Sept 23rd

We will get home this afternoon and we are not sure if we are happy about it or not.  There is lots to do there and when we are on the road there is nothing we can do about it so it is much more relaxing.  We got up and took a walk around the “City of Rocks” in the early morning light – early for us was about 8am.  The sky had cleared up from the low clouds of yesterday and the rocks looked even more inviting.  We flushed out a great horned owl from a tree among the rocks – twice!  First he flew around a few rocks and into another tree and then, when we got there, from that tree back to the first one.  Those birds are amazing – so big and so quiet – no sound in flight.  We see great horned owls around our house in the Tortolita Mountains and are always impressed.

The trip was uneventful.  The new fan clutch kept us cool as the temps climbed into the low 90’s but it was on all the time.  This needs work and hopefully I can get it done before our next trip.

Keep an eye on this blog because I will be adding some details like a map and some statistics.

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Sept 22nd
We are full steam on our way home.  We wish that the trip wasn’t ending but we are already looking forward to our next trip – a GMC Western States rally in Las Vegas.

We planned to have a pretty short day today because we only planned to get to the Deming, New Mexico from Carlsbad.  Just south of Carlsbad is another national park called Guadalupe Mountains National Park.  It seems to be primarily a hiking kind of place so we planned to just stop at the visitors’ center and take a short walk to the ruins of a Butterfield Stagecoach stop dating to the mid-1800’s.  The park is really scenic but the weather didn’t cooperate and there was a low fog that hid the mountains pretty well and even made driving a problem for a while.

Like the first night of the trip we are spending our last night in a New Mexico state park.  On the way out of the Southwest on August 1st we spent our first night at Elephant Butte State Park in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico and loved it.  Tonight we will spend the night at the City of Rocks State Park near Faywood, New Mexico.  It was a little off of our planned route but Carol really wanted to go and that is all it took for me to want to go too.  City of Rocks State Park is a place she remembers from her youth in Las Cruces, New Mexico where she lived from age 7 to age 14.  It was a place to stop for a picnic on the way to her mother’s twin sister’s house in Bayerd, New Mexico near Silver City.  The park has a nice campground that is located less than 100 yards outside the rock city.  It is easy to walk among the rocks and is extremely scenic.  We are glad that we drove the extra 30 miles off of I-10.

Here is a slide show of the day’s photos – don’t forget to click the little square at the bottom right.

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Sept 21st

Today was the day to go visit the caverns.  Both of us had been there before – my last visit was in 1967 when I was in the Air Force and stationed in San Angelo, Texas.  I know that the caverns have looked the same for about the last 50,000 years but I wanted to see them again and so did Carol who last saw them on her 10th birthday.  We got a bit of a late start because we met some really nice people in the camp ground and one of the couples was really interested in the GMC.  They spend May through October in their really small class ‘B’ and liked the looks of the GMC.

Our original plan was to get there early enough to do the two self-guided tours that took a total of 3 hours and then take the ranger-guided tour of a couple of smaller chambers.  Our late start caused us to skip the ranger-guided tour and it was just as well because we were tired from the 3 hours of walking.  The self-guided tours started at the natural opening of the caverns – the place that the bats come out – and proceeded down about 750 feet to the “big room”.  It took about 1 1/2 hours to get down there and then another 1 1/2 hours to see the “big room”.  Photos are very difficult to take because of the lack of light and the immense size of the caverns.  They are gigantic – not the biggest in the world but ranked as the most beautiful – and we agree.

Photos are hard to take in the caverns but here is an attempt – don’t forget to click on the box in the lower right of the photo to go to full screen.

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Sept 20th

We left Lubbock in the morning with the new fan clutch and could not believe how quiet it was – at first.  Actually, it never got very loud at all but seemed to be on all the time.  At low highway speeds you can’t even hear it.  When you get up to cruising speed you can hear it but it is not loud enough to bother us.  Today was not hot though so we’ll reserve judgement until we get back to hot country in the next few days.  I did manage to find an O’Reilly Auto Parts store and exchange my bad Hayden 2797 for a new one free of charge.

The source of UFO information

Our first stop of the day was Roswell, New Mexico – the home of the alien conspiracy.  You know, where the US government has successfully hidden the fact that aliens crashed and died there in their flying saucer.  It all really sounds suspicious until you realize that the US government probably could not keep something like that a secret for very long ever.  We went to the International UFO Museum and Research Center and did a lot of reading about what happened, who saw what , etc.  All very interesting and just something that we had to do being in Roswell.

Our next stop was Carlsbad, New Mexico and the Carlsbad Caverns National Park.  Both of us have been there before but not for many years.  Today we got into town at about 3pm – too late to tour the caverns but in plenty of time to visit the cave entrance for the evening bat flight.  The weather and the lighting were perfect and we watched as thousands of bats left the cave.  Tomorrow we will tour the cave and just relax afterward.

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Sept 19th – The title of this post refers to the objective for today which is to visit the Buddy Holly Center in Lubbock, Texas and to the fact that the fan noise today almost drove us over the edge.

In front of the Buddy Holly Center

First, again for the GMC folk who might be interested: the fan noise.  For the past few days the fan clutch has liked to be on whenever we were driving slowly no matter about any temperature – engine or ambient.  It would run for a long time and then finally shut off after we had been driving at highway speed for five or ten minutes.  Today, it stayed on almost all the time.  We had to resort to wearing foam ear plugs.  When we got done with Buddy Holly I went to an AutoZone and bought a medium duty TorqFlo 922747 clutch that crosses to the Hayden 2747 – the “heavy” rather than “severe” duty clutch.  I would have bought the Advance Auto 21-5046 recommended by Ray E. but we have no Advance Auto stores in Tucson (that I know of) to exchange it if I need to.

the only photo I was allowed to take

The Buddy Holly Center has recently moved and is in a really nice building in the middle of town.  Unfortunately, they do not allow photos to be taken of any of their exhibits but that is really not a big deal because it is a nice low key exhibit with only a few original items.  The reason it is small is that Buddy Holly was a star for only about 18 months before he died on “the day the music died” in January of 1959.  During his very short career, however, he had twenty-five hit records and influenced many rock and rollers who came after him.  It is even said that the Beatles name was inspired by the name of Buddy Holly’s backup band, the Crickets.

We again had some good barbeque on highway US-82 on the way here.  We stopped at a gas station – there are not very many between Wichita Falls and Lubbock – that also served barbeque and seemed to be pretty popular with the locals.  It was good.  Just a note for fellow barbeque lovers – Texas barbeque does not seem to include any pork, just beef.

After the Buddy Holly Center we went to buy the fan clutch and get some more groceries and discovered that Lubbock is a really nice town.  The population is over 200 thousand and there are lots of nice stores.  I installed the fan clutch after dinner – hoping for the best tomorrow.

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Sept 18th

Clinton's first home

We left Arkadelphia, Arkansas intent on getting to Wichita Falls, Texas tonight so that we can get to Lubbock, Texas and the Buddy Holly Center early enough on Sunday to make it worth while – they are closed on Monday so we have to get there tomorrow – Sunday.  The first thing that happened is that we saw the signs for Hope, Arkansas and the Bill Clinton boyhood home, etc.  We had to go, having just been to the Clinton Presidential Library.  It was interesting and worth doing but it took about an hour and a half – putting us that much behind schedule to make Wichita Falls tonight.

This paragraph is for any GMC people who would be interested and anyone else can just skip it.  It was hot again and again the GMC ran cool at 180-210 degrees.  The fan is still driving me nuts though.  The ambient temperatures ran from mid-80’s at first to almost 100 by the end of the day.  It seemed that no matter what temperature was showing on the engine water temp gauge the fan would run fully engaged at low highway speed and never turn off until the highway speed got to at least 55mph.  When the ambient temperature went up the amount of time required to turn the fan off increased accordingly.  Every time, the engine temp would be at 180 degrees and the fan would run and run.  The fan running or not running had absolutely no relationship to the engine temperature being high or low.

We got to Wichita Falls by about 4:30 so we made up most, if not all, of the time we lost at Hope.  We drove on US-82, a 2-lane road, almost all the way in Texas and saw lots of signs for Texas barbeque along the way so we wanted some tonight.  In Memphis, we had asked one of the employees or volunteers at the Civil Rights Museum where to get good barbeque and they sent us to A&R’s on Third Street – it was delicious and the tab was only about $20 for two big meals.  Tonight Carol asked the lady who checked us in at the RV park and she suggested a “dive” in town that was easy to get to and had good barbeque.  This time the food was good but the service sucked.  Carol had some delicious ribs and I had the brisket, we each had an O’Douls and the bill came to $26 plus tip (a small one).  The place was a real dive too – called the Bar L.

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Sept 17th

We left Memphis and headed for Little Rock, Arkansas and the Clinton Presidential Library.  I had purchased a new fuel filter for the carburetor but had not installed it.  The fuel problem came back about three times early in the day but has not recurred since. The outside temperatures started out a little warm but climbed into the 90’s pretty quickly.

Clinton Presidential Library

When we got to Little Rock we parked the GMC and took the Tracker to the library.  Turns out that this was the day for a swearing-in ceremony for 97 new US citizens and the ceremony was taking place at the library.  We were invited in to see the administration of the oath.  The actual ceremony went on for a couple of hours but we left to look around the library.

Library interior

The library building is a large 3-story building, very modern with lots of glass and overlooking the Arkansas River and the city of Little Rock.  The first floor is the welcome center and has one of the presidential Cadillac limos on display.  The second floor has lots of displays of programs and events during his presidency.  The Third floor has a re-creation – very accurate – of the cabinet room and the oval office and lots of the gifts and mementos of his presidency.

We spent about 3 hours there and then left at 4pm for points West.  The temperature was high – 95 to 99 – and the traffic was heavy – Friday evening.  We had hoped to dry camp at a WalMart but with the temps that high we had to find some electricity to run the AC.  We got the last camp spot at the Arkadelphia RV Park in Arkadelphia, Arkansas and went to the WalMart for groceries for dinner.

Here is a slide show – click the little square at the bottom right for full screen view of photos.

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Sept 16th

We took the free shuttle bus from the Graceland hotel and camp ground to Sun Records in Memphis.  Sun Records was the name of the studio founded by Sam Phillips who had Elvis, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis on contract in the early 50’s.  He also recorded B.B.King, Howlin’ Wolf and Roy Orbison at Sun Records for other labels.  The tour was really entertaining due to the enthusiasm of the tour guide named Eldorado – a member of a local rock band.  This tour was awesome – the place is original from the ceiling to the floors except for the equipment.  The equipment was removed when Sam Phillips quit running the recording studio and the building was used for other things until 1985 when a local musician bought it and started doing the tours.  It is again being used as a recording studio in the evenings and has had many current stars record there for nostalgic reasons.  The control booth was not open for the tour because it has been updated with current equipment.

Our next stop was the National Civil Rights Museum at the location of the motel where Dr. King was assassinated.  It is basically a documentary of the history of the civil rights struggle for African-Americans.

Here is a slide show of today’s photos. Don’t forget to click the little box at the bottom right of the photos to get a better look.

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Sept 15th

We left Dan and Teri’s at about 9:00 or so and headed south on some country roads, heading for I-55 to Memphis and Graceland.   We have been wishing that we had the Paul Simon CD with “Graceland” on it to play on the trip but we didn’t bring it.  We tried singing it ourselves but it lacks something.

The coach was still suffering a little from the fuel issue which started yesterday.  It didn’t do anything bad until maybe and hour on the road and then it started acting – a couple of seconds at a time once in a while – like it was starving for fuel.  I tried switching to the second fuel tank to see if the problem was unique to the primary tank and maybe the notorious “sock” filter inside the fuel tanks but the second tank did the same thing.

Graceland campground

We got to Memphis and the camp ground at Graceland in about 3 hours and called Jim K at Applied GMC to see what he might suggest.  He thinks I should change the fuel filter in the carburetor because some of the junk that clogged the big filter may have gotten through and clogged the little one.  I will get one tomorrow at the Advanced Auto Parts store that is almost right next to the Graceland entrance.  I may go ahead and buy that medium duty fan clutch that Ray E. suggested on the GMCnet while I am there.  The fan clutch was much more reasonable today – the temperatures were 90 to 95 degrees and the noise seems to be more acceptable when you need it.

We toured Graceland today – took about 2 1/2 hours – and will do Sun Records, Beale Street and the Civil Rights Museum tomorrow.  The Graceland hotel (“Heartbreak Hotel”) and the campground, both at the end of “Lonely Street”, provide shuttles.

I have to admit that I have been a fan of Elvis since about 1958 when my then girl friend played his records for me.  After getting over the shock of the “Hound Dog” lyrics I learned to really enjoy his music and even saw him perform live once.

Here is a slide show of the other photos from Graceland.

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Sept 14th

The GMC started acting up a little.  It would suddenly lose power and act like it was running out of gas. Since we had an earlier case of a loose electrical connection  on the fuel pump I checked that first.  One of the leads was loose so I tightened it a little – it is a slip-on connector so a little tweaking was all I had to do.  That didn’t fix it so I stopped at an AutoZone and bought and installed a new fuel filter – the large one that goes ahead of the Carter Electric pump from Applied GMC.  That seemed to make a huge difference but did not get it all.  More on that tomorrow.

Dan & Teri

We arrived at Dan and Teri’s house at about 3:30 and were greeted very warmly.  Dan drove me back and forth to the local AutoZone to get a manual heater hose shutoff valve to replace the one that had been leaking since I installed it on the second or third day of this trip.  We had a delicious homemade dinner, met one of their daughters and her family – beautiful kids, the oldest of whom looks just like Dan.  We had an enjoyable evening with lots of GMC and other stories.  We went to bed a little early but we had just crossed a time zone and were a little GMC-lagged.

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