Camp Compson – Alpine CA

Monday September 29 we left T T Wilderness Lakes in Menifee at 9am. Acey’s mileage 66,648.7 and Thor’s mileage 73,117. Driving into Alpine, you can’t help but notice El Capitan!

We will be staying at Jim’s brother Bill’s place for about 3 weeks!

A tight fit, but it works!

Jim had a few projects to work on while we are here. We have a 3-burner propane cooktop that we want to replace with a 2-burner induction cooktop. When we use the propane stove, it invariably sets off the smoke alarm, even with the exhaust fan running. AND, the kitchen exhaust fan, unlike the bathroom exhaust fans, has no cover over the top of it – so if it is raining, the rain could come in which turns off the fan. (Adding a vent cover is another project!) Here are the “before” photos:

This is a “stock photo” – I forgot to get a true “before” photo!

…during…

…and now its done! Darn – didn’t get a photo of the wiring behind it…

Linda’s cousin Janet and Uncle Don live in nearby San Diego, so we went to visit them! Don has a downstairs apartment in the same building where Janet has lived for many years. We sat outside in the courtyard and had a nice visit – it had been quite some time since we had seen them!

Janet came to visit us and to see Acey. Our families had camped out a few times many years ago, but none of our rigs were quite like Acey!

During our visit, we all worked on jigsaw puzzles.

Here are some of our completed ones!

We had lots of yummy dinners – Charlene cooked ribs and asparagus one night!

Acey went in for a checkup at Cummins and passed with flying. Changed oil and filters, had the brakes checked and more. There MAY be a small oil leak – so that will be attended to another time.

Once the extreme heat broke – it had been into the 100’s! – we did some exploring. The USS Midway aircraft carrier is now a museum in San Diego. This former US Navy ship is the lead ship of her class.

On the hangar deck, there were several aircraft on display.

The wings fold up on many of the planes, like this F4U-4 Corsair Fighter, to save space.

It took a LOT of food to feed 4500 sailors every day!

The Midway was on duty for 47 years; Commissioned a week after the end of World War II, Midway was the largest ship in the world until 1955, as well as the first U.S. aircraft carrier too big to transit the Panama Canal! She saw action in the Vietnam War and served as the Persian Gulf flagship in 1991’s Operation Desert Storm.  Decommissioned in 1992, she is the only remaining inactive U.S. aircraft carrier that is not an Essex-class aircraft carrier. (Thanks Wikipedia!)

Snacks .10 and .15  – videos rent for $1.00 a day at the Geedunk !

Each sailor had storage under their bunk – and in a small locker.

Not much room for sleeping – the bunks are only 6’ long!

Did you ever wonder why a ship’s speed is measured in knots – and how they figured that out?

This is what the chip log looks like!

The deck of Midway covers about 4 acres. The original deck was a straight deck down the length of the ship.

The US followed the British design and added the angled deck to enable jets to take off and land; the Midway was modified to look like this:

Naval Aviation – it all began in San Diego!

Here’s a model of the Midway – hard to capture the big ship in a photo!

it’s a REALLY big ship! You can almost see more ships in the background at Coronado Island.

We had a delicious lunch at the Beach Hut Deli.

A tribute to Bob Hope; he dedicated a lot of time entertaining the troops!

This large statue is modeled after the famous photo that was taken in Times Square.

Jim and I drove to the beach and rode our bikes around Coronado the next day. The Bayshore Bikeway is an “out and back” trail and goes along the “Silver Strand” that connects Coronado to the mainland from the south.

You can see a few of the RVs if you look carefully…

We have seen many of these signs as we have been at the beaches, but this one was a bit confusing!

Another RV park – much like a parking lot!

The bike trail was mostly straight and flat.

At the end of the trail, there were some salt evaporation ponds.

That is a lot of sea salt! From a distance, we thought it looked like snow…

Watch out for turtles!

Watch out for cats too!

Don’t leave your dog poop behind…

The trail went past a Wildlife refuge.

The bridge from San Diego to Coronado was a big one!

Another day, we drove up to the small town of Julian and got some fresh apple cider.

Julian is a quaint little town and lots of folks were visiting the day we went.

Lots of shops and eateries in Julian!

We liked the mural painted on the wall at the Wolf Center

We enjoyed a delicious BBQ lunch and some brews at the Julian Beer Co.

On the way back to Alpine, we drove up Mount Laguna – it was a bit hazy but it was still a lovely view!

Linda had made appointments for a well check-up and a mammogram last year, and we decided she should fly back to Nashville and keep the appointments. While there she could renew the tag for the Jeep, take advantage of early voting starting the day before she heads back to CA and also collect our mail. She was also able to see her dentist and her hairstylist, and attend Sunday worship and the Wednesday night service at Stephen’s Valley Church.

Several of Linda’s mother’s paintings are hanging at the church. We have enjoyed seeing them for many years at our parents’ homes and are glad to be able to share them with our church family!

Linda and Eve with Mom’s painting – “Can Any Good Come Out of Nazareth?”

Linda stayed at the home of our friends Cyndi and Dennis. They rented a Winnebago Travado RV to drive down the Natchez Trace Parkway!

Cyndi is organizing their gear.

Dennis and Cyndi are ready to start their 10 day adventure!

It was great to get a good haircut!

Linda met up with Eve and/or Chris a couple of times – Chris and Linda went to dinner at Honeyfire when she flew in on Saturday evening – Chris’ favorite BBQ place. Eve and Linda had lunch at O’Charley’s after we went to church, and the 3 of us visited the Yazoo Brewery.

A lovely afternoon on the patio at Yazoo!

We had dinner a tasty dinner at McNamara’s Irish Pub.

While Linda was in Nashville, Jim took Acey to have the slide cover/awning fixed (The awning that blew apart when we drove into South Dakota) Jim and Bill were kept very busy!

The 30 GALLON propane tank was replaced with a much smaller 30 POUND tank. We only need propane now for the refrigerator.

Bill helped Jim replace the shocks on Acey – the original shocks were bad.           

The all of the covers on the a/c units and vents on Acey’s roof were black – which seemed wrong! Black tends to absorb heat, which would be counterproductive to keeping our home cool… so Jim painted them all white!  He also fixed duct issues which will help keep us cool in this heat.

Here’s the “before” photo of the a/c unit on the roof with the black case.

The covers had to be taken apart and cleaned before painting.

Jim installed a cover over the kitchen vent – here’s a view of the roof with the 3 white A/C covers, and the 3 vent covers – one more to paint white!

The indicator light in Acey that shows the brakes are coming on in the Jeep (when Thor is attached behind Acey) was not working.

Jim found a wiring problem and running a new wire fixed that issue. He also changed the brake pads on the Jeep. Bill and Charlene have a great carpet cleaner (Bissell Pro heat 12 Amps), so Jim cleaned the carpets (AGAIN!) The shag carpet on the slides seems to get dirty pretty easily. Lots of projects completed at Camp Compson!

Saturday morning, October 17, we packed up and bid farewell to Bill and Charlene and Camp Compson. Next stop – Yuma, Arizona.

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2 thoughts on “Camp Compson – Alpine CA”

  1. I liked seeing the pictures of Cyndi and Dennis’ RV. Kinda pint sized compared with yours. Looks like Acey is really getting super fit and up to date. Thanks for keeping me up to date on your goings on. Gotta find out now what an Essex class aircraft carrier is…
    Happy trails!

    1. Interestingly, Jim and I had thought about getting a class B RV a few years ago for vacationing but decided it was too tight and the bed would not be long enough.
      About the aircraft carrier – I figured I had enough info about the Midway class and left it hanging about the Essex class – something for my readers to look into if they so desire.
      Thanks for reading – and for commenting!

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