John E Davies

One of my hoses split unexpectedly near the sewer outlet when dumping, fortunately it was just grey water, I would not have enjoyed that if there were black solids spilling out into the rear bumper cavity and onto the ground! I bought a spare set of two hoses at Walmart and tossed the bad section. I decided to carry the second one always as a spare. Ten feet will compress to less than two! I wrapped around it in a circular manner, added two full lengthwise wraps to make sure it couldn't pop open, followed by more circular wraps. The wrap is common mover's wrap, it is super expensive at Staples or even Walmart, but this is a great source for less than $6. It is an on-the-shelf item in every store. I use this for all kinds of temporary securing in my garage and while camping. My trailer was delivered with Camco hoses, yours may vary but they should stow the same. John Davies Spokane WA

Have you ever towed any kind of trailer? If not, you really need to get some driving time to see how different it feels. If you can’t deal with a little rental U Haul utility trailer, you will definitely have problems adjusting to an Ollie. I welcome all newcomers here, but I am not in the “no worries, everybody can do it” camp. It takes a certain practical mind set, plus some driving and fix-it abilities. Little stuff happens all the time, and you just can’t go running to an RV dealer every time. They are all back-logged for many months, partly due to the huge number of RV newbies. We have had more than one member here who bought both tow vehicle and trailer, and within days discovered that their dreams did not match reality. A month or two later their rigs were for sale…. I have towed stuff for close to six decades. If I were solo I would not have a travel trailer, NO way. A small (maneuverable) self contained Class B or a truck camper might make a much better fit for you. I just finished a 4500 mile trip into BC and YT, and there were a whole a lot of times I wished my rig were much more compact and easier to handle! Please tell us a little about your background and where you hope to travel…. John Davies Spokane WA

My wife has been REALLY struggling with her work on this trip into north BC and southern Yukon Territories. Wifi, if it even is accessible at all, is crawlingly slow every where and even the simplest tasks bog down. RV parks rarely have it there, and those that do charge a fortune for a few GB. Verizon limits us to 500 MB of cell data daily and both our iPads and her hotspot get throttled quickly, leaving just our iPhones functioning, barely. We can buy a 5Gb upgrade for 24 hours, but the challenge is still to find an actual signal. Actual LTE access is super super limited, especially above the center of BC. She would be able to do her work, which involves providing financial and operational planning for small rural hospitals and most importantly, grant research and applications to get them critical funding. She has been so very frustrated on this trip. Usually she can function at a low but acceptable level even in remote parts of Western states. She would embrace a reliable mobile Starlink system with both arms. She has no need for steaming movies, just reliable phone calls to speak with clients, and moderate Internet speeds for research and file transfers. This article is interesting, but does not address RV users at all. My wife would be in heaven if we could just pull off into an open area and connect with the world. https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/09/06/1034373/starlink-rural-fcc-satellite-internet/ John Davies Spokane WA

Muncho Lake BC, from the north viewpoint, Alaska Highway, headed south. View out the back window, Strawberry Flats CG, Muncho Lake Provincial Park, at the south end. We encountered our most expensive gas near here, C$1.97/ liter (US$5.97/ gal). Average is about C$1.45, the cheapest was C$1.27 (US$3.85/ gal) in the gas/ oil fields around Dawson Creek, near Alberta. The weather was lovely, for a change, and I took some wonderful time lapse videos of the lake and clouds, and encountered the dreaded black flies for the first time. This is 24 hours after getting bit about a dozen times around the top of my socks. Yes, they really itch! Three days later they still itch…. We are near the south part of BC now, approaching Kelowna, and if we pass our Covid tests on Wednesday, we will be able to cross over into the USA again. Otherwise we will have to quarantine. 😳 John Davies Spokane WA

Just after reaching the north end of the Cassiar Hwy at the Yukon border. “Caution Extreme Dust” said the sign….. but it was raining steadily and had been for three days. 10 km of road construction, ripped up asphalt and single lane pilot car traffic, with 30 minute delays, followed by 60 km of very fresh chip seal (loose gravel over tar). The posted speed limit was 45 kph but everybody was doing nearly double that. Most of the lower stuff washed off, but there was this odd oily Nike Swoosh left on both truck and trailer. The windshield has quite a few new pits. The Cassiar is a route everybody should do one time. You won’t want to do it again unless you are riding an adventure bike…. I’ll update this post with a pic of “Mouse” when I can get one from my wife, she was snapping lots of pictures with her Nikon DSLR as we gassed up right after the mud bath. John Davies Spokane WA

Eye candy….. SS Klondike 2 (the second one of that name) from the wonderful multi-use trail across the Yukon River. We signed up for a tour inside tomorrow, I want to see the steam plant. My wife took this pic with her rehabilitated iPhone 11 Pro; what amazing image quality with that phone! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Klondike John Davies Spokane WA

It is really important to get a brand that has a local dealer, these machines are not as simple as regular bikes, they can have electronic and electrical issues just like a car, and many bike shops will not work on them! I do not have an ebike yet, but I am partial to the Yamaha ones, they have a superior warranty and are very high quality. Mid-drive with both speed and cadence sensors will give you the most natural feel. It makes you feel like Superman, with a very transparent assist. Avoid any bike with a hand throttle that can make the bike go by itself, they are illegal in many states on bicycle paths. “Pedal Assist” types only if you want to ride bike trails, and most states limit the power and motor assisted speed (tho you can pedal faster, no worries, like downhill). Look for light overall weight and a removable battery, that makes loading and unloading a lot easier, and the battery should be stored out of the weather and out of sight (theft). I would buy this Cross Connect, it is 49 pounds with fenders and rack; since I live in an arid climate, I would take those off and store them for the next owner, or sell them. I think it is a very sexy design too. https://www.yamahabicycles.com/bikes/crossconnect/ The Haibikes are quite nice and are a great value, but they do not compare to the Yamahas. https://www.haibike.com/ Watch a bunch of ebike review videos, that will teach you a lot. Don’t walk blindly into a store and just take the sales droid’s recommendation. John Davies Spokane WA

Thanks for the suggestions. We are at the swanky High Country RV Park two miles southwest of downtown Whitehorse. It cost C$178 for three nights, full hookups, plus C$25 for three days of unlimited Internet. Unfortunately that crawls to a stop at the busy times. But it feels great after the Cell Phone Desert along the Cassiar Hwy. Tomorrow, Friday, we are going to explore the city, hike some, see the SS Klondike 2 steamer, and take advantage of a dry and sunny day. Saturday will be soggy (0.6” of rain expected) so we will visit museums, do some shopping, and wash clothes here at the CG. Sunday we will head out south via the eastern leg, through Watson Lake and Nelson, then to Prince George and south from there. Depending on wildfires, we have to choose a populated city so we can get Covid tested, then wait for the lab results, then cross over to the USA. We had hoped to go back down the Cassiar, even though it is agonizingly slow and stressful driving, but the weather is being uncooperative. It is glorious, jaw dropping glacial scenery when the sun is out, unfortunately we had steady rain and fog for two days coming north from Meziadin Junction (turnoff to Stewart), plus endless road construction north of Dease Lake, so the truck and trailer got extremely filthy. Gas was crazy expensive (worst was C$1.79 per liter, US$5.38) and many of the pumps are closed and the towns are obviously in enormous financial distress. All the First Nation towns and facilities (museums, stores) are closed to outsiders. Along Hwy 1 a bunch of the commercial resort campgrounds are closed. It makes finding a spot to stay very challenging, and refueling is stressful when there is one pump with diesel and regular, and a double trailer semi truck is blocking one side for twenty minutes, while six cars and trucks with trailers are jockeying to get the the other side. And it is “Pay Inside Only” (with four people stacked behind the only register). And the next pump is 80 miles down the road, if it is even operable…. My truck is getting really bad mileage, similar to when I am driving those precipitous Idaho backroads, I suspect the gas quality is very poor, even though I religiously use a fuel additive. I am happy to see 10 mpg. Normally I get around 12. With a 25 gallon tank, range anxiety is painful. I do carry an extra 10 gallons in jerry cans and so far have not needed it. If anybody is thinking about crossing into western Canada, forget it. Wait until next year. Too darned stressful! John Davies Spokane WA

We lucked out, the Cracked Glass guy checked it out, said, “No Worries, we see that kind of damage all the time. I have an iPhone 11 display in stock and can have it ready in a couple of hours.” He added a screen protector but told us we should not drive over it again…. We had a burger and cruised Canadian Tire for a while, went back and the phone looked great. You could not tell it had been damaged. US$376 total with tax. My wife was delighted. No insurance claim and deductible, and all her apps and data are there. How cool is that? BTW we made it to Whitehorse YT. Woohoo. John Davies Spokane WA

Bubble net feeding. The humpback whale blows a ring of air bubbles to confine a school of fish, then surfaces though them with gaping jaw. You can see the ring. How cool! John Davies Spokane WA

Needless to say, she was devastated. While departing yesterday morning, she was helping me gather up some of the LEGO blocks from under the stabilizer jacks. Ten minutes later we were leaving the dump station, after emptying the grey tank and she exclaimed “I’ve lost my phone! Don’t move the trailer!!!” She was afraid it might be underneath and did not want me to drive over it. She hiked back to our site and found it. Of course, I had driven over it while leaving. It had an Otterbox Commuter case so it wasn’t destroyed, but it was face down, so the super hard Apple glass was driven down into the sharp gravel. Tears and a hug followed, it is not even paid off yet. It still functions, sort of, but the screen won’t come alive and obviously she can’t call out or use any touch functions. She does’t use Siri, so she can’t just tell it to do things. The alarm just came on at 5:30 AM and she had to let that run until it self cancelled. This happened in Prince Rupert BC, on the west coast half way up BC; there are no great resources there to get a phone repaired or replaced with a Verizon one, since all the Canadian carriers are different. We are now in nearby Terrace BC (sizable enough to have a shopping center and a Walmart Super Center) at a municipal CG (quite nice, 4 stars) waiting for “Broken Glass” to open at 10:00AM. It’s an ex-phone store manager who runs a shop from his home and sells used phones. We are hoping he can switch the Verizon SIM chip to a cheap refurbished Apple or Android phone to get her up and running with her old number. I doubt if he has the parts to repair hers while we wait…. Maybe it would, after all, be prudent to have a cheap disposable Burner Phone with a Canadian calling plan when venturing into this country, if only as a backup. We might end up with one. Update to follow, but we are headed north on the Cassier Hwy to Whitehorse, so it’s going to be “cell phone desert” for quite a few days. OTH we had a spectacular whale watching trip Sunday, in glorious sunny weather. A few of those pics of the stunning scenery and closeups of broaching whales are still on her phone and were NOT yet uploaded to iCloud because the WiFi was terrible at the CG and we only have 500MB of cellular data daily through Verizon. but she was mostly using her Nikon DSLR, so all is not lost, unless I drive “Mouse” over that too😳😳😳 John Davies Spokane WA

If they are in your area, Discount Tire can order the AT3 XLTs and you probably will not find a better price. I have not driven in rain yet with mine. But I don’t see why they would not do well. John Davies Spokane WA

https://www.amazon.com/DEWALT-DCS334B-Brushless-Tool-Only/dp/B07JPFHQKG/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=dewalt+jigsaw&qid=1629713493&sr=8-3 Cut a larger round hole around the flange with a fine blade, not a wood blade. The regular toilet is not supported by the floor right at that location, nor is the NH toilet. I love Dewalt tools, but I have reservations about the more expensive barrel grip jigsaw. It is lovely to use but overheats and shuts off very quickly, maybe the standard one is better. But for quick holes it is perfect. Please don’t lay steel tools directly on the gelcoat, that scratches it! Use the heavy 3M blue masking tape (not duct tape - too sticky) at the area you are cutting, and put down an old towel or some scrap cardboard where you put your tools. Vacuum very often. If you can, set up your shop vac so the hose is right there at the cut and leave it running while you are generating dust - it tends to drift everywhere otherwise. CAREFULLY sand the cut with 80 grit paper and wear disposable gloves - the glass shards will break off in your fingers and since they are glass and transparent they can be horrible to remove, unlike a wood splinter. Been there, it is not fun…. A dust mask is advisable but not at all necessary if you have the vac going. Don’t forget to disconnect and cap the fresh water line under the sink, that will save winterization hassles. Remove the ball valve entirely so the floor is clear back there. Glue down a white plastic hole plug. Or leave that circuit in place if you think a future owner might want it. But I would take it out and put the parts in a big zip bag along with the old flush toilet parts. Have fun. Overland took his tank out completely and chopped a huge hole in the floor for storage, I am sure he will chime in here. This is optional but I do recommend that you remove the black flush line and fittings, unless you plan to repurpose the tank for additional grey water storage (transfer it in with a portable 12 volt pump.) https://olivertraveltrailers.com/forums/topic/5272-how-to-flat-foam-storage-tray-for-the-front-dinette-seat-compartment/ Edit, I have been wondering how to cut the flange off. This should work. https://www.amazon.com/Survival-Stainless-Cutting-Emergency-Chainsaw/dp/B07V6NVL86/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=camp+cable+saw&qid=1629717008&sr=8-3 John Davies Spokane WA

One other factor is high quality suspension parts (if you have the EZ Flex (standard equipment now, but it was once an option). The cr@ppy plastic bushings and tiny bolts of the standard Dexter suspension, which comes installed on nearly all mass produced stick and staple trailers, wear out within a few thousand miles, resulting in weird noises and lots of unwanted play and motion in the springs. Combine a worn out suspension with poor aerodynamics and improper design, and those trailers are very prone to sway and jack knifing. I have never experienced sway of any kind, even with a 480 pound tongue weight, which many will say is “too low”. It isn’t…… John Davies Spokane WA

What OS? My iPad has a known bug, if the temporary map file cache gets too large, you cannot delete it and eventually the entire app bogs down, big time. It also clogs up the storage on your phone or tablet. This has been going on for over a year and GAIA support still doesn’t know when they will have a fix. Go to Settings/ Storage and look at the Storage/ Storage Use section, scroll down to Tile Cache. If it is huge (over a few hundred MB) then try clearing it. Go to Storage/ Clear Cache. If that doesn’t work, try it ten times. If the files still don’t go away, you will have to delete the app entirely, reinstall it, login and sync to your GAIA online account. (You must use a desktop or laptop computer for this, synccing won’t work with another portable device.) That will download all your personal waypoints, routes, tracks, etc, but you will have to decide and then select which map folders you want, (look in the Archive section for more choices) and ALL those individual file tiles will have to download again, over a strong wifi connection. It may take a full day or more, depending on how big they are. I have over 40 GB😳 I have had to do this twice, once I had over 20 GB of temporary file cache ! If it gets over about 2 GB you are headed for trouble. If this is your problem, be sure to open a service ticket from within your app, and complain to them about it, the more people who complain, the quicker it will get resolved. I actually told them that I could no longer recommend GAIA for overlanding travel (out of cell coverage) and they refunded an entire year’s fee. I try to remember to clear the cache manually very often, and on this trip it seems to be working fine. Good luck, and please post a followup. John Davies Spokane WA

David, Coopers are great tires, I am a big fan. I know nothing about those Hercules ones, but you should research the Cooper Discoverer AT3 or AT3 4S if you want the winter snowflake. I recently installed a set of the AT3 XLTs on my Land Cruiser and am very pleased, however the soft and cushy ride translates to very poor road feel through the steering wheel. It sticks to curves without a problem but it just doesn’t provide much tactile feedback. Odd but not a big deal on a truck. They do have a 60k warranty. And they look great. These are what I plan to put on “Mouse” when the time comes for new tires. John Davies Spokane WA

Those work quite well in a ducted AC unit, but Ollies use ductless ones. So, no dice….. John Davies Spokane WA

It is easy for a scammer to falsify a certified check, I would use an escrow company. The buyer pays the company, when the funds clear, they notify the seller, you deliver the trailer and sign the title, the escrow company pays you. Somebody has to pay a fee, I think it is usually the buyer but I could be mistaken. You could certainly agree to split the fee. It is like having PayPal being the go-between in an eBay transaction. It protects both parties from all kinds of bad things... at a price. (An eBay seller pays a nearly 10% fee for most items, which is a burden for me as a seller.) I don’t know the fee structure for an escrow company. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.escrow.com/buy/how-to-buy-a-rv-trailer%3famp=true $100 bills is certainly an option, but those can be faked to, and I personally would be scared to be walking around with $50k+ in cash money…. John Davies Spokane WA

I would not worry about adding some kind of placard, I have never heard of an independent tire store that does that, though a Toyota service department would probably recommend installing one. I have upgraded to LT tires on several vehicles, I just figure out the recommended value for the axle load using the TIRE manufacturer load/ pressure chart, for that size tire, and write it with a sharpie next to the OEM one inside the driver’s door opening. For your half ton Tundra, I suggest that you start with 42 psi all around, Typically you need “about” an extra 10 psi over the stock P rated car tires. If you want better advice, go to a Tundra forum and see what pressure members are using for that tire size. John Davies Spokane WA

Your truck is fine for the LE1, but will be sorely lacking in power and reserve capacities for the heavier LE2. Your 4.7 engine and transmission are nowhere as capable as the later 5.7 with 6 speed tranny. Maybe it would be OK for dragging an LE2 around Florida, but in no way will it be safe or enjoyable out west. If you really want the larger trailer, plan on trading in on a larger truck…. What is your tow rating - 7200 pounds? John Davies Spokane WA

Thanks…. Jogging east won’t work, the smoke is generally streaming that way, we need to stay close to the Pacific Coast. I am using the Windy app, it shows wind forecasts for a week, and smoke (PM2) forecasts for the next three days, it is very helpful in planning where not to be. This darn new heat dome is a repeat of the one last month that spiked to nearly 130 degrees F, it is only going to be 105….😳. That is awfully warm for British Columbia, so we want to get out of that area and get into the more moderate marine climates near the ocean, up north. Three days or so in Prince Rupert, whale watching if there are any tours operating. Bears…. oh my. John Davies Spokane WA

We made it across the border! What a royal PITA. We had to find a local source (Rite Aid drug store) for Covid tests, that would do a Canada approved one, and also turn it around promptly, because if it is older than 72 hrs when you show up at the border, they will turn you back. We wanted to wait a day or two at least to cross, we knew it would be a zoo the first day (Monday). Tested on Sunday noon, we had to prep completely for “a trip”, either to Canada if negative, or to Montana if positive. We were all packed up and got the good results Tuesday evening. So I ditched my firearms (I decided trying to cross with an approved long gun would be adding fuel to a fire) and Wednesday morning we booked north two hours to the nearest border crossing, getting there an hour before our 72 hour period expired 😳. The agent questioned us meticulously for a full twenty minutes, scrutinized our vaccination and covid info, asked all the “do you have anything to declare” stuff, and then said have a nice trip, adding that as foreign nationals we were being allowed to enter as a courtesy, and were required to mask up in all public spaces, regardless of the local policies, and we could incur a big fine if we were caught maskless. We also had to fill in info at ArriveCAN, upload documents and provide a quarantine plan, in case they did a surprise Covid test and we had to self isolate. That was tricky, we decided that reserving a commercial spot and using that address would probably get us by that hurdle, and it did. We went as far as Nakusp Municipal CG, a delightful resort townlet in a stunning alpine setting in SE BC. Unfortunately the wildfire smoke was horrible, with ash literally raining down at times. Visibility varied from merely bad to less than half a mile. Our window smoke filters worked most excellently, combined with a floor HEPA filter. None of the locals wore masks, not even for the smoke. Maybe they are used to it? We spent two nights there, recuperating, then went 330 miles NW to try to escape the worst smoke and the building “heat dome”, which is crippling. We found an ex-KOA CG, with full hookups, so we can run the AC and empty and refill tanks. The owner was ecstatic, we were the first Americans to stop by since March 2020. He gave us a 10% discount, just for that, and he wouldn’t stop talking. We are headed up to Prince Rupert and probably White Horse YT, we have four weeks to explore, at the end of that time we have settle down near the southern border, near an urban area, get MORE Covid testing for the US station, then cross when we get negative results. Or quarantine if they are positive. Kind of like Border Russian Roulette. We decided to not attempt Alaska since that would double the number of tests we would have to take… and pass. It is cool being among the first Americans to visit, we are getting a lot of interested remarks and double takes on the WA license,plates, and at our very first rest break somebody collared my wife to ask about the “cool rig”. I guess Ollies are still pretty darn rare here. I will be pretty much incommunicado for weeks, If I can, I will try to give a few updates in a new thread, but cell coverage will be nil the further north we get from the mid-point, about Prince George. John Davies Spokane WA

Coconut coir (ground up shells) is renewable and in plentiful supply, I have never used peat moss, the coir works fine. https://www.amazon.com/s?k=cocoanut+coir&ref=nb_sb_noss John Davies Spokane WA

Thanks. All well and good, I think I have seen that page before, but the specs are for steel wheels. Alloys usually have a lower recommended figure. John Davies Spokane WA

Thanks for the very kind words. It was tough to get that particular pic, being buried behind and on the wrong side of that 6” round access hole. I took a bunch of pics with my iPhone, blindly until one came out centered and in focus 😬 https://olivertraveltrailers.com/forums/topic/5357-how-to-mount-a-tablet-computer-in-place-of-the-zamp-controller/ John Davies Spokane WA