22.10.-18.11.2007: Fernley - Reno We spent two nights at a campground and Kirsten had a disaster in the kitchen! First, she put too much mustard in the pumpkin soup so that it was inedible. Then she burned the cinnamon rolls because they rose too much in the oven!! We discovered a small oil leak so we needed to find a garage to get that looked at and get an oil change before we went to California to get our smog test and registration done. We drove to Reno and found Sunshine Services which cater for RVs. We arrived at 4-30pm on Thursday 25th October and ended up staying for nearly a month!!!!! So how can a simple oil change take that long - was this the garage from hell?? Actually, they were really nice to us and let us stay that first night in their parking area with a cable so that we could plug in. The next morning, we went for breakfast at a casino across the road whilst Winnie was being checked out. We'd asked them to change the spark plugs and when they did that they found out that one of them was so bad that the distributor cap needed changing. We'd had the same problem 3 years ago and there were a number of things that pointed to a more serious problem. Tolly, the manager, put us on the smog test machine as a favour to see if we would get through the test in California and we failed miserably!! Everything pointed to a head gasket and a cylinder head problem. We were looking at costs of around $1800 and we would need to go into a hotel for a few nights because Winnie would be practically without an engine inside the bay and we would not be allowed to sleep inside. It was a real blow but all we could do was to wait here over the weekend and then get a proper estimate on Monday, after Tolly had had chance to make phone calls and find out where to get a new cylinder head from. We spoke to Tolly on Monday and were told the estimate would be ready tomorrow. He recommended a Leak down test, to ascertain if the main engine block had any problems. The results were excellent - the compression figures were as good as new. We then got an estimate for $2,400 with a worst case scenario of $2,700. We were totally in shock. We had already paid $300 for work done on the oil leak, oil change and filter, new distributor cap and plugs, new belts etc so we could end up paying $3000 to get us back on the road! Was it going to be worth it? We had no idea! It felt like we had abruptly come to the end of the road - what were we going to do? There were too many things to consider. Selling Winnie with costly engine problems that hadn't been repaired wasn't an option because the value would drop down too low. What about buying a newer motor home, bearing in mind we could be buying something with exactly the same engine problems without knowing. Plus Winnie's petrol consumption is excellent and a lot of other motor homes need twice as much petrol. We worked out that we had spent $10,000 on petrol over the last four years. A newer motor home would then cost us $20,000 in petrol over the next four years!!! How much was Winnie worth anyway - even with a repaired engine. Did we want to continue travelling around Mexico, USA and Canada? If not what were we going to do with our future and where were we going to go???? Questions, questions, questions and we needed answers. So, we spent the next three days using the garage wi-fi system getting the answers we needed; discussing our future; contacting lots of friends - we needed a few shoulders to cry on; looking at the possibility of travelling around Central and South America; contacting Uwe and Jeanette who run RV tours throughout those countries to find out if a repaired Winnie is a suitable vehicle for the road conditions; checking out GPS systems - more phone calls to travelling friends Ingelore and Rolf (now back in Germany) and Edi and Jochen (now in Spain). We basically had only a few days to work out our future -amazing! All we can say is - Thank God for Skype, which we can use to phone people from the computer for very little money and Thank God for wi-fi. The guys at Sunshine Services were really nice to us - we had our very own little spot with electricity, water and drinking water, and wi-fi. We were enclosed inside a padlocked fence for which we had a key, so we were secure. We did ask them if they could build us a shower but that wasn't possible and neither was hanging out our solar shower and showering in our bikinis!!! At least we have two sinks to wash ourselves and our hair! By Friday, we had decided that it would be worth paying the $3,000 for the repairs and then driving Winnie through Central and South America for the next four years. We could then sell Winnie in Argentina where we will get a lot more money for him because there aren't many motor homes available down there and the cost of shipping from Europe is far too expensive. We were exhausted!! But also relieved that we had a plan! Over the weekend, we bought a GPS system for $150 and Kirsten had great fun with it, getting us from Radio Shack where we bought it, to a Wal-Mart to do some shopping. But we didn't like Jason - the American GPS voice because he kept saying "route" the American way, (rhymes with "lout"). So we changed to Thomas, the very British voice! But Kirsten's new toy had a down side - she spent hours on the internet and on the phone trying to get maps for Central and South America. We had been assured when we bought it that there would be free maps. After hours and hours of frustration, it turned out that none of the maps were compatible with our GPS and the ones we could get were expensive. So the GPS went back! We also started sorting out Winnie and throwing out stuff that we no longer needed. We put our kayak up for sale online on Saturday and got an email from Gary and Marti the next morning saying they were interested. So on Sunday we got the kayak off the roof and cleaned it. By 2-45pm it was sold and they came back later that evening with a suitable vehicle to transport it away. Then we put our bikes up for sale but there are too many already for sale so we doubt they will go so quickly. Helen started phoning the DMV about our smog test and registration. We needed an extension because we are still in Nevada and can't drive. The DMV told us to get towed to California to get an extension at one of the offices because they couldn't send it through the post!! Without our registration sticker we wouldn't be able to drive on American roads! We ordered some expensive roof sealing tape called "Eternabond" from Camping World so that we can finally seal our roof and stop the small leak we already have. When we drive south along the Pan-American Highway we are going to be going through rainy seasons and hit high humidity, so we definitely need to be waterproof! We also tried to order a new memory foam mattress but Kirsten's German credit card wasn't accepted and the whole process took 3 hours!!! We continued to tidy up Winnie and gave a lot of things to Tolly and Mike (another mechanic who works in the bay where Winnie is parked, so we talk to him quite a bit). Winnie is now about 21 stones lighter (300lb, 150kg). Winnie went back into the garage all day Friday and the engine got taken apart. We were even allowed to take photos and see what was happening. We waited 6 hours and then got the bad news - our bottom engine block is warped and so now we are looking at a new engine which will cost $5,000 or buying a different engine where there is no guarantee that there won't be a problem in the near future. This was a serious blow but we immediately told Tolly that we weren't prepared to pay that kind of money for repairs because Winnie is only worth that amount! So Tolly said he would start looking into whether it was possible to repair the block or use some kind of alternative to make the surface level so that a new cylinder head can be put on top. Winnie had no engine, so we took off the bikes and Winnie got pushed back into his little corner next to all the oil barrels for the weekend and we had to wait for Tolly to look into the new problem. Fortunately, we discovered some great films on the internet and ended up spending all weekend watching, which took our minds off our engine problems. We watched "Man of the Year", a very good comedy with Robin Williams, (Kirsten cried); Harry Potter 5; a romantic film that made Kirsten cry for 2 hours!!! We talked to Tolly on Monday and he brought a mechanic from the workshop that will be dealing with the new cylinder head. They will be removing the valves and springs from our old head and putting them into the new one because the new parts are not as good. There was a long discussion and it was decided that it would be possible to get the gap between the bottom engine block and the new head reduced to acceptable levels. So we decided to go ahead with the new cylinder head as planned. Our cylinder head was sent off to the workshop and was returned on Wednesday. But unfortunately we lost the Wi-fi connection because it actually belonged to one of the mechanics and not the garage. He hadn't used it for 3 months and so he decided to take it home and use it there. So we couldn't use the internet any more and that was the end of our film watching spree! Winnie went back into the garage on Thursday but he was too heavy to be pushed out from our spot. So we had to get towed. Then we got pushed up onto the ramp - Helen couldn't keep up with the pushing and got left behind! Kirsten was taking video shots. We spent most of the day in the office and then got a lift to the Silver Club Hotel. We had checked out quite a few hotels in the area but got a shock by comments such as "Don't stay here, the drug dealers keep you awake all night" and "This is a real dump" etc. But the Silver Club was really nice and we got a discount because Kirsten is German and the manager had German relatives!!! Tolly came over in the evening and took us out for a meal which was really sweet of him. We have been here for almost a month and they are like family now. They'll probably miss us when we leave!! On Friday morning, Helen went out of the hotel in search of a cup of tea and managed to get free take-away tea from the casino across the road which she brought back to the hotel. Kirsten was suitably impressed!! We had a slight problem when we went to check out because our discount wasn't in the computer. The receptionist was not impressed that she had to reimburse the credit card transaction that she had already done for us and do a new one. She actually said "five f...ing dollars" with disgust!!! Not very nice! But we got our discount and then walked back to the casino across the road from the garage where we had breakfast. Winnie was finally ready at 4-30pm and we drove straight to a dump station, got petrol and picked up a pizza which we ate on the drive back and we offered some to Tolly when we returned. Winnie certainly sounds a lot better but we still have to wait over the weekend because on Monday there are a few odds and ends that need doing to Winnie and Tolly also wants to put us on the smog test machine to take a look at our values. So fingers crossed!! Over the weekend, Kirsten got up on the roof and got rid of all the silicon sealant that we have put along the roof rack which is where we believe the leak is. Unfortunately only one of us can be on the roof at one time. Helen sealed the roof last time over two days, so this time it was Kirsten's turn. Helen did all the fetching and carrying and we ended up having to dry the roof off using the heater because there is a wooden plank which is used to attach the roof rack to the roof and it was quite wet. It took about 6.5 hours in total over the two days. Hopefully it does the trick. It certainly looks better than all the silicon sealant we have slapped on! Afterwards we went to Wal-Mart and spent another fortune on various electrical goods and shopping and we'll wait to see what tomorrow brings!