Day 30, 31, 32 - Whitney, TX - TT

Friday (30) - There are a lot of closed campsites. These are campsites behind us (the back of our coach can be seen on the left) and the red bags circled are the closed sites. I think I count only 7-8 other RVs in our camping loop which has over ten times that many sites. Though it does make it really quiet.

Yesterday afternoon while enjoying the warm weather under the patio awning, I noticed that the led light strip on the awning tube had a tiny 4-pin connector on the end. I had seen wiring inside of the RV cabinet with the same connector but didn’t know where it plugged in. After testing the connector to measure the voltage and polarity, I plugged it in. It worked! There are no buttons other controls on the led control module. It cycles through seven colors. I googled the label on the module and found a picture of an RF remote which was also in the cabinet. No labels on the remote just buttons for “On/Off”, “S+”, “S-”,  “M+”,  “M-”,  “B+”,  “B-”, and “Pause”. Further googling I discovered directions. Speed, Mode, Brightness and the other two are self-explanatory. And it included a list of the 25 modes. Fortunately, one of the “strobe” wasn’t the one last selected as the battery in the remote is dead. It is an A23 alarm battery. Now, I just need to figure out how to get the wiring out to the awning tube (it rotates) so I don’t need to constantly plug and unplug the connector. Another project.

We went to Georgetown today to visit friends who used to live in Fairbanks. We stopped at a Buc-ee’s just north of Temple along the way. In case you hadn’t heard of Buc-ee’s before, they are ginormous travel centers, aka gas stations, with close to a hundred gas pumps and store the size of a large grocery store. Huge place. Lots of travel food, trinkets, and other stuff you may need/want while on a road trip.

BTW, Buc-ee’s had the A23 battery for the LED RF remote and it works great. So far, we settled for “mode - static cyan”.

Saturday (31) - Back to somewhat dreary weather. I think there is rain in the forecast for during the week. Not a good time to have the windshield worked on. The quote I received from a glass shop in Waco was 50% higher than it was in Arizona plus, they aren’t even mobile. I would have to bring the RV into their shop and leave it for 24 hours minimum. Not going to work.

After a bit more googling, I found the installation instructions for the led strip. If the led strip is installed on the roller, they say to remember to disconnect and remove the controller before retracting the awning. So there is no easy way to leave the controller plugged in. I would need to climb up on a ladder and plug the controller into the led strip each time we wanted to use it. Not very user-friendly. They suggested attaching the led strip to the side of the RV just under the awning and running the wire into the RV. Our awning extends over the kitchen slide so that isn’t going to work. Oh well, we may need to get a ladder sometime. I brought a ladder with us on the 5th wheel trips. It came in handy.

Sunday (32) - Another kind of dreary day though the sun did show through by early afternoon. This is Whitney Lake. It is a Corp of Engineers property and the Thousand Trails shoreline is undeveloped. It's still only 56°F but at least it isn't windy here as we are surrounded by trees. I dug out my laptop and am taking advantage of the purchased WiFi to do at least some of the pending updates. I'm sending the laptop with Bridget to Alaska so the tech at the university can add the serial number into the firmware. I guess you need special (Apple only) software to do it. The software updates are going to take forever as they are all of the Microsoft Office programs and their updates are huge.

Not much else going on today. I put the awning away since there is rain and wind in the forecast again. I know it may seem silly but seeing the led lights and not knowing how to turn them on was bugging me. For now, the wiring has been put away for now.