it seems, and any RVer who is honest about it will admit that. But they will also tell you that it’s part of the experience/lifestyle, and you either learn to take it stride and deal with it or you end up doing something else.
As a final technical note, now that I have started valving off additional circuits on the auxiliary air system, the pressure seems to be holding much longer and thus the compressor runs much less often. It is now at least a two hour cycle and may be holding longer than that. The new auxiliary air distribution/control panel that I built last year and installed this past spring has made it possible to do this.