This week was one of just putting on the miles. We decided that it would be fun to go to one of the Crownpoint (Navajo) Rug Weaver's auctions as this week there is one on Friday the 10th. We went to a Crownpoint Navajo rug auctions back in the late 1970s but haven't been since. Not sure if we will buy anything but we remember the auction as being quite fun so decided to give it a go again. So that means we have to get from Portland to Gallup New Mexico in 6 days. For folks who do a lot of long distance driving this is probably a no brainer but we usually limit ourselves to about 300 kms in a typical day, and usually have a rest day every few days, so this was a bit of a slog or us.
Sunday we set out from Portland to Medford, about 20 miles north of the California border (about 450 kms). And, yes, the "check engine soon" light is still lighting up the dash :-( We stopped at Joe's Diner, in Creswell, for lunch. Bit of a greasy spoon but food was good except the "fresh fruit" bowl was actually from a tin and was in a heavy syrup. In Medford we stayed at the Holiday RV Park.
Monday: Medford to Oroville, California (about 400 kms). Stopped for lunch at a Black Bear Diner in Redding. We've seen them all over the place in these parts so decided to give one a try. This one was very popular (quite crowded actually) with families. The tuna/chef salad and bacon/cheeseburger salads were HUGE but very fresh and very tasty. Good place to keep in mind. More lunch than we could eat for two with a generous tip: $25. It rained a lot during the day but let up a bit north of Chico. We stayed at the Oroville KOA for the night. We opted to walk over to the casino for a buffet dinner. No winnings at the machines but a decent steak dinner. It was a lovely evening. Got up about 3:30 AM for a quick walk to the restroom. Still lovely out. Woke up about 6:00 AM to absolute pouring rain. Got soaked getting everything put away. By the time we left, around 9:30, a basin we had sitting on the picnic table had just about 2 inches of water in it.
Tuesday: Oroville to Bakersfield, California (about 570 kms). It continued raining on and off past Stockton and into the Central Valley (we took route 99). The rain stopped so we decided to head into Modesto for lunch. We stopped at a shopping plaza where we could park the trailer at the far end, of the lot, from a Mexican restaurant, Las Casuelas, where we had another "more than you can eat" lunch of quesadilla and taco wrap. As we left the restaurant another heavy downpour had started so we skipped next door for a Starbucks first. The rain let up a bit but we still got quite wet walking across the large parking lot. It rained off and on all the way through to Bakersfield. These folks really need it but really, couldn't they have waited just another day or two? We stayed at the River Run RV Resort for the night. For dinner we tried a Logan's Roadhouse where the servings are monstrous and we both declined the "extra" side... "but it's free, are you sure???" asked the waiter... but no thanks, we really didn't need them. After dinner we decided we should start to stock up on some cash in case we see something we really really like at the rug auction, in Crownpoint, on Friday. Brian's card failed but we were able to withdraw some on Kris' card. Back at the RV park we called Scotia Bank to find out what's up. Apparently the bank person in Courtenay neglected to "turn on the foreign country flag" on Brian's card but it should be good to go now. We'll see!
Wednesday: Bakersfield to Needles, California (about 450 kms). The drive across the southern edge of the Mojave Desert can only be described as boring. Other than short desert shrubs there is bugger all to see all the way. Put the car on cruise and try to stay awake. We stopped for lunch at Jenny's Grill in Barstow. Excellent meatball soup and salad for Kris and a ham and cheese omelet for Brian. After lunch we tried a Bank of America again. Brian's card still does not produce any results but Kris' card does. So will have to call Scotia Bank again but will wait until we get our Tracfones going again. Approaching Needles we saw a sign for a KOA and pulled off at that exit. On the side road to the KOA we spotted a sign for the Desert View RV Resort. We pulled over and checked our Woodall's bible and noted that Desert View got a much better review so decided to try it instead. Nice choice. Beautiful flowering bushes lining each RV site...
... and a very nice pool which we immediately jumped into as it is the first chance so far on this trip. The only flaw in the park is the absence of picnic tables at each site (something we like to see). Afterwards we drove around Needles to find that there are zero grocery stores (folks have to drive to Bullhead City, about 30 miles, for regular groceries). Places like Rite Aid carry the typical limited, expensive, drug store grocery items where we opted to pick up a bottle of wine and some milk for coffee in the morning. For dinner we stopped in at Juicy's River Cafe where the steak salad and sourdough bun burger and fries were decent. Not great but decent. Also filled up the gas tank in Needles... man they have you there, we paid $4.299 a gallon for premium, the first time we've been anywhere near $4 a gallon.
Thursday: Needles to Flagstaff, Arizona (about 350 kms). The boring drive continues but as we go higher in altitude we see more of the desert plants with flowers. We stopped at an I-40 rest stop east of Kingman and took a bunch of pictures...
.... more pics in our Picasa album for this trip. For lunch we stopped in Kingman. After a look through the visitor center we walked across the street to Mr D'z, a retro diner in the style of old Route 66. Great atmosphere and excellent food. It was late morning so we both opted for breakfast items, scrambled eggs and sausage for Kris and a Mr D'z special omelet for Brian. Nice. Arrived in Flagstaff early afternoon, checked into the KOA then went down to the historic town center for a stroll followed by a really good fennel and sausage pizza and plate of roasted artichokes at Fat Olives Pizzeria.
Friday: Flagstaff to Gallup, New Mexico (about 300 kms). Beautiful day for driving across the high plains desert through some cool juniper forests before the landscape leveled off to boring again. Then it happened!!! About 60 kms out of Gallup, our car started to lose power and the cruise control stopped working. The best Brian could do was to keep the car at a steady 100 kph and we literally limped into Gallup. The rather disconcerting thing was that we could almost see the gas gauge level drop. In that 60 kms we used nearly a half tank of gas and were concerned that we'd run out before we reached Gallup!! We managed to drop the trailer off at the USA RV Park, found a Nissan dealer and headed over to it. Note... the GPS probably paid for itself right there as we were able to use it to locate the Nissan dealer and get there quickly.
The Nissan service guy was great. He got us in right away and said it would take about an hour to figure it out. We walked over to a Sizzler (fast, greasy food) for a bite to eat. Went back to Nissan to find out what they found. INTERESTING!!! First off, the tech discovered the oxygen sensors (remember that from last week) had not been properly installed so he fixed that and they now function properly. BUT... he said the mystery thing was that when he pulled out the oil dipstick to check the oil level, the dipstick was completely dry (ie a very low level). He said there is no indication of a leak nor that we were burning oil. He suspected that the loss of power was due to very low oil pressure. He suggested we do a full oil change rather than just top it up because that would allow him to see how much was in there. So full oil change it was. Turns out there was just a little over 3 quarts of oil when there should have been about 5 and a half. Is it possibles that not enough was put in when we had the pre-trip service done??? After discussion he said that given the low temperatures we have had all the way from Courtenay to Southern California the car would probably run ok on that low amount of oil but the higher altitude and higher temps could have also caused a low pressure vapor lock resulting in the loss of power. So it looks like a chat with the Nissan service manager in Courtenay is in order. To boot, the service tech says that the low oil pressure situation may have buggered up our catalytic converter so it now needs replacing. He said they could not get a new catalytic converter for at least a week and it would not harm the car to drive it the way it is until we get to Houston (later next week), but the "check engine soon" light will continue to be on!!!
Anyway, all that took about 4 hours so we headed off to Crownpoint at about 5:30 PM. The auction started at 7:00 PM so after the hour or so drive out to Crownpoint, we still had about a half hour to view the rugs before the auction started.
The auction was at the Crownpoint Elementary School and there was quite a crowd of both sellers and buyers. We had a quick look through some of the rugs then sat down for a hot tamale dinner before the action started. We sat with a Navajo family and chatted with a woman who was likely mid 40ish. She told us that both her and her elderly mother beside her had rugs in the auction. Anyway, the auction started and there were many fabulous rugs, many for which the minimum price was not bid so "no sale". The least expensive were in the $80 range and the highest bid one was for $3600 with several larger ones going for over $2K, all being terrific bargains compared to regular retail...
... more auction pics on our Picasa album for this trip. We ended up with 3 very small ones 2 of which were sample Two Grey Hills style "rugs within a rug" (very difficult and technically challenging weaving)....
Saturday was finally a rest and shopping day. Late morning we headed into downtown Gallup to Richardson's, the pre-eminent Navajo trading place to go. Kris picked up a beautiful necklace and earring set. The sales person suggested a place up the street for lunch. She said they have a number of Mexican restaurants in Gallup but Jerry's is the place to go...
... A little hole in the wall place with limited seating and a line of eager customers waiting at the door. Had to wait about 15 minutes but, man, was it worth it. Yummmmm! Side note... while waiting in line some folks come out and Kris says "I know that guy"... then it comes to her... it was Chuck Wilson, an ex-CEO of Shell Canada. Small world. Later, back at the RV Park we chat with a couple who were from Minnesota. Turns out her father was a ball player and her cousin is Paul Molitor, a MLB Hall of Famer and current manager of the Minnesota Twins (we'll see them play in mid August).
We finished the day, and week, off with dinner at El Rancho...
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