Tuesday, December 13th - Overnighting in Anthony, New Mexico

 We were at the Cummins Service Center in Odessa at 7:50 this morning. Ricky, the service guy I  talked to, said as soon as he could break a Tech free they would send him out to read the Codes our coach has been throwing. About 8:30 he came out, plugged in a machine and got the Codes. Three Codes showed up. 

He went back inside and came out with a Service guy who knew more about the Codes. Two were communications issues between the coach and the Cummins system and the third was to high a pressure in the crankcase, due to a dirty filter on the crankcase vent. The Service guy wasn't overly concerned about the communication issues but said we would need to go to someone who worked on RV chassis issues to get them straightened out. He thought one of them related to a dirty sensor that counted revolutions of the rear wheels. He didn't think they were overly  important. 

The crankcase vent filter needed to be changed. They were short staff (the Service guy is temporarily helping out at the Odessa site, he normally works in the El Paso Cummins Service Center) and said they  couldn't change the filter until tomorrow. They asked if we could leave the coach. I explained the we lived in the coach. I  told them that we could stay at a local campground overnight and be back at their facility  when they  opened at 8AM tomorrow morning. They asked me to give them 15-20 minutes to confirm they had the part in stock. When I went to check with Ricky he told me the easiest way to deal with the issue was for me to buy the filter from the Parts Dept. He walked to Parts with  me and told the guy what I needed. $128 for the filter. Then he told me to take the filter out to the coach. He sent a different guy out and had the guy change the filter. It required pulling up a section of coach floor that is above the engine. It took him less than a half hour. Ricky wished us well and sent us on our way without charging us for the labor. By 9:30 we were back on I20. God is GOOD!

My photos don't even remotely come close to presenting the grandeur of the scenery. Note that we are definitely out of the pine trees both sides of the roads section of Texas.

We stopped at a rest area, where Kathy fixed us some lunch. Other than travelers the place seemed abandoned. It was interesting, even though there wasn't much around.

Inside the building was the "skeleton" of an airplane fuselage. Sadly the kiosks weren't active.

The we headed into the mountains. Over many miles we climbed to 4,450', dropped back down to 3,500', climbed back up  to 4,660' before dropping back down to around 3,800' in Anthony.

Miles later the mountains looked more impressive. Not in the sense of the Smokies, or the Rockies, but just seeing them popped up out of the landscape was impressive. Note the beautiful sky today.

Soon after leaving Odessa I checked my Gas Buddy app looking for "cheap" diesel along today's route. It showed a station selling diesel for $4.19, along I10 but in the middle of nowhere. The app also said the place was a convenience store & truck stop. The store was good sized and packed with stuff and diesel was $4.19/gal. We saw it as high as $5.05/gal at brand name truck stops. We did see one other station at $4.19 some miles down the road but I don't remember any others where diesel was less than $4.40/gal.

Looking back east in the photo below. You won't be able to see it but off in the distance is a string of vehicles traveling on I10.

Looking west.

The size of El Paso surprised us, as did all the traffic and road construction. El Paso has a population of nearly 700,000, well over twice the size of St. Louis. 

We saw several interchanges with more levels than this.

Parked at El Paso West RV Park in Anthony, New Mexico. Anthony seems to be included in the El Paso area urban sprawl. I  asked Google Maps to give me directions to El Paso from here, the distance is 23 miles.

The sunset was beautiful. I  didn't even try to capture the beauty of the colorful sky after the sun went down.

God is so good. I pray that He blesses you and yours.