On March 10 2002 Peggy and I departed Virginia for Thomasville
Ga. and an FMCA Amateur Radio Chapter Pre-Rally the following week then on to
Lakeland Florida to get Bigfoot Levelers installed on Footloose on the 18th.
We left Fredericksburg around 8:00 AM and drove to a Flying J in Brunswick Ga.
that evening. Footloose used 108 gallons of diesel on this 600 mile leg of our
trip which was approximately 5.5 MPG.
I have owned and driven 3 manufactured Class A RV's, a pull type camper and
two popup campers. Footloose beats them all in terms of ride comfort and driver
fatigue. I can tool her down the highway all day and about the only thing I
worry about is getting stiff from setting in one place too long. The King Cruise
cruise control also makes a big difference in this area , I usually set it on
70 and let her go (70 cost's me about 1 MPG over 55-60 but I generally flow
with the right lane traffic instead of blocking it).
We spent Friday night in the Flying J truck parking lot since the RV side was
completely full (looks like everyone is using their free parking services).
I always fill on the truck islands anyway since it takes forever to dispense
diesel with those small nozzles on the RV side.
Got up the next morning and headed west on secondary roads to Thomasville and
the rally site at Sugar Mill Plantation CG.
After the rally ended on Sat. (16th) we headed on South into Florida and spent the night at a new Escapees park in Bushnell Florida. Peggy and I were evaluating it in terms of possible lease when we hit the road later this year. This park is nice but obviously not designed for big rigs. I had to be extremely careful negotiating around some trees that should be removed. The nightly rate for SKP's is reasonable at $10.00 but they charge 10 cents/KW hour for electricity which is a killer. Our overnight electricity cost was $1.50 we did not use AC or electric heat.
On Sunday we drove on into Lakeland and spent the night adjacent
to the Quadra shop. We managed to miss a left turn on one of those %$&*^^
cross streets that changes its name when it crosses a major road and drove about
8 miles out of our way before I could find a place wide enough to rotate Footloose
and the Toyota Mini-Van we tow. I think cities do this just to confuse the %&*
out of visitors. The Quadra shop is located waaaay in the back of an industrial
park and we thought we were lost again until we finally found it almost at end
of a dead end road (thank goodness).
Monday morning we met Jeff the shop manager and the two installers that were
to work on Footloose. Jeff had to leave immediately for the FMCA Rally in Perry
and as luck would have it, one of the installers hurt his back about two hours
into the install. The job was scheduled for one day with one extra day to cover
problems. It actually took three full days and I served as Gopher for the remaining
installer which was OK also since I now have a better understanding of the system
and know that it was installed correctly.
Each of the jacks has 20 inch stroke and lifting capacity of 18,000 lbs. With
the jacks fully extended the rear drive wheels of Footloose are about 8 inches
off of the ground and the front wheels are approximately 3 inches off the ground.
This will allow me to get under there to do some of the maintenance I have been
unable to to by raising her up, stuffing blocks under the wheels, then letting
her back down on them. The system is also capable of completely automatic mode
where you push a button, then go outside and watch her level herself, neat huh!.
We finally left Lakeland and drove to Kissimmie late Wednesday(
20th) to visit with some friends of ours who are fulltimers and Workcamping
in a CG there. We had only planned to stay until Friday but liked this resort
so much that we extended for another week and did not leave until Thursday (March
25). We left Kissimmie about dark on the 25th with the intention of getting
out of Dodge before the Easter crowd really messed things up (traffic was already
bad) and managed to get back to the Flying J in Brunswick about 11 PM that night.
Filled Footloose up again and parked for the night in truck area. This time
I managed to get beside a car carrier that started moving stuff around in the
middle of the night and neither one of us got much sleep. There must have been
at least 5 major backups on I-95 Southbound with the major one just North of
Jacksonville where Florida is doing construction on the interstate.
Friday (26th) we continued on North to a small CG about midway through North
Carolina where we planned to stay until Sunday and visit with our son in Raleigh
but only stayed one night due to a major rainstorm coming up the coast (I hate
driving in rain).
Saturday (27th) we headed back to Fredericksburg and stopped at our local Flying
J in Bowling Green Va. to fill her up again. She only took about 83 gallons
of fuel which I am still puzzling over since the odometer mileage indicated
it should have took at least 90-100 gallons. I "tickled" it for one
or two minutes to insure that nozzle wasn't shutting off on foam but it simply
would not take any more.
This was our last major enhancement on Footloose before I retire and Peggy and I will now go into "Sell The House" mode almost immediately.