Trip to NY & VT

If you’ve been following our blog..you all know how hard Jim has been working on the Nissan LD28 diesel engine in the boat.  Well…his talents haven't been wasted.

We went to NY. While there the heater in the camper died…it was cold too…so he removed it and replaced it with a new one.  While there he found a fuel leak on the pickup. We headed to VT and he spent 3 days fixing that. (waiting for parts..wrong ones sent…waiting again)

Great!! everything fixed…we’re nice and warm and no leaks…We head back to NY to spend a few days at the family cottage, which has been sold to some really great people, who allow us to come there when in town. So we do all our visiting and while Jim and his brother Carl are at the last visit….a tree falls across the drive.

So we call Rick and Pam, from the cottage next door, and he comes up with his chain saw. The part of the tree on the ground was completely across the road…while clearing it out of the way …the section on the right falls and hits the power lines.. Guess where our camper is parked…you got it…under the power lines.…so Jim hooks up (at first the truck wont start…then it does) and moves it past the fallen tree. 2 parts down..don't know if the last section will remain standing.  Jim shut the truck off…but upon hearing the sirens…tries to start it…no go…nothing..nada..zilch…you know the rest.  The starter is gone.

So we unhook…push the truck out of the way…Rick hooks up and gets the camper out of the road..then tows our truck out of the way. By now…the new owners, Tina & Ray are there and Mark and Cindy from the cottage a bit farther down show up and we are having a good time visiting and watching the power crew remove the tree from the wires…everyone is having a great time …oh…forgot to mention…Jim is under the truck taking off the starter so he missed some of the camaraderie.

When Jim went into the cottage to grab his supper (which got set aside for tree removal) the top to the candy dish fell and smashed..He wondered what else could go wrong.

Rick took him to the parts store to pick up a new starter. It was dark, and raining by the time they got back, so we had a glass of wine and went to bed.  He installed it yesterday morning and we headed home.  Got here with no other problems. Had the tree not fallen…we may have been on the road when the starter went and missed all the action. And it would have been much harder to get the starter.So it all turned out well…but..for awhile we were beginning to wonder if we’d ever get out of NY.

We may start the engine in the boat tomorrow…run it awhile and then Jim will change the oil. If things work out we may get it in the water for a test run sometime next week.