Hot Air and Ticks

Full time RV life is perfect for us in every way as we often share but it doesn’t come without a hitch or two or three. The past month has not been all fun and games! It all started when Jeff heard a “tic” from the engine as we drove, that caused some concern so we scheduled a diagnostic test with a Cummins dealer in Richmond, Virginia since we knew we would have a place to stay with family while they took a look. Before we headed that way we were in Hilton Head, South Carolina having a wonderful time on Jeffs vacation week when our front air conditioner went out on the Love Bus… So we scheduled with a small RV shop in Kittrell, Virginia to have that looked at after the engine check. Our third tick was Oliver keeps getting ticks every where we go so I went into PetSmart to get a medication to remedy those nasty bugs.

When we pulled into Stone Mountain in Georgia, Jeff could hear a discernible exhaust tick coming from the engine as we pulled into camp, Having a little knowledge of Turbo Diesel engines,Jeff knew that this should be remedied before it became a bigger problem.

We dropped the Coach off at the Cummins shop in Richmond VA to let them begin their work. The next day, they called back and informed me that the exhaust manifold gasket had blown out on the number 5 cylinder. Jeff suspected that might be the case. After discussions with them, we decided to go ahead and replace the 17 year old exhaust manifolds.

We were also told that the down pipe from the turbo had cracked. The down pipe had to be ordered from Spartan, who is the manufacturer of the chassis that Newmar had built our Coach on. That little piece of pipe cost us more than the set of exhaust manifolds from Cummins. We weren’t expecting that……

The Cummins shop did a great job solving the exhaust issues and we picked the Love Bus up only a week after dropping it off.

There are two AC unit / Heat Pumps on the Love Bus. One controls the temperature in the main living area at the front, and one controls the temperature in the bedroom. The previous owners had updated the bedroom AC at some point, but the front AC was still the original that came with the coach. It stopped blowing cold air when we were in Hilton Head, so we decided to go ahead and replace it. The original one was a 13,500 BTU unit and we decided to also upgrade that to a 15,000 BTU unit.

There were a few hiccups due to the age of the thermostat and the need for additional control boards from Dometic, the AC manufacturer, to get everything to work together properly, but the RV shop got everything installed and we have nice cool air once again.

Time for a trip to the PetSmart Vet called Banfield. We chose this vet because the pups can be seen all over the country. We just went in for routine visit to check for heart worm and get up to date on vaccines. After blood work was done they came back to say Oliver needed further blood work because he was showing signs of a tick born disease called Ehrlichia. I gave them the go ahead and they came back and said he tested positive and would need to go on a month long antibiotic and then come back for more blood work. Sad for Oliver, happy we caught it at an early enough stage that there is a treatment remedy and $700 later we left PetSmart. Please NO MORE TICKS!

As stressful as all of these events were we were grateful that family put us up during this time! We never once thought twice about our decision to go “full time” in the Love Bus. Traveling the country with your best friend is like being on vacation every day while having your home every where you go. We look forward to every day being a new adventure, new sunrises and sunsets, new farmers markets, and hiking trails, new friendly faces (that can almost always tell that we aren’t locals) and new astonishing views. We are never sad to leave a place always grateful for the experience and ready to take in a new one. We feel that the life we chose somehow chose us. Our hearts are full as we lead with gratitude in this amazing journey!