Andersonville, GA

We arrived November 17, the Saturday before Thanksgiving to spend the week with Amy’s folks.  The city campground is located just down the road that is across the street from their house.  Our arrival, however was not a happy one as we had issues develop as we left Whitetail Ridge Campground and drove to Andersonville.  About halfway to Andersonville on I-185, we noticed a rather large crack in the windshield of the truck so that needed to be taken care of.  In addition to that, the 4 days of straight rain we sat through at Whitetail exposed the fact that our issue with water in the underbelly described in our first post was not caused by road spray as predicted.  

When we were hooking up to leave Whitetail Ridge Campground, we observed a rather large amount of water coming out near the front of the unit as the front levelers were extended for hitching up.  This immediately made us suspicious that water may have gotten into the underbelly again.  After getting unhooked and setup in the Andersonville City Campground, Dan checked the underbelly and sure enough there was water in there.  After thinking about it for a while, Dan decided to take care of it himself, having seen the unit with its underbelly open earlier this summer.  On Sunday morning, we went to the local Lowe’s to buy some insulation and other supplies we thought we might need and got started on the job.  Of course, the important thing was to figure out where the water was really coming from and try to solve it once and for all.  The appearance of water as we left Whitetail was a clue and upon investigation, we located a piece of molding on the outside of the rig that was not sealed properly against the wall of the unit and water would run down the wall and get into the molding at that point.  The molding continues along the side and takes a 90 degree turn and wraps to the bottom of the rig.  The theory is that the molding served as a channel for the water to run in and get into the underbelly and travel to the low point there.  We’ve caulked the opening and will keep an eye on things but we think this was the real source of the water problem.

The repair job took most of Sunday and Monday.  The special tape, ordered from Amazon, to reseal the underbelly would arrive on Tuesday.  The appointment for the windshield replacement at Safelite in Columbus, GA was Tuesday morning.  The final touches of the RV repair were completed on the morning of Thanksgiving Day.  The water problem and the windshield actually overshadowed the first problem we noticed before even hooking up to leave Whitetail.  At some point, likely while navigating the roads in the Whitetail Ridge Campground, we bottomed out on the rail of the truck bed with the overhang of the 5th wheel.  A minor cosmetic repair job will be needed at some point, something we can handle ourselves as well.

It wasn’t all work and bad news while spending time near family.  On Wednesday, Amy’s folks, Al and Betty, took us to Warm Springs where President Franklin D. Rosevelt passed away on April 12, 1945.  The museum at Little White House, as it was called, contains the unfinished portrait that was being painted at the time of his death.  After visiting the museum at Little White House, we had a lovely dinner followed by a drive through the holiday light show at Callaway Gardens.  The light show was large and well done.  We enjoyed it thoroughly.