Wednesday April 28, 2010-Red Roof Inn

As you can see, there is more damage to the trailer than first thought. The front cap has been removed and the bedroom slide can be seen on the floor beside the trailer.

Much more damage. The living room slide has been removed and is laying on the floor.

They are preparing the dining room slide for removal.

Even the rear cap will come off. The ladder has been removed in preparation for the removal.

I got a call pretty early this morning about the trailer repairs. It seems that once the back wall was opened water damage was found. The water was traced back to the roof, where a rubber boot that should have secured the antenna cables had slid upwards, allowing a 3/4 inch hole to be open and allow rain to enter the trailer. When this was discovered, Keith, the technician doing the work said he could not guarantee that any repair short of replacing the entire back wall would work out-long term. Heartland took the high road and elected to do the work the right way and re-skin the back side of the trailer. This will mean that the entire front cap, off door side skin and rear cap will have to be replaced. This is a huge job and will require our trailer, once the pieces are removed, to be brought back to the original assembly line for all the fiberglass to be replaced. They have scheduled an entire assembly-line crew to come in on Saturday to do the work. It also means that it will be late next week before the trailer is ready. I told Jim that we would be at the plant this afternoon to help in removing everything from the trailer.

We had lunch with Coley Brady, Vice President and Director of Fifth Wheel Sales for Heartland. He had told Jim Beletti that he wanted to meet with us this week while we are in town. We had a very nice meal with him with a lot of interesting conversation. He, like most of the Heartland executives that I have met, is very nice and easy to talk to. He listens to all suggestions and is glad to listen.

We went to our trailer and along with four Heartland employees, moved almost everything out of the trailer and stored it in a store room which was padlocked. I called Gwen at Rayford and explained that we will be delayed in getting back to run Timber Ridge. She told me to come back when my work here is done. I am so glad she is easy going. We are looking forward to working for her soon.

We came back to the motel and brought in some more stuff from the trailer. We didn't have nearly enough clothes, medicines and other things, so we picked up hopefully what will be enough to last us. When we got here, we met a very nice couple from Weatherford Texas. He is an RV transport driver, so we probably won't see them again. It brings back memories of my time as a driver. Someday I'll tell you about it.

So long.