It has been a busy 7 months since we returned from our last
adventure to the NORTH and WEST. During this time we have been busy emptying out
Mary’s house and getting it ready for sale, as well as visiting old friends and
as the RV lifestyle goes, making new ones. Finally, the house was ready to be
listed and it got a full price offer in the first 3 days.
Unfortunately, the buyer’s financing supposedly fell through (despite a
Pre-Purchase Commitment Letter from the Bank, which shows why one just cannot trust banks' Commitment Letters anymore). Yet within a week
several other buyers were congregating and getting ready to put in offers
(expected at full price as well) when one of them wanted it so badly that their
offer was for full price plus, plus, subject to the appraisal coming in at that value (we cannot say what their actual offer was, prior to closing, but we can say that the appraisal did in fact come in for their full offer price.) That was a huge accomplishment, due in no small part to the Realtor, Michelle Chase (who we recommend confidently as a true professional in real estate for her clients (as buyers and sellers). The high sales and appraisal values help other homes in that subdivision to be valued higher. Given that the buyers are financing less than 50% of the sale price we expect there will
be no issues now and closing will happen on or before June 12th, and will be done via a mobile closer.
We had delayed our original departure date, waiting to be
there for the first closing, but when that fell through and was not going to
happen on time, we opted to go ahead and depart Florida on May 11th
so we could layover in Batesville IN at the Thousand Trails Indian Lakes
campground for a week before taking the coach to the Fleetwood Factory Service
Center for final resolution of our remaining issues, on May 22. Well, there was a major weather system from
as far north as Oklahoma to the Gulf moving East, which was going to catch up
to us enroute, so hearing that it was producing tornadoes in OK we decided to
press the pedal to the metal and made the 900 mile trek in a total of 30 hours
(sleep inclusive). We even drove through Atlanta, but failed to find any of the
‘slow, murderous downtown traffic’ that we were warned about. Really! Traffic
was a breeze with only 2-3 cars on the road.... at about 2:00AM. We took great photos but unfortunately they would not show up when loaded on the blog.
Anyway, we finally made it to the TT Indian Lakes campground
which judging from their photos online appeared to be a great place for a
relaxing layover. Appearances can be and in this case were very deceiving. This
place is horrible. First of all this is a combination campground with a KOA as
well as a Thousand Trails within it. As such the nicer camp sites are KOA and
the other TT. But, it gets better. The TT sites are totally without any order.
Even the site numbers on the map do not coincide with the actual numbers at the sites. Further, some sites are totally without utilities, some just have water and electric, others
just water and sewer, and of those that are full hook-up (water/sewer/electric)
some are 50/30/20 Amp hookups and others just 30/20. But WAIT… THERE’S MORE. Even the ones that
are supposed to be 50/30/20A, either the 50A or 30A are non-working. No… not yet…
there’s still more. The direction that the pull-throughs are supposed to be
laid out is totally screwed up. To cite an example (the one we pulled into
because the sewer and water would be on our Driver’s side) which is where the
utilities are located on a motor home, the electric hookup also on that side
was being used by a tiny trailer with 2 adults, 3 horrendous little kids and 3
unruly dogs, so we had to feed out 50A running through our sitting area (under the RV). Anyway, as it is a requirement of the campground rules that folks refrain from walking through other folks campsites. Mary asked the children not to run through our campsite, but she was ignored, so she went to ask the
father to control his kids, but the father was just as spoiled and did not take kindly to being asked
to control his children. Thankfully they left the next day, but not before emptying half his black water tank on the ground 3 feet from our coach. Obviously they were new to RV'ing, as even their trailer had a temp tag still on it. Bill could have offered to help them, as he usually does other newbies, but not someone who had talked to Mary as he did the day before, when his children were obviously out of control (not even on Mother's Day). The rest of our days here have been uneventful, cleaning and maintaining equipment.
The coach is still beautiful after Bill spent 3 days washing, waxing and polishing the whole thing (and the car) before we left Florida. Mary did as much on the inside and redesigned the bedspread cutting a piece of the excess material that needs to be tucked in at the headboard sides and sewing them so they lay out perfectly. We discovered a product called 'Protect All' sold at Camping World and at most regional airports as it is often used on the fuselage and on the windshields of airplanes, working much better than Rain X. We also discovered that it works great on the shower, on the Corian countertops and just about everything in the motor home. The weather here in Indiana is so much nicer than Florida. The days and nights have been cooler (but not cold) so we have been able to make campfires in the evenings after cooking on the grill and eating on the camp table outside, sitting with a burning fire while enjoying some wine... if only the neighbors had been more like the ones we had in Florida. Hopefully after our stint in Decatur, at the REV Group (Fleetwood Factory Service facility) for warranty repairs, our future campground will produce nicer people (without small children and with well behaved dogs).
Tomorrow we leave Indian Lakes in Batesville on our way to Decatur, a 3 hour trip. Though our appointment is not until Monday at Fleetwood, we opted to go on Saturday due to weekend weather and to get a better parking space when we get there. They provide a 50Amp electrical hookup, but every few days we will have to go to another facility to dump our black and gray tanks and refill the fresh water tank. The procedure there starts at 06:00AM when they pick up our coach and then return it at 02:30PM Monday through Friday.
We have no idea how long we will be there, but won't be leaving until they have addressed ALL our issues, to our satisfaction. To that end we wrote a very detailed 7-page letter of complaints, accompanied by 43 photos and 8 videos to justify our complaints, and have requested an appointment with whoever we need to talk to to make the repairs and replacements of now non-working appliances. We first reported these issues on our 10/17/2016 visit to Decatur and were ignored at that time, until finally they died altogether. For a time we even had to buy a tabletop microwave oven and portable ice maker, to be assured of having cooking capability and ice for 'happy hour'... not the best referral for Fleetwood of a brand new motor home, but hopefully they will make it right this time.
One more item before closing this post. We used to be on Facebook as 'Bill and Mary RoughingItGently' to match our Blog; however, a few days ago we kicked off of Facebook... without any warning even. Before they used to allow 'couple' listings, but apparently their rules have changed and instead of notifying every one that they will need to make an adjustment to their profile, they just send you a message "Your profile has been DELETED." So we have equally DELETED Facebook. They want to control people too much and want to make changes and requirements according to their own criteria, irrespective of how anyone wants their profile to be. Some say "You can control this or that... but we are not IT techies and if it is not simple (to us) we don't need it. SO, don't look for us in Facebook. If you know us personally and want to communicate with us, you have our RV EMAIL roughingitgently@gmail.com or our personal emails.
OK, so we'll see you next post, which will be of our Decatur stay and dealings with the REV Group (Fleetwood Factory Service). Here are some photos from our trip and stay at the Thousand Trails (TT) Indian Lakes campground.
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