Wednesday/Thursday, September 9 and10: We returned the rental car just before 9:00 AM and headed south towards Bakersfield passing mile after mile of orchards and vineyards that stretched as far as we could see.

From there the highway turned East and the terrain changed rapidly, first to brown hills and then to desert.

We stopped for fuel and lunch in Tehechapia. While we were eating a lady came in and said there was a storm coming. We heard the first fire engines head out of town and saw the lightning strike caused fire up on the hills above the town.

We passed an area where the hills were dotted with hundreds of windmills, although very few of them were turning.

About 40 miles farther we were suddenly alerted to engine problems by a hot smell and the sound of something hitting the engine casing. The engine was also acting strange and soon died on us. We were just about to the North Edwards exit but could not get the engine to run long enough to get to the off ramp. Once Jim had the engine covering off he discovered that the air conditioning clutch had malfunctioned and was turning out of round. It had cut through a wire casing and severed about a dozen electrical wires. So Jim had to piece all of that wiring back together in order to get the engine to run again. Once he did that we could get the camper off the highway.

There wasn’t much available at the North Edwards exit - just a small diner. Jim knew we should not drive any further as the AC clutch could do much more damage than it had already. That meant a call to AAA and request for towing. I was very glad I had upped our AAA membership to the RV level so that we would be covered for just such an occasion.

We waited just under an hour for the tow truck to arrive. By then the storm we had seen coming at lunch time had caught up with us. The skies got very dark and the wind rocked the camper while the rain pelted the ground. The worst had passed when the tow truck arrived but he still had to do all of the hook up in the rain. Jim had an extra rain suit he gave the driver.

I had made quite a few phone calls to find a place that could do the repair and the one that said they could do it in the morning was Barstow Truck Repair so that is where we headed. We ended up “camping” in their parking lot for the night. We walked about a 1/2 mile to a pizza place and discovered we were on historic Route 66.

Thursday morning we talked to the mechanics and found out we would have to wait until 2:00 for the part to arrive so we called Enterprise for a pick up and spent the day discovering the town of Barstow, CA. There was a Tanger Outlet Center nearby so we spent some timing shopping there. We stopped at a brand new Harbor Freight where Jim was able to get some supplies to fix the wiring better if need be and he got a hair cut  We ended up in the afternoon doing some more Walmart shopping.

If you are looking for excitement, don’t come to Barstow but if you like it hot this is the place to be - temps hit about 102 degrees in the afternoon.

As we were headed back to the repair shop to check on progress we got a call saying the part they received was defective and we would have to wait until the morning for a new one to arrive.

That meant another night in Barstow but this time we got a room at the Ramada and extended the car rental for another day. It was good to have a full size tub/shower and a strong internet connection.