We’re feeling guilty – even though we visited Crush and started her up a few times, she’s a mess. Amazing what an RV looks like when you finally draw the shades after a long storage (since late July, 2012 after work was done in a shop). It started last weekend, when we couldn’t get the RV started. Okay – we’ll just jumpstart the RV…or not. We took the battery to O’Reilly’s and had it jumped. Verdict – battery was dead. Since it was an Interstate battery, we decided to take it there to have it replaced since it was under warranty. After a full day of charging on their end, they pronounced it good to go. Today we tested it and the engine started right up. Whew! The generator also started right up. Two things off our long list.
You can’t see the mess…but it’s there. Dust & crumb like thingies everywhere.
When we visited last weekend, we also realized a strong smell that reminded us of cat urine. Now, stupidly, we left one litter box in the RV for most of the storage time but that was removed about a month ago and smell didn’t improve. Last weekend I febrezed the entire RV and while it made a small dent in the smell, it’s not liveable. Yesterday it was finally nice enough to draw the shades and open the windows & I got to see where the smell was coming from… mold & mildew. Ugh.
Seems that one trip during the winter we had wet enough feet to leave tracks and now the floor in front of our bathroom is a wet mess of nastiness. Except that there is more water there than which would have been left with wet feet, which means we may have a leak somewhere. Nothing visible from the windows or the ceiling…so who knows what awaits us when we put out the slides.
Not Good. Not Good at All.
Oh, and let’s not even talk of the fresh hell that was inside the toilet bowl. The rest of the RV…well, I am sure we will have more surprises.
The moral of this story? If we have to leave Crush again when we work, we need to clean her up & take better care of her. We never did a thorough cleaning when we stored her, as I was already working & Keith got a job very quickly…and stupidly it didn’t occur to us that we might have problems down the road. While we didn’t leave it trashed, we didn’t make an effort to continue the care we did while we were living in it.
Lesson Learned.
Crush in storage, with Samantha’s ears doing a photo bomb!
Our plan was to take Crush out for a test weekend next weekend, then put it back into storage until the 15th, allowing us a marathon sprint to move out of the apartment & into the RV by the time our lease is up the 25th. Silly plans. We decided that instead, we will start paying the monthly rate on the 2nd at Roamer’s Rest which is only a few miles from our storage place, and extremely close to stores that we may need for parts/cleaning supplies/etc. This gives us more time to steam clean, treat for mildew/mold if we have to…along with giving us some additional time to ensure all the basics work. We’re a little concerned about the fridge, as we had work done on Crush after we moved out & haven’t had full hook ups to test everything. Not that we think the guys at B. Young didn’t do a good job, but it’s always been a what if in the back of our minds. If things progress smoothly, we may move out to a quieter place at the beginning of March, but our first concern is getting Crush road ready.
Anyway – we have a really busy month ahead of us. We both gave our notice at our jobs and we both will be working until March 29th. This means full time work during the week, sorting & tossing more stuff at night in the apartment & on the weekends spending a crazy amount of time fixing a laundry list of items in the RV.
Let the fun begin!
Oh wow. I’m sorry to hear about all the cleaning in store for you. Bummer about the moldy footprints and the cat smell. Can you re-carpet? I don’t know how expensive that would be.
Still though, you’re back on the road soon. I’m envious!
Renee — RambleCrunch recently posted..Proof of Life
It’s our fault…we tend to learn things the hard way.
We hope that we can clean up enough to not have to re-carpet, but that is always an option depending on the cost. We are on the road soon! And you shouldn’t be too envious…you are technically on the road still!
Even with all the moving and cleaning….it’s still going to be exciting planning your travels. Just keep that in mind when you are on your hands and knees scrubbing the carpet. Sorry about that BTW. That’s never easy to clean up. Is their a possibility of pulling the carpet back to make sure the sub floor is ok? If theirs mold on the sub floor, as you know, the smell will go away a lot easier if you can clean that too and let it fully dry before you put the carpet back. Good luck!
Brenda recently posted..Why
We’re thinking we probably should pull up the carpet to make sure the sub floor is good, but that is a whole ‘nother host of headaches…re-streching carpet is never fun. Ah well – you are right, we are looking forward to the road again, regardless of the challenges that come up along the way!
glad to hear you have a “return to the road” date. Good luck on the clean-up, hell I could see myself cutting the ruined section of carpet out and living with a temporary throw rug over sub-floor if it meant getting back out there. i’m sure you will find way. kris
We’re not opposed to subfloor!
It wouldn’t be the first time we lived through a construction project, although back in the home days, we had a bit more room to skirt around it. We are looking forward to hitting the road whatever the rig looks like!