My little camping buddy

When we arrived at High Falls River Campground last night, I noticed that the battery was reading 9.23 amps.  Yikes!  There was no way we could have run it low!  So we plugged into the power pole and I checked it a little later.  It read 12.70.  I breathed a huge sigh of relief.  Then later I glanced at it and it was reading 17.95!  I immediately had Ron unplug from the power pole before the batteries exploded.

Shortly thereafter the battery charge had fallen to 10.20.  Ron checked the battery box, and the sealed batteries had leaked and corroded the tops.  It was obvious that they were toast.  The temperature in the refrigerator was 60 degrees.  So we operated by

Our camper at High Falls River Campground

flashlight last night and didn’t dare run anything so we could save any available battery power for the refrigerator controls.  Then this morning I checked the temperature in the refrigerator, and it read 65 degrees.

We asked the camp host where we could get someone to check out our electrical problems.  He told us there was a Camping World a little south of us in Byron.  So we stopped

The river at High Falls State Park in the River Campground

there, but they were backlogged with service work and didn’t have anyone available to work on our camper.  So the girl at Camping World called Mid-State RV across the interstate for us and told them we were losing the food in our refrigerator and asked if they could possibly squeeze us in over there.  They were backlogged, too, but told us to come on down there and they would try to work us in.

It turned out that the guy who I usually have do the work on our camper had hooked up the 3 stage smart charger, but had not fixed it so the old

Rocks across the river

converter would not charge the battery, too.  Apparently both of them were charging the battery.  Anyway, the old converter was fried, as were my expensive AGM batteries.   Mid-State RV was able to use my old converter as a breaker and fuse box, with the 3 stage charger charging the battery.  So the only thing I had to buy was a new battery. Instead of two 6 volt batteries, which is overkill for this tiny camper, I had them put in one Group 27 battery.  We can really tell the difference with the heavy load off the front of the trailer.

The campground is beautifully wooded

I was so happy they were able to get us fixed and on the road again!  But the temperature in the refrigerator is only down to 55 tonight.  Tomorrow morning I will throw out all the food in there, and we will restock it when we get to Mom’s… if the refrigerator gets down to temperature.  I hope it didn’t get damaged, too.

Tonight we are at Veterans Memorial State Park.  Almost all the sites are filled.  Glad we were able to get space without a reservation.

We went into town for dinner this evening and enjoyed a really good Chinese buffet.

A 13 year cicada on our picnic bench

I forgot to mention the cicadas.  When we were at High Falls, we kept hearing some kind of weird, non-stop equipment noise.  We listened and tried to figure out what it was.  Ron said, “I can’t tell which direction it’s coming from.  It sounds like it’s coming from everywhere.”

A little later I saw the cicada in the photo on our picnic bench and realized that’s what the noise was.  The 13 year cicadas are out in force.