Sometimes things are not as they seem. Take, for example, ourweekend trip to Meramec State Park in Sullivan, Missouri. We pulled into ourcampsite and set up our trailer: leveling, disconnecting, and connecting to theelectrical outlet. Because the water was turned off due to the season, webrought water with us. It was cold, so we turned on the furnace to warm up thePod, let it run a bit, and then headed off into the local town to run someerrands and have dinner. When we returned, we learned that the furnace wasn’tworking because the propane tank had run out. No problem…just connect our sparetank and fire it up. Ah, no…it blew cold air, but the igniter wouldn’tactivate. Crawled under the bed and took off the grate looking for a resetbutton after numerous times turning the furnace off and on at the thermostat. Checkedall the breakers and fuses, too, but everything was ok…so no heat and the tempwas going into the high twenties overnight. Thankfully we had brought the heavydown comforter and felt as if we could stay warm under it. After sitting aroundthe campfire, it was time to turn in; however, upon entering the POD we noticedthat the lights had really dimmed. So, we, thinking systems, looked at all the electricalconnections, and saw that nothing was amiss. Decided that maybe it was theelectric source, so we took out the extension cord and went to the nextelectric box and connected. Same thing. We tried using the 30-amp port, 50 ampwith the 30-amp adapter, the 30 to 110 ac adapter multiple times with bothboxes…no change. Brain hurting, we snuggled under the comforter and tried tosleep under the comforter with multiple blankets on top with Sam and Spot ourtwo Shih-tzus on top of us. We slept off and on throughout the night.

Next day, thinking we had missed something went through thewhole process again thinking systems…where was the faulty link?  The Mr. Coffee worked but the lights dimmedappreciably when we plugged our phones in to recharge. Finding the problemstill existed and deciding that we could not repeat the previous night’s fun,we drove to the nearest Walmart and bought a space heater. It worked and weslept that night.

Next day…getting ready to leave and we try to bring theslider in…you guessed it: it wouldn’t activate. So, we threw a Hail Mary passand connected the POD to the Beast (our F-150) and it activated; and we made ithome without incident.

 Lessons learned:

1. Sometimes things are not as they seem, I was thinking itwas the POD; but the problem was the electrical hookups. The camping area is ina flood plain along the Meramec River that floods regularly and some of the electricalhookups are faulty. Our neighbor had no electrical problems with their JaycoHummingbird and the hookup at their site.  We wondered if the hookups were the culpritand our theory was confirmed when we got home and plugged our electrical cordinto our garage 110 outlet with our adapter and EVERYTHING worked: furnace,lights, slider without hesitation. Next time I’m going to find the host and geta new spot. Any other ideas?

2. Numerous entries have recommended the use of a portableheater to use the electricity that has been purchased instead of the propane.Did and will use.

3. Have fun and roll with these little glitches. It didn’truin the weekend, the scenery along the river was beautiful, and, due to itbeing November, there were only 5 other campers.