Serendipity

Serendipity:  the faculty or phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for

Thursday, June 22, 2017
Picking up from our previous post, "Fire - The Jeep is Toast"...

We spent much of the evening and some of the early morning hours discussing next steps for our trip now that we had a 3700 pound bike rack holder sitting behind the RV.  Before the fire we had planned to move on to the Bend, OR area and do some bike riding on the many forest roads and EASY single track mountain bike paths that are in the Mt Bachelor area.  Jim and Heidi were even considering making a trip down for the weekend to show us some of their favorite rides.  But we had put that all on hold to deal with our destroyed Jeep.  

We had contacted Ben to go to our house in ABQ to get the title for the Jeep and send it to Jim so we would have it in the next week or so.  I had called a local RV/auto repair shop to have them take a look at the Jeep just to confirm my "it's totaled" assessment.  I was pretty convinced that it would be a real project to repair with all of the systems that were damaged by the fire... cooling, brakes, AC, heater, fuel injectors, radiator shroud, air filter and intake ducting, multiple electrical wire harnesses and cruise control.  And that was what was readily apparent.

We packed up the RV, removed the tandem and bike rack from the Jeep, cleaned the Jeep of any personal stuff (Beth was really hoping it wasn't coming back) and headed out.  Beth had found a laundromat in town so she did laundry while Ted went to talk to the mechanic.  

I (Ted) pulled into High Desert RV and Auto Repair and checked in at their front desk.  An older gentleman came out to take a look at the Jeep and sadly told me about his Jeep Cherokee that had done the same thing while he was driving it across Wyoming.  He had put the fire out with a gallon of ice tea.  Obviously this is not an infrequent occurrence with Jeeps.  His best guess was probably $8000 to get it back in running shape which is about the Blue Book wholesale value of it.  He said we should have Daryn take a look since he is more of the auto mechanic.  So Daryn came out to have a look as well... The consensus was pretty much "OH MAN... What happened!"  

I asked Daryn if there was a salvage yard in Prineville that might be willing to take it.  Daryn (who owns the shop) said if I wanted to get rid of it, he would take it and gave me $400 for it.  Considering I would have given it to him to lighten our load, it was "Serendipity #1" and Beth's wish answered.    

While he was looking at my towing setup he said he really likes my "ReadyBrake" towing/braking system.  He has been installing them for several years and are the best system he has found.  That was good to hear since I was a little worried about it after seeing smoke come off the RV brakes after a long, 8% grade descent in the Colorado Rockies.  I had done some adjusting to the cables that actuate the brakes after that and the Jeep brakes seemed to be more effective from then on ... at least the Jeep front disk brake rotors where hot when I checked them after some long descents.

I told Daryn I wanted to keep the cabling for the brakes system.  He said he would just give me all new braking cables since he was a dealer and had them in stock.  It would save the trouble of removing them.  "Serendipity #2"

Since Daryn was being very helpful and was very knowledgeable about RVs and towing, I asked him what he thought of the Chevy Equinox as a tow vehicle.  We used to have one, know it is a good cross-over vehicle and gets good reviews from other RV'ers and far more reasonably priced that Jeeps. He said he hadn't ever installed a towing system into an Equinox, but pointed me to a website that lists good tow vehicles.

He then proceeded to ask "Have you ever looked at Chevy Geo Trackers?"  I said I had looked, but they haven't been in production for a number years and finding one that wasn't completely beat up was very hard.  Daryn goes on to tell me that there is a 1995 Geo Tracker for sale in Prineville completely set up to tow with only 80k miles on it.  He has considered buying himself since he collects them (he has 7 of them), knew it was in excellent condition and had the phone number of the guy selling it.  "Serendipity #3"

I went to collect Beth from the laundromat and discuss my good fortune of the morning.  Beth would been thrilled with just getting rid of the Jeep, much less getting $400.  Over a lunch of bar-b-que brisket from a semi-permanent food truck, we decided to call and see if the Tracker was still available.

"New" '95 Chevy Geo Tracker  (no burn marks on the hood)

Glenn, the 80+ year old owner of the Tracker, said it was still available and we could come look right then.  He lived about 10 miles out of town right on Highway 26 and we had driven by his place the day before.  A quick 10 minute drive and we were in Glenn's front yard looking at his red Tracker.  As I took a quick look, you couldn't have asked for much more.  It was set up for towing, not exactly a match to our tow bar, but he had a tow bar that would only require us to buy a 2" ball for the RV (I have to at home in the garage of course).  The rear of the Tracker had a 2" receiver hitch which is exactly what we need for the bike rack and it had a roof rack to tie down the bike rack... it was checking lots of boxes.  I had very little concern about the engine since Daryn had checked it out, but Glenn and I took a quick drive just to see how it ran.  It was plenty good enough for a tow vehicle and was more comfortable than the Jeep. Beth and I looked at each other and said let's buy it.  At $4700 we weren't going to be out too much money, well at least not in the scheme of things.  "Serendipity #4"

Hard to see the  2" rear trailer receiver for the bike rack

Glenn's one condition of the sale was he wanted cash.  Well you wouldn't think that would be too big of a problem, but it proved to be the most difficult issue of all.  Not that we don't have the money sitting in our credit union back in NM.  We keep a pretty healthy emergency fund for these trips.  But it is getting cash that proved to be more of a problem.  After visiting 2 credit unions in Prineville it was clear that cash from a CU was a problem.  Cashiers check, no big deal, but cash was going to be limited to maybe $2000 in a given day, even if you were a local member of that credit union.  We have a Chase credit card and there was a Chase bank in town, so we headed there.  After looking at multiple options, we checked the cash advance limit on the credit card... $4400 and with the $400 that Daryn gave me for the Jeep, we were there.  "Serendipity #5"  The interest rate for a cash advance is insanely high, so that thing is getting paid as soon as it posts to the account.

We had agreed to meet back at Daryn's RV/auto repair shop to do the exchange, money for title and car.  As we are signing the papers and handing over the cash, Daryn comes out to see how things are going.  We were both glad that he put us together to solve our problem and replenish Glenn's fun money.   Turns out Glenn did not get the money, his wife did because it was her car and the cash disappeared into her purse.  Daryn looks at the tow attachment on the Tracker and said he could get us the right adapter for our tow bar by the next day if we wanted.  Since Beth had already arranged another night in the RV park this was working out quite well.  "Serendipity #6"   So yet again, things just keep falling into place.

So then all that's left to deal with is registration back at NM MVD. Insurance was handled online.  Oregon will allow you to purchase a vehicle transfer permit that is good for 21 days so tomorrow in addition to getting the tow bar adapters, we will most likely be at the OR MVD office and doing some practice towing while we have access to maybe the best RV shop we have found anywhere.

What a turn of events and we got to meet some really nice, friendly and helpful people here in central Oregon.