Colorado: August 17-19, 2009. Engine Check Light Fixed & Colorado National Monument

We arrived at Cummins Rock Mountain at 10am and they took the Bug in almost immediately and started working on it. We had hoped we could leave the ‘babies’ (LiLi & Misty)

in the Bug, but the technicians need to work from the inside as well as the outside. In the motorhomes, with the diesel engine in the rear, the only way to access the top of the engine is to open a removable panel near the bed.

So we put the babies in their carriers and took them into the customer lounge with us. They protested for a while and then went to sleep.

The techs found an electric noise suppressor module was defective and needed to be replaced. They also found that the fuel pump was leaking and needed to be replaced. They didn’t have either part in stock. They ordered them from Denver and they should arrive by 10:30am tomorrow.

This Cummins Dealer, like most repair facilities which working large trucks and motorhomes, has electric hookups in their parking lot so customer can stay overnight, free of charge. I would say ‘free’ is a matter of interpretation! The cost of the repairs is far more than the cost of any RV Park!

This is our camp for the night.


Our camp for the night turned out to be comfortable and quiet. Cummins is in nice, fairly new industrial area, instead of an older rundown part of town.

At 8am they came to take the Bug in and start the repairs. We weren’t expecting them quite so early. We quickly closed up the Bug and went sightseeing. We decided last night that after sitting in the customer lounge from 10:30 to 3:30 yesterday we weren’t going to sit in the lounge all day again. We put the babies in the Blazer & went for a drive through Colorado National Monument (CNM).

Grand Junction is bordered on the SW by a series of sandstone cliffs. These cliffs are protected by the CNM. In the 1930’s the CCC built a road which follows the edge of the cliffs. Lots of beautiful scenic views along the road.

First an arial view of the CNM. This is a photograph I took of a poster on wall of the visitor center. It is an excellent view of CNM

Notice the road running along the cliff at the bottom. The road follows the edge of the cliffs for about 20 miles.

The following are photo taken from within a few steps of the road.


This monolith is called Independence Monument, because it stands independently from the rest of the narrow ridge of rock


There is a lot more to see in CNM than we could see on our quick tour. We would stay here longer, but with the temperatures in low to mid 90's, we want to get into the high country and cooler weather.

Back to Cummins about 1pm. Still not finished. Back into the customer lounge. About 3:30 they finished and moved the Bug back to our parking spot. It was far too late for us to think about driving to an RV Park. We had already planned to spend the night here anyway. Besides, the paper work wasn’t finished up yet. Cummins was waiting for payment from our extended warranty company, Good Sam Club, Continuing Service Plan (CSP). Cummins has worked with CSP before and knew they don’t pay invoices after 3pm, but do generally pay them by 9am if CSP has the invoice. CSP is paying $800 of the $1300 bill, which left us with our $500 deductable. Diesel repairs are not cheap!!

This morning, Wednesday, at 7:15 I was off to Wal*Mart for supplies for our next week of boondocking. I was back before the Cummins Service Manager came over at 8:30 with the completed invoice. I went in and paid our balance of $490.83. Didn’t ask why we didn’t have to pay the entire $500 deductible!

As soon as we got packed up we were on our way to Silverton.

Until later,

Al & Sharon

Colorado: August 12-16, 2009. Douglas Pass, 40th anniversary and engine check light

After touring the petroglyphs & pictographs yesterday, we had pretty much exhausted what we wanted to see in Rangely. Time to move on down the road.

We knew there was a nice gravel parking place at Douglas Pass on Hwy 139 about 37 miles south of Rangely where we could boondock for the night. There are beautiful views of canyons & mountains at the Pass. Since there wasn’t anything to do at the pass except watch the sunset and mountains this evening, we delayed leaving the city park in Rangely until about 3pm. We arrived at the pass a little after 4pm. The last 2.5 miles of the drive was a 1200’ climb to the top of the pass at 8260’. We drove the entire 2.5 miles going 15mph in first gear with the engine RPM at 2250, which is just below redline.

This is the parking area, canyon & mountains at the pass.

The view out of our side window, the road you see down below is about 1300’ down.


I took a short walk up a gravel road across from the parking area and saw this very inquisitive, young mule deer.



When I started the engine to leave Douglas Pass the yellow check engine light came on. I checked fluid levels and everything else I could and all looked OK. The yellow check engine light is a caution warning, not a turn the engine off light. Since the engine was running fine, we drove on to the little tiny town of Olathe, about 50 miles south of Grand Junction.

On the way down from the top of the pass:

I think these arrows tell us we better turn

Driving along the side of the cliff

We better make this turn! No arrows this time!

Back down to the open plains



In Olathe, we are staying at Uncompahgre River RV Park, a nice adult’s only park.




Each afternoon at 5pm they have a ‘tea time', basically a happy hour. It was OK, but completely segregated! The men are in their group and women are in their group. Menfolk talk & womenfolk talk does not mix!! We only attended the first night we were here. We just couldn't take any more.

Sunday, August 16th, we celebrated our 40th wedding anniversary. We are having a hard time comprehending 40 years of marriage! That's a long time, no matter what your age is. We celebrated with just a quiet day. Sharon fixed us a nice breakfast and I grilled a nice ribeye for dinner. An old folk’s celebration!

While the Bug is drivable, we felt we needed to find out what the engine check light is all about. When we leave the Olathe area, we are heading up into high mountain near Silverton. Olathe is about 5000’ and the first pass we are going over is 11,120’. We sure don’t want to get into the mountains and have the engine problem turn into something serious. I called the Cummins engine service facility in Grand Junction and made an appointment for Monday morning.

That’s all for now. Monday we find out about the engine problem.

Al & Sharon