As much as we love being in motion, constantly changing our location and adventures – we also look forward to our extended stays of a few weeks in one location.
When we arrived to Desert Hot Springs a little over a week ago, we had a long list of projects we wanted to tackle.
Amongst them, was getting clean.
After many miles of driving, our toad – a Mini Cooper, gets quite dirty being pulled behind a 2-stroke engine. And add to that a few miles of dirt roads, and the Mini was looking pretty bad upon our arrival.
The bus on the other hand shows dirt pretty well, but it had been over 3 years since our last wash and wax – right after we first purchased the bus. I do maintenance rinses when I can, usually when a rain storm blows through I head out with a brush.
So tops on the agenda, spa days for both.
Our friends Forrest and Mary are also staying in the area and we met up for lunch & exploring with them in Indio.
We found a highly rated car wash (K & R Car Wash) on Yelp, and went in to town a bit early. When we pulled in, the owner came out and said ‘You really need a waxing… I’ll cut you a good deal on a hand wax.’
For $35, K & R pampered the Mini inside and out. And this has got to be one of the cleanest car washes we’ve ever been to. It made me want to walk through all those colorful scrubby things myself!
Ahhh.. our Pixel looks so good, and so shiny!!
Next, was finding an RV Wash. We saw none coming into town, but figured we’d call one of the many RV detailers listed on the community board in the park’s laundry room.
But even before we could get around to writing down some numbers, Dave came walking around the campground soliciting his service. Now generally, we’re not fans of solicitors coming to our door. But when they’re offering exactly what we’re needing, we actually flagged him down before he reached our spot.
He pointed out several other rigs he had cleaned in the park, and quoted us $6 per foot for a hand wash and wax (at our 35 foot length, that would be $210). Not a bad price at all for a hand pampering done right at our site. We booked an appointment for later in the week.
Dave spent all day with Zephyr, even finishing up a bit after the sunset. He got everything just as shiny and clean as is possible for a 53 year old bus with a fading paint job. Which is no small feat, considering the back end of Zephry is usually coated in 40w oil, dirt and road grime.
He even got the roof spic and span!
Ahhh… it feels so good to have our outsides being all clean and shiny. Now we just need to work on finishing up some of our interior projects so we can get the inside tidied up.
Join our Next Video Chat: Solar Electrical Systems for RVs
When: Saturday, December 6 – 3pm PST / 6pm EST
Where: Our Livestream Channel
With our roof all clean and sparkly, and with decent internet connectivity at our current location – we’re going to host our next live video chat a little early this month. Our long awaited chat about solar for RVs.
We’ll give a quick tour of our newly installed 800w solar panel installation, talk about our decision making process to go traditional glass panels instead of the flexible panels we had been testing, talk about our combo setup of a roof and ground setup and some of the practicalities of living off solar in boondocking situations. We’ll of course also take questions, and as always – the session will be archived for later viewing.
This chat will be hosted on Livestream.com (ad free!), which will require you setup an account in advance of the chat. Click on the link above to get setup.
We are also in DHS, in the same park I believe! The sun and scenery are spectacular 🙂
In Anza-Borrego, make sure you do the “metal-art trail”–get a booklet that shows where the all are–like 50 or of them. Really cool!
I’ve heard about this, and can’t wait to check it out. It will be the closest I get to Burning Man style art this year I think… 🙂
– Chris
Your bus cleans up well! And so does Pixel! What a great name for your Mini, it’s perfect! I know you have a post about the cross country Mini acquisition, but I thought that post might be too old to comment on from here. I have a Mini Clubman, which I love. A great satellite rover when you need to venture away from the mother ship. As I will be carrying quite a bit of photo equipment, I thought an enclosed trailer could house the equipment along with the Mini. I am aware of the additional PITA associated with a trailer, but it would be an efficient way to drag all that gear around the country.
Is it possible to get Dave’s ph number or email from you? I would like to get my “baby beast” cleaned when I pass through on the way to Escapade in a couple of months. It looks like he does a good job. Looking forward to viewing the solar video chat on the 6th. I’m still looking at the cost effectiveness of solar vs staying in an RV park every 3rd night to charge up. I really appreciate your blog. Keep up the good work.
Afraid we already tossed his contact info, sorry about that. But should be plenty of detailers in the southwest to find.
If you’re only looking at solar (and a suitable matched battery system) for cost effectiveness.. it’s unlikely to balance out for a long while. For us, it’s about the flexibility.
What nice-looking vehicles! That’s really a big difference.
It’s amazing what a little elbow grease can do!
Sitting next to you “the beast” feels so dirty….. 🙂
Nina
Someone’s gotta balance out all the clean in this little roving neighborhood. Party at your place.
Look forward to your video chat Saturday covering the Solar Electrical System. This is a first priority install when we eventually get our rig. Although our initial goal is to live off the cord 100% of the time I don’t think we’ll actually pull it off; I tend to like campgrounds and being around other like minded folks once in a while, lol. But who knows, we’re not there yet so anything can happen!
Cheers! ~M
For us, it’s about flexibility. We love mixing it up. And, you can boondocking/dry camp with like minded folks too 😉
With all that cleaning and shining, you’ve gone from boondocking hillbillies to resort snobs! Lol! 🙂
Nice job and keep having fun.
Hahaha.. nice to know we can fit in anywhere 🙂
We and our RV are in Indio for a few weeks … wanna meet up?!
We’re thinking of hitting the tamale festival this weekend.. are you planning to be there?
Hmmm. Not sure. But we would definitely be up for it if it gives us a chance to meet.
Write us directly at contact@technomadia.com and let’s coordinate. We don’t have any firm plans at this point, other than being back in time for the solar video on Saturday afternoon.