A timelapse of driving our RV, a Tiffin Allegro Bus motorhome, 354 miles from Sun City, Arizona to Bonita, California.
RV
Posts featuring the coach.
Sun City, Arizona to Sweetwater Summit Regional Park in Bonita, California
We drove our coach 354 miles, about six hours of driving, from Encore Paradise RV Resort in Sun City, Arizona to Sweetwater Summit Regional Park in Bonita, California.
Here’s a map showing our route, heading west:
An interactive map, with potential stops pinned:
Pulled out of our site in Encore Paradise:
Leaving Paradise:
Exit to I-10 West:
Teacups ride trailer:
Rail crossing:
Dinosaurs:
Another Tiffin Allegro Bus (with poor lane placement):
Oversize load:
Train:
Rest area:
Mountains:
Arizona centennial sign:
Fuel stop before leaving Arizona:
This short handle isn’t all that useful for washing RV windshields:
Spendy fuel, but cheaper than California:
Interesting bridge art:
California State Line:
Welcome to California, and Pacific Time Zone:
Agricultural Inspection Station:
No Inspection Today:
Rest area (with a dump station):
Interesting rocks:
Tecate Divide; Elevation 4140 feet:
Closed immigration inspection:
Exit to CA-125 South:
Arriving at the campground of Sweetwater Summit Regional Park:
Entrance station:
Campground map:
Our site, #134, with a nice concrete pad:
Very level site:
A nice campground; we’d stay here again.
Simplifying posts
I’ve decided to simplify my blog posts a bit. You may have noticed that I’m not following the schedule I used to use (Modification Mondays, Travel Tuesdays, etc); I’m now just posting each weekday.
Since the most useful and interesting posts (to certain audiences) are RV modifications and things we do, I will continue those posts much as I have been. The modifcation posts are useful for other Tiffin motorhome owners; I regularly link to them in Facebook groups to help others with similar issues. For other people, those posts are easy to skip. The exploring posts are more interesting to family and friends (and future us!), to see the interesting attractions we’ve experienced.
But travel and campground posts aren’t all that useful, and all the data recorded for campgrounds was a lot of work, so I’m going to merge those two, much as I did for the New Zealand series. The new format will be like the travel posts, with photos from the journey, but end with a few campground pictures, and omit all the data. So each post will document some interesting sights during our travel from one campground to the next, for anyone interested in that. They will continue to include maps with potential stops marked, which are useful for others traveling this route (including our future selves).
I will continue the travel timelapse videos, at least until after Alaska, since that will no doubt be very scenic. Those are a lot of work too, so I may discontinue them in the future, but we’ll see.
I know that the audience for this blog is very small; mostly just family and friends, and a few others who have seen the blog on Facebook on seen our motorhome on the road (via the QR code). In large part, it’s just a hobby travel diary for my own satisfaction. And that’s enough.
Video: Sun City to Tolleson back to Sun City, Arizona motorhome travel timelapse
A timelapse of driving our RV, a Tiffin Allegro Bus motorhome, 37 miles round-trip from Encore Paradise RV Resort in Sun City to Velocity Truck Centers in Tolleson, then back to Paradise in Sun City, Arizona.
Velocity Truck Centers for engine air heater repair
As we were arriving in Phoenix, we got a Check Engine light on our dash. Never a welcome occurrence!
Looking in the BlueFire app, it showed more details of the codes; clearly a short of the engine intake air heater:
Later in our stay, we started the engine again to see if the codes were still there. They were, so I contacted NIRVC to see if they could fix it. They referred me to Velocity Truck Centers, which is a Cummins dealer, and has an RV department.
Travel route, heading south then back north afterwards:
Our appointment was for 7 AM; we considered arriving the day before, since they had a few full-hookup spots, but decided to just go very early in the morning. Probably a good thing, as their RV department was very busy that day; there may not have been a spot for us.
We toaded up just before sunrise:
Sunrise:
Exit to the truck place:
A hot air balloon in the distance:
Arriving at the truck service center:
The RV waiting room was so crowded that one couple brought in camp chairs:
We decided we didn’t want to hang out there, so went to Chick-fil-A for second breakfast:
Then some chores, and to Starbucks to spend the next five hours:
They completed the work in the afternoon; the issue was a metal-wrapped line intermittently touching the heater relay, causing a short. They secured the line, and replaced the relay, since it had been damaged by the arcing. Just over one RV Buck (about $1,300) to fix.
Heading back to the RV park after the work was complete:
Arriving back at Paradise:
Back to our site, which looks a bit weird without the RV there:
A hassle, but I’m glad it was a relatively easy fix.
Replacing closet light
One of the lights in our rear closet stopped working properly; very dim, and only half working:
Plus blinking:
I unmounted it from the ceiling:
Then replaced it with a new one, bought from Tiffin:
Remounted on the ceiling:
Done:
An easy fix.
Quartzsite Sports, Vacation & RV Show
We attended the Quartzsite Sports, Vacation & RV Show in Quartzsite, Arizona. A two-hour drive from Phoenix.
This show has been an institution in Quartzsite for over 40 years. A big tent full of vendors selling RV accessories, with lots more outside. We weren’t in the market for anything, but wanted to check it out, since we hadn’t been before.
Lots more vendors outside:
Beer Belly’s adult daycare:
Back through the tent:
An interesting experience. Not sure we’ll bother with it again in the future, but if we’re in the area, we might check it out again.
Encore Paradise RV Resort
We stayed at Encore Paradise RV Resort in Sun City, Arizona. (Campground Reviews listing.)
A nice 55+ community in the Phoenix area, where we spent three months; our longest stay to date. It was ostensibly winter, but had record unseasonal temperatures reaching 105° F!
Dates:
- Check in: 2026-01-01
- Check out: 2026-03-31
- 89 nights
Weather:
- Partly sunny
- High temps 55-105°F, lows 38-69°F
- Negligible wind, occasional gusts to 25 MPH
Noise:
- Little road noise
- Very distant train horn noise
- Little neighbor noise
- Frequent fighter jet noise weekdays (in flight path for Air Force base)
Site:
- #832, back-in, sandy gravel
- Needed to disconnect toad, parked beside coach
- Somewhat level site; low slope in front; used hydraulic leveling
- Sandy gravel driveway about 45 feet long by 18 feet wide
- Total site 55 feet deep by 45 feet wide
- Just gravel between site on passenger side
- Carport on driver side
- 24 by 8 feet concrete patio
- No trees
- Clean site
- Elevation 1210 feet, front facing south
Utilities:
- 50 amp power, conveniently located
- 60 PSI water, conveniently located
- Good sewer connection, conveniently located (1 10-foot pipe needed)
Internet (in usage priority order):
- Starlink: 105-125 Mbps down, 25-35 Mbps up, 30 ms ping
- RoamLink: 21-23 Mbps down, 4-8 Mbps up, 88 ms ping (RoamLink uses whichever is best of AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile)
- AT&T: 580-620 Mbps down, 13-17 Mbps up, 35-42 ms ping (I have AT&T on my iPhone)
- Campground Wi-Fi: none
Amenities:
- Garbage dumpsters
- Pool
- Cafe (breakfast and lunch, Tuesday to Saturday)
- Lots of activities
Campground map:
An interactive map:
Our site:
Since we were there for three months, we set up all the things:
Including making pizza:
Record heat:
A nice thing about this place is that Amazon, UPS, and FedEx delivers directly to the site:
For USPS, they have mailboxes:
They also have a small on-site cafe (that is open to the public, though I doubt many outsiders patronize it); we thought we’d eat there regularly, but actually only went once — not because it was bad, we just never really felt like it (if they had been open for dinner, we might have gone there more):
Cafe menu:
Lots of activities:
A popular pool (that we didn’t use; we’re not really into pools):
RV arrival area:
Water feature at the front of the park:
A nice pond and fountains:
I added a Pokemon Pokestop for that, and the front water features:
Lawn bowls:
Pickleball:
And more:
Garbage:
Recycling:
Propane fill:
The park is split into two parts, the pet area (where people can have dogs) and the non-pet area (where they can’t); we were in the non-pet area, as an indoor-only cat doesn’t count as a “pet” (fair enough; he’s in charge, and we’re his staff):
“Stop; it does matter”:
Free fruit:
Other sites; the vast majority of the community are park models:
Aerial views of our site (a couple of days before departing, after packing up our stuff) and other sites:
Quite a nice community. We’d stay here again. The jets were somewhat annoying, but we got used to them after a while.
Video: Palm Desert, California to Sun City, Arizona motorhome travel timelapse
A timelapse of driving our RV, a Tiffin Allegro Bus motorhome, 252 miles from Palm Desert, California to Sun City, Arizona.
Travel from Palm Desert, California to Sun City, Arizona
We drove our coach 252 miles, about four hours of driving, from Palm Desert, California to Sun City, Arizona.
Here’s a map showing our route, heading east:
An interactive map, with potential stops pinned:
Entering I-10 East:
We got a little bit of fuel at California prices:
Back onto I-10 East:
Foggy:
Rest area closed:
Another rest area:
Interesting homebrew van:
Paladin in a box:
Arizona state line, and also Mountain time zone:
Welcome to Arizona:
Arizona Centenial:
Airstream trailer:
Interesting mountains:
Westbound freeway closed for hours due to accident:
Another fuel stop to top up, since we’ll be in one place for three months:
Filling diesel:
Filling DEF:
Exit to AZ-303 North:
Overpass:
Exit to Bell Road:
Arriving at Paradise RV Resort:
Registration parking, where we filled in the paperwork and untoaded:
Guided to our site:
