Wednesday, December 2, 2009 - Brantley Lake State Park, Carlsbad NM

Snow in the park, Brantley Lake State Park, Carlsbad NM, December 1, 2009

The power is out again

I guess I get at least one more turn in the barrel (where does that expression come from anyway). I woke up about 4:00am - cold. The power is out again. But just in my rig this time - the lights are on at the bathhouse and in a few rigs I can see from here. Sheesh - what is it now?

One leg of the main 30 amp output line from the transfer switch to the breaker panel burned off at the crimped and soldered connector at the switch. Fixing it was easy enough and an hour later I had power back and the heat back on. But....

My water pump is leaking

Luckily, diagnosing and fixing the burned connection got me down behind the access panel under the sink where the rats nest of wiring coming and going from the power panel lives on the floor with the water pump. It seems my 17 year old water pump is leaking - not enough to send water out across the floor to let me know it is leaking but enough to wet down the wiring secured to the floor next the pump.

What a great idea - let's strap our wiring to the floor next to one of these notoriously leaky water pumps and let 'er age a few years and see what happens. Yeah, right. I'm lucky to find this slow leak before it did much damage to the floor and wiring down there. If I can come up with a simple enough plan and find the parts this might be a good time to relocate the pump. Or lift the wiring above the floor.

Just to keep things interesting, Amazon has a good deal on pumps and for an added $3.99 they will overnight one to me. But here's the catch - Amazon's database doesn't recognize the Brantley Lake State Park's address as valid and I can't find a way to override their database. To get around that I tried the the local RV dealer here in Carlsbad - the pump is not in stock. Grumble. I ended up using the UPS Customer Center address in Amazon's address field with a hold for pickup. We'll see if that works.

Buying this old rig was like buying a 20 year old house

The systems are at the end of their normal lifespan and need replacing. I'll have a brand new worn out rig by the time I get done replacing stuff. Fun.

Night camp

Site 37 - Brantley Lake State Park, Carlsbad NM

• Verizon cell phone service - Access is via Extended Network, roaming
• No Verizon EVDO service - access is via the Extended Network and service varies with many drop-outs.
• See a list of the nights I've camped at Brantley Lake State Park
• Locate Brantley Lake State Park on my Night Camps map
• Go to Brantley Lake State Park website
• Locate services on my Resources map
• Check the weather here