Gremlin Gus

Hopefully we have seen the last of Gremlin Gus

 

I picked up Gremlin Gus last week at the Warhawk Air Museum.  Little did I know that he was going to become the mascot of this part of the expedition.  With some 1600 mile logged on the trip so far the Cortez started to exhibit some very temperamental issues even for a 38 year old classic motorhome. First was a loose electrical connection in Carey, then a stuck solenoid in Promontory and an almost constant vapor locking every time we stopped to fill up.  The altitude, heat and ethanol laden fuel weren’t helping the situation.  Lost power a couple of times in Salt Lake City including going over a UTA Trax light rail crossing(that word would have made it to Seattle).  Just after leaving Richfield Wednesday morning over some steep backroads the Cortez lost power several times and stalled.  I got it restarted.  Discretion being the better (and smarter) part of valor I decided to turn back to Richfield before getting stranded in nowhere.  At this point I was suspecting the mechanical fuel pump.  Just to be sure I stopped at a shop in Richfield and the mechanic there concurred that it sounded like the pump was getting weak and close to failure.  Fortunately there’s a NAPA store in Richfield.  They ordered a new pump for $34 and told me it would be in when they opened the next morning.  We checked into the local Motel 6 for the night. 

It’s great not being on a set schedule, trouble like this seem much more insignificant.   Took out the old pump, worked on my blog and did some rethinking on the best routing to Monument Valley.  After a nice dinner at a local steakhouse I took in a movie…”Vacation”, how appropriate. 

 

The new pump was waiting at NAPA Thursday morning, I put it in and we were off to Kanab.