This is so not a good sight!Left So. California on Friday morning, a day later than planned. My sister, Kathy had an unscheduled visit to the hospital via ambulance on Wednesday with chest pains. We didn't want to leave until we were assured she was doing o.k. After an angiogram on Thursday she was released and we went on with our plans to head east.
Since there is so much traffic in the morning we decided to head east to I-10 and then up through Havasu City to catch I-40 ending the day in Flagstaff, AZ where we were meeting friends, Jerri & Lloyd Wood. They were coming west as we were heading east and since we were already delayed a day, Flagstaff worked out as a good place to meet! Once we got
into Havasu City Don noticed our alternator wasn't charging - AGAIN! The last time was in Feb. 2006 when we left Oregon and made it to Redding, CA. Monaco gave us a couple of repair shops in Havasu but none worked on chassis'. We turned on the generator to keep our batteries up and headed to Kingman. Once in Kingman, the repair shop couldn't even look at it until 3:30! We waited for a few hours when I called Flagstaff Freightliner to see if they would at least confirm it was a bad alternator. Monaco wouldn't ship one until that was done and the place in Kingman said they couldn't even verify it until 3:30...by then it would be too late to get it shipped out until Monday - anyway! I certainly didn't want to spend the weekend in Kingman when Jerri & Lloyd were already waiting for us in Flagstaff so when Freightliner Flagstaff said they could at least confirm it...we kept on going! Within minutes of arriving in Flagstaff it was confirmed that it WAS our alternator and they told us to come back (without the coach) on Monday and they would get the part ordered. Don was there exactly at 8:00 when they opened and our alternator was on the way! Tuesday morning we were there at 8:00 a.m. and waited and waited and waited! They got the alternator about 11:00 (everytime a Fed Ex or UPS truck would come in one of us went in to see if it was there...I think they got a little tired of seeing us!) and pulled us into the service bay. While we were there we also had them do a lube and oil change. Finally finised about 4:30 so we decided it was too late to head anywhere and ended up parking in their lot for the night! I am so glad that this was a Monaco covered repair...the alternator and labor came to over $1700.00! Yikes! Hope they find out why it keeps happening before we have to pay for the repair ourselves!!!Left Flagstaff at 7:30 am and put just under 500 miles under our belt! Arrived in Tucumcari, NM about 3:30 and got settled in! (Last time we were here it was WHITE, now as I type this it's WINDY, WINDY, WINDY! Thank goodness were not driving in it though!) We're trying to get to Fort Worth, TX and Melissa, TX to see Don's cousin, Chuck Wheeler and his wife Kathy (Chuck "found" us on this blog and it's been about 21 years since they've seen each other!) and also friends, Dave & Marie Ostrander who are in Melissa, TX where Dave has just finished up treatment for throat cancer that was found just before we were all to head to Florida. We will stay two nights in each place and then it's on to Cabot, AR where we will meet up with the realtor, banker, architect and builder to get our new house under way!
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Almost crossed paths again this trip. We were within a few miles of Melissa this morning as we went through McKinney. Thought you might be there but we were needing to push on to get home by afternoon.
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