Sunday August 9, 2015 Day 12
Vernal Utah, Ashley National Forest, Lodgepole C.G., site 32
54 miles towing
We finally left Dinosaur National Monument. It was originally meant to be a one night
stopover on the way to Flaming Gorge. We
really liked it there and kept extending our stay. The scenery, hiking trails, exhibits, and
campsite were all excellent.
We didn’t have far to travel today and we know there will be vacancies
at the campground we are headed for so we took our time this morning. I wrote the draft for Saturday’s post and
sorted out the pictures for it while drinking coffee in front of the fire. We left Green River campground at 10:00. We had camped for six straight nights with no
hookups. The holding tanks were all
full, but Green River campground has no dump station. We would fill at Lodgepole on the way in,
before setting up.
Stopped at a 7-Eleven in Naples, UT (just east of Vernal on US-40) to
top off gas, get a bundle of firewood, and a bag of ice. Then went straight to the Lodgepole
campground and set up on site 32.
US=191 from Vernal to Dutch John near the Wyoming border is a designated
scenic highway. There were some long 8%
climbs and descents. The Oliver with
full tanks and the loaded truck struggled somewhat up some of these
grades. That made me wonder if I should
consider an F-250 with a PowerStroke Diesel.
I priced them and they are $8,000-$10,000 more than a comparably
equipped F-150. The F-150 has a tow
rating of 7,000 lbs. and the loaded up Oliver is about 5,500 lbs. But I don’t know if they take into
consideration 8% grades for 7 miles. It
has no problem going back down. I always
downshift. I avoid brakes if I can
because I’ve seen brakes catch on fire on cars coming down from a mountain who
ride the brake all the way down. There
are hairpin turns with 20 mph speed limit at the bottom of long descents. So you really have to pay attention. Marsha was happy they had guard rails on this
highway.
It topped out at 8400 ft. The
campground was a few miles past the summit and is at 8080 ft. Green River was just under 5000 ft. So we climbed about 3000 ft. in a little over
50 miles, actually 30 miles because we didn’t start climbing until after
Vernal. And the gas milage reflected
that. I got 9.2 mpg on the way here, the
worst of the trip, or ever. Best towing
milage of the trip was 12.4 mpg on the way to North Sterling State Park across
the Colorado desert.
After we arrived here at 11:30, it started sprinkling and then turned
to rain. There was blue sky to the west,
but rain and clouds to the east. There
was even sporadic thunder and lightning.
The temperature was only 62o and within an hour it was 52o. The rain lasted several hours, then the sun
came out and all was well the rest of the day.
However, it didn’t warm up. I had
my fleece and my hoody sweatshirt on to try to stay warm. Later in the evening we made a fire to hang
out around. We even made hot chocolate
in the afternoon (with some Carolan’s in it).
We spent the rainy afternoon catching up on blogs and I input all my
accumulated receipts into Quicken. We
have a 4 bar cell signal here, but only 1X data. I was still able to post a draft of
Saturday’s blog, but still have a few more pictures to upload, which is
agonizingly slow at 1X speed.
Here are a few pictures of our campsite:
New issue. Actually old, but is
more of a problem now. When towing, the
truck alternator is supposed to charge the trailer batteries. The Oliver batteries have not been charging
while we drive. This is not an issue
when hooking up every night, but when camping without electric, the battery
gradually runs down. We have a solar
panel which works quite well, but our site at Green River was quite shaded and
there were a few cloudy days. But we
were OK for the three days we were there, but we ran the battery down to 12.1
volts, from fully charged at 12.7 volts.
Where we are now has no electricity either. We are also shaded or clouded here. So after I got here, I brought out the big
guns, the Yamaha 2000 portable generator.
It had us charged up in an hour.
It runs very quiet and uses very little gas, but I only use it if I have
to because it upsets the peace and quiet of the forest somewhat.
Warning! Technical discussion to follow:
There is a 12V pin in the 7 pin connector that feeds the trailer. Opposite that is the ground pin. I checked the truck side between the charge
feed and ground and got 13.1 volts. The
matching pins on the trailer yielded nothing.
But the charging pin to the tongue (ground) was 12 volts. I checked the continuity from the ground pin
to the tongue and there was none. That
tells me that the ground pin on the trailer pin is not connected to the trailer
frame. But everything else works,
lights, brakes. Must be grounding
through the hitch. More on this later.
End of technical discussion.
Another beer observation. While eating at the Mexican restaurant yesterday,
I had a Dos Equis Amber. When it came to
the table it was labeled as 3.2% alcohol by weight, not to exceed. So I’m
still in the land of 3.2% beer. I saw a
State Liquor Store somewhere so that must be where
you can buy the real stuff.
I’m hoping to hear from the Ford Dealer in Vernal tomorrow to see if I
can get in. That will determine what we
do tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment