RV De-Winterizing, Driveway Camping, and Getting Ready for Lebanon

We arrived home from Ohio, and life settled back into normal. Well, as normal as things ever get in our household.

It didn’t take long before I started thinking about the next RV trip.

Every year, there’s a Radio Control flea market in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, and I go pretty much every year. It’s held on the second Saturday of March. My usual routine is to head up the night before and drop off the things I plan to sell. Once everything is set up on our table, I take a walk around to see if there’s anything I might “need,” which of course is flea market language for something I absolutely did not know I wanted until I saw it.

Then I drive back home.

The flea market opens at 7:30 a.m. for vendors. Since I’m already set up, I can walk around first thing in the morning and grab the items I spotted the night before, before the general public comes in at 8:30. The only problem with that plan is the drive. It takes an hour and a half one way to get to the flea market, which means if I want to be there by 7:30, I need to get up at 4:00 in the morning.

Now, I like RC airplanes. I like flea markets. I do not like 4:00 in the morning.

Mrs. Weeble suggested I take the RV and stay overnight.

That sounded like a fine plan, except for one small detail: I still wasn’t fully familiar with the RV. And on top of that, it was still winterized, which meant there was antifreeze in the water lines. So before I could fill the fresh water tank and use the system, I had to de-winterize the RV.

No big deal, really… other than the fact that I had never done it before in my life.

I read up on the process, and it all sounded pretty cut and dried. At least it did on paper. In real life, it turned out to be one of those jobs that looks easy until Captain Weeble gets involved.

I hooked the hose up to the RV and, not taking any chances, also connected the water pressure regulator to protect the system. I threw the switches, turned on the water, and listened carefully.

I heard exactly what I wanted to hear: nothing.

That seemed promising.

I opened the faucets and let them run until the water came through clear. Then I fired up the water heater and waited for it to get hot. After a while, I turned on the faucet.

Cold water.

Not “maybe it’s warming up” cold. Just plain cold. The kind of cold that tells you the RV is winning.

So back to the switches I went.

I should probably explain what I mean by “switches.” What I really mean are the valves, which are controlled by the panel settings. I rechecked everything and confirmed that I had removed the water system from winterized mode. I knew there were valves for the water heater as well, but I assumed the control panel handled them too.

That was an adorable theory.

I checked around the water heater area and couldn’t see any valves. So I went inside the RV and started hunting for a removable access panel. I found two. Naturally, both required special screwdrivers to open, which I did not have. Fortunately, I had ordered a tool kit from Amazon the day before.

Apparently, Amazon had more faith in me than Jayco did.

Why Jayco makes an area you need to access twice a year so difficult to reach is beyond me. You would think something that important would have a little sign on it saying, “Captain Weeble, look here first.” But no. That would be too easy.

Once I finally got in there and opened the proper valves, hot water flowed just like it was supposed to.

Victory.

Or so I thought.

The next day, after I had gotten the RV ready, Mrs. Weeble and I were sitting beside it under the awning when she noticed a water drip. That was when I remembered I had put the hot water plug back in without using plumber’s tape.

That, as they say, was not my finest moment.

So now I had to take the plug back out and do it correctly. Knowing that a hot water heater is a pressurized system, I bled off the pressure and started removing the plug. Or at least I thought I had bled off all the pressure.

Turns out, I had not.

The plug blew off, and water started flying everywhere. And I bet you cannot guess where most of it went.

That’s right. All over me.

Apparently, the RV decided that if I was going to work on the water system, I was also going to shower whether I wanted one or not.

Naturally, after solving one problem and surviving an unexpected personal rinse cycle, I decided it was time for a full systems test. So I scheduled what I called my Alan Shepard sub-orbital flight — right there in the driveway.

On Saturday night, I climbed into the RV for my overnight test. Of course, it was 35 degrees outside, because apparently my driveway test needed to include an arctic survival element. The weather had been cloudy for a couple of days, so the solar system hadn’t been able to do all it normally could, and the battery was already a little low.

Still, I fired up the furnace, got comfortable, and headed off to dreamland feeling pretty pleased with myself.

The next morning, I woke up warm and rested under my comforter. For one glorious moment, I thought I had this RV thing figured out.

Then my feet hit the floor.

Cold. Very cold. The kind of cold that makes you question your life choices before sunrise.

I looked at the thermometer and saw it was 45 degrees inside the RV. Sometime during the night, the furnace had quit. I checked the battery, and sure enough, it was low.

So that explained it.

The lesson learned was simple: it does not need to be 70 degrees inside when you’re sleeping. Sixty degrees is plenty comfortable and a whole lot easier on the battery. There is no reason to heat the RV like it’s a beachfront condo when all you’re trying to do is stay warm enough to avoid seeing your own breath.

So the following Saturday, we tried again.

This time, armed with a little more knowledge, a little less guesswork, and a little more respect for battery management, everything went smoothly. The furnace ran all night, the RV passed its driveway test, and Captain Weeble successfully completed his mission without needing NASA intervention.

That meant we were finally ready to head to Lebanon.