Jacqueline’s Jaunts: Palm Springs

31 March - 06 April Palm Springs and Cathedral City, California

This post is delayed and will be a longer one. I apologize for that. A lot happened during this week. I will try to highlight the significant events. We planned to drive from Bakersfield to 29 Palms and stay for 2 days, but that changed for us. I combined the next week's events into one post for my own ease in keeping track of them as they unfolded.

I will start by quoting Barry from his diary, "Well, this day will be considered a pivot point, a transitional moment, a paradigm shift, life-altering, destiny maybe..."

We left Bakersfield about 9:15 AM and the original plan was to stop at the Cesar E. Chavez National Memorial. I called to make sure they had RV parking. Darn'it POTUS!!!!! They had a recording that stated closed today due to "operational constraints." We decided to head to Palm Springs Aerial Tramway.

The decision was to go there first, then drive the one-and-a-half hours to 29 Palms instead of the other way around. Jan called the tram park to make sure the road to the tram was OK for our RV sizes. She was ensured it was "no problem, plenty of parking, we get RVs all the time."

Well, a 3.5-mile drive up the side of a mountain with a 6-8% grade was too much for Julie. She overheated right before the gate. It was moments after a car had driven off the side of the road and crashed into a ravine. I could see it from my seat where we stopped when the RV overheated. Now came the paramedics, two fire and rescue, two firetrucks and six police cars blocking the entrance. All of this unfolded in front of us while Julie was spewing coolant, and we were blocking the lane. Barry unhooked the Jeep, a challenge on the incline, and I got in to move it away from the RV. I was still parked as the paramedics came by the side of the Jeep with the guy from the car on a stretcher. He looked pretty messed up. It was chaos! Once they got him to the ambulance, things started to dissolve slowly. The RV cooled off enough for Barry to drive the short distance to the first parking lot. He was emotionally a wreck after all the chaos.

Ken & Jan pulled into the parking lot and we sat there trying to decide what to do. We let her cool off and went up to the tram anyway. Darn...we came all this way!

The tram ride is a 10-minute ride, over 8,000 vertical feet, and the floor rotates so you can see the valley floor and the ride up. Pretty cool. At the top, the view is incredible. I bought an ornament, we went to the restaurant, sat in the bar, and had a few appetizers and drinks. It was hard for Barry and I to enjoy the moment with our looming RV issues. And it only gets better.

After we returned to the RV, Ken and Barry started poking around for a leak. They put distilled water in the radiator, but it leaked from somewhere. They couldn't see from where. The RV was stuck here for the night. We told K&J to continue the trip and we would keep them posted. Barry made numerous phone calls, and about an hour later, he was able to find a mobile tech to come out at 10:00 AM tomorrow, April 1. After checking with security, it was OK to leave Julie there all night since they patrol the parking lots. I made a two-night reservation at a Hilton in Palm Springs. I packed a to-go bag for us and we headed to the hotel. Our minds were racing: Do we cancel the trip and go home, Can we make it to Florida, Was this trip a mistake, Should we buy a new RV? Needless to say, we did not sleep much.

The next morning, on April 1, we drove to the tram park, but the gate at the bottom of the hill was closed, and people in yellow vests were turning cars away. What the heck!!!! We drove up to the gate, and a woman told us they were closed until 2:00 PM due to a power issue SoCal Edison was working on. Barry tells her, "I have an RV," and she says, "Oh, you're the RV guy." She yells at a guy to open the gate for us and tells us, "Good luck."

The mobile tech, George, arrives a few minutes after us. He pokes around for a half hour and finds a pinhole in the lower left corner of the radiator. After another thirty minutes of analysis and discussion, Barry starts calling around for a place to get the radiator fixed while the tech drops stop-leak pellets in the radiator. Barry was having difficulty finding someone, so George, the tech, called his buddy who works on semi-trucks. He said he could fix the radiator. He was thirty minutes away in Cathedral City. George's fix worked and the leak stopped. Barry paid George and we were off to George's buddy.

I don't need to tell you the difficulty of driving back down that road with the 6-8% grade. I was a nervous wreck following Barry in the Jeep. We made it to Roy's Shop around noon. He says he can fix it in 4-5 hours, so we head to the Mexican restaurant he recommends since we are starving.

Amidst the chaos, I researched RVs for sale in the area. I found a used Tiffin Phaeton at a local dealer, Mike Thompson. After lunch, we head over to take a look. What harm could we do? This dealer has been in operation since 1972 and has excellent reviews. We met Steve and found out the Phaeton was sold, but a 2020 Tiffin Allegro Bus and a 2019 Newmar Dutch Star are on the lot. The Tiffin was just dropped off and is not in their system yet. Owned by a couple from Oregon. We looked at it, asked many questions, drove it, and BOUGHT it. OH SHIT!!! We spent the afternoon working out the details and trading in our RV.

Barry received a call from Roy. Roy's supplier doesn't have the radiator...damn it! So he needs to fix it. Anyway, we spent the night at another hotel in Cathedral City. We are a mess at this time—too much to process. Again, no sleep.

The next day, 04-02-2025, we woke up for breakfast at the hotel and couldn't believe we bought a new RV. We kept thinking it was all a dream. The RV dealer arranged for us to stay at Cathedral RV Resort when we picked up Julie. They reserved two spots, one for Julie and one for our new RV, so that we could transfer all our stuff. We moved Julie to the RV park that afternoon when all the radiator work was completed.

We spent most of the day preparing to move all our belongings. What a chore! Keep in mind that all this is happening within a few days, including arranging finance and all the other associated tasks that come with buying a vehicle. The financial part of the process went smoothly. Moving money around was challenging for our financial planner, but he managed to do it. Love him! We had planned to buy a newer RV at the end of the year, but sometimes life throws you a curve, and you have to work with it. Unfortunately, we cannot recoup the money we had to spend on Julie.

On April 3, I spent part of the day canceling reservations and making new ones. One park, Destiny RV in Arizona, would not cancel our reservation. We are not happy about that. The rest of the day was remapping routes, Docusign for money, Costco for new sheets since the new RV is a king-size bed, laundry, and other miscellaneous stuff. All seemed rather bizarre, but we kept moving forward in a daze.

Today, April 4, is our walk-through of the new RV. I recorded everything as Mark explained the ins and outs of the rig. We brought donuts for everyone and they were all happy. Apparently, it's a thing. We spent approximately three hours going through everything.

After the walk-through, we had to get a document notarized, Target for a few supplies, Trader Joe's for lunch, and back to the RV park to wait for the Tiffin to arrive. She arrived between 3:00-3:30 and we started moving things. I think the total hours it took us was about ten hours—lots of up and down the steps. We knocked off about 9:30 PM and slept our first night in the Tiffin. Up early the next morning after getting a good night's sleep.

We finished moving things at about ten AM on Saturday morning, 5 April, then started organizing things. A driver is arriving around 2:00 PM to drive the RV to Arizona for the Notary process. This process is necessary to demonstrate that we reside in Oregon and are exempt from paying sales tax. It's necessary for the state of California as proof so they do not question why we did not pay sales tax.

We said goodbye to Julie and thanked her for all the good memories. We hope she finds a good home and that they take care of her. The drive from Cathedral City to the Notary in Arizona took two and a half hours. Barry rode with the driver and I followed in the Jeep. The driver hooked up her car to our RV before we left. Once the notary process was completed, she unhooked her car, we hooked up the Jeep, and she took off.

Now, we were on our own!! We looked at each other and wondered what the heck we did. Once we got over that, we were eager to get underway. Next stop, Picacho, Arizona, and then Jan's brother, Kenny, in Silver Springs, New Mexico. The drive was a little nerve-wracking but Barry was so happy with how easy the drive was and the power we had going up hills. Getting a diesel was well worth it. Pacacho KOA was not far off the road and a great place to spend the night.

The next morning, April 6, we were on our way to Kenny's and arrived around 4:00 PM. We were so glad to meet up with J&K again and hugs from everyone. After touring the new rig, we all went out for Mexican food. Conversations never stopped. It was nice to see Barry relax a bit and not be so tense after a day of driving.

If you have read this all the way through, thank you for your time. I appreciate it. It was a really crazy week for us. Good night, all.