Rain and some Wind.

It was supposed to be a rainy day, and it did look all overcast this morning, but it only sprinkled a little bit.  That's usually what a rain storm that is forecast here in the valley becomes.  A sprinkle event.  But just like clock work, the rains brought the wind and frontal passage.

It began to whip the awning, and before the auto retractor could get it done, I pushed the button.  In the travel trailer days, it would have been manually release the arms and fold up the sliders.  After releasing the lock, it was carefully allow the roll to retract as it rolled up the strap inside the fabric.  Seems like I always managed to let it slip about two thirds the way up, and it would bang home against the side of the trailer.  Then it would take physical shoving to get the arms to line up and retract inside of each other.

On the travel trailer, I used some manual straps to keep the awning folded while we were moving.  I have read several blog stories about awnings that began to unroll while moving down the road.  Al of the Bayfield bunch comes to mind immediately!

But the most horrendous story belongs to JB and Brenda about the day that the wind up in Montana blew the entire roof loose on their motorhome.  I don't know how to link to that story, or I would.  Basically they had the entire roof come loose from the walls.  Perhaps they can leave a link to the story in a comment, since I think they read this most days.

Since it was cloudy and then sunny and alternating between cold and windy and then really nice, we just hung out here at the coach all day.  I left on errands and we walked around the park between the rains.

But tonight, it began to rain for real.  Coming down in torrents, but the wind had settled down.  Loyce took Biscuit out to go potty, so for a while I put out the awning again.  Bad choice, as the wind just came up as I was writing this little piece and about blew it over the coach.  It is supposed to auto retract, but it never does when you need it most!  I was pushing the button, but it didn't want to roll up in the wind.  I guess the motor isn't strong enough to overcome the gusts.

It is finally retracted, but it is dark, so I can't see if it is rolled up correctly, and the rain is in torrents again.  I even had to put the bat wing TV antenna down, as the wind was blowing that all around too.

But we have had no where near the amount of wind and rain that is over in the Colorado River area and from there on into California.  This is supposed to keep up for most of the night.  Slide toppers are a flappin, but we haven't put the slides in yet.  That may be next!

Retired Rod