A timelapse of driving the coach 100 miles from the Desert Hot Springs in California to Orange, also in California (near Anaheim, within the greater Los Angeles region).
travel
Freeways, highways, and other roads as we move the coach from one site to another. Plus cat pics.
Travel from Desert Hot Springs to Orange, CA
We departed Catalina Spa and RV Resort in Desert Hot Springs, California, and headed to a couple of weeks at Orangeland RV Park in Orange, California — conveniently located about 10 minutes from Disneyland. Yep, we spent five days at the Disneyland and Disney California Adventure parks! You can bet there will be posts about those coming up soon.
Here’s the route map (right to left); 100 miles, about three hours drive in our coach. A non-stop drive, since California apparently doesn’t believe in rest areas (or road maintenance):
Paladin started on top of the kitchen counter; he complained a few times, but was quiet for most of the journey:
As always, Jenn drove our coach. She prefers to drive, and doesn’t enjoy being a passenger, and I feel the opposite, so that works out best for both of us:
It’s much more common for men to drive RVs than women, so people are sometimes surprised when they learn she is the driver. She’s a member of a Tiffin Lady Drivers Facebook group (with 824 members), for female drivers of Tiffin motorhomes.
The onramp to the I-10 freeway, with a snow-tipped mountain and wind turbines in the background:
Paladin used his top-entry litter box while in transit:
One area attraction we didn’t get to, but will in the future, are some big dinosaurs:
I have a phone holder to help me keep an eye on one of the RV-safe GPS apps; I have it mounted via a suction cup to a plate on the pull-out desk for the passenger chair (on which rests one of Paladin’s cardboard nests):
The shortest route, via CA-60, was closed for repairs, so we continued on I-10:
More freeway scenes:
Nearing our destination:
The entrance of Orangeland RV Park:
After unhooking our truck, I drove it following our coach to our site:
As usual, I’ll have a post about our experiences at this RV park after we’ve left it. And a timelapse video of the trip tomorrow. I still need more subscribers to the Sinclair Trails channel, so if you haven’t yet, please do so.
2022 plans
[I previously published a variation of this at the end of the 2021 travel post, but thought I’d re-publish it separately and update it, since I know some people missed it after all the stuff in that post.]
We started 2022 in Arizona, and are currently in California (and will shortly head to Disneyland for Jenn’s birthday in February, and to the coast), then will go back to Arizona, including the FMCA convention, then north into Nevada, Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming to hit more National Parks. Then via Idaho into Oregon to visit doctors and dentists. After that, we’ll head north to Washington, east to Idaho and Montana, then south through Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico (including the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta!), ending up in Texas for next winter, as we slowly make our way across the country.
Places book out months in advance nowadays, so we like to have about six months booked, where possible (or longer, though many popular places only allow six or fewer months). Currently, we already have reservations up till late-July, during the Oregon portion, plus a few busy times later in the year, but the rest of the year is subject to change.
Here’s the current route and stop map for 2022 (updated since the 2021 travel post); starting from the Phoenix area, heading to the coast, then going basically clockwise:
Still a lot more of the country to see, but we’re working our way across, with trips back to Portland each year. The maps for subsequent years will be similar to the 2022 one, but heading north from and ending up further east each time:
I hope you’ll enjoy following our journey!
Video: timelapse of coach driving from Buckeye, AZ to Desert Hot Springs, CA
A timelapse of driving the coach 22 miles from Buckeye, Arizona to NIRVC in Phoenix, Arizona, then 262 miles from there to Desert Hot Springs, California, with a stop at Love’s for fuel and a couple of rest stops. See if you can spot when the dashcam fell off the windscreen!
Travel from Phoenix, AZ to Desert Hot Springs, CA
Three days later, we picked up our coach from NIRVC in Phoenix, Arizona, then headed back into California, to Desert Hot Springs.
NIRVC successfully fixed the driver chair power issue, fixed the slide-out glide block issue, and serviced the slides. They didn’t get to the remainder of the (lower priority) items on my list, so hopefully we’ll get those taken care of when we visit them again in March — I had already made that appointment in anticipation of needing more time, plus generally like to schedule service appointments every few months, just in case, since things inevitably break, and there’s regular servicing needed.
I admit, I had high hopes for NIRVC, based on their excellent reputation, so was a bit disappointed that they didn’t get much done. But they only had a short time, and they’ll have another chance to impress me soon.
Here’s the map route for this travel day (going from right to left); 262 miles, about six hours drive in our coach. A bit longer than we prefer, but we didn’t want to add another interim stop:
Our coach at NIRVC:
Heading west out of Phoenix:
We were passed by three of these oversize loads (going rather fast):
Paladin still wasn’t pleased with travel, but not too bad this time, perhaps because it was only a few days after the last time:
Lots of trucks on the freeway:
Funky mountains:
Goodbye cacti; fewer and fewer as we head west:
We stopped at Love’s in Quartzsite for diesel; it was pretty busy, and some trucks were being inconsiderate in blocking the exit, resulting in some honking by other truckers. It’s the last fuel stop before the California border; diesel was about $1 more across the border:
While waiting for trucks ahead of us, I snuggled with Paladin; here’s a view of the coach in travel mode, with the slides in and the GPS mirrored to the overhead TV:
More of Paladin:
Back on the road, crossing into California:
A stop at the agricultural inspection station:
They didn’t actually ask us if we had anything this time. We were wondering if they’d object to the little cacti we bought in Arizona.
Welcome to California sign:
Heading down the freeway:
Paladin looking relaxed at a rest stop:
Downhill:
The overpass bridges around the desert cities have nice decorations:
Snow-capped mountains; pretty sure there wasn’t any snow when we were here a month ago:
The highway nearing our destination:
A cell tower nicely disguised as a palm tree:
Our destination for 17 days: Catalina Spa and RV Resort:
Stay tuned for a timelapse video tomorrow. If you haven’t watched them before, they’re a fun compressed view of our journey; watch a few hours of travel in mere minutes. With music! If they aren’t fast enough, you can also tell YouTube to play at 2x speed, or jump ahead, though you may miss interesting sights. Or slow them down if too fast.
I enjoy making the videos; I hope you enjoy watching them. And everyone please do subscribe to the Sinclair Trails YouTube channel; I need a bunch more subscribers to be able to get a nicer URL.
Video: timelapse of coach driving from Lake Havasu City, AZ to Buckeye, AZ
A timelapse of driving the coach 165 miles from the Xscapers Annual Bash near Lake Havasu City, Arizona to Buckeye, Arizona.
Travel from Lake Havasu City to Buckeye, AZ
We departed the Xscapers Annual Bash near Lake Havasu City, Arizona, and headed to a one-night stay at Leaf Verde RV Resort near Buckeye, Arizona.
Here’s the route map (top to right); 165 miles, about four hours drive in our coach (including a lunch break):
A fairly familiar route, having been along I-10 a few times this winter.
But the trip had a bumpy start; we couldn’t bring in our front driver-side slide-out, or move the driver chair, due to a disconnected wire underneath the chair:
This stop was the first time we had rotated that chair around to face the living area, so we guess the wire didn’t have as much slack as it should, and got pulled out.
Obviously this is a big problem; we can’t drive with the slide out. The reason the slide was affected is the switch to extend or retract it is on the side of the chair, to help ensure the chair is forward enough to not get hit.
Fortunately there is an emergency retraction button in the fuse bay in the basement, so I was able to use that to bring in the slide:
Also fortunately we had an appointment at the National Indoor RV Center in Phoenix the next day, so we only had to live with this issue for one day.
That issue worked around, we moved the coach to a clear space at the Xscapers Bash grounds to hook up our toad (tow vehicle); you can see our truck and the neighboring coach (nice folks, that we enjoyed meeting and chatting with):
Our coach, ready to hook up the truck:
We’re on our way; a bridge over wetland:
Colorado River:
Hilly highway:
Our coach has an RV-safe GPS, that knows the height and other info about our rig, so it doesn’t route us places we can’t go (we also have a label above the GPS as a reminder for low bridges):
A fun and handy feature of the GPS is the ability to mirror the output to the (otherwise pretty useless) TV above the windshield — useful so I can see the GPS more easily (it just displays grayscale for some reason):
In Parker, Arizona we encountered several VW buses, probably leaving a recent gathering of them at London Bridge in Lake Havasu City:
Highway:
Quartzsite sign:
I-10 freeway:
Mountains:
Cacti:
We would have liked to stop at the first rest area on the I-10 portion of the route, but it’s been closed for a while for renovations:
So we continued to the next one, half an hour later:
Crackers, summer sausage, and cheeses for lunch:
Paladin wasn’t thrilled when we started going, but settled down in one of his nests during lunch:
When we got underway again, he was a little happier than earlier. We do hope he gets more used to travel days eventually:
Our exit:
We had a one-night stay at Leaf Verde RV Resort; I won’t bother doing a separate post about it, since we basically just stopped there to dump our tanks after dry camping for over a week during the Bash, to catch up on laundry, and as a location fairly close to the National Indoor RV Center:
The map:
From the little we’ve seen of it, I wouldn’t call it a resort; while the transient campsites are mostly pull-through, they are fairly tight “buddy” sites, where pairs of RVs face opposite directions, and thus their doors face each other. Not very nice:
Notice that we didn’t extend the front driver-side slide-out, since the switch wasn’t working:
We didn’t bother unhooking our truck, since it’s just an overnight pitstop (an advantage of a pull-through site):
A timelapse of this travel is coming tomorrow. Please subscribe to the Sinclair Trails YouTube channel; I need a bunch more subscribers to be able to get a nicer URL.
Video: timelapse of coach driving from Salome, AZ to Lake Havasu City, AZ
A timelapse of driving the coach 83 miles from Salome, Arizona to Lake Havasu City, Arizona, for the Xscapers Annual Bash, with a stop at Love’s for fuel. (I forgot to start the camera until we exited the RV park, but didn’t miss much.)
Travel from Salome to Lake Havasu City, AZ
We departed Salome, Arizona and headed to Lake Havasu City, Arizona, for the Xscapers Annual Bash. Our first coach drive of 2022.
Here’s the route map; just 83 miles, a couple of hours drive north in our coach:
Heading down the highway to Quartzsite:
Love’s fuel stop:
We weighed our coach and truck again at a CAT Scale at Love’s:
The weight was up a bit, in part due to adding more stuff, in part due to having a full tank of water, in preparation for dry camping at the Xscapers Bash. But still within acceptable tolerances:
Paladin wasn’t enjoying the trip, as usual:
Heading north on the highway:
Entrance to the bash:
Sold out:
Another Tiffin:
Paladin settled down:
Backing in to our spot:
We arrived a few days early, as Jenn is volunteering in the mail room. So there’s lots of empty space now, which will be filling in as everyone else arrives today:
Our truck and coach in our spot:
If you’re at the Xscapers Bash and see us, feel free to say hi. We’re introverts, and this is our first time at a rally, but we’re looking forward to it:
Stay tuned tomorrow for the timelapse video of our journey.
2021 travel
Happy New Year! 🎉
As we begin 2022, let’s look back at our coach travel in 2021.
We bought our 2017 Tiffin Allegro Bus 40SP diesel pusher motorhome on September 2, 2021, and other than a few times when we’ve been out of it due to our Yellowstone trip and a couple of servicing appointments, we’ve lived in it full-time since then.
We’ve driven the coach about 2,300 miles in that time, on the west coast, from as far north as the Seattle area, and as far south as the Phoenix area (actually Gila Bend, not far north of Mexico). We’ve stayed in it in just four different states so far: Washington, Oregon, California, and Arizona.
Here’s the map of our coach travels and stays in 2021, via the excellent RV Trip Wizard website:
If we include our Yellowstone trip, staying in a rental trailer, we can add Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming to the list of states:
You can see all of the travel-related blog posts via the travel category, with the earliest posts at the top, or the latest posts at the top.
I thought it’d be interesting and useful to include a summary of travel days. I didn’t start blogging about them consistently at first, but over time settled into a pattern. Here are links to blog posts, and a sample picture of the view of each, so you can see how the landscape changed as we travelled in our coach.
Travel to Mom’s place in the Seattle region:
Video timelapse:
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And a timelapse to Phoenix:
Video timelapse:
What’s in store for 2022?
We are looking forward to the Xscapers Bash in mid-January, then will head to Disneyland for Jenn’s birthday in February, to the coast, then back to Arizona, and the FMCA convention, then north into Nevada, Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming to hit more National Parks. Then via Idaho into Oregon to visit doctors and dentists. After that, we’ll head north, then east, then south, heading towards Texas for next winter, as we slowly make our way across the country.
We already have reservations up till mid-June, but the rest of the year is subject to change.
Here’s the current route and stop map for 2022; starting from the Phoenix area, heading to the coast, then going basically clockwise:
Still a lot more of the country to see, but we’re working our way across, with trips back to Portland each year. The maps for subsequent years will be similar to the 2022 one, but heading north from and ending up further east each time:
2021 was an eventful year, what with the big transition from the homestead to coach. 2022 should be an interesting year, as we continue to explore. I hope you’ll enjoy following along via this blog.